I'd Eat a Bug If I Could Walk, Or At Least Some Canned Vegetables!

Hello Fellow Travelers!

I was all set to take on a big think-piece on something cancer-related (This week cookie cancer.  Decidedly not "funner".  Completely disproves my theory about putting the word cookie in front of any word, making it "funner".  It works on almost any word.  Some words are just too icky!)  Then this happened:  I was popping off, as I often do about my son's 9th Grade reading assignment:  John Steinbeck's "Of Mice & Men", or how I might of titled it: "Two Hobos Dreaming About Ketchup" or "Homeless Dudes Fantasizing About Baked Beans!  In cans!"  Yuck!  Then I was asked the following snarky question:  Would I eat the legumes in cans if it meant I would walk?  I detest ketchup and baked beans and canned foods in general.  It's a silly question, in general and really silly for me in particular (the unequivocal answer would be "Of course, every day and twice on Sundays!) but it got me thinking, what wouldn't I do to walk?  I voluntarily had a shunt placed permanently in my brain on the off chance it might help!  It didn't.  But it's one more thing I can check off my list!  Who does that?

I'll tell you who, someone who is so desperate for any improvement that drilling another hole into my cranium starts to make a lot of sense!  "Sounds good, let's try that!"  Any other time "cranium" and "drilling" would be bad ideas!  I feel so great that everything sounds like a great idea! Rainbows?  Uzis? Ketchup?  Unicorns?  Baked Beans?  Why not?  It's all good (Thank you, Hamid!)

Remember Cal Worthington and his "dog, Spot"?  I'm like the late, great, Mr. Worthington, I would eat a bug or stand on my head (with a lot of help) to walk.  What I have to do to get there doesn't matter one iota to me.

According to PBS, FDR never let himself be photographed in a wheelchair, so the public never knew that he was for all intensive purposes, paralyzed from 1921 to the end of his life.  That charade carried him through three terms during the "Great Depression".

So my search for an answer continues.  And my unparalleled hatred of wheelchairs also continues.  Go see Cal, Go See Cal, Go See Cal!  Kinda catchy!

PS. Did anybody see last week's "Naked & Afraid"?  Those two just flat out didn't like each other!
Awkward!

The Inevitable Passage of Time - Measured In "Dog" Years! Or More "Travels with Charlie"

New Charlie (2014)

Hello Fellow Travelers!

My younger niece recently obtained a shih-tzu puppy she named Charlie.  The "old" Charlie was a cockapoo that belonged to my parents.  The original  Charlie was great with kids and inserted himself in every "child" situation.  My father's understanding of the canine brain was as pragmatic as it was insightful, "He hung around kids because they were the most likely to drop food!"

Kiddies Watched Over by "Old" Charlie (2003)

Whatever his true motive, he was a fine dog especially around kids!  He was in almost every child photo during his lifetime and he has the same expression on his furry face in every photo:  The look that says, "Are you done with that?"  "Are you going to drop it?"  "Would it be OK if I licked it, like this?"  Hey, he was a dog!  Really!  Not a man that acted like a dog but, in fact, an actual canine.  He probably sniffed other dogs with the same expression of concern on his furry face.  ("Are you done with that?"  "Too bad, I'm taking it!")

I fully expect the "new" Charlie to be as singularly motivated.  He's supercute but he is a doggy, a drop-kick piece of fluff doggy, but a descendant of the wolf nonetheless.  Weren't Shih tzus bred to be guard dogs in Imperial China?  What, exactly did they guard against?  Over-zealous imperial stylists?  Extreme decorators?  It's just hard to imagine any circumstance where any encounter with these little dogs isn't met with an, "Awwww!  He's just so cute!"

Shih tzus are the cookies of dogs!  They don't inspire fear!  They inspire "Awe"!  (As in,"Awwww, isn't he adorable?")  They make everybody happy!  Damage?  Who cares?  They're just so darned cute!  Look at that face!  Who could stay mad at that face?  Didn't China come up with opium too?   Cute puppies and poppies!  And fireworks!  And pasta and silk!  All the good stuff comes from China!

