Mark, puh-leeze!

Taste and decorum here. I was kind enough to crop out much of the face of this slattern, in hopes that would free her from stalking by loathsome lotharios. But I left in her lips, since they look to be heavily impregnated with botox. (Her eyes looked nice.) (Screenshot by BobbaLew.)

—“What, pray tell, is it with Facebook that they keep parading all these buxom vixens past me as “friend” suggestions?
It seems I get one of these honeys per week; two last week.
I sent a full screenshot, including her face, to a friend of mine who is a boobie-man.
He responded right away that I should “return to sender;” which I did = I dumped her immediately.
Every time I get one of these honeys I say “Mark, you’re barking up the wrong tree!”
I really like women, but most of my lady friends are nowhere near as well endowed, nor was my wife.
Adequate, but not balloon-breasted.
Many of my male friends complain I have it all wrong; that many of my lady-friends are flat-chested.
Well, LA-DEE-DAH! What matters to This Kid are the smile and the eyes.
Not too long ago I Googled “Scotch and Soda” by the Kingston Trio back in 1958. During my final year of high school (1962) I belonged to a small rock-’n’-roll band that had a girl singing “Scotch and Soda.”
It has a fabulous line: “All I need is one of your smiles, Sunshine of your eyes, oh, me, oh, my……”
Right smack on the nose!
Some lady smiles or twinkles her eyes at me and I am smitten.
I think of *****, my pretty lifeguard friend at Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming-pool. She’s rather reserved, although she probably wouldn’t like me saying that. (She’s also married.)
When I talk to her, there’s very little eye-contact = she’ll look off into the distance.
Many of my lady-friends don’t do that.
But there was eye-contact once, and I’ll never forget it. She smiled at me, eyes twinkling. It was incredibly pleasant.
So Mark, please get over it! I don’t prefer creamy-breasted vixens.
I remember a few months ago meeting an extremely flat chested lady on a nearby rail-trail, and she kept smiling at me. Talk-talk-talk-talkity-talk!
I asked her to keep smiling at me, since it was so enjoyable. She became embarrassed we were enjoying each other’s company so much it was unfair to her husband, who wasn’t there.
I also remember talking about 25 minutes to a lady bicyclist, probably in her 40s, who kept smiling at me. She wasn’t that pretty, but her smile was ravishing.
I also remember meeting a pretty young jogger on another rail-trail, who was thrilled I struck up a conversation with her.
None of these ladies were balloon-breasted, but their smile was smashingly attractive.
That chesty “friend” suggestion is probably in her 30s, or maybe even early 40s. My lifeguard friend is 65, but she’s still attractive when she smiles.
What happens to “balloon-breasts” when she gets older? Those breasts, heavy with silicone, droop below her belly-button. Wrinkles appear.
My lifeguard friend has wrinkles too, but she also has that smile, which I will never forget. “No pretty girl will ever smile at you!” ***** has — but only occasionally = I keep hoping.
And of course many of my lady-friends render extravagant eye-contact and fabulous smiles.
I strike up conversations with complete stranger-ladies just for that eye-contact and smile.
So Mark, what matters to This Kid from ladies is the smile and eye-contact. Indication a lady enjoys my company.
Balloon-breasts would be a distraction. Beyond that her fulsome sexuality is gonna fade. My aging lady-friends still have their smile and eye-contact. Plus they’re fun to talk to.
How ya supposed to talk smothered in balloon-breasts?

Another Facebook “friend” suggestion. I don’t know this girl from the Moon. Much prettier than balloon-breasts, but it looks like she couldn’t finish her dress. (Slugged as “no botox.”)

* “Balloon-breast” is a Trumper = “hump for Trump!”
* “Mark” is Mark Zuckerberg, founder and head-honcho of Facebook.

Tell her! Let ‘er know!

The handiwork of Pigtail-girl. (As one of my lady-friends said: “Kee-YUCK.”)

—“Are you, by any chance, ‘Pigtail-girl’?” I asked that yesterday to a store employee at my supermarket.
“Yes I am,” she said, smiling as she turned toward me.
Saturday morning, go to Weggers to get groceries for the coming week.
“What happened?” I asked. “Now your hair is straight as an arrow.”
“Yes,” she said. “It took forever.”
We talked a few minutes, proving yet again that striking up a conversation with a girl always works.
That girl perceives I consider her attractive enough to strike up a conversation.
Which I now do like crazy. The girl smiles at me and I am smitten. Her doing that reverses “No pretty girl will ever smile at you!”
That is, I thought her attractive enough to strike up a conversation, but I wasn’t hitting on her.
That’s telling her I like what I see — and she likes that.
Pigtail-girl isn't physically attractive. She’s kind of a horse.
But her smile was ravishing, even though we were all wearing masks. Her eyes twinkled; they gave her away.
“SAY SOMETHING TO HER! Tell her! Let ‘er know you found her attractive.”
We went our separate ways, me to shop, and her to put out her Brussels Sprouts.
Shopping complete I ambled into “self check-out.”
“Were you here the other day?” I asked the girl manning self check-out.
“DO IT! DO IT! DO IT!” = Strike up a conversation!
She wasn’t that pretty, like my wife was before I convinced her she could be pretty.
“You look familiar,” I said.
That’s telling her I noticed her, which she’ll probably like.
She’ll like I noticed her, which I will like. Then she’ll like that I liked that, then I like that she likes that I liked that. We have a love-fest going, striking sparks.
We end up liking each other, even if only for 30 seconds.
I noticed Pigtail-girl again as I exited. I hoped I would. Instead of exiting I angled toward her.
“I am so glad I said something to you,” I said to her. “I was afraid you’d take my head off.
Instead you smiled at me. You’re doing it now!”
I never can get outta that supermarket without striking sparks with some pretty lady!

• Lemme finish, Facebookers!

They’re cutting me slack

—“You are so compliant,” my friend said.
“*****,” I thought to myself; “you’re talking to me.”
***** being my pretty lifeguard friend at Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming-pool.
At this point my critics bellow “there is no way any girl would say anything to you! DREAMIN’!”
“Then how come I heard it with both ears?”
“You were hearing things = all made up!”
“She even repeated herself — she said that to me twice.”
Later she wanted me to finish what I started saying to her instead of doing something she might prefer.
In other words she was more interested in pleasing me than herself.
I’m not used to this, readers: “no pretty lady will ever be interested in you!”
***** is not gorgeous. But she’s attractive for age 65.
Three years ago I noticed she was attractive, but figgered there was no way under Heaven I could befriend her.
Now, despite numerous flubs and foul-ups, somehow or other we became friends.
So far eight consecutive encounters over the past 2-3 months. I’m always happy to see her, and think she’s happy to see me.
More than ***** seem to be at play at that swimming-pool.
With the childhood I had, and the continuing poor image I have of myself, I’m always surprised these ladies seem interested in me. “No pretty lady will ever be interested in you! You are DESPICABLE!”
Most of these lady-friends are married — ***** is.
Yet they all seem to wanna befriend me — which I’m not used to.
One friend, who I goofed up royally, seems to wanna keep talking to me.
I’m soon to be age-77, and I’m hardly a stud = way outta shape, 50 pounds overweight: “what in the wide-wide world would they ever see in me?”
LET ‘EM TALK!
I think that’s what it is. “Let’s just talk; and as equals. You’re likely to say something I wanna hear.
Forget romance; let’s just talk.”
And women love talking = once I start talking with them, I hafta shut us down = they won’t stop.
And no hittin’ on ‘em! Leave that to the loathsome lotharios.

I can’t resist!

—“Last week I told ***** a lot has happened since she said hello to me three years ago.”
*****, of course, is my pretty lifeguard friend at Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming-pool.
I will say that to Mrs. ******, my cute aquatic balance-training coach at that same swimming-pool. She and I walked our dogs together about the same time.
That dog walk, and ***** saying hello, could be considered the beginning of recovery from my sordid childhood.
Both events counter “No pretty girl will pay any attention to you. You are disgusting!”
I told ***** “I no longer am the person I was back then.”
“Mostly it was my dog,” I said, my silly Killian, one of the dogs Mrs. ****** and I walked. Killian, an Irish-Setter, was the most people-friendly dog I ever owned. He wasn’t scared of pretty girls, so I shouldn’t be either.
He’d drag me toward a pretty girl, wanting to be petted.
“Oh what a pretty dog! Can I pet him?”
Here I am, yet again, talking to another pretty girl.
I’d been scared of girls over 70+ years.
“No pretty girl will have anything to do with you!” is the infamous Hilda Q. Walton, my hyper-religious Sunday-School superintendent neighbor when I was a little boy.
My Bible-thumping parents heartily agreed since I couldn’t worship my holier-than-thou father.
Marked-for-life = deathly afraid of pretty girls, so unable to relate.
44&1/2 years married to one, but I kept to myself.
Before ***** was *****, my super-cute physical-therapist after my knee-change. Scared at first, but I got so I could talk to her.
If not for *****, I probably woulda never responded to ***** saying hello.
Many pretty ladies have come and gone since. And thanks to Killian I got so I could to talk to ‘em.
I began using Killian as chick-bait. Now that he’s gone I can talk to pretty girls myself.
My most recent triumph is striking up conversations — like with pretty ladies. I keep doing it because I never get smacked, even when I tell a girl she has pretty eyes.
Doing so seems to make us both feel extremely good.
The mere act of striking up a conversation tells that girl I was attracted to her enough to do that.
I ran into a pretty young jogger once on a nearby rail-trail, I struck up a conversation, and she was thrilled.
All I wanted was to shoot the breeze, talk with her as equals.
I was perceived as not trying to score a trophy.
Girls like that; especially the pretty ones. They always hafta be wary.
I also told ***** striking up a conversation seemed rare. That being the case, it seems like girls like it more that I was attracted enough to strike up a conversation.
“He likes me; and he’s not hittin’ on me.”
Responses have been so positive, I strike up conversations like crazy.
“I never can get outta this supermarket without striking up a conversation with some pretty lady.”
“DO IT! DO IT! DO IT! DO IT!” Even though stuff piles up.
The lady talks and talks and talks to me, and she smiles and her eyes twinkle.
The smile and eyes are what count!
I can’t resist!

