My Top Ten New Years Resolutions….

1.…Don’t drink before sex.

2.…Get used to not having sex.

3.…Lose 50 pounds starting next November.

4.…No more references to Wifey’s weight when she can hear.

5.…No more dropping cats in the Goodwill bin after dark.

6.…No more jokes about Wifey’s hair colorization and Guinness World Records.

7.…No more dozing off in the McDonalds drive thru.

8.…No more taking a leak in the backyard when I cut the grass.

9.…Stop using terms like “dumb ass” and “donkey dicks” around the grandkids.

10. Tell Wifey everyday that she is beautiful. 

Well, it’s time to breakup the Elves coco break and get the sleigh packed. Coffee thermos, Vicks Rub, NoDoz, GPS, pocket full of gummy deers, four changes of Depends and finally my iPod with the entire collection of Bruce Springsteen tunes. With just a few moments before liftoff, the reindeer are wired and stoked on Red Bull. My shop foreman, Elf second class Snogwilly, comes running up to me with an additional bag of loot. He tells me these are the magical tree ornaments for all the special children this year plus a vial of Chickenpox virus for the others. I fill all my pockets with the magic ornaments and then toss the empty bag and vial of virus out in the snow. I take a dip of Copenhagen, blow my nose, tighten my seat belt and then I whistle and shout;

“Now, Dasher! now, Dancer! now, Prancer and Vixen!

On, Comet! on Cupid! on, Donder and Blitzen!

To the top of the Artic! To the top of the world!

Now dash away! dash away! get on the ball!”

The spooked team of flyers took off like Wifey Claus’s relatives after Sunday dinner. I figured I’d run down south along the eastern seaboard slope of North America, cut down around the southern tip of Brazil and back up the western fringe of the Americas until I cruise into Alaska. Should take about 45 metric minutes and then I’ll cross the Beren Straits into Russia. I’ll then trek southward down the Asian continent avoiding North Korea because of a death in the family. The boys will keep pulling the sleigh until I do a fly-about around Australia and then west to the African continent and up into the Middle East where I’ll drop off a ton of coal and just bypass Iran and watch for missiles. I will then be into my eighth hour of deer wrangling and will take an extended hay stop in Italy where I’ll really be welcomed, being a saint and all.

Soon enough, me and the sleigh haulers will be off and crossing Europe dodging snow fronts and socialism. The reindeer will relieve themselves over France before making our way across the English Channel into the British Isles. Then a stopover to fill the Queen’s stockings and then a few minutes to have Tea and Scones with a couple of the Coldstream Guards on Christmas eve duty. Then I’m bloody well off.

Time has flown by now and with only a short time before the ‘Christmas sunrise’. We’ll leap from Iceland and spend a few precious minutes in Greenland so the boys can strut their antlers with some of the local does. But now the time has come for the finale of the trip…..Canada! I make my visits to all the isolated cabins and bars in Ontario till I finally come to the last child on my list. She had been scratched off several times with my ’naughty pencil’, but she always ends up redeeming herself with her love and unselfish caring for others.

I crawl in through the basement window because she has a habit of keeping the friggin fireplace blazing all Christmas eve and I don’t want to roast my new Wolverine boots. Up the basement steps I sneak, down the hallway lined with graffiti and finally into the living room where a beautiful forest tree stands decorated and full of charm and holiday twinkle. I notice there’s no damn fire in the hearth this year. First, I look around for some fresh cookies and milk, but only find half a box of chocolate covered cherries….not even the good syrupy ones.

I bend over and open my mostly deflated gift sack and a moment of panic runs over me. The little kitten I was bringing her this year was not there!! Then I remember….I had left it with the other cats in Beijing. Maybe next year. I did have the wind up Brad Pitt doll she wrote me about and the schnapps flavored Play-Doh. But there’s something else I need to leave but I’m getting too tired to focus. I step back and I’m trying to think outside the gift box for a moment and now I remember! Reaching into my side pocket I take out the special ornament and smile. I hang it on the tree and then give a short holiday blessing.

I use the chimney this time to get out and once on top of the house, I realize I parked the damn sleigh on the ground next to the basement window. Laying my finger aside of my nose and giving a nod, I slipped off the roof and landed on top of Prancer.

“I sprung to my sleigh, to my team gave a whistle,

And away they all flew, like the down of a thistle:

But I did exclaim, ere I drove out of sight

Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good night” 

                                                               Christmas Shopping with Wifey

   Wifey took me shopping with her yesterday. I was doing pretty good from my surgery back in November and my doctor, Abo Monorumbo-whatever-the-hell, said it would be good for me to get out for a couple of hours. I told Wifey to drop me off at HOOTERS while she went to the mall. Right off, Wifey says no to the HOOTERS sanctuary, so I was very much in her power. We got to the mall and from outside it looked like a scene from FOX news when all the loony Egyptians took to the streets in Cairo not long ago.

   Malls have always fascinated me. We used to build civilizations, but now we build shopping malls. Seems we peaked. The malls are like windowless fortresses manned by underpaid serfs and con artist. The committed bargain hunters enter through the swinging portals with a grim determination on their faces and blood in their eyes. Shopping for Wifey is very much like a contact sport such as football. She enjoys the scrimmage, the noisy crowds, the over priced food, the danger of being trampled to death, and the ecstasy of the purchase. I don’t shop anymore because of my knee injury.

   The parking lot, (the trenches) was no man’s land. No empty spaces anywhere and cars were slowly prowling the lanes like wounded cheetahs…..I was sure I could hear screams coming from the mall’s entrance. The shopping director, Wifey, recalculated her course and soon we were heading to Wally World (Wal-Mart).

