I’m trying to think

I need to figure shit out. You know, put all my ducks in a row. Get my head straight!

I’m thinking about being old….

I’m old but I don’t whine about it.

Except maybe a little bit here in this Blog.

And everywhere else…to anybody that’ll listen.

You know what they say about complainers.

They call em Wimps.

Give me more money and I’ll whine less

Once you achieve Old Fart status I figure the Government owes you. Why? Because you’re a CITIZEN and you made it to OLD AGE. Remember: you were around your whole life, willing to defend your country. The fact that we haven’t been invaded except by the Bumbling British isn’t your fault.

You’ve been standing-by in reserve.

Willing to fight off the invaders.

Part of the home guard.

All my life I’ve been hanging-out awaiting the invaders. Like the Russians. Or the Cubans. Or how about the Canadians?

I’m standing-by in case we get invaded by the Canadians.

Old Age Reparations

That’s the ticket!

Shit. It just came to me….thanks to all my thinking.

Black people are demanding reparations on account of Slavery. I’m all for it. Give every person-of-color reparations. And while you’re at it? Give everybody that makes it to seventy reparations. Some people will get double reparations. I’ll settle for just the Old Age part.

Social Security was a good start.

On June 8, 1934, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, in a message to the Congress, announced his intention to provide a program for Social Security. Subsequently, the President created by Executive Order the Committee on Economic Security, which was composed of five top cabinet-level officials.

Wikipedia

A rich liberal progressive left-winger who cared about us sad sacks gave us all an income.

Can you believe that? It’s hard to believe! With a stroke of the pen he gave us all a chunk of change every month. He called it SOCIAL SECURITY. And all us (most of us anyway) get it. For real! I’m not making this up.

Back then people cared about people. Even rich people cared about people.

A lot of Trumpy Socialist-despising Conservatives are collecting Social Security–as I speak!

I’m not making that up, either.

Griping about the Socialist Government while you’re sucking on her nipple.

Tells me you’re a Wimp!

I gotta clear my head

I’m trying to work out in my head the details of Old Age Reparations.

But I can’t think while the Lobotomy dude is talking.

He talks and talks and talks.

I can’t think while he talks….

“The world is easy to explain,” he says, staring at the wall beyond.

He focuses on me:

“This is all there is,” he says.

“What is all there is?”

“Chaos, Ecstasy and Routine,” he says. “That’s all there is.”

“Shit.”

My Guru explained this to me and I believe it to be a true.”

“You had a Guru?”

“I had several. Baboon Shri Lamboondili was my principal Guru. I followed him to India where he passed abruptly into the unmanifested. Not long afterwards I had the procedure.”

“You had a Lobotomy after this Guru explained everything?”

“Yes…following his passing I became angry and frustrated. I became so angry I lashed out at my friends and loved ones.

“I was like a Angry Postal worker.” he says for emphasis.

“That’s pretty angry.”

“That’s why I had the procedure. It worked beautifully. Now I experience nothing but peace and calm. Even my spelling has improved.”

“No shit. The Lobotomy improved your spelling?”

He nods. “Markedly.”

“Maybe I should have a Lobotomy.”

The Procedure

“I met the bloke’s mother,” The Phony Australian dude says.

“Yeah?”

“She came in here one day look’n for him.”

“You know his Mother?”

“No, Mate. She called out to him. Shout’n for him. Call’n him by his name.”

“What’s his name?”

“Lester something. Or Lee something. LeRoy? Yeah, that’s it. She’s shout’n out LeRoy. A real terror, she was. Scared the shit out of my little Tippy.”

A frightened Tippy

“So I says to her, I says, you look’n for the dude had the Lobotomy? Well, that clipped her caw. She starts to laugh. Says, My son had his gall bladder removed.“

“She told you he never had a Lobotomy?”

“No. Could be he had both. I didn’t push the topic with the old lady.”

The Lobotomy Dude’s Mother

“You know, a dude his age liv’n with his mother still. That tell’s you something.”

“What? That he needed a Lobotomy.”

“Naw. Says he’s a Wimp.”

Tippy’s Pad

Yesterday I catch the Phony Australian Dude getting out of his car. I was a little taken aback but not much. I’ve seen the car parked out front of Starbucks every single day for months. It’s usually packed with shit like somebody’s living in it. Today there’s more junk than usual.

He acts like it’s no big deal the mountain of trash.

“Man, how do you drive that thing?”

“Whattaya say, Mate. Top of the morning to ya.”

He’s holding his termal cup and his bat gammon case. Tippy is nowhere to be seen.

“Oh, he’s in there. Take’n a little rest.”

Deep within the mound of trash I spy a dog kennel.

“Little Bloke’s tuckered out.”

He catches my look.

“What’s wrong with you, Mate? You look like you seen a pile of Elephant shit.”

“Oh…nothing.”

“It aint nothing, mate. I know what yer thinking.”

“What am I thinking?”

“Yer thinking, am I a wimp or am I a Power Dog?”

He offers me a thin smile.

“That’s what you need to ask yourself, Mate.”

With that he strolls into the Starbucks.

I’m left staring into the bowels of his car.

At tippy.