• “All I need is one of your smiles; Sunshine of your eyes, oh, me, oh, my…..” “Scotch and Soda,” 1958, The Kingston Trio.
• “Killian,” a “rescue Irish-Setter,” was my most recent dog. He made age-11, and was my seventh Irish-Setter, an extremely lively dog. A “rescue Irish-Setter” is usually an Irish-Setter rescued from a bad home; e.g. abusive or a puppy-mill. Or perhaps its owner died. (Killian was a divorce victim.) By getting a rescue-dog I avoid puppydom, but the dog is often messed up. —Killian was fine. He was my fifth rescue. (Yet another dog lost to canine cancer.)

“Women are so forgiving”

—“Tell me the rest of your story,” ***** said.
“No, you go swim,” I said to *****, who was gonna swim laps in Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming-pool, which she lifeguards.
“No, I wanna hear the rest of your story,” ***** said.
“***** wants to hear the rest of your story before she swims her laps?”
So said the little voice in the back of my head, except this time it was the ghost of Hilda Q. Walton, my hyper-religious Sunday-School superintendent neighbor who would be glad to tell me “never in a million years will ***** wanna hear the rest of your story!”
That headline is a repeat of a comment an old college friend made when she heard about ***** being so turned off by my “zinger” suggesting she join me for dinner.
Yet ***** reappeared a day-or-two later like my muck-up never occurred.
Another zinger recently, although not as bad as the first. But again I thought ***** and I were done forever.
I only meet ***** one day a week — my aquatic balance class in that swimming-pool.
“Be positive!” I said to myself. “Let ‘er know you’re happy to see her.”
I knocked on the wall-glass separating the pool from the YMCA lobby.
Yrs Trly learned that knocking-trick at Thompson Hospital’s Physical-Therapy lobby, where I knock on the wall-glass from outside.
“Let ‘em know;” my two pretty lady friends, the so-called “temperature-ladies” in the PT lobby per COVID-19.
“Don’t be scared, DO IT! DO IT! DO IT!” Don’t avoid her. Let ‘er know! “Happy-to-see-ya” is contagious.
We waved at each other after I knocked. Starting out on the right foot I guess.
“I’m hoping we can talk sometime today,” I said to her poolside. “Not right now, but sometime.”
Yr Fthfl Srvnt has learned a few things about how to deal with women. One being to not hit ‘em with one complete topic in one fell swoop.
***** and I are still strangers: we’re not married; we don’t finish each other’s sentences, or “I was just thinking the same thing.”
Hit the average person with a complete topic and you’ll lose ‘em with the first sentence, which you’re probably gonna hafta repeat.
So give her a chance to cogitate: develop anticipation for what you’re gonna say. “I wonder what’s on his mind; what’s he gonna say to me?”
Finally, after 45 minutes of staggering around, balance class finished, I talked to *****. And she was ready to listen to me. I wasn’t hitting her with a completely unknown topic outta the clear blue sky.
Women love to talk; and we were talking.
I wasn’t verbally staggering all over having to repeat every single phrase, boring poor *****.
And much to the angry dismay of Faire Hilda, ***** wanted me to finish what I said before she swam her laps.

• I do aquatic balance training in Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming-pool, currently one class per week — 45 minutes — less than usual due to COVID-19.

“You have the eyes!”

—“There she is again!” I said to myself.
“Did you not just get outta my way?” I asked her.
“Other side of the store?” she asked.
“What it is,” I said; “is you have the eyes.”
She blushed. I was telling her she had pretty eyes, and I wasn’t being a sleaze about it.
“You were blessed,” I said. “Many weren’t.
Pretty blue eyes, and smiling at me.
By then our eyes had met and WOW!
If there’s one thing I learned since my wife died it’s how to strike up a conversation.
I turned down that aisle just so I could talk to that lady.
Apparently striking up a conversation hardly ever happens; and ten years ago I wouldna done it.
Striking up a conversation isn’t flirting; unless you wanna say telling a lady she’s pretty is FLIRTING.
She already stepped aside for me once, and I didn’t say anything.
Then there she was again, so I had to tell her. I woulda skipped that aisle, but there she was again.
Apparently I do it right; I haven’t been smacked yet.
“Thank goodness for Wegmans,” I said to myself as I turned out of their parking-lot.
A litany of goof-ups occurred here at home. Worst was leaving a stove-burner on over five hours.
(Haven’t burned the house down yet!)
So my need for bananas from Weggers was a blessing. Escape from utter stupidity.
And best of all was striking sparks with a pretty lady.
No matter what my critics say, she was smiling at me. It wasn’t faked.
“Why thank you,” she whispered.

• I can’t escape that supermarket without striking sparks with some pretty lady.

“You’re a busy man”

—“Every day something,” I said to my bereavement-counselor.
She was phoning to set up next month’s counseling-session.
—A) Yesterday (Monday) was pretty *****, head-honcho at my in-store supermarket pharmacy. ***** was probably the first pretty lady I successfully befriended — that is, who I wanted to befriend, and I succeeded.
—B) Today (Tuesday) would be the “temperature ladies” outside Thompson Hospital’s Physical-Therapy department. They determine whether you’re COVID-19 free.
One is pretty ******, astonishingly cute, and also quite young. I’m probably old enough to be her grandfather.
No matter, she seems to wanna talk to me. And that’s despite my mucking up royally with her a couple weeks ago.
—C) Tomorrow (Wednesday) will be my pretty lifeguard friend at Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming-pool. But that’s if she wants to talk to me, since I screwed up royally with her the other day.
If she doesn’t, there’s always Mrs. ******, my vaunted aquacise instructor — who seems to want me to continue liking her, despite her being married. (In fact, I’ll probably be trying to talk to both.)
That lifeguard friend is also married, but we seem to have got past that.
Pretty ***** at the pharmacy is married too.
****** may be too young to be married.
—D) Thursday I’d go up to hike Lehigh Valley RailTrail, risking another fabulous encounter with a pretty lady.
“Why always Lehigh Valley RailTrail?” people ask.
“Pretty ladies,” I say; “left-and-right, in abundance.”
—E) Friday I have a neurology appointment with another *******. She’s also married, but makes a very cute face. She twists her mouth, and looks askance = “yer makin’ that face again!”
She’s supposed to be professional, but mostly we laugh and carry-on = “hello Mr. Hughes,” she says.
“Nyuk-nyuk-nyuk-nyuk!” I say.
****** the neurologist prescribed an MRI brain-scan, but the hospital called back and told her they couldn’t find a brain.
****** the neurologist roared in laughter, but one of her male cohorts got upset.
Why is it women can laugh and men can’t?
—F) Saturday I shop the Canandaigua Weggers to buy groceries for the following week.
I never can get outta that store without striking sparks with some pretty lady. All I’m doing is striking up a conversation, which they perceive as my being attracted to them.
And they love it!
Yes, I was attracted enough to strike up a conversation, and apparently striking up a conversation is rare — especially since I ain’t hittin’ on ‘er.
—G) Sunday is Lehigh Valley RailTrail again, risking another encounter with a pretty lady.
“You’re a busy man,” my counselor says.
“And this is the way it’s been for weeks,” I said. “Every day striking sparks with some pretty lady!”
“No pretty lady will strike sparks with you!”
Childhood reversed! Marked for life! I was convinced of that 70+ years ago — my hyper-religious Sunday-School superintendent neighbor, and my Bible-thumping parents.
Today (Tuesday) will be the temperature ladies, with super-cute ******#1.
After 70+ years of hiding from pretty ladies, I am stunned I strike sparks as well as I do.
She’s my bereavement-counselor, but all we ever talk about is recovery from my dreadful childhood.

“Keep in touch”

—“You can do it,” the little voice says.
“Say hello to pretty *****. Don’t be scared.
She’ll probably like it.”
(Pretty ***** being head-honcho of my supermarket pharmacy in Honeoye Falls.)
“Gotta say hello to ***** before I leave,” I said.
(She’s also tiny.)
BOINK! She did it again.
She sprang from her workstation deep inside her pharmacy, and zoomed to the window so we could talk.
I’m not used to this readers. It’s the way I was brought up: “Pretty ***** will not wanna talk to you! You are DESPICABLE!”
“My son really likes that calendar,” she chirped. “He goes to bed with it every night.”
That’s my annual train-calendar. I gave one to *****, and she handed it over to her little boy.
“I had a thought,” I said, as she told me how thrilled her son was with that calendar.
“Uh-oh…….” she said.
“Go ahead, SAY IT,” the little voice says.
“Do I say this, or don’t I?” I think to myself.
HEM-HAW! Hesitation and whispering on my part.
“If your son likes trains so much, maybe we could chase trains sometime.”
“That’s a wonderful idea,” she bubbled.
“Are you sure?” I moaned.
“If we do it,” I said: “I want your husband along.”
“Oh don’t worry about him,” ***** said. “He’s so far out of it, he won’t even know the difference.”
At this point I think to myself: “What are you telling me *****? Are you happy? Is your husband as happy-to-see-ya as I am? ‘Happy-to-see-ya’ makes your subject happy-to-see-ya. It’s contagious!”
“‘DREAMIN’!” my critics bellow. “You think too much!”
“I’m not pursuing *****,” I counter.
“We’re just talking, and I discovered women love talking.”
“Well,” I say; “we could visit that railroad-museum in Rush, but it may not be open due to COVID-19.
“Been there many times,” ***** said.
Beyond that, that museum is not 40 mph,” I said. “No 5-10 mph dawdling for this kid! Got to be doin’ at least 40 to be any fun.
The CSX main goes through Rochester, and there is a location where I’ve watched trains there myself.
Trouble is I’m not savvy up there in Rochester. Altoona I know fairly well, but that’s 260 miles away.”
“Keep in touch,” ***** kept saying.

• My brother and I photograph trains down near Altoona PA, where the old Pennsylvania Railroad crossed Allegheny Mountain. The railroad is now Norfolk Southern. Every year I take 13 of our 89 bazilyun photographs to assemble into a calendar — I do it with Shutterfly. I give those calendars as Christmas presents.

