Three Awesome (terrible) Dad Jokes

Today is Friday, the 23rd of August, the very essence of the Dog Days of Summer. The humidity sits at 98%. It is not currently raining, but the weather people assure us that we are in for a deluge later today. Delightful.

So, what better time than now to share some organically grown, world class Dad Jokes?

Many of you ask me where I come up with so many Dad Jokes. Truth is, it takes lots of research and Googling. But, sometimes they just come to me. Other times, my kids send them to me, egging me on. I’m not sure why they do this. I would think that my propensity for Dad Jokes might be a source of embarrassment for them, and yet, just the other day my Son sent me this text...

Now...that’s a great Dad Joke, people.

Then, a couple of hours later, Facebook shared one of those “Memories” from several years ago which featured this exchange between my daughter and my wife...

Pam: What’s the best way to throw an eclipse party?.........You planet!!

Kaitlin: There’s entirely too much lunarcy in this family.

Two excellent DJ’s.

Finally, yesterday my wife bought a new computer from the Apple store. To her great surprise, they gave her a $345 pair of Beats headphones in the bargain. Since I was the one who had gifted her the money to buy the computer she graciously gave them to me. So, last night I thought I would share my news with Patrick to get his opinion on the quality or lack thereof of these particular headphones. I sent him the following two photographs...

  

Then, I sheepishly added a third...

...with the tagline, “They’re even endorsed by a real doctor”

You could practically feel the eye roll all the way from Nashville. Major Dad points with that one!!

Why Didn’t We Think of This??

Did you guys know that there is a Federal Program called Energy Star? It’s managed jointly by the Department of Energy and the Enviromental Protection Agency, and provides helpful information to consumers about energy efficiency practices that not only save us money, but also helps us protect the environment. Well. . .this morning I stumbled across this headline:

Federal energy program suggests keeping thermostat set at 78 degrees — 82 while you sleep

I cannot wait to share this particular bit of helpful information about energy efficient practices with my wife. When she hears how much money this will save us and how much it will help protect the environment, she’s going to be thrilled. Matter of fact, she’s probably going to pop herself on the forehead and say, “Why didn’t we think of that!!”

But this particular article didn’t stop there, it was packed with many other energy efficient suggestions like this jewel...

taking shorter showers and running fans while you do things like shower and cook can also help reduce the heat build-up in your home.

 This is the type of out of the box thinking that this country needs if we are ever going save the planet. Oh...and how about this pearl of wisdom...

Energy Star also recommends opening windows to fill the house with cool air at night and then shutting all windows and blinds in the morning to trap the cool air inside.

Now, admittedly, this suggestion might be more difficult to implement. . .since finding cool air, at night, during the summer, in Short Pump might be difficult. But whenever we stumble on some cool air, I simply can’t wait to trap it inside my house by quickly slamming all the open windows!! “There!! Now I gotcha!!!”

Another side benefit of keeping your thermostat set on 82 degrees while sleeping, in the south, will be the rapid decline in the birth rate. Because everyone knows that the fewer humans there are running around out there, the better off the planet will be. Also, and this just now occurred to me. . .yet another benefit of sleeping at a toasty 82 degrees will be that my wife won’t even notice when she’s having a hot flash!

Thanks, Energy Star.

Freshmen

Over the past couple of weeks I’ve been noticing all the pictures of moms and dads dropping their kids off at college. There’s usually a shot of Dad carrying boxes or Mom sitting on a newly made bed with the freshman. Every room looks the same to me. Every room exactly like Kaitlin’s room at Cedarville and Patrick’s at Belmont all those years ago. . .cleaner than it will ever be again. The smiles on everyone’s faces look strained and fragile, as if the slightest breeze could drift by and transform them into pools of tears. For the kids, it’s mostly nerves at so momentous a chapter of their life story being newly written. For the parents, I see the Herculean effort being put into those smiles. They want so much to be optimistic and supportive. . .when what they really want to do is grieve the end of something. But, that will have to wait, at least for the car ride home.

For Pam and me the car ride home was nearly unbearable. Cedarville was seven hours away, Nashville nine hours away. That’s a lot of grieving. I remember that first year we dropped Patrick off at Belmont being the worst of all move-in days, since it meant the dawn of our empty nest years. That particular nine hour drive would take us back to an empty house. I had barely pulled out of the parking lot when I decided that we should pull over onto a side street and sit for a minute to gather ourselves. It didn’t work. Pam cried all the way to Knoxville. The first two weeks back home felt like a wake. The silence in the house was deafening. Our first sit down meal as empty-nesters featured Pam abruptly leaving the table after the blessing!

