Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge

Before our oldest son, Aidan, went to middle school, he attended a private institution known for the arts. The music program was mostly percussions and bells. There was no school band nor jazz ensemble. Whenever my wife, Christine, and I attended a concert, I was struck at how mediocre the students performed which was odd since the kids had to play only one note. I imagined that this private arts school, costing well over $20,000 a year, would be staffed with former pot smoking hippies from the 60's who were all avant guard thinkers. I couldn't have been more wrong. Most of the instructors at one time worked for a parochial school, that is, the only place that pays less than a private institution.

When I attended the first concert, I was ready to be blown away by a high caliber of musicianship. Nine grades plus kindergarten and pre-K performed for the Winter Arts Festival which included some music as well as contemporary modern dance that dragged on for hours. The look of boredom on the parent’s faces was in juxtaposition to the middle school headmaster expressing to the crowded auditorium,

"Your children are soooo talented!"

After an hour I was thinking of a different adjective, something along the lines of uninspiring banality. Being a parent with a first child, I learned to scale back my expectations. A colleague encouraged me to attend a concert at the local public middle school to hear the student jazz band. I went by myself because Christine was home with our newborn, William. I sat in the crowd as a spectator, not a parent. As the concert went through the music program, I was impressed. When the jazz band played, I was mesmerized. I called Christine and held my phone aloft.

"What's going on here?" I thought.

The jazz band was so crisp and vibrant as they played the music my father listen to. I left that night resolved to move Aidan to the local public school. At the time, my boy didn't play an instrument. I wanted him to take piano, but he wasn't interested.

When he started school, he was musically a year behind all the other kids. The music program was mandatory. His music teacher, Mr. Hilbie, suggested that he play the trumpet. Aidan struggled but kept with it. After a few weeks, Mr. Hilbie told Christine that Aidan had "a natural ability and should take private lessons." He called a local music instructor, Jose Cordero, who I heard was hard to get, urging him to fit Aidan into a lesson. I thought trumpet instruction would be just another thing I ferried my son to in which he would be half interested.

While in Mr. Cordero's waiting area to his music studio, I noted the pictures and memorabilia he had on display. Although now retired from the military, he played in the Coast Guard Band on active duty. He seemed strangely familiar to me, then I realized who he was. I had seen him in uniform on television playing at presidential inaugurations. He confirmed what Mr. Hilbie had heard in Aidan.

At the private school, the feedback was always negative. They were sure Aidan suffered from attention deficit disorder having badgered us relentlessly to have him tested. A third of the student body were on Ritalin. Almost all of them were boys. I was incredulous having recognized that my son’s problem was boredom. That and he was in a classroom with over thirty students.

One time at the private school when I was offering help to Aidan’s first grade teacher, she was going over a lesson on making change. She was particularly forward with her assertion that my son had a short attention span. When she noticed as I had that Aidan was staring blankly out the window while his friends were all eager to answer a question, she called on Aidan certain that she would catch him daydreaming.

"How much is it Aidan?"

Without turning from the window, he answered monotonically,

"A dollar thirty-three."

He was correct. Instead of praising him, his teacher ignored his response. Of course she did since it didn't fit her diagnosis. I never doubted my son's abilities. Being a new parent, I just didn't know what to do about it. Sometimes, imperceptible forces push you in the right direction and away from the things that don't work. I was an engineer and computer scientist. The arts were something I thought appreciation for was just as good as participation in. I was never a good musician. I often say that I was pretty bad at the guitar until I got worse. Christine took piano lessons for years and was moderately accomplished.

I experienced music through my eyes rather than my ears. I looked at a staff full of notes, memorized what a symbol meant then learned how to translate each to an instrument. My son learned what a note sounded like rather than how it appeared. When he was in middle school, music was mandatory. In contrast, both Christine and I were not required to take music in school.

Now, I had two accomplished musicians telling me that Aidan had a natural embouchure. I wasn't sure what that was, but I figured it was a good thing. For the first time in eight years a teacher said something positive about my son. A year later, Aidan was trying out for the middle school jazz band. Mr. Hilbie had high expectations of his students. It's no coincidence that most, if not all, the band members were on the honor roll. Aidan was eager to perform trumpet solos which propelled him in other studies resulting in high honors. After a successful audition, he held his trumpet aloft as he exclaimed,

"A year ago I didn't know what end to blow into, and now I'm in the jazz band!”