Not a Facebook “like”

—“How come always Lehigh Valley RailTrail,” people ask;” instead of Boughton Park, which is nearer?”
“Two reasons,” I say:
—A) “That’s where Killian’s ashes are.”
and —B) “Lotsa pretty ladies.”
“Here she comes!” the little voice says.
“DO IT! DO IT! DO IT! DO IT! DO IT!
Say something to her! Don’t be afraid. You’ve done it before.”
“Your dog looks old,” I say.
“Ten years old,” she says.
“You keep going that way,” I say; “and you’ll pass my dog’s ashes.”
“Awwwww…….”
“Cancer always wins,” I say. “Lost him four months ago.”
“Lost my husband to cancer,” she says; “ten years ago.”
“My wife too,” I say. “Almost nine years for me.”
Yack-yack-yakkity-yack; 5-10 minutes of pleasant bantering: battin’ emotions back-and-forth.
Proof yet again that striking up a conversation is always worth it — especially with a lady.
“Another bereaver,” I think myself. “It ain’t easy,” I whispered to her.
“Ya gonna get another dog?” she asked.
“Don’t know as I should,” I said. “I’m almost 77.”
“Get an older dog,” she says. “No puppies!”
“It’s not flirting,” a friend tells me.
“But if I strike up a conversation,” I’d say to that friend; “it tells that girl I was attracted enough by her to strike up a conversation.
Which she likes, then I like that she likes it, then she likes that, and we end up liking each other = striking sparks.
I’ve had it happen!

• “Killian,” a “rescue Irish-Setter,” was my most recent dog. He made age-11, and was my seventh Irish-Setter, an extremely lively dog. A “rescue Irish-Setter” is usually an Irish-Setter rescued from a bad home; e.g. abusive or a puppy-mill. Or perhaps its owner died. (Killian was a divorce victim.) By getting a rescue-dog I avoid puppydom, but the dog is often messed up. —Killian was fine. He was my fifth rescue.

Bigga-Bazoomza

Taste and decorum here! I cropped out pretty *****’s face, so she’s not stalked by some drooling ne’er-do-well geezer.

—Facebook, in its infinite all-knowing wisdom, has apparently decided I should get acres and acres of deep, dark cleavage.
UHMMM; yer barking up the wrong tree Mark.
Facebook is hurling lots of buxom honeys, all completely unknown to me, as “friend” suggestions.
Two so far; one being the bottom picture, blogged as truckstop candy.
Second is some pretty young cutie-pie who wasn’t able to finish her dress. “In a relationship,” it says.
The top picture is supposedly not Facebook — it was only e-mail.
Somehow it got past my two spam detectors, and ended up as a valid e-mail.
I opened it, and was immediately swamped by bigga-bazooms.
***** is cute, but them bigga-bazooms would be a distraction.
How ya supposed to enjoy the company of a lady if ya can’t even breathe?
Sex is not what’s important to this dude. What matters is “can we talk?”
Talk-talk-talk-talk; that’s where the pleasure is.
How can you talk smothered in bigga-bazooms? How can you talk with bigga-bazooms distracting you?
Most of my lady-friends are nowhere near as well-endowed as the ladies pictured.
They have what matters, their smile or eyes are ravishing.
A couple weeks ago I Googled a song my long-ago rock ’n’ roll band — high-school — played as a girl sang. It was “Scotch and Soda,” by the Kingston Trio, back in 1958.
It had a fabulous line in its lyrics: “All I need is one of your smiles, sunshine of your eyes, oh, me, oh, my…..”
There it is, readers! Every one of my lady-friends has done that to me over the past few months, and many are flat-as-a-board. (Well, maybe not “flat-as-a-board,” but no bigga-bazooms.)
When that lady smiles at me I am smitten.
It’s my past of course = “no pretty lady will smile you!”
Every time I read that “Scotch and Soda” line I tear up.
Some pretty lady smiling at me counters 70+ years of thinking “no pretty lady will have anything to do with you!”

More taste and decorum! I cropped out pretty *****’s face so she too wouldn’t be stalked by slobbering geezers. (She’s pretty, but I seen prettier.)

• “Mark” is Mark Zuckerberg, head honcho of Facebook.

Silver-haired beauty

—“I keep running into you,” I said to a pretty lady in my supermarket.
She had long flowing silver hair.
“This is the third time,” I said.
“Every time I see you I wonder if your hair-color is real.”
“Oh I wish it were,” she said.
“The reason I ask,” I said; “is because my kid-sister in VA is letting her hair go gray.
And she’s rather assertive about it; like it’s the coming thing: a statement against the common male misperception that a lady has to dye her hair to remain attractive.”
We were at the hot soups kiosk, soup for consumption in a nearby eating nook, or to take home in a cardboard container.
“I was thinking of letting it go gray,” she said, as she ladled some turkey concoction into a cardboard container.
I considered rendering the old vegetarian waazoo that “no turkey should hafta sacrifice its life,” etc. etc.
“They don’t have it,” I said instead. I had been looking for lentil chili to take home.
“See ya later!” I said as I walked away.
“Nice meeting you,” she said.
What’s notable is I said anything to her at all. Ten years ago I wouldna, but things are different since my wife died.
Some of my readers complain I celebrate too much about breaking free of 70+ years of “no pretty lady will associate with you!”
Another friend tells me I’m not flirting; that all I’m doing is striking up a conversation.
She’s right, but the fact I struck up a conversation tells that lady I considered her attractive enough to strike up a conversation.
Striking up a conversation is rare, especially with pretty girls.
That pretty girl loves that I found her attractive enough to strike up a conversation, yet I ain’t hittin’ on her.
So that silver-haired beauty can you go home and tell her husband/boyfriend/main-squeeze/whatever some aging bum struck up a conversation with her based on her pretty hair.
Yes, her hair gave me an opening line, and she definitely was not a Harley mama.
(I doubt I could strike up a conversation with a Harley mama — no smokers, no drinkers, no gamblers, no sluts or slatterns; only classy ladies.)
I hoped I’d meet her one more time as I left, saying “there you are again.” (I didn’t.)
Saying that repeats something I did two weeks ago after striking sparks with another cutie pie.
They love when I do that, so “DO IT! DO IT! DO IT! DO IT!” says the little voice in the back of my head.
Let ‘em know you noticed = that you’re attracted to ‘em.
I had gone to that supermarket fully intending to not say anything to anyone.
But she was pretty; and I kept running into her.
Free at last from my 70-year fear of pretty ladies!

• My wife died almost nine years ago.

“No blog-material,” he says to himself

—“You look like a store employee,” I said to the pretty young girl rearranging stuff on a shelf.
“I am!” she said, as she turned toward me.
Overweight, but “WOW!” I thought to myself. “How am I supposed to ask you a question, when your eyes are so gorgeous?”
I didn’t say that of course, but I was speechless = stunned!
HEM-HAW; “I haven't shopped this store in years, so I don’t know where the coffee is.”
“Well we want you back,” she said.
“I shop the Weggers in Canandaigua,” I said. “I live in West Bloomfield.”
We were in the Pittsford-Plaza Wegmans; what I call “the-jewel-in-the-crown.” A supermarket so big you need a powered cart to shop it. And they have a valet service out in its vast parking lot. There even is a two-story segment.
Wegmans has many supermarkets in the Rochester area, but Pittsford-Plaza is the the-jewel-in-the-crown.
The girl was overweight but had gorgeous eyes. They were such a distraction I quickly forgot where she told me the coffee was.
What I didn’t do was tell her she had gorgeous eyes. And I shoulda.
“You’re probably married,” I woulda said. “Which means your husband sees those eyes a lot. I may never see ‘em again in my entire life!”
She was smiling at me! I’m always a sucker for that.
She wasn’t pushing me off.
Last weekend in the Canandaigua Weggers I told a complete stranger she had gorgeous eyes — and they were gorgeous.
And she was a shopper, not a store employee.
She was “touched;” “you are so sweet,” she said. I really hit the mark with her, and I almost didn’t say anything.
“Every day something!” I say.
There are seven days in a week, and five-or-six of those days I’m likely to have some fabulous female encounter.
This coming Saturday I hafta shop the Canandaigua Weggers to buy groceries for the coming week.
What’s it gonna be this weekend?
Every fabulous female encounter is blog-material = something worth blogging.
I got things to do: banking, checks to write, accounts to reconcile, tax records to update, and making sense of the gigantic pile of papers next to this computer.
That means no contact with pretty ladies at the supermarket.
Which was what I was gonna do last week, except there was that lady with her gorgeous eyes.

Good times with my lady-friends return

—“Good afternoon, ********* Kennels, can I help you?”
“This sounds like *****,” I exclaimed.
“I turned around and drove back in case what I saw was your car. I haven’t seen you in months!
I’m out here in your parking-lot, and it was a Jeep Cherokee, and that’s your car.”
“I have an eye appointment,” ***** said; “but I’ll be out in a minute to warm up my car, and we can chat.”
“Chat?” “Talk?” “Shoot the breeze?” To me it’s laugh and smile at each other. The simple exchange of emotions, enjoying each other’s company.
Finally there she is. “Hooray-hooray!” I said to myself. A lady-friend I can strike sparks with instead of striking out like I did so many times this past week.
Story after story after story: her partner’s mother had recently been killed in a nearby head-on car accident, blood transfusion for her husband, etc. etc.
“I usually don’t pass here,” I said. “I use back roads to avoid the Bloomfield speed-trap. 500 smackaroos —‘welcome to Bloomfield’!
But the other day I stopped and met ****, and she had let her hair down. ‘Keep it that way,’ I told her. Suddenly **** was cute. Make sure she knows that!”
We talked and talked and talked some more. “Chatting” equals laughing and smiling, plus bewailing the sad stuff.
“What about ****?” I asked, my cute little college-age friend.
“I told her to get another job,” ***** said. “Business is so slow I can’t afford much. Afternoons we’re closed — no one is here at all.”
“The last time I saw ****, I told her I didn’t look forward to losing one of the most pleasant lady-friends I ever had.
She told me that wouldn’t happen, but no **** for five months.”
**** would smile at me, and light up the entire kennel. Her eyes would twinkle. She was incredible.
***** is cute, but she’s 48.
Much more importantly she’s great fun to talk to. We laugh and smile and commiserate the sad stuff.
“No dog yet,” I told her. They all loved Killian at that kennel.
“And what I want is another Irish-Setter.”
“Why?” ***** asked.
“Because Irish-Setters are chick-magnets!”
***** laughed.
I could bore you all noting ten years ago our “chatting” wouldna happened.
“No cutie will talk to you!”