But eventually we discovered that an empty nest wasn’t all bad. The emptiness ushered in a new freedom. To our profound relief, we discovered the happy news that after 20 years of raising two kids, we were still in love with each other. Our affection for each other had managed to survive the grueling ordeal of parenting, no small feat. So, our children weren’t the only ones having new chapters written. 

Still, although your kids ultimately leave your home, they never leave your heart. The worry that has been your constant companion since the day they were born doesn’t go anywhere. You still fret about everything that happens to them. They get a new job and you worry if they will lose it. They get married and you worry if they will be happy. You wonder if either of them will ever move back to Virginia. You wonder when that first grandchild will come. You don’t even want to think about how much you will worry once he/she does!

All of this is good and proper. Change is what makes life interesting. Nothing is eternal except our love for them. Everything else a crapshoot. 

And that freshman, tentatively smiling for the camera? You won’t even recognize them on graduation day.

Beware The New Killer in the Kitchen

I recently read a scholarly article that made the case that we are currently living in the most peaceful time in the entire history of the world. That may be true, but that doesn’t mean that modern life isn’t without grave dangers. Sometimes, those dangers are an unintended consequence of what we euphemistically call...progress. For example, in our panicked rush to save the planet we have unleashed a new and deadly killer into our midst...

That’s right, metal straws. In our zeal to eliminate waste, to cleanse landfills of billions of one-use plastic straws, some wise guy came up with the idea of metal straws. My wife fell for them hook, line and sinker...

And while the concept is good, it’s always the unintended consequence, the potential for misuse that winds up biting you in the backside. Take this ghastly story, for example...

BOURNEMOUTH, England – A retired jockey died when she fell onto an eco-friendly metal drinking straw which impaled her eye, an inquest heard.

Elena Struthers-Gardner, 60, who was known as "Lena," suffered brain injuries in the accident at her home in Broadstone, England.

She was carrying a mason-jar style drinking glass with a screw-top lid in her kitchen when she collapsed. The 10-inch stainless steel straw entered her left eye socket and pierced her brain.

Her death has led to a coroner warning that metal drinking straws should never be used with a lid that fixes them in place, and “great care should be taken” while using them.

This poor woman was minding her own business, basking in the serenity of her well earned retirement from horse racing, when she suffered her tragic end at the hands of her metal straw, a possibility that the metal straw manufacturer surely knew was inevitable. Was there a product warning on the straw advising users to refrain from falling forward and being impaled through the eye? No. And even if there were, who would have the eyesight necessary to read such tiny print? Certainly not 60 year old retired jockeys.

Question: Have you ever heard a coroner warm anyone to take “great care” when using a plastic straw? I think not. In the old days, we didn’t need to walk around on pins and needles while sipping our sweet tea from Tervis Tumblers lest we get run through the eye with our straw! We all know not to run with scissors, but I suppose now it’s going to be...don’t run with scissors or walk with straws.

Is this really progress? 

Our Black Sheep

It’s what every family fears. The call in the middle of the night. The gut-wrenching panic that swells up and constricts the throat at the sound of the State Trooper’s voice. That feeling of impending doom when you see the squad car pull up in front of the house and the officers solemnly walking up the driveway. You have felt this day coming all of your life. It has been your nightmare, constantly in the back of your mind. You have always known that it would come to this. Every family has one, you tell yourself. It’s nobody’s fault, you remind everyone. You still love her despite the years of rebellion, acting out, and foolishness. But all along you’ve known that she would finally go too far and the long arm of the law would reach through the madness and administer justice. Yesterday, it finally happened. Our beloved Christina Garland finally went too far...and had the brazen gall to broadcast her sins on Facebook:

Christina: I accidentally ended up in the EZ-Pass-only lane on the Powhite Parkway tonight and could not get over to the cash lane in time! What am I supposed to do? Whom do I call? Are they going to fine me??

“Accidentally” indeed! This is a lifelong pattern of defiance. First it was innocent enough . . .refusing to come out from under the table at dinner time, failing to sharpen borrowed pencils before returning them to their rightful owners. . .and now this!!

Nobody thinks it will happen to them. Everybody thinks that it’s other families who have the problem child, that surely one so devoutly raised and nurtured would be able to resist a life of wanton crime and depravity. But, I am here to tell you that if it can happen to our Christina, it can happen to anyone. 

Thoughts and prayers would be greatly appreciated in this, our hour of need.