I attended a Catholic school for secondary education so while I was exposed to some music, there wasn't any school bands. When I went to the public high school in my town, I tried out for the jazz band. I played the upright bass. Not only was I tone deaf, I couldn't keep time at all. Making matters worse the school's bass was fretless so I had to hear the notes to play them correctly. None of this deterred me.

Earlier I had taken a composition class which was considered the hardest music course in high school. Many of the band kids avoided that class as they regarded writing an original piece of music as next to impossible. I don't know what made me think I could compose music. Making matters worse I sometimes had to recall that every good boy deserves fudge just to determine which note was represented by a line on the staff. I struggled. My music teacher, Mr. Trevor, helped me tremendously. Somehow I managed to completed my score. It was no masterpiece. A little more sophisticated than a nursery rhyme, it was an easy piece to play. The jazz band got through my score on the second take. Many of the musicians in the band were quite accomplished, and I was proud when they told me that my piece was fun to play.

Pride makes you do stupid things. Fresh off the success of my one and only arrangement, I decided to try out for the jazz band. Mr. Trevor was less than encouraging. He needed a bass player, but his years of experience and sound musical talent led him to believe that I was not up to the task. He was right. I was not a good musician. Given ideal instruction and unlimited practice, I would never be any good. To me the bass was an easy instrument to play because it had less strings than a guitar and was in the background, but don't try to float that by Paul McCartney. For some reason Mr. Trevor wanted me to audition with the jazz band instead of with just him. Undaunted, I practiced night and day in preparation for my performance before the entire musical student body.

On the day of my audition, I first played by myself. When I finished, Mr. Trevor said,

"Okay, try it again, but this time play the notes on the staff."

My second take was better, but he pointed out that I played too slowly as he clapped out 3/8 time like a metrodom. For my third try Mr. Trevor summoned the whole band. I didn't have a full score in front of me so I was unsure when I was to come in. As everyone brought their instruments to bear, I noticed that they all concentrated on the band director. Thats right! Mr. Trevor would tell me when I was to start playing.

Most musicians might recall the first time they played with a brass band. Some of the auditorium seats are better than others when it comes to experiencing sound. When playing an instrument from inside a band, you would think you have the best seat in the house, but the nearest instruments often can be so loud that you are unable to hear the rest of the band. When I took my queue to play, I knew right off I came in too early. When I tied to adjust, I fell behind. As we finished, I was pretty much on time, but I knew the bass line should be driving the beat not following it. The distain on the face on the drummer told me that I screwed up, and everyone knew it.

Mr. Trevor scowled as he shook his head. To this day I think he was hoping I would just quit instead of continuing to punish the ears of the actual musicians surrounding me. Some of the students vocalized their opinion of my poor playing ability to their neighbor. Others whispered as they looked in my direction. Although I knew I was over my head, I don't know why I did what I did next, but for some reason I blurted out,

"One more time."

Everyone readied their instruments as if directed by the conductor rather than the baseless instructions of a lousy bass player. Mr. Trevor followed the familiar routine after the jazz band was locked and loaded. He momentarily looked about oddly before he motioned the band to play. I came in closer to my queue, and played more forcefully. In retrospect, I wasn't angry nor was I stubborn. I just wanted to experience playing from inside a band one more time. On this last go around I did much better, enough to stifle any overt critism. If this had been a play, the contortions culminating in the frown on my Mr. Trevor's face would be described by critics as method acting. The music teacher had just taken direction in front of the whole jazz band from a student, summoned for evaluation as a bassist, who couldn't keep beat to a Devo tune. When he cobbled together some semblance of composure, Mr. Trevor said,

"Again."

After a brief pause, he added,

"Just you."

I readied the school issued, fretless bass as Mr. Trevor stared sternly in my direction. He raised his baton then froze at the apex. His hands sunk unceremoniously to the podium. When they came to rest, Mr. Trevor commanded,

"Sing it."

I was unsure what he wanted. Did he want me to sing the notes? I can barely find where they are supposed to be played on the neck of this bulky string instrument, and he wants me to sing? I don't sing even when I'm alone. Some of the students looked about and smiled broadly. Others were giddy.

"Sing?" I asked.

"Yes," Mr. Trevor replied, "Sing it."