• “Killian,” a “rescue Irish-Setter,” was my most recent dog. He made age-11, and was my seventh Irish-Setter, an extremely lively dog. A “rescue Irish-Setter” is usually an Irish-Setter rescued from a bad home; e.g. abusive or a puppy-mill. Or perhaps its owner died. (Killian was a divorce victim.) By getting a rescue-dog I avoid puppydom, but the dog is often messed up. —Killian was fine. He was my fifth rescue. (Yet another dog lost to canine cancer.)

“Who’s hitting these things” continued

—“A cellphone hit is a BlogSpot hit!” I exclaimed.
—1) Write blog and publish on BlogSpot.
—2) Crank blog-link into Facebook, usually the same day I publish.
—3) The following day I e-mail blog-links to my constant-readers out there in cyberspace. There used to be about 30, but I cut back to maybe 15.
The idea was to see if anyone was reading these blogs from Facebook. Only Facebook “friends” can do that — and I don’t have many.
Many of my Facebook “friends” are not among my constant-readers.
Plus that Facebook “friend” has to be notified I Facebooked that blog link. I’ve heard hoary stories about the dreaded Facebook algorithm.
Often one or two Facebook hits (visits) per blog, and I don’t know who they are.
The other day I noticed a single hit before I Facebooked my blog. Someone (I thought) was hitting direct to BlogSpot.
Who could that be?
My friend in Californy has a reader that probably grabs direct.
Another possible is my pretty lifeguard friend at Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming-pool. Long ago she suggested she could Google “BobbaLew-BlogSpot.” Her hit would be direct.
Then I realized I could “proof” a published blog on my iPhone, saving me having to disconnect and move this laptop.
I started doing that, but I gotta publish to be able to do it.
That puts an “unproofed” blog out there for grabbing by all and sundry.
Not a problem if the blog-link wasn’t Facebooked or e-mailed yet.
Or so I thought!
I noticed I was getting blog hits before I even Facebooked or e-mailed.
My lifeguard friend mayhap?
If so, good for her. Many of my recent blogs say she is pretty.
The first thing I do every morning is fire up this machine, then look at my blog-monitor to see if anyone hit the blog overnight before I Facebooked or e-mailed it.
The other morning no hits at first.
I then “proofed” it on my iPhone, then “refreshed” my laptop blog-monitor, and suddenly it had one hit.
Perhaps my lifeguard friend just got up and grabbed it? Or perhaps my Californy friend’s reader grabbed it while she was asleep?
I again “proofed” it on my iPhone, then again “refreshed” my laptop blog-monitor, and suddenly it had two hits.
HMMMMNNNNN.
Time for a test, even though science (GASP!) is a conspiracy.
Try again: fire up blog on iPhone, then “refresh” laptop blog-monitor. Suddenly three hits.
Engage scientific method: try it again, and keep trying; all the way up to eight hits.
Scientifical conclusion time = HELLO! A cellphone hit is a DIRECT BlogSpot hit!
This puts the kibosh to my hope my lifeguard-friend was the one hitting my blog before anyone else.
This also puts the kibosh to my hope anyone else was hitting my blog before I e-mailed — like various Facebook “friends.”
So I was being led astray = proof yet again that my all-knowing critics are correct as always to say I think too much.
“No pretty lady will have anything to do with you!” (E.g. My lifeguard-friend, et al.)

Down days with my lady friends

—It had to happen.
So many positives perhaps I got overconfident.
So any attempt by me to strike sparks with a pretty lady fell flat.
I also been told I celebrate my incredible successes with pretty ladies too much.
It’s because long ago I was told “no pretty lady will have anything to do with you!”
So now when some pretty lady enjoys my company, and so many do, I am blown away.
I tell some complete stranger she has gorgeous eyes and she is touched.
I strike up a conversation with a pretty young jogger, and she is thrilled. I’m not hitting on her; we’re just talking. And I encourage her to talk to me. I don’t solicit her talking to me; I just let her talk.
I tell her I am so happy I struck up a conversation with her, and she tells me she’s similarly happy.
She tells me she hopes we meet again. We meet again two weeks later and she talks first. Totally unexpected with my history: “no pretty girl will talk to you!”
Once I met a bicyclist resting on a rock — I think she waited for me. She wasn’t that pretty but her smile was ravishing! We talked and talked and talked and talked. And she smiled and smiled and smiled! I don’t think she was faking it. Extravagant eye-contact, and she smiled and smiled and smiled.
She seemed thrilled I was talking to her. Her eyes were smiling, and I still can visualize her smile.
She basked in my listening to her, i.e. I considered her attractive.
The past couple days were not that way.
—First I would strike sparks with my two pretty lady-friends in the lobby beside Thompson Hospital’s Physical-Therapy department.
They been there since Thompson Physical-Therapy reopened after closing due to COVID-19.
Both are attractive, but one, ******, is extremely attractive. Young and cute, extremely cute.
The other girl has prettier eyes, but looks heavy. ****** isn’t.
I’d show them a humorous photo on my iPhone, except with masks “Facial-Recognition” no longer works.
Login (getting the phone working) is by entering a password on its virtual keyboard, and my fingering is spastic.
At least seven or eight failed attempts = 15-20 minutes.
So much for my quick laugh. The poor girls were left waiting for me.
By the time I got to our laugh, we were climbing the walls. By then pretty ****** was faking interest.
I don’t think I lost either, but never again.
“Happy to see ya,” and that will be all.
“Talk to me if you wish.”
—Next would be my pretty lifeguard-friend at Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming-pool.
“I been thinking about you,” I said to her.
What a stupid way to start a conversation with a lady.
“Don’t worry, it was clean,” I shouted. By now she was looking off into the distance.
I indeed had been thinking about her, that she was retirement age. She told me she’s 65.
“Sooner-or-later you’re gonna leave this place, and I’ll probably never see you again in my entire life.”
That’s a repeat of a similar discussion I had with my pretty college-age friend at the kennel that daycared my dog when he was still alive.
That discussion was over four months ago, and “I’m not going anywhere.”
I haven’t seen her since.
**** and I were great friends. So too is my lifeguard friend.
We’d laugh and smile at each other; mainly talk. By just talking to her I was telling her I liked her, that I found her attractive. —Which she liked.
My lifeguard friend is rather reserved. Maybe she has to be considering the responsibility she carries.
But sometimes we talk, and when she smiles at me I am smitten.
It’s my hoary childhood: “no pretty lady will smile at you!”
The next time I meet my pretty lifeguard-friend she makes the first move.
If I’ve lost her, well, so be it. I get what I deserve.
“Happy to see ya,” is about all I’ll say, unless we can still talk — and I hope we can.
—Last would be my vaunted aquacise-instructor, a cute little sprite for age 61. She’s definitely not a Harley-mama; in fact, she’s tiny.
Unfortunately she’s the lady I made all the mistakes with.
She was the first cutie-pie who smiled at me. I’m sure my wife did too, but I never noticed. That was a mess I was back then.
Then that aquacise-instructor wanted to walk dogs with me, which to someone with my history was the equivalent of a date.
Mistakes piled up. It seems she wants me to remain interested, but not too interested; since she’s married.
It’s probably her nature: she wants me to remain interested even though I pretty much avoid her anymore.
Here I am trying to not be too interested, yet there she is trying to strike up a conversation with me.
She picked the worst guy in the world to wanna walk dogs with = the dude messed up by hyper-religious zealots.
Nevertheless she was a female success over the past couple days.
Another would be pretty *****, head honcho of my nearby supermarket pharmacy.
Pretty ***** is married, and not gorgeous.
But she’s pretty enough to be a lady I woulda avoided years ago. She is probably the first pretty lady I ever befriended.
That is, I wanted to become friends with her, and succeeded.
Were it not for *****, that aquacise-instructor woulda scared me away.
Perhaps a week ago I was bothering *****’s pharmacy regarding COVID-19 vaccination, and I wanted to talk to pretty *****.
But she was on the phone, and couldn’t talk right then. So I said I’d come back later.
When I returned it looked like she was still on the phone, so I said I’d just say hello.
BOINK! “I’m not on the phone,” she said as she ran toward me.
Pretty ***** wants to talk to me! (She’s running across her pharmacy toward me.)
I’m not used to this readers: “no pretty lady will desire your company!”
Her wanting to talk to me the other day was not the first time. She’s hung with me before, surprising the daylights outta me.
We’ll see what happens next week: so many successes.
****** wants to talk, pretty ***** wants to talk, and that aquacise-instructor seems to wanna talk. Hopefully my pretty lifeguard friend will too.
If not, complete strangers are smitten when I tell them they have gorgeous eyes. —I had one yesterday at the Pittsford-Plaza Wegmans.
And no one has smacked me yet!
I am rather lost: no contact with women through 70+ years.