   After a 15 minute ride, she let me off in front of the mega store and I was told to sit on the old folks bench and wait for her while she drove to the next county to park the car. I obediently sat on the sticky bench and observed the natives. Wal-Mart natives are comprised of many tribal affiliations. West Viginiikes, Alabamian Pud Pullers, Georgiana Sheep Sniffers and many more….all dressed in their traditional tribal butt crack regalia.

   In time, Wifey comes huffing up to the store and once inside I’m instructed to ride one of their ‘scoot-arounds’ as I’m an invalid in training. I had a little buzzer for warning folks that an old fart was coming through, but you could hardly hear it for all the jabbering dialects.

   Already Wifey’s eyes were starting to glaze over and she started sniffing the air. Soon she picked up the scent of a sale and we’re off like a huntress and her scooter hound. Wifey is a serious minded being when it comes to watching my money. The quickest way to get to know a woman is to go shopping with her and I have learned several things about Wifey and her philosophies on the concept of competitive shopping. First off, she believes that anyone who lives within their means suffers from a lack of imagination…Second,….she will buy anything that has a sign saying ‘one to a customer,’ and third, she likes her money right where she can see it….hanging in her closet.

   She ravaged the women’s clothing department looking for anything that said “Extra Medium,” or “Petit Large”…..she was unsuccessful. My sole responsibility was to sit and hold her purse while I watched the young women picking through the halter tops and thongs. She soon tossed a furry looking hat in her cart on top of all the other imported, (Chinese) goods and bargains and we finally headed to the front of the crowded store and then waited. Anyone who believes the competitive spirit in America is dead has never been in a Wal-Mart when the cashier opens another checkout line. After the rush, all that remained was a confused old man sitting in a scooter with a dead battery. Wifey had abandoned me like a mammal abandons it’s young fur seal sleeping on the beach. She had made it to the new cashier and was only second in line with about twenty shoppets behind her. She looked back at my predicament and with a sad look on her face, she just shrugged her shoulders in sympathy. In turn, I held up her purse and shrugged mine.

                  The Doghouse Is A Man’s Castle

    The other day I was telling Wifey a joke. She did not find it funny on the first telling, so I told it again with some modification. She failed to get it the second time and that’s when I transgressed……I told her that even a ‘bimbo’ would get the joke. I will not detail to you what followed in both verbiage and actions, as I’m not sure if minors may be reading this, except to say I was mute during the entire ordeal.

I have been in the proverbial ‘doghouse’ for the last two days. It is not a nice place as Wifey was both the architect and contractor of it‘s restraints. My ‘doghouse’ is a cold and lonely place that is haunted with past transgressions and misspoken responses. A very lonely place. The food is all simple and comes from cellophane wrappers and peal top cans…..one step up from fasting.

It is misleading to call my dilemma a ’doghouse’ in that at least the dog is shown affection and gets it butt scratched from time to time. I receive neither and I am cautioned not to solicit any. I am emotionally marooned! In time, Wifey will cool down and feel sorry for me and once again allow me into the matrimonial house, but there will be conditions…..warnings you might say. Then she will expect absolute contrition on my part followed by a nice dinner out and possibly sending her to the local hair dyer for a $40 tint job.

 In the final analysis, I will do whatever it takes to get out of the ‘doghouse’ and back to the tender affections of my keeper and in the future, make sure I tell her only bimbo tolerant jokes! Now…..I need to go check the laundry. 

        “BAD TO THE BEARD”

    I was talking the other day to Jake, one of my old buds, over a couple of chilled cans of banana flavored Ensure. He asked if I had as many problems as he did when it came to women who were afflicted with a beard fetish. I told him it was more of a curse than a problem in that most women assume that only Greek gods are adorned with robust beards and as they say….the fuller the beard….the mightier the…..whatever. Anyway….I told him that once, a few years ago, when I played Santa at an elementary school for their holiday party, that when all the young moms stood in line with their squirming offspring, I could see the hunger in those women’s eyes for old Santa and his mighty bag of surprises. They stared at me like I was a ‘Blue Light’ special in the meat department at Winn Dixie! The memory still haunts me and I have nightmares about being chased by a gaggle of female shoppers wearing thongs and waving meat tenderizers…..excuse me, I need a moment…..

Seems that Psychiatrists have a name for it;  Rub-da-fuzz-syndrome.  Many believe the only reason Castro is still in power is because he’s protected and endeared by over a million devoted beard fetished senoritas. Gives you a chill. Often, when I go out in public without a proper disguise, some women will notice the beard and right away they will walk up to me and ask about my parents?? “Who’s ya daddy?” they will whisper or sometimes they will simply blurt out “Yo mama!”  What my parents have to do with all this is strange in that neither had a beard, except for my aunt that lives in Canada.

Jake related a few chin whisker chapters of his early life while playing in a rock band, but I refrain from reporting these episodes as both P.E.T.A. and the Association for the Protection of Indigenous Peoples would most definitely make issue. He, like me, has endured the traumatic ordeals of being cursed with an aphrodisiatic growth of face fur and the effects it has had on the passion challenged females we have encountered. Sad storie, all.

After a lot of head nodding and beard stroking, we both concluded that to be face naked was not an option and the continuation of our plight was a forbearance we were emotionally shackled to. I must say, though, that sometimes when I stick out my chin a certain way….Wifey gets all girlish and overcome with the vapors. It is a power I must always keep in check.

                               HALLELUIAH AND AMEN!