I could've packed it in right there to cut short the torment, but with little hesitation I belted out my best interpretation of the notes on the staff before me, much to the amusement of the entire high school jazz band. When the laughter subsided, I backed away from the music stand before me. Returning the large instrument to the case resting on the floor, I ran my fingers over the strings for the last time before I closed the lid. I collected the sheet music from the stand then retrieved a piece of paper from a notebook in my backpack. As I threaded through my once and only bandmates, I stopped in front of Mr. Trevor's podium where I neatly placed the papers then turned for the exit. Walking down the hallway, the jazz band began to play. The sound was wonderful.

When Aidan climbed into high school, his audition for the jazz band went pretty smoothly. He made it on his first try. Aidan coupled his love of music with technology to streamline the process of writing music. He's remastered arrangements based on the music in video games like the MII Channel and Chemical Plant Zone from Sega's Sonic. He also wrote a score for Memories by the band Lucky Chops which was to be played by the school ochestra. Unfortunately the public concerts were cancelled his senior year due to the pandemic. He spent his time editing individual tracks from students to create virtual performances for the school's online coffee house concerts. Currently, he is working on an orchestral arrangement based on a three part medley from the game Deltarune.

When Aidan learned that the education board in our town was considering dropping the music requirement from the middle school curriculum, he went to the town meeting to tell his story, how mandatory participation brought out the best in him. The board listened to many former students explain that exposure to music at an early age helped shape the kind of student they were now, but unfortuately the music program was pushed off to an after school activity making way for “more important” subjects like environmental science and personal finance.

I've read an article recently that espoused the idea that playing an instrument makes a kid a better public speaker, more of a leader. Studies show that musical kids do better in school. I have a friend who adamantly says that musicians make better STEM students. Even if this is true, I think it's misguided as was my long time belief that appreciation of art is just as good as participation. Some people need to express themselves in music and that is good in itself even though our pragmatic society would only note its value if it helps students with math or science. I believe now that music is important not just to help kids with more practical studies. It is good in itself.

I never again played an instrument after I auditioned for the jazz band in high school and was doubtful of the value of doing so when Aidan took up the trumpet. When I was in the composition class back then, Mr. Trevor once asked us if all the conceivable songs would someday be written. He told us that the number of unique sequences which can be formed by twelve notes was infinite. He was wrong. It's not infinite. There are 479,001,600 permutations which can be made with twelve notes. I know this because when I was in high school, I deduced the formula by listing all the sequences formed from two, three and four notes.

That's what was on the extra piece of paper I added to the sheet music which I left on Mr. Trevor's podium.

Editor's Note: Based on a post originally published on June 19, 2018.

What It’s Like Living with a Superhero

Our youngest,Willy, occasionally wears a cape. At first I wasn’t sure if he had any special powers, but then they revealed themselves in a not so subtle way. You see, William has “super X strength,” that is, might disproportionate to his size.

Willy is in the 75th percentile for height and 100th for width. He’s a very stocky, dense kid. The gravity must have been greater on his home planet compared to that here on earth. In 2018, he started second grade weighing in at a fourth grader's mass. He’s unusually muscular. Instead of baby fat, Willy has a six pack. It’s not easy raising a superhero. They have to learn all the things just like every other human child, but they also must discover, harness, and eventually master their extraordinary gifts.

At first Willy’s unusual strength caused him to break a lot of things. It all started with his older brother’s pristine Thomas the Tank Engine collection which Willy inherited. Aidan always took impeccable care of his toys. At a very early age, William became fascinated with Thomas and Friends careening off the table. It wasn’t long before William broke Thomas’s face. He handed me the hapless tank engine's head in three pieces, while saying,

“Fix please.”

His brother, who is eight years older, is our go to babysitter. Whenever my wife, Christine, and I enjoy a night out on the drive home we always wonder aloud what William might have destroyed. He tends to plow right through things rather than bothering to go around.

He broke two banisters on the handrail to the staircase while running in socks. He also cracked the glass on his iPad three times. That was kind of my fault. I didn’t know that superheros are supposed to get tempered glass on their mobile devices. He also managed to rip a seam in our newly reupholstered couch by sitting too forcefully. When young, superheroes tend to gravitate to high places like the backs of couches as such vantage points offer the best opportunity to scan the landscape for bad guys.