Beauty revisited

—Her name is ******.
But after our surfeit of eye-contact and talking to each other, her beauty is downgraded.
I used to say ****** was “extremely pretty.” But now I only say “pretty.”
She’s still pretty enough to scare me off ten years ago. But I’ve seen prettier.
My earlier assessment of her beauty was probably colored by wondering how a 76-year-old, outta shape geezer could ever talk to anyone so pretty.
But now I can, and she seems to wanna talk to me. And this is despite my goofing up earlier on my first try.
Yes, I enjoy talking to any pretty girl, but after all our face-to-face and eye-contact, I only think she’s cute. Incredibly cute. Strikingly cute.
Her pretty brown eyes aren’t the gorgeous eyes of her sidekick.
Yesterday was a disaster. I would try to make her laugh. I’d show her and her sidekick a picture on my iPhone.
With masks “Facial-Recognition” no longer works. In which case I have to login to my iPhone via my virtual keyboard.
My spastic fingering delays things.
Logging in took at least seven tries, maybe 20 minutes.
So much for a quick laugh — and I love making my lady-friends laugh.
I was hoping I could get ****** laughing. But I don’t think I did.
So much time got wasted logging in, the poor girl was waiting for me!
Our laugh was supposed to be regarding my fitted-sheet heaped atop my dryer.
We never got that far, although probably we did after 10-15 minutes of exasperation.
She ended up telling me how to fold a fitted-sheet; a chance for her to talk instead of me.
And women love talking. All I know is her name, but “yada-yada-yada-yada-yada!”
I found out her name after asking “who’s ******?”
It was ****** who answered my car’s Bluetooth phonecall.
Well, it seems we can talk. She knows who I am, and I know her name is ******.
No Smartphone shenanigans next week. Just “happy to see ya,” and I think the feeling will be mutual.
My critics will loudly disagree, but I’ve experienced so much joy I can’t agree with them.
Many of my lady-friends forgave me just so we could talk. I think ****** has.

• ****** and her sidekick are the two check-in ladies in the lobby next to Thompson Hospital’s Physical-Therapy department per COVID-19. I do a weekly exercise program in that Physical-Therapy department.
• ****** seems very young = early 20s. I’m probably old enough to be her grandfather.

Marcy

Granny comes to the receptionist-desk Uzi blazing. (Photoshop.)

—“Grady, where do you get all this insane and outrageous stuff to write up?”
“Marcy, it’s everywhere!” I’d shout.
During my final years of employ at the Daily-Messenger newspaper in Canandaigua, the guy in the cubicle next to mine quit, and a new employee named “Marcy” moved in.
I called her “the new girl” at first, but stopped when I found she didn’t like it.
We were all in the Messenger’s gigantic newsroom — I guess we “produced” the newspaper.
Marcy was sort of an artist; and I was sort of an editorial-assistant. Marcy used her artistic and computer skills to generate pages for the newspaper, whereas I generated copy for those pages. Plus I even wrote a little, although it wasn’t reportage.
Marcy and I don’t have much in common. She’s more outgoing, and I keep to myself.
But apparently we both have the jaundiced-eye. or at least I do, and she likes it.
How we both got this way I have no idea, although in my case I know it’s a product of my childhood with hyper-religious parents.
Marcy is from the rural outback of western NY, whereas I am from the world’s arm-pit: south Jersey.
She is from Canisteo, (NY), and I know there is no cell-phone service in the Canisteo river valley.
I am from a sleepy south Jersey suburb, where the principal scenic attractions were gravel pits and oil refineries. (One could say my view of the world was determined by my south Jersey childhood.)
One day Marcy was in her cubicle on the phone telling her caller she worked under the “plaque-wall.” (The back wall of the newsroom was where the newspaper hung its many plaques.)
“Did I hear the word ‘plaque’?” I shouted. “Somebody say the word ‘plaque’?”
“There is no plaque in the Dental Hall of Fame!”
Marcy blew her coffee all over the floor!
In other words, she got it, and to her it was hilarious.
So began our relationship of continuous laughing. With 99% of the people I meet, I hafta explain what I just said. With Marcy, and my wife, I never had to explain anything = they always got it.
At the Mighty Mezz our coffee machines were in a lunchroom upstairs. About 9 AM I would leave my cubicle to go upstairs to get coffee.
“Ahl be bahk!” I’d say to Marcy, with my best Arnold Schwarzenegger imitation.
With anyone else I couldn’t do it, but with Marcy I could, because she would get it.
During my final years I was doing the newspaper’s website. I doubt hardly anyone looked at it, but I was obsessed with trying to put as much “art” on it as possible (photography, etc.).
I’d get in trouble for throwing too many pictures on it, but each picture was 10 to 15 minutes for me, so they weren’t time-consuming.
One picture we always did was the daily weather-drawing, submitted by a child for publication on the weather-page. Usually the child’s parents or grandparents submitted that drawing.
One time I was going on vacation the next week, so the question was who would do the website, since it was me doing it.
A management minion came over to harass Marcy, so I mentioned I was going on vacation, and wondered who would do the website.
“Dave knows how to do it,” minion said.
“But Dave doesn’t know how to do the weather-drawing, and you know what happens if we don’t publish that weather-drawing. Granny comes in to the receptionist-desk with Uzis blazing!”
“Ya lost me Bob,” minion said.
“I GOT IT!” Marcy yelled.
Come Christmas Marcy would decorate her cubicle with Christmas lights. I’d get there maybe a half-hour before her, so when she came in she would plug in all her Christmas lights.
“OOOO” and “Ahhh,” I’d say.
LAUGH ALERT!
We were always striking sparks like that = laughing.
When I first met Marcy I was doing writing like this for my family’s website, which was like Facebook became = exchange of family information, except Facebook was also identifying potential buyers. In my case acres and acres of deep female cleavage, I suppose because of my age.
I’d write stuff for my family’s website, then e-mail it to her also — I thought she’d like it.
Years ago I e-mailed her a report about my wife and I marching our Irish-Setter in Rochester’s annual St. Patrick’s Day parade. I reported members of the Brighton Volunteer Fire-Department were openly urinating on the manicured lawns of Rochester’s mega-rich.
“Grady, you should be blogging this stuff,” she’d say.
So here I am, over 14 years with BlogSpot; still crankin’ the same jaundiced-eye maunderings I long-ago wrote for my college newspaper.
Like retirement of “Sam-the-Soda-Machine,” an “institution” in front of our college’s tiny radio station, 12 watts.
And also the fact a secretary “liked” the tangle of varicolored wires emanating through holes in the wallboard as her office was remodeled.
“Marcy, it’s everywhere!” I’d shout.
Finally I gave her a very important pearl-of-wisdom: “Marcy, yer gonna get married someday. Whatever ya do, marry somebody who can make ya laugh. Do that and yer in it for the long-haul..”
I told her that because my wife always told me the reason we lasted 44&1/2 years was because I could make her laugh.
I’ve told that to many pretty young girls since: “Now listen to him,” an older lady-friend would say. “This is extremely important. Don’t let us down; don’t make a mistake!”
And I think Marcy married a guy who could make her laugh. Jealousy, exasperation, anger, who knows what. But if the dude can make ya laugh you’ll get over it.
Marcy and I are worlds apart, but I’m thrilled we still strike sparks.
And Marcy is out in Californy = I may never see her again.

• Marcy, and everyone else at the Mighty Mezz, called me “Grady.” See blurb at right.

Fabricatin’

—“Were you the gentleman who told me the other day I had pretty eyes?” the lady would ask.
“Could be,” I'd say. “Lemme see…….
Yep!” I’d say, after looking straight into her pretty eyes.
“Yer eyes are still gorgeous, so it was probably me.”
“That was so touching!” she’d say.
“And I was touched you found that touching,” I’d say.
“I hafta continually remind myself I actually told you that,” I’d say.
“I usually keep to myself. In fact I was gonna avoid you. Scared of pretty ladies.
But I am so glad I told you that.
You and I are complete strangers, so you don’t know my history.
70+ years ago I was told no pretty lady would have anything to do with me.
My wife died over eight years ago — cancer always wins. She put up with me over 44 years, despite the royal mess I was, and still am somewhat.
Now that she’s gone I discover those fevered zealots who convinced me I was despicable were WRONG!
I also had a dog — my four-legged chick-magnet now also gone — who got me used to talking to pretty girls.
A while ago I did similar. I went to Applebee’s to pick up pre-ordered takeout. A smashingly beautiful young girl brought it out.
‘I hafta say something,’ I said. ‘I’m 76 years old, and you’re a pretty girl.’
She blushed, and I was stunned. The lifelong scumbag told a girl she was pretty?
You’re not the first. I told another lady she had gorgeous eyes, and she did.
What’s amazing is now I can do this.
I got much better at striking up conversations, even with gorgeous ladies. And apparently I say the right things.
Too innocent and inexperienced to be devious.
So your eyes are gorgeous, and I’m not trying to get cozy.
Ten years ago I wouldna said anything to you at all. I woulda been scared.”
“DREAMIN’!” my critics shout.

“I been thinkin’”

—I’d say that to *****, my lifeguard friend at Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming pool.
And I better say “pretty,” because if I don’t she might be hurt.
It’s like ****, a receptionist at Thompson Physical-Therapy, to whom I gave my annual train-calendar because she always smiled at me every time I said hello.
**** was thrilled some dude cared that much about her.
I always said hello, because I figgered she’d be hurt if I didn’t.
I always knock on the glass enclosing Thompson’s Physical-Therapy lobby. I became friends with two pretty ladies inside per COVID-19.
One is extremely pretty.
I knock on the glass because they might be hurt wondering why if I didn’t.
No hurt lady-friends, so ***** is my “pretty lifeguard friend.”
“Be careful with that thinkin’ jazz,” I was long ago told at the Mighty Mezz. “Thinkin’ is dangerous!”
***** is the lady to whom I told “my wife would say I flirt too much.”
“You’re not flirting,” ***** declared. “All you’re doing is striking up a conversation. It’s not flirting unless there’s evil intent.”
“EXACTLY!” I shouted. “No evil intent.”
My wife died over eight years ago, and I been on-my-own ever since. I miss the companionship = no one to talk to.
But no desire to remarry. I was lucky to do as well as I did. My wife was extraordinary.
My wife might switch from “flirting” to “strike up conversations too much.”
Enjoying the company of some lady other than my wife would be threatening to my wife.
Understandable. She was almost as badly brought up as me. That’s why she could endure my madness.
“NO PRETTY LADY WILL HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH YOU!” I was long ago told. “No talking, no smiling, no female friendship whatsoever. You are DESPICABLE!”
That was my hyper-religious Sunday-School superintendent neighbor. My Bible-Beating parents heartily agreed. I was rebellious and disgusting because I couldn’t worship my holier-than-thou father.
That “despicable” albatross hung over me 70+ years. And now, after losing probably the best friend I ever had — she actually liked me — I emerge from my hoary past.
That’s exactly what I’m doing.
Striking up conversations, especially with pretty ladies, negates my sordid childhood.
And sadly my beloved wife woulda been fragile enough to feel threatened. Striking up conversations with ladies is so thrilling I do it too much.
“Hooray-Hooray; a guy who likes me as a person instead of as a trophy.”
Conversation begun, we talk and talk and talk and talk some more.
And usually the lady smiles at me, which admittedly I fish for.
“No pretty lady will smile at you” yet “you’re smiling at me; I can tell.”
“You’re cute,” a lady said after I noticed her twinkling her eyes at me.
“You are so sweet!” another lady whispered after I told her she had gorgeous eyes.
Stuff like that wasn’t supposed to happen to a lifelong scumbag. “No pretty lady will enjoy your company. You are disgusting, Bobby.”
So you nailed it, *****. “Striking up a conversation” instead of “evil intent.”
It is such fun to this kid, but my wife would feel threatened.

