Life Is What I Make of It

September 8, 2024 / skidaz / Leave a comment

I’m a seventy-six. Ye Gods! I never thought I’d be that old, but I even have friends who have also achieved that milestone. Thankfully, in my mind, I think I’m thirty, while my humor suggests I’m twelve–even though, my body feels it has barely survived WW I.

Though not a philosopher, I’ve learned a lot through the process of aging–it’s what I make of it. And believe me, I made lots of it this week. Now, as to not bore you to death, with my play by play nonsense, I must share my most daring feat. A young friend of mine, Katie, occasionally sings with a band. Though she’s had no formal training, she performs Landslide, as well as Stevie Nicks. On Thursday, she texted me: I’m singing the second set tomorrow night. Should start between 9 and 9:30.

I was in a quandary; I hadn’t been to a bar just to listen to a band in years. Nine PM? I’m usually half asleep by then! (Unless, of course, I’m in Las Vegas, sitting a slot machine or in NYC, having dinner after a Broadway play.) Somehow, I managed to talk myself into going with a couple of other old broads, and we laughed about our adventurous spirit at OUR age. I had a superb time, and Katie was very grateful we came. So, when she performs again next month, I’ll be there.

At my age, I am solely responsible for my own happiness. “I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul.” (Invictus, Henley, William Ernest.) Remember that my friends. You only get one shot at life; there’s no do-overs.

Carpe diem, Sue

Swimming with Spiders

April 10, 2017 / skidaz / Leave a comment

Phoenix summers are not for the faint-hearted. The stifling heat, skin-burning pavement, fiery hot winds are brutal to visitors. As they exit the jetway at Sky Harbor, they quickly realize they’ve arrived in a place Satan vacates in July.

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When my eldest, Annie, was also my only child, I established a summer routine. We’d don our swim suits around 11:00 AM, play in the backyard pool for an hour, change into dry clothes, eat lunch, watch a video, and then she’d toddle off to nap time, while I worked on my dissertation.

Unlike high humidity states, wet towels and swim wear were draped on patio chairs; they dried instantly and were easily accessible for the next pool frolic. On Tuesday morning, I gathered up the swim suits from the patio, pulled up Annie’s suit, and put on my two-piece. (Yes, I realize I never did/have/will cause men to ogle at my body in a two-piece. I simply prefer them to those tight one-piecers that hurt in all the wrong places.) And just like every other morning, we frolicked in the pool.

Fortunately, the bathroom had an outside door from the pool. I helped Annie strip off her wet suit and pull on her shorts and t-shirt. She ran off to find a Barbie doll as I began my disrobe routine.

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When I tossed my wet bra on the floor, I saw it. Right there. In the bra cup. A big bug. On closer examination, not an insect…a spider. And not just any spider. A FEMALE BLACK WIDOW!

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OMG! It appeared to be alive. I swished my bra in the toilet and flushed the arachnid away. Oh, sweet baby Jesus, did I just spend an hour in chlorinated water with a spider on my chest? Am I like the princess and the pea?

Thankfully, I just laughed off this encounter and didn’t bother to research said spider species. Had I knew then, what I know now, I would have died from my own imagination.

Female Black Widows, unlike males or juveniles, have a red hourglass shape on the underside of their abdomens. Unlike males or offspring young, female venom is 15 times more toxic than venom of a prairie rattlesnake! (Be still my heart.) While death from a Black Widow bite is extremely rare, human victims are nauseated, experience muscle aches, and may have difficulty breathing.

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In retrospect, I will never know why Wilhelmina, the Widow, didn’t bite me. Perhaps, she took pity on my flat chest; she saw first-hand I needed to make up with cotton what God had forgotten. Perhaps, she was weary of sweating in the relentless sun, spinning a web, and yearning for a splash in the pool. Or perhaps, she had mated with Wesley the Widow, ate him for breakfast, and wanted to chill.

Regardless of your motivation or lack thereof, I want to belatedly thank you, Wilhelmina, for sparing me of poison, vomit, pain, and gasps.

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Coming next week: Spider in my ear….

How to Catch Flies

April 2, 2017 / skidaz / Leave a comment

Over three years ago, I began to blog with the intent of publishing a book of the most humorous ones. My plan began to unravel this past summer; my mood changed. I found myself engulfed in a humorless world filled with we vs. they. Even though, I’ve experienced the darkest side of life over the past six years, I was ill-prepared for the diabolical firestorm currently overtaking America. My humor was suppressed–buried.