Recently, while getting toilet paper from the roll, William snapped off the spindle. It’s made of metal, but it broke like a twig. When we had William's grip strength measured by his pediatrician, he broke the tester. The other day after spending some “we time” at the gym, Christine and I returned to find that William accidentally tore the door to his room off the jam. We never got a straight answer how it happened because he is somewhat self conscious over his unusual strength, and we thought it might not be a good idea to upset him too much should he turn green and grow in size before going on an anger induced rampage. I’ve got an ever expanding list of things to fix, most of which will have to wait for winter to set in as fall outdoor cleanup absorbs most of my time.

The other day we got a note from his teacher. William was selected to participate as a “partner” for the Unified Sports Team, a national program coordinated by the Special Olympics. As a participant, William is to assist athletes in achieving their goals. His teacher said he was chosen due to his "leadership, positive attitude, and compassion for others in the school setting." He was very proud as was I, but I wasn't surprised.

Compassion is his other superpower, the one he's already mastered.

Editor's Note: Originally published on October 9, 2018. A few readers asked if William really pulled the door to his room off the jam. He did. We're a bit unsure how he managed to do it and suspect his older brother was involved, but neither is talking.

Recently William announced that as a fifth grader he would no longer smile for his school picture. He said that the time for seriousness is upon him. He must be thinking about the task before him, a life of fighting for truth, justice and equity but not the bad things historically associated with socialism.

I Don't Miss Work

I don’t at all. It’s not like I didn’t have good jobs. I worked as an engineer for a defense contractor right out of college, then later after earning a masters degree, I toiled away as a computer scientist for a small software company. Both these disciplines were lucrative and interesting, but they came with a few odd moments.

There are many aspects of work which I don’t miss like numb-nuts meetings, feigning interest in my boss’s leisure time activities, keeping my mouth shut while absorbing mindless company policies, noises emanating from my colleagues bodies including middle school level banter about current events. Some people have told me that they just love what they do and can’t see how I don't go to work every day. Here's why I don’t miss work.

Unwitting Bathroom Monitor

I used to sit in a cube farm just outside the men’s bathroom. From my vantage, I could hear colleagues dropping friends off at the pool. I bore witness to the sound of the flush, followed by the sink shortly thereafter. This last part was optional. About half the men I worked with did not wash their hands after pinching cocoa. These same people would reach into a box of donuts on Friday mornings to retrieve a favorite crumpet only to return it after determining it was not what they thought. I routinely passed over the donuts at work.

Spend a Penny Like a Wee Boy

I worked with a guy named “Ted,” who urinated while standing up with his pants and underwear down to his ankles. The first time I went into the men’s room and saw Ted’s big, rugged ass staring back at me, I thought that I would never be able to unsee that. Ted's butt was so large that his drawers would slingshot to the floor under tension when his belt was released. I suspected he was one of those guys on YouTube who while dancing at a wedding reception, spontaneously lost their pants. Others in the office noticed the same odd appearance of Ted’s flank steaks so my boss called a meeting. None of us knew why we were all in the conference room.

Boss: Does anyone know why I called this meeting?
Me: You’re leaving?
Boss: No.
Me: We’re leaving?
Boss: No, it’s come to my attention...

My boss went on about Ted’s bathroom reveal. Everyone at the table voiced their tragic encounter with Ted's ass. When it was my turn, I said,

"I think we should get HR involved."

"No, I think we can handle this at my level," my boss declared.

“So what are you saying, one of us should just tell him?” I asked.

With that he announced,

“Great idea! You do it.”

Everyone abruptly got up and scrambled for the door. My boss pushed through the minions to get out first. I was left sitting alone thinking that I had to tell Ted that his fundament was something his colleagues didn’t want to see with any measure of regularity, and he should get that boil lanced. Ted was clueless when I bridged the topic so I brought him in the loo and told him to use the urinal next to me. When his pants and briefs hit the floor I said,

“Now look at my pants then look at yours. See the difference?”

“I think so,” Ted answered, “Mine has pleats. My wife says pleats are out.”

“No, look where my pants are,” I insisted, “you know, relative to yours.”

Ted looked at my pants as I pretended to wiz in the upright, porcelain urinal, then he looked to his slacks at his feet, bunched up like a theatre curtain.

“Oh!” he exclaimed.