• My brother and I photograph trains down near Altoona PA, where the old Pennsylvania Railroad crossed Allegheny Mountain. The railroad is now Norfolk Southern. Every year I take 13 of our 89 bazilyun photographs to assemble into a calendar — I do it with Shutterfly. I give those calendars as Christmas presents.
• The “Mighty Mezz” is the Canandaigua Daily-Messenger newspaper, from where I retired 15 years ago. BEST job I ever had. I was employed there almost 10 years — over 11 if you count my time as a post-stroke unpaid intern. (I had a heart-defect caused stroke October 26th, 1993, from which I recovered fairly well. That defect was repaired.)

Thank you ***** wherever you are

—With any luck this coming Wednesday I will meet *****, my pretty (say it again) lifeguard friend at Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming-pool.
I hope she’s there. If she is, it will be our seventh consecutive encounter.
Our eyes will meet, and we’ll smile and wave at each other.
Two weeks ago I couldn’t do that. The ghost of my sordid childhood resurfaced: “she won’t wanna meet you again!”
So last week I beat down the ghost and “happy to see ya!” (And I am too.)
If I may say so, I think my joy draws her in.
We’ll meet, and she’ll say “BobbaLew; how are you?”
Per usual I’ll lock up, unable to respond appropriately.
*****, my coach, will say the words I should use. I may be able to force ‘em out.
Another female lifeguard does that; although I asked her.
“Please know my ability to socialize, especially with women, is NILL.
Please don’t give up on me!”
Now ***** does it, and I never asked her. — Thank you ***** wherever you are.
Enter the real me.
“Perfunctories aside, I sure hope you’re okay. It’s the sunshine of your smile and eyes.”
Forget romance! That’s for kids.
What we’re doing is reversing my hoary past.
“NO PRETTY LADY WILL SMILE AT YOU!”
Yet ***** does — I’ve seen it.
Others contribute. I’ve made many more lady friends than I ever expected.
But ***** is special.

• “Sunshine of your smile and eyes” is a misquote of a line from “Scotch and Soda” by the Kingston Trio back in 1958. “All I need is one of your smiles; Sunshine of your eyes, oh, me, oh, my…..” To this kid, that is female beauty. That means the lady likes hanging out with you. (NO PRETTY LADY WILL HANG OUT WITH YOU!”)

“You are so sweet”

—Saturday, go to supermarket, buy groceries for the coming week.
I walked away from the fish freezer — no haddock — headed toward a pretty lady with gorgeous eyes.
“Don’t say anything,” I said to myself.
I angled around her, and she didn’t move.
“I normally don’t say anything to anyone,” I said to her; “I normally keep to myself.
But your eyes are gorgeous.”
“Why thank you,” she whispered, caressing my sleeve.
“You are so sweet,” she added.
Did it again, readers, and I didn’t get smacked.
“Take the risk!” advises my bereavement-counselor.
“DO IT!” “DO IT!” “DO IT!” says the little voice in the back of my head.
The voice my hyper-religious parents and neighbor Sunday-School superintendent declared was the Devil-Incarnate.
But I am so glad I did that: make both me and her feel great.
Things are way different since my wife died. Ten years ago I wouldna said a word.

• As a result of my wife’s dying, I see a bereavement-counselor once a month. She’s become more psychiatrist, except she can’t prescribe drugs. Most times we talk about my dreadful childhood, and my recovery therefrom.

Ready for duty

My finely folded fitted sheet.

—“If it’s Tuesday,” I say to myself; “I strike sparks with Thompson Hospital’s ‘temperature-ladies,’ one of whom is extremely pretty.
Not gorgeous, but young and extremely pretty.”
Both “temperature-ladies” are young and attractive. But pretty-girl’s sidekick has eyes more gorgeous than pretty-girl. But sidekick looks a little overweight. Cute, but heavy.
Pretty-girl isn’t overweight. She’s also not a Harley-mama.
The temperature-ladies, whose names I don’t know, hold court in the lobby next to that hospital’s Physical-Therapy department.
I no longer do physical-therapy, but I still do an exercise program on that department’s machines.
The temperature-ladies are there per COVID-19 protocol. Pretty-girl takes your temperature, and her sidekick renders what I call the speech: “Covid symptoms including blah-blah-blah-blah-blah; out of the country within the last 90 days? Blah-blah……”
I do it over my car’s Bluetooth on my way in: “Please say a command.” “Call temperature-ladies!”
So how does a 76-year-old outta-shape geezer befriend one of the prettiest girls I’ve ever seen?
I tried to start a conversation a couple weeks ago: I told her she had pretty eyes.
Bad mistake! That made her nervous, eyes to the floor, smile disappeared.
“Oh well,” I thought to myself. “Another lost effort; try someone else.”
And pretty-girl has been constant since Physical-Therapy reopened. Her sidekick changed a few times.
Yrs Trly discovered the key to striking sparks with a pretty girl is most importantly: don’t hit on her! Treat her as a person instead of a sex-object — or a trophy.
More importantly, make ‘em laugh, and let ‘em talk. Women love talking, so let ‘em!
Pretty-girl has since gotten friendlier (opened back up). I got her laughing a few times, and treated her as an equal. Disregard her incredible beauty: “hooray-hooray; a male who likes me as a person!”
And don’t tell her I’m thrilled such a pretty girl wants to talk with me.
As you all know, I have a sordid history: “no pretty girl will associate with you! You are disgusting!”
Next Tuesday, I will walk into the Physical-Therapy lobby, and unholster my iPhone for the temperature-ladies.
“I could tell you a short story if you want,” and I bet they’ll wanna hear my story. (The simple exchange of emotions back-and-forth = let ‘em talk!)
“I received the Christmas annual a week ago from my cousin in Arlington, VA. He said something about his girlfriend (late ’70s) wanting him to learn how to fold a fitted sheet.”
That was the end of their relationship: his learning how to fold a fitted-sheet was utterly beyond the pale.
I quickly zagged into my laundry-room with my iPhone to photograph my finely folded fitted-sheet. Ready for duty; to be installed by my cleaning lady.
I bet those two ladies laugh; including the prettiest girl I’ve ever seen in my entire life (I think, although I may be wrong).
“What in the world is that old geezer doin’ attractin’ all them pretty ladies?”
Next will be the next day (Wednesday), when I might meet my pretty lifeguard friend again at Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming-pool. (Say it again; don’t be afraid.)
And let ‘em talk! Next time I won’t butt in on my lifeguard friend.

• “Harley-mama” defined: no smoking, no drinking, no gambling, no sluts or slatterns; nothing but class. No Harley-mamas for this kid!

“I like the bubble”

—A hairdresser (barber) probably reflects the opinions of whoever sits in his chair.
If I were to say “get The Donald out of office before he blows up the entire planet” my hairdresser would probably agree.
Yesterday I heard the other side. An older woman had come early, and was waiting for my hairdresser to finish cutting my hair.
“Antifa,” “Black Lives Matter,” et al. “The triumph of Socialism, our taxes will skyrocket; that Nancy Pelosi is wacko!
Little kids will never understand how to start a business; this country is doomed!
Black people never had it better than under The Donald.
So much for individual initiative: the smart ones get dumbed down, and the dumb ones get elevated.
This country is so divided, there is no way under Heaven we can reunite!”
With that I considered entering the fray, but I didn’t. I figured it was better to lay low.
Somewhat like my aquacise instructor, I possess this feeble hope of reuniting with kindness and compassion.
Not with someone like Rush Limbaugh, et al, to stoke the bigots and extremists.
Trump-supporters seem to be all-knowing knowers of all things.
“Every 10 miles during our drive back from FL, ‘this town for Donald Trump.’ Them Democrats stole the election!
First Texas will secede, but maybe not. A lot of Californians moved there.”
“Maybe I’ll move to Norway,” the lady said.
“Or maybe Sweden,” my hairdresser said. “First I thought Tennessee, but not anymore!”
What usually happens when I hit that hairdresser is I detail my various successes with my lady friends.
“Why in the world they’re interested in a 76-year-old outta-shape geezer I’ll never know. Maybe because I encourage ‘em to talk = talk-talk-talk-talk-talk-talk-talk.”
Not this time! No lady talk.
I scrunched down in the chair, and I didn’t utter a word. Clearly I was out-numbered. Kindness and compassion are for wusses.
Limberger in highest dudgeon!
Two years ago I was riding the train back after visiting my niece in Fort Lauderdale. I texted that aquacise instructor about how Fort Lauderdale, and where we live in Canandaigua NY, are two different worlds.
“We live in a bubble,” I commented.
“I like the bubble,” my friend said.
Yrs Trly avoids politics and religion in these blogs; but yesterday at my hairdresser was frightening.

• I do aquatic balance training in the Canandaigua YMCA’s swimming-pool, currently one class per week — almost an hour — less than usual due to COVID-19.
• “Limberger” is Rush Limbaugh. I call him that because I think he stinks.

“Happy to see ya!”