And, before anyone suggests it I will not be nor am I in favor of shipping cute-as-a-button puppies to Iraq to battle ISIS with their "cuteness".  Those a--holes might behead something and then we'd have a Sarah McClachlan type situation on our hands and no one wants that!

Then the three of us (Myself, Sarah and her dog) would have to go to Iraq.  When I was already planning a "Thelma & Louise" scenario with my best friend that did not include dogs but did involve the use of an Uzi!  The "T&L" scenario includes many explosions!  "Embrace the Suck, People!"

Joan Rivers Dead? I Didn't Even Know She Was Sick! I Just Saw Her!

Hello Fellow Travelers!

I was all set to pontificate on a gripping, tumor-themed topic (this week brain tumors and Josef Goebbels as "Minister of Propaganda".   The man had a brain tumor!  Doubtless.  It would explain a lot!  That must be the answer!  What other answer could there be?  Brain tumors and Nazis!  You can't have one without the other!  It's like peanut butter and chocolate!  Two things that compliment each other! ) Then this happened:  Joan Rivers died.  I adored her for years!  Joan had reinvented herself, yet again, and I watched her every week on "Fashion Police".  Ms. Rivers was funny!  Always!  She was absolutely fearless and I never heard her tell the same joke twice.  She loved little dogs and gay guys and her family and she never, ever stopped moving forward!  There was no "off" button on the woman!

So, when I heard she was sick following some routine procedure and I assumed she'd recover. She didn't.  She was 81.  About the same age as my parents!  I'm here to tell you people, the Reaper doesn't play around!  We could get our tickets punched at any time!  Any of us!  Even the female pioneers! As a possible pioneering "patient of the future" (clearing the Tumor Tarmac for y'all since 2011!) I'm more committed than ever to attaining my goals and benchmarks in Physical Therapy.  I'm no Joan (heck, I'm not even a Kathy Griffin!), but I'll never stop moving forward!  So watch out PT Moore!  Haha!  I've mastered what you've assigned me and I'm ready for more.  A lot more!  My world is silver, blue and gold and full of possibilities again.  OK, smart asses, it's definitely full of something!  Happy?

Did I think I'd outlive Ms. Rivers?  Undoubtedly.  Did I know how much I would miss her?  Decidedly not.  I think I know what Ms. Rivers would say if she were in my situation, the same thing Hannibal Lecter might say, "Tick tock, tick tock".  Time.  I'm almost out.  We have so little, we owe it to everyone we love to use every minute well!

Did you see last year's documentary about her?  "Joan Rivers:  A Piece of Work"  Maybe that's what we have in common, and why I like her so much.  I'm a "piece of work", "iron-willed" and always moving forward.   We have that in common to be sure but it's not why I'll miss her!  Nah, she was just friggin' funny.  And it doesn't matter where you are in life if someone or something is really funny. At the end of a Tom Cruise movie I actually like ("The Last Samurai"), The "emperor" asks Mr. Cruise to describe how "The Last Samurai" died.  Cruise's character responds with, "Let me tell you how he lived."  I saw enough TV to know whether she was on "E!", "HBO" or "QVC" Joan was spending her time well!

PS - Someone recently asked me if I'd heard of the TV Trend of "Naked and Afraid".  Not only had I heard of "N & A", in my capacity as CCC (Chief Crippled Critic, or C3) I have viewed some of the inevitable spinoffs from "N&A", like "Naked & Dating".  But the most cringeworthy, extension of the "N&A" (Did I say "N&A"?  Because I meant to say "Naked and Afraid" for, oh, I don't know about 5 minutes.  Then the rest of the 21 days should be more accurately called, "Dirty and Disgusting or "dehydrated and really dirty and really hungry") phenom has to be "Naked Real Estate".  The buyers are naked and the real estate agents are not.  The sellers just have the good sense not to be any part of this fiasco or wisely determine that a naked person probably isn't "their" buyer!  RE "naked"?  Why?  Why indeed?  The best part is when the agents hook up with the naked "buyers" back in the kitchen.  It is so awkward and so uncomfortable you know there won't be a Season 2. You can almost hear the crickets!  Hahaha!  It's great TV!