Hong Kong v. Chinese Communism

In case you haven’t noticed, Hong Kong is a hot mess. When the British handed the city back over to the Chinese Communists in 1997, it was only a matter of time before the free people of Hong Kong would collide with the authoritarian government on the mainland. The first protests came in 2003, then another wave in 2014. Now, with this extradition bill gambit by the Communists in Beijing, the citizens of this vibrant and democratic city have apparently found the straw sent to break their backs. As of this morning, thousands of protesters are still occupying the second busiest air port in the world, and the patience of the autocrats in power seems near its end.

When President Obama failed to wholeheartedly come out in rapturous support of the Arab Spring back in 2011, he was widely criticized for his inadequate response. I defended him at the time. Now, Trump is being criticized for his tepid support for the protesters, accused of being more concerned with getting a trade deal with the Chi-Coms than defending freedom and democracy. Now, I write in his defense. Actually, it’s his job to get a trade deal with the Chinese. It’s not his job to defend democracy around the world.

Sure, if I had to pick a side here, I’m all in on the protesters. In a perfect world we would throw everything, including the kitchen sink, at the Chinese government. Who wouldn’t prefer the triumph of free people over tyranny? But, we do not live in a perfect world. We live in a world of interconnected trade, and interconnected interests. Our desired response is limited by our inability to project power at will and without consequence. For those asking for more from Trump, a more forceful defense of freedom and democracy, let me paint you a picture.

If these protests continue much longer, and I find no evidence that they won’t, the thugs in Beijing will revert to what they know best. Does anyone remember Tiananmen Square? Yes, at some point very soon, the Chi-Coms will send in the heat. When they do, and there are tanks and armored personnel carriers rumbling through the streets, how are we exactly supposed to support democracy then? Send in the First Armored Division? Launch WWIII over Hong Kong democracy, defending one of the most opulent cities in the world? As much as I loathe the Chinese Communists...this is their problem. How many times in the past fifty years have we gotten into trouble by playing the roll of the World’s Policeman? 

What I support is minding our own business as a nation. The list of things I object to when it comes to the current occupant of the White House is a mile long, but insufficient support for Hong Kong democracy isn’t one of the them.

Boob Tube Guy

For those of you who don’t live around here, you are probably not aware of Boob Tube Guy...

For the second time in six months, a neighborhood in Short Pump has awoken to discover old school television sets deposited on their doorsteps. The mastermind behind the mischief wears a hollowed out TV set over his head, and sometimes poses for the cameras. I use the male pronoun here although Boob Tube Guy could very well be a woman. Whenever he or she strikes, all the local news rooms cover the story, each of them posing the intriguing question...why??

What is the point? Why would someone go to the trouble of traipsing around in the middle of the night delivering obsolete television sets to random upscale communities in Richmond’s West End? I have come up with some working theories for your consideration.

1. These are nothing more than college kids with too much time on their hands, doing what college kids have always done when bored.

The problem with this theory is..I believe that this latest incident occurred before most local universities had opened for business. Also, we’re talking nearly 30 television sets. Where did a bunch of kids get their hands on that many sets?

2. This is a television repair man who’s business is on the rocks, making a statement about excess. West Enders, with their constant need for more and bigger no longer have televisions repaired, they just buy new ones. Boob Tube Guy is protesting consumerism.

I don’t know...does this dude look like a malcontent? There is a certain whimsical quality to this prank, with his TV helmet and posing for the security cameras. He just doesn’t strike me as an idealist.

3. He is actually the ultimate Good Samaritan, handing out vintage tube televisions to households most likely to have big flat screens hanging in their living rooms. Boob Tube Guy knows that these new age smart screens are being used by the Dark State to spy on us, so he is striking a blow for privacy.

...but, he’s wearing a TV on his head. 

4. He’s just a fun-loving practical joker who gets a kick out of pulling everybody’s chain and getting himself on the nightly news.

I think we have a winner.

I, for one, love Boob Tube Guy. He’s a guy who has an active imagination, a sense of fun, and a commitment to quality. Have you noticed how he places each set in the exact middle of each porch? He doesn’t just slap it down all cockeyed and cattywompus. No, he takes care to place it dead center of the porch. This man has pride of ownership. If he’s going to commit Tomfoolery, he’s going to do it right. And another thing...he isn’t hurting anyone. Everyone gets a good chuckle out of it, the cops come out and load them up and take them away, and we are left talking about something besides politics.

All Hail Boob Tube Guy!!