—“There’s one person I know!” I yelled at ********, queen of the Canandaigua YMCA exercise-gym.
I was walking through a hallway to the swimming-pool locker-room, and ******** was coming toward me with a trash-basket.
Smile-smile-smile-smile-smile; we were all wearing masks, but her eyes told me.
I know ********, and ******** knows me.
I began working out in that exercise-gym years ago, when my wife was still alive, and before that exercise-gym was remodeled = new equipment, etc.
At first ******** was intimidating, and I didn’t know she was a YMCA employee.
But then my wife died, and ******** and I became friends as I continued working out in that exercise gym.
But my balance began to degrade, and my pet-groomer mentioned that to a lady who runs aquacise in that YMCA’s swimming-pool. (She uses the same groomer.)
So I stopped working out in the exercise-gym, and switched to the swimming-pool.
I don’t see ******** much anymore, but occasionally — like in the pool area, or at my local supermarket.
She always seems thrilled to see me; like we know each other.
So, “happy to see ya!” Except what I shoulda said was “you’re smiling. Mask or not I can tell. Your eyes tell me!”
I wish I’d done that; she’s a really good friend, and she deserves it. She should know I really like her.
70 years late, and not much time left, Yr Fthfl Srvnt is learning what a joy it is to talk to someone. I have others too.
And much to my pleasant surprise, most are ladies.
I’ve tried men too, but often they get defensive or throw that macho-crap at you.
Women don’t, even complete strangers. Strike up a conversation with the lady, and OFF-WE-GO!
Years ago I woulda avoided ******** completely = I woulda never said a word to her.
Things are much different now, I have since learned that talking to someone, especially a lady, can be thrilling.
They laugh and smile at me, which I find immensely attractive.
This contradicts my sordid childhood: “No lady will associate with you! You are despicable!”
So, “Happy to see ya ********, and thanks for hanging with me despite my total inexperience at socializing.”
(******** isn’t the only one.)

I’ve seen it!

—“I have come an awfully long way since you said hello to me.”
I’d say that to *****, my pretty (say it!) lifeguard friend at Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming-pool.
“I could celebrate the fact one of the prettiest girls I ever met seems to wanna talk to me.”
I could bore you all to death, but HO-HUM! Of course she wants to talk to me.
Give that pretty girl the opportunity to talk to a male, without having to defend herself, and OFF-WE-GO!
“All you’re doing is striking up a conversation,” said ***** the other day. “No evil intent.”
“Yep,” I’d say. “I ain’t hittin’ on ‘er!” Pretty girls carry the albatross: some loathsome lothario (there are many) puts ‘em on the defensive.
“And women seem to wanna talk,” I’d add. “Let ‘em, and make ‘em laugh or smile.”
Back-and-forth, the simple exchange of emotions; I trigger you, and you trigger me.
I’ve had it happen. “We could talk forever, but I gotta buy groceries!”
Yrs Trly carries a sordid childhood: “NO PRETTY LADY WILL EVER TALK TO YOU!”
Right now I’m attracting an extremely pretty girl — so pretty I felt like she was unapproachable.
Of course I am; I ain’t hittin’ on her, and I make her laugh.
***** really hit the mark when she said “all you’re doing is striking up a conversation.”
To which I add: “strike up a conversation with some pretty lady and you’re telling her she attracts you.”
They like that; I’ve seen it!

• Three years ago, as my aquatic balance training began in that swimming pool,***** said hello to me by name, and I got up enough nerve to say hello back later. So began recovery from my childhood fear of pretty girls. My dog helped. (“Oh what a pretty dog!”)

Wish me luck

—“Boy did you hit the nail on the head!” I would say to *****, my lifeguard friend at Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming-pool.
“How so?” ***** might ask.
“When you said striking up a conversation wasn’t flirting: when you said striking up a conversation wasn’t evil — “flirting” — unless there was evil intent behind it.
Right smack on the nose, *****! Precisely; exactly!
I been on-my-own over eight years; and have no desire to remarry. Someone might come along who changes my mind, but I doubt it.
I do my own laundry, cooking, banking, etc.; I don’t need a char-woman.
I’d be a pain-in-the-neck; I’m better off by myself.”
So yes, all I’m doing is striking up a conversation. There’s no evil intent.
But I can’t get away from thinking striking up a conversation is EVIL.
Every time I strike up a conversation with a female, it gets perceived as I find her attractive.
That girl likes the fact I considered her attractive enough to strike up a conversation = I didn’t avoid her.
The fun begins: she likes the fact I found her attractive, then I like the fact she likes that, then she likes that even more, me even more; and on-and-on it goes. It becomes a love-fest. We enjoy each other’s company so much, we are, as it were, striking sparks.
Striking up a conversation becomes so much fun, and so pleasant, and almost always successful, I end up doing it way too much.
This flies in the face of my upbringing = if it’s fun it’s sin!
“Well get over it!” ***** would say.
“Easier said than done,” I say. “I been living with that “if it’s fun it’s sin” albatross over 70 years = the lifelong scumbag, evil incarnate.
“All males, including you, Bobby, at age 5, are DISGUSTING!”
That was my hyper-religious neighbor Sunday-School superintendent, the infamous Hilda Q. Walton.
Had my Bible-beating parents come to my defense, Faire Hilda woulda crashed mightily in flames.
They heartily agreed; I was rebellious and disgusting because I couldn’t worship my holier-than-thou father.
***** isn’t stunning; but she is attractive, especially for age 64 — on her lifeguard stand she looks like she’s in her 40s.
I thought her attractive ever since I began aquatic balance training in that YMCA swimming pool three years ago.
She said hello to me by name, which for someone with my childhood was amazing.
Had it not been for super-cute *****, at Thompson Physical-Therapy after my years-ago knee-change, I doubt I coulda responded to *****’s saying hello.
And now, despite my many flubs and foul-ups, including a real zinger, *****, perhaps, is becoming someone I can talk to.
***** is married, but so are two of the other ladies I can talk to.
Both are far away: one in Philadelphia, one in NC.
So any discussion with them would be one-sided = text or FB “message.”
***** would be face-to-face, which works a lot better.
That’s if we can do it.
Wish me luck, readers!

• My beloved wife died of cancer over eight years ago. She was probably the best one I ever had to talk to = I was very lucky.

Precisely!

—“You’re not ’FLIRTING',” said my lifeguard friend at Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming pool.
“All you’re doing is striking up a conversation.”
“Precisely!” I shouted. “Right smack on the nose *****!” (Her name is *****.)
“I been on my own over eight years, and I’m not looking for a mate. Someone might change my mind, but I doubt it.
I was lucky with the one I had. I’d be extremely hard to live with.”
I just got done telling ***** my wife would say I’m too “flirtatious.” I wasn’t years ago, but that person was replaced by what Bible-beaters call a “FLIRT.” (Gasp!)
“It’s ‘flirting’ only if there’s evil intent,” ***** said.
There you have it readers: I love talking with women because they’re likely to say something that makes me think!
***** got me reconsidering my definition of “flirting,” the one I had all my life = the one I grew up with. Any contact between men and women, even if only verbal, was EVIL and disgusting.
Per *****, mere striking up a conversation is not EVIL. I’ve heard that same definition elsewhere.
Over the past few months I got much better striking-up-conversations with women. But I thought what I was doing was “flirting,” = EVIL.
Per *****, it’s not.
Mere striking up a conversation with a person of the opposite sex is not evil.
Striking-up-conversations with women is so much fun, it must be sin = “flirting,” (“If it’s fun, it’s sin!”)
I’ve gotten much better at striking up conversations — I do it all the time — mainly with women.
We talk and laugh and talk and laugh and smile at each other. After my childhood I never expected that: “NO PRETTY LADY WILL SMILE AT YOU!”
I’ve considered Facebook “defriending” my aquacise-instructor, to put some distance between us. But I haven’t.
Every once in a while she puts something on her Facebook that gets my attention.
“What’s wrong,” ***** says; “is our society’s values, e.g. striking up a conversation with a person of the opposite sex is EVIL.
And people think they gotta convert others to their way of thinking. Plus people wanna take advantage of others, like men take advantage of women.”
(I hope I have this right if she’s reading it.)
“What’s depressing to me,” I would say; “is you and I are fighting a losing battle. It sounds like you, like me, might be a liberal (gasp); what my arch-CONSERVATIVE sister (deceased) would call a “bleeding-heart liberal.”
Congratulations *****, you got me thinking. My wife used to do that.
The last thing I said to her as I took her to hospice was: “don’t forget, you always had what matters: what’s between the ears.”

Who’s hitting these things?

—“Who, pray tell, is hitting these things?” I’d ask. “When I haven’t even Facebooked ‘em yet.”
The way I do these blogs is: —1) I write ‘em into Apple’s “Pages” word-processor as voice-recognition, since my keyboarding is so sloppy.
Then —2) I publish ‘em into “BlogSpot BobbaLew,” so I can proof ‘em on my iPhone. I could “preview” ‘em on “BlogSpot BobbaLew,” but I haven’t yet seen a way of “previewing” on my iPhone.
—3) After proofing, as finished, I “Facebook” ‘em, which means my blog is okay enough for Facebook “friends” to read. I usually Facebook ‘em the day they’re published.
—4) The next day I e-mail “BlogSpot BobbaLew” links to others not Facebook “friends.” (My vaunted “Ne’er-do-Wells.”)
That way I get to see if there are any Facebook hits. First there was one, then there were two, now I get four or five.
But the other day I published a blog and got four “BlogSpot BobbaLew” hits before I even “Facebooked” it. So someone or something was hitting it directly from “BlogSpot.”
Four hits, but I can only think of two possibilities.
—One would be my lifeguard friend at Canandaigua’s YMCA swimming-pool.
She’s probably computer-savvy enough to be able to Google “BlogSpot BobbaLew.” She’s probably more computer-savvy than me — I used to think my wife was more intelligent than I am.
I know I’m fairly smart, but I think my wife was smarter.
—The other possibility is the reader my friend in Californy uses to access my blogs. She was the one who started me blogging in the first place.
Perhaps her reader is grabbing my blog direct from “BlogSpot.”
Direct from “BlogSpot” might not be my finished blog = not “proofed” yet. (I’m trying to not publish until the blog has been proofed.)
Two hits outta four, and I have no idea who they are.
—If one is my lifeguard friend, why she’d wanna read anything I wrote is beyond comprehension. Mostly what I write about, at least recently, is my incredible and mind-blowing successes with women. Celebration of the end of my sordid childhood, whereby “NO FEMALE WILL HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH YOU!”
—My friend in Californy apparently likes reading my blogs: that I still write pretty much the same way I did years ago = my jaundiced eye. My twisted view and reportage of madness around me.
But those four pre-Facebook hits may not be getting the finished product.