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Admittedly, I didn’t get much sense until about 40 or so years ago. I paid attention to the debacle of the Viet Nam War, Nixon freezing my $6,000 teacher’s salary for two years, and Watergate. Certainly, I found no humor in these events, but I managed. When the Twin Towers fell, I was outraged. Several nights following, I was in a crowded Mexican restaurant. th-3

The waiter had just brought our dinners, when a mariachi band appeared on the balcony above and played God Bless America. Every patron dropped their utensils, rose and sang in unison. Tears ran down my cheeks as I sang; yet I wasn’t overtly sad. The American patriotic spirit didn’t die in New York City; I had hope.

When the presidential election campaigns kicked into high gear this summer, so did the we vs. they mantra. Civility and decorum vanished. Extremism was rampant. Suddenly, it became socially acceptable to mock the disabled, use despicable racist terms, and blame the press for inaccurate reporting. Following the election, the we vs. they went viral. Somewhat cogent folks jumped on this out-of-control roller coaster and without serious thought and consideration demolished long-standing laws with the stroke of a pen. A classic example of throwing the proverbial baby out with the bath water–health care, public education, environmental safeguards. Budgets of long-standing programs, such as the Center for Disease Control, medical research, the arts, and Planned Parenthood were slashed. Further this divisiveness was stoked with “alternative facts,” late night tweeting, erroneous wiretapping claims, and a cloak of darkness on Russian ties.

True, I didn’t get much sense till about 40 years ago, but in those 40 years, I never witnessed the outward hate and derision I see now. In the past few months, I’ve lost long-time friends–not to death–but to their down-right argumentative, combative attitudes. Intelligent, reasonable, civil discourse is fine. Friendly confrontation has its place, but I have no desire to debate with blatant ignorance.

The world has shrunk. Like it or not, we are all citizens of the same planet. We must cooperate, communicate, collaborate, and even compromise. As my grandmother frequently reminded, “You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.” It’s about all of us–not some of us.

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Dr. Suze Is an Immigrant

March 12, 2017 / skidaz / Leave a comment

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In the past two weeks, I’ve experienced what it is like to be the proverbial stranger in a foreign land. My heart aches for the numerous children that sailed into Ellis Island over a hundred years ago and encountered a new language, culture, and social mores. My heart aches for the numerous children who fled from poverty and Mexican drug cartels. My heart aches for the current refugee children fleeing their homelands in search of safety and security. Most of these children came to American public schools where they not only encountered a new language, but often the feeling of intellectual inadequacy.

I feel their pain. First, it took me a while to learn teenage slang. My daughters were continually using words like rad, meh, and tight, which in my mind were meaningless in context. Then I was forced to learn text talk. I vividly remember receiving a text from one of them–FOFL. What does that mean? And now there’s texting for seniors! Just yesterday, I texted one of my high school friends and asked, “How are you?”

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His reply, “LOL.” Hmm. Why was he laughing out loud? He wasn’t. He was Living On Lipitor! I inquired, “Where are you?”

His reply, “BFF.” Another strange answer, which meant Best Friend’s Funeral in senior speak.

By now, I was crazy and responded, “WTF?” I literally meant what the f@#k!

His reply, “Sue, really? You wet the furniture?”

So as I struggle to learn a new computer and a new printer, I’ve been forced to learn another new language. Bear with me. Someday I may understand what an iCloud is.

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Dr. Suze Says Is Dead

March 6, 2017March 6, 2017 / skidaz / Leave a comment

It’s true. My blog died several weeks ago with the advent of a new computer, and the switch from a pc to Mac has almost killed me off! I’ve spent copious hours reading online manuals and watching tutorials; I swear learned nothing! Even though I thought I could read, listen, and understand English, technological talk renders me illiterate.

It chaps my heinie that simplistic directions of “how-tos” have been so confounded for folk my age. Can you even imagine how difficult it would be to execute a Betty Crocker recipe written in techno-talk?

Open your search engine. Enter the exact name of the recipe.
Click on the button.
When the recipe appears, scroll downward using the arrow key.
Note the ingredients needed. If you need help, press the help icon.
To alter the portion setting, press the space bar by the number of servings needed. If you need 12 servings, press 12 times.
If you enter serving amount incorrectly, press F7 to go back.

Ad infinitum!

I was doubly foolish. I bought a new printer. THE printer created by some genius who delighted in making my life absolutely frustrating and miserable for two weeks. When I finally got it to print, I tried to scan. Of course, there were no directions, except online. I found them and clicked on print, so I could follow them. A message appeared: Do you want to print all 196 pages? WTF? Is this the great American novel?

But my nightmare didn’t stop. The sound bar on my “smart tv” fell silent. The more buttons I pushed, the more online advice I read, just made matters worse. Fortunately, I was somewhat lucid enough to buy another, less sophisticated sound bar that works…as of this moment.

With that being said, please be patient. Dr. Suze Espouses is a work in progress. It takes a long time to teach this old dog.