Category: My stories

I remember all of the ice cream shops in the town I grew up in.
Knights was at Cleveland and 161, and they’d have all kinds of handcrafted flavors.
We went there after I ran a red light and needed to chill out.
Friendly’s was a chain that had great peppermint ice cream.
But not much else.
There was this stand in Central College on the way to school, but I rarely went there.
Not much parking.
Finally, there was the Dairy Queen by the South high school along the main street, but that’s not really ice cream, is it?

The doctor calls in my prescriptions for me.
I could get them delivered, but the Post Office make enough mistakes as it is.
So all I have to do is pick them up.
It’s not like it costs much… my prescriptions are simple and cheap.
Maybe a buck for a month, after insurance.
Waiting in line, I overhear people arguing over hundreds of dollars and those shady benefits plans you hear commercials for.
It makes me grateful to have insurance, at least to be healthier than these people.
Maybe next time I’ll pay in advance and use the drive-through window.

In school, the teachers said that everyone would go to jail.
“You’ll either be a prisoner or you’ll be a guard.”
Reggie was in an out of jail for years.
His brother Rudy was a guard. And he was a good one.
Usually, Reggie went to jails other than Rudy’s, but thanks to overcrowding and slow paperwork, Reggie was put in a cell under Rudy’s watch.
Things went well for a day while the warden worked out the transfer.
“How’s Mom?” asked Reggie.
“She’s fine,” said Rudy.
Ten signatures later, Reggie was in the van and off to another facility.

Betty White almost made it to a hundred.
What was her secret?
Not eating Snickers bars.
Sure, she was in that commercial playing flag football and seemingly eating a Snickers for energy, but the truth is she didn’t actually eat the thing.
Instead, she tended to eat healthy, get exercise, and stay busy.
Oh, and she was rich. The rich can afford the best health care.
She got rich by acting and marrying into wealth, but stayed rich by reviving her career with that Snickers commercial.
The only time that chocolate-covered Diabetes bar could be said to extend someone’s life.

I keep a posable Kermit the Frog figure by my workspace.
On Zoom calls, I’d use it to mimic the Kermit Drinks Tea meme.
A visual representation of “This doesn’t involve or matter to me.”
But the truth is, I’m incapable of not caring.
At some level, I care.
And when I care, I end up caring too much about it.
Then, I say things I shouldn’t.
I never learned to be still, never learned to just keep quiet.
Even keeping quiet is saying something when it comes to people who can’t normally keep quiet.
I should sip more tea.

I know there’s a lot of hype with Burger King’s Impossible Whopper.
I have to special order it without mayonnaise because I’m allergic to egg.
McDonald’s also has a meatless burger option.
They’re had it for years. It’s called their cheeseburger.
A dollar for a bun with onions, ketchup, mustard, and a burger patty so thin, you could shave with it.
Add a bun and thousand island dressing over a second meat wafer, and you get a Big Mac.
As for Wendy’s, well, they’re just awful to begin with.
And when it comes to plant-based, their employees are mental vegetables.

It took 23 years for the state to execute the prisoner.
Lawyers, judges, politicians, and an endless parade of activists posing as experts did their best to keep delaying the execution, but eventually justice was served.
Why was he executed?
Twenty-three years ago, the prisoner killed a cafeteria worker.
Apparently, he didn’t like what was being served then, either.
As they put the needle in the prisoner’s arm, he vomited.
It’s a common thing to happen.
But I’d like to think someone in the cafeteria gave him food poisoning for his last meal, as a final kick in the teeth.

Growing up, I got a lot of hand-me-down clothes from my brother.
He was two years older than me, so I was a bit smaller than him.
But I grew quickly and outpaced him, so the hand me downs didn’t last very long.
And eventually, I was bigger than him, and he refused to wear any hand me downs from me.
I got a lot of cheap IMPERFECT label clothes, and discount shoes.
Dressing up for weddings, religious things, or anything special was uncomfortable at best.
Until I was off to college, got fatter, and nothing ever fit for long.

I recently got a new passport.
Work wanted me to travel to Europe for a conference.
So, I got my photo, filled out the forms, and expedited the process.
Six weeks and two hundred bucks later, I have a nice new passport.
And nowhere to use it. The conference was cancelled because of the pandemic.
Using a passport as a photo ID is always fun.
Feels kinda hoity-toity compared to a mere driver’s license.
Especially when it’s a new passport book, no stamps, and the clerk asks where I’ve been.
I say “To the DMV to replace my driver’s license.”

My family’s always asking me to go to Starbucks to pick up coffee.
We started with a coffee maker with a coffee pot, but that wasn’t good enough.
Then there was the one I got with the pods.
Variety packs with every pod they made.
Not good enough.
The espresso machine? Too complicated.
You need a college degree to run it.
A degree in sociology or psychology, mind you.
Starbucks is full of baristas with those worthless degrees.
And the espresso machine that ran on pods wasn’t good enough.
I sold them all on eBay.
Except for the coffee pot.