• “Marcy” is my friend in Californy. Years ago she wondered where I got so much madness to report.

“DO IT!” “DO IT!” “DO IT!”

—“DO IT!” said the little voice in the back of my head.
“Bang on the window! Let ‘em know you thought they’re worth waving at.”
That’s the same voice my hyper-religious parents and Sunday-School superintendent neighbor claimed was the Devil Incarnate.
“They’ll love it,” the little voice said.
Bang-bang-bang-bang-bang!
Gigantic waving; it looked like they were thrilled.
Do the math, dudes: I solicit their attention, and they love it.
These are the two pretty ladies inside the lobby next to Thompson Hospital’s Physical-Therapy department.
They pre-check clients per COVID-19.
One girl is extremely pretty. The other girl has prettier eyes. But both seem to love talking with me.
And they both smile at me = guilty-as-charged.
“No pretty girl will smile at you!” bellowed that Sunday-School superintendent long ago. So when two pretty ladies smile at me, I am smitten.
“That’s FLIRTING,” the Bible-beaters exclaim. Any contact between the sexes, even verbal, is EVIL and disgusting.
“But it sure is fun!” I’d say.
Those ladies laughed and smiled at me, waving frantically. “If it’s fun it’s sin!”
Heard it a million times, but it’s fun striking sparks with a female!
And those ladies seemed to like it too. Girls love shooting the breeze with a male not hot-to-trot. (“He likes me; and he’s not hitting on me!”)
Those two, among so many others, counteract my sordid childhood.
“Hey, where ya goin’?” I asked pretty-girl as she left the desk where she usually takes my temperature.
“You can’t leave,” I said. “Who do I talk to?”
“Don’t worry,” she smiled. “I’ll be back.”
At this point I could presume she wanted to talk to me. She didn’t refer me to her sidekick.
Enter my childhood: “No pretty girl will wanna talk to you!”
“DREAMIN’,” my critics would say. “She’s only being sociable.”
At which point the little voice advises that thinking she wants to avoid me would make her avoid me.
If I think she wants to talk to me (think positively), she’ll wanna.
—And now the girl in my supermarket who looked like someone I knew.
“I saw you earlier, and almost said something, but you were too far away.
And now we meet again. You looked like someone I knew, but you aren’t her.”
She smiled at me.
There it is readers: strike up a conversation: it always works. Here I am striking sparks yet again with another cutie-pie.
I almost didn’t, but “DO IT; say something!” And boy am I glad I did.
At least five minutes of pleasant yammering: “And who might that be?”
“No idea, but I think she works at Pittsford-Plaza Wegmans.”
“DO IT!” “DO IT!” “DO IT!”
Women/girls/females seem to love talking. Let ‘em!
A simple exchange of emotions, back-and-forth.
—Now the missing cart episode.
I perused the 89-bazilyun coffee offerings in my supermarket, wandering away from my cart.
“Suddenly my cart is missing,” I said to no one in particular.
A tall pretty blonde appeared and conversation began.
“You should stand here with this errant cart,” she said; “and I bet your lost cart reappears.”
Not gorgeous, but pretty eyes; it’s the masks.
Tall and lithesome with pretty brown eyes.
Enter childhood: “What’s she talkin’ to me for?”
After a few minutes I gave up and started over. I had to shop blind. Most of my Smartphone grocery-list had been zapped during earlier shopping.
“Will the person looking for their shopping cart please come to the service desk.”
I headed that way.
“There she is again!” I said to that young cutie-pie I spoke to earlier.
She was the same girl I thought might be someone else.
She turned and smiled at me; I am so glad I said something. Five years ago I wouldna. “DO IT!” = incredible joy.
On my way to the service desk, I passed that lithesome blonde again.
Look-lookity-look — HEM-HAW! At long-last our eyes met, and “you found it!”
“WOW!” I’d say to myself.
“You talkin’ a-me?” my childhood would say. It's also Robert De Niro in Taxi-Driver.
That blonde was striking!
“DO IT!” “DO IT!” the little voice says. Success beyond imagination.
—Finally the girl with the torn Levis.
She was shopping the sushi-bar — I won’t tell my sushi joke.
“I almost said something to you out in the parking-lot, but didn’t. Your Levis exceed my Levi jacket, which I finally threw out, because people said I looked like a bum.”
She touched her pretty thigh and smiled. (She’s showing me her leg, dudes. Look what I get for striking up a conversation!)
There it is! I made the magic move: “yada-yada-yada-yada-yada.” By striking up a conversation I in effect told her I found her attractive.
Not gorgeous, but cute.
“My father says I should just throw these Levis in the trash. Goodwill won’t except ‘em as rags.”
70 years late Yr Fthfl Srvnt finds striking up a conversation, especially with a female, works fabulously.
“DO IT!” Bang on the window!
“Go to Hell, Bobby! Do not pass Go, do not collect $200. Go DIRECTLY to Hell!”

• My sushi joke: last February I was walking my dog back from out Canandaigua’s city-pier, and I met a guy coming the other way who wondered if I saw any bait shops out there. “No,” I said; “but they sell sushi down at Wegmans.”

In one ear and out the other

My sister (deceased) and I are in this picture. My sister is at the left end of the third row. I am obscured further back. At center, with white robes, is the Carol choir (the children’s choir). Pastor Bill Childs is at right; near him is the infamous Mrs. Dager (white collar and glasses), the church organist and choir director. She also taught piano to my sister and I, and her fervent desire was to get us crying playing Clementi 64th-note arpeggios. (1954.)

—Years ago in the early ‘50s, when Yr Fthfl Srvnt was six or seven years old……
We children sat in the first two or three pews on the right side of the church sanctuary for the first 20-25 minutes of the regular Sunday worship service. That is, until the pastor began his sermon.
Before he began, we children were led into an anteroom so we didn’t fidget during his sermon.
Before leaving we had a children’s sermon, usually the pastor, but not always.
One time it was my father, one of the deacons who helped found the church.
My father quickly became angry with me. He started yelling at me, threatening violence.
I admit I egged him on. He was demonstrating to the congregation what a jerk he could be. (I’m not a Trumper, so taste-and-decorum here.)
His yelling increased. He screamed he would beat me to a pulp when we got home. It drove him crazy the congregation could see what a jerk he could be. (Again, taste-and-decorum.)
Nothing happened when I got home; my mother had probably intervened.
His madness was nothing new. It continued through childhood, high-school, college, and even into my 30s.
By then I was married and far from home in Rochester; plus I was driving bus for Regional-Transit-Service, the supplier of transit bus-service in the Rochester area.
My parents were still in northern DE, raising my younger siblings. I was first-born, and had left my family behind.
What made my father maddest was I paid no attention to him. He could smack me, or scream, and I just let him foam.
In one ear and out the other, which made him angrier still. He’d become a raging maniac.
I never challenged him, but unfortunately, for him anyway, I got lots of abuse from passengers when I drove bus.
Most were decent, but occasionally I’d get a jerk.
Same reaction as my father: “In one ear and out the other.”
Or “I can’t drive this thing if you keep yelling at me! Keep yelling at me and I’ll stop. I can’t get you home if you keep yelling at me!”
In other words, I got so I could parry jerks. (Taste-and-decorum again.)
One time my parents visited me in Rochester — probably on bald tires with the cord showing. 360 miles.
“I hope you’re not driving home on those tires,” I said to my father.
My father started raging: “The Lord will protect us! What do you know? Rebellious and disgusting!”
Enter bus-driving experience dealing with jerks (more taste-and-decorum).
“What brought that on?” I asked. That was my bus-driving experience challenging jerks.
Suddenly my father was speechless. Never before had I challenged him. Previously I just let him rage or beat me.
“In one ear and out the other.”
Eventually my parents moved to south FL as my siblings came of age.
My father died of Parkinson’s in 1994, and I visited my mother a final time.
She was distraught! Obviously her firstborn was gone. My father had lost me.
So now, 70 years late, and after my beloved wife died, I recover from a screaming frenzy, the continual bad-mouthing.
I remember crying years ago in a south Jersey diner during a motorcycle return to my childhood digs.
I had always been on my own; I never had a loving family. What I had was a screaming maniac with a supporting sidekick.
She mellowed as I got older — she could see my father was losing me.

• My parents were Bible-beaters.

Wonders never cease

—“We gotta stop meeting like this,” said the pretty girl as she jogged past smiling.
We were on Lehigh Valley RailTrail, and I just got done asking her if she was the same jogger I met before.
That time we had a wonderful time just talking to each other. Apparently I said the right things, and I wasn’t hitting on her.
She said she hoped we’d meet again. But I know how it goes. I meet some pretty lady, and we talk and talk and talk, she smiles and smiles at me; we’re striking sparks.
I also hope we’ll meet again, but we don’t. I can count the many ladies I’ve struck sparks with: the girl with a few gray hairs, the smiling bicyclist resting on a rock, the lady on Ontario Pathways who liked our talking so much she became embarrassed our joy was unfair to her husband — who wasn’t there.
Billions upon billions of pretty ladies are on this planet, all of whom would be great fun to talk with.
Me and that jogger struck sparks, but never again in a million years.
Yet there we were!
“Happy to see ya!” I said, along with “holy mackerel!”
She didn’t stop like last time, but kept running.
I hoped I’d meet her again before I left, but I didn’t.
I’d ask her if she ran there a few days ago — same pink jacket, same black running-tights, and same black hat.
She was running down the path next to the trail parking-lot.
She’d probably say it was her, but she was too far away to renew our friendship.
She’s pretty enough to attract the loathsome lotharios — and I’m not a loathsome lothario. I’m 76 years old, and not on-the-hunt.
But I enjoy talking to pretty ladies. I can tell a lady she’s pretty; “it’s one of the perks of old age,” I say.
If I can tell that jogger she’s attractive, without being a hot-to-trot lothario, it’s worth it to see her smile.
Men, especially strangers, are usually no fun. They get defensive.