Ted thanked me since as he put it, no one had ever told him. Talk about discovering a loogie in the mirror at the end of the day. A month later, I was called into a meeting with the head of Human Resources and my boss. They were both frowning when I entered. As I sat down, the VP of HR said,

"It's come to my attention that you spoke to an employee about his use of the facilities."

I looked to my boss, waiting for him to explain that he instructed me to do so. Instead, he kept curling the corner of the paper in front of him as he frowned. Apparently, Ted filed for disabled status under the Americans with Disabilities Act. The HR robot admonished me for not involving management. My boss dropped his frown in favor of a look of pure guilt. When the Human Resources douchebag finished, I thought there would be no repercussion, then she told me,

"That's strike one for you."

Professional Phonies

Some people in computer science exaggerate their skill set. Once I was assigned an older woman who was newly hired as a senior software developer. I gave her tasks that a high schooler should have been able to complete in an afternoon. She never finished any of them. I chatted with her during the course of her day even though I was busy as fuck, being one of the few productive developers employed by this shithole of a company. I sat with her at a cookout as she pawed through her pictures of her grandkids. She never asked me about my family even though William, our youngest, was sitting next to me. The fact was that after three months she hadn't done anything to advance the project, but instead absorbed so much of my time that I was completing my tasks from home at night.

I met with my boss when I began to suspect that something was amiss. Frankly, this old biddy seemed senile to me. She barked at me some mornings then moments later was pleasant as can be to others. I think she suspected I was onto her overblown credentials. I told my boss,

"I don't have the skill set to deal with her."

He instructed me to "go back to my desk and try harder." When she up and quit, I was relieved until I learned that she blamed it all on my lack of skills and knowledge. She claimed our architecture was "all screwed up," and I personally didn't know what I was doing. All this went down without my boss or HR ever consulting with me. In retrospect, I learned a very valuable lesson.

If your input is not being sought out, then they're blaming you for everything.

That's why they don't want your opinion. Once the ole bag had me in the bag, she went for a double play by trying to implicate my boss as well. He was having no part of that. She lost credibility by trying to tarnish my boss who survived only by defending me. He was fine with throwing me under the bus, just as long as he got a window seat, but the minute it looked like he was going under the wheels too, he put a stop to all of it.

I learned later that she had a panic attack and froze up while filling out paperwork on her first day. Instead of human resources protecting employees from an overt nutjob, they reassured her that we "were all nice people to work with." Of course my boss covered his tracks about our meeting when I informed him that the one psychology course I took in college was inadequate training to deal with her level of dementia. The HR head sent me an email indicating,

"Strike Two for you."

Just another day in shithole corporate America.

Scheduled Morning Dumps


In my youth, I worked for a defense contractor that made submarines. As a salaried professional engineer, I was often baffled by the older unionized workforce. If you called one of them to ask a question at 7:29 am, they would always ask,

“Can you call back at 7:30?”

Then when you did call again at the rightful start of the day, they would be unavailable. I quickly learned that unionized workers hated the company. Many disappeared to the men’s room at the start of the day because they held in their morning constitution so they could shit on company time. Seemed unhealthy to me.

Sick Lottery

A defense contractor makes money by billing the government for the hours reported against a human sitting at a desk. It doesn’t matter what that human actually does as long as they’re breathing. The more humans, the more money the company makes even if most of them do nothing at all. The company, though, pays when an employee calls in sick. Normally, the government doesn't pony up for sick time. So this led management to implement a lottery system for cash and days off for all employees who didn't call in sick over the past year.

The first time this was implemented, I went to work at least once with some contagious ailment emanating from my body. My wife, Christine, worked there also so I encouraged her to go into work after she spent the previous night puking. When the day of the drawing arrived, I thought we were going to win for sure because we had two names in the hat. In fact, I believed we would clean up. As my departmental manager stood before an eager crowd rotating a drum then pulling names from the bin, I was sure I was going to win and win big. The last drawing came and went with no victory.

“What a rip off!” I blurted.

Suddenly, it was all clear to me as I sat in my seat as a sick lottery loser, the person next to me coughing up phlegm. The way to guarantee a win was to call in sick when one wasn’t actually ill; after all, why come in to work with the Nutella squirts just to win a days vacation when you could call in sick and spend the whole day at the beach.

I also accepted that I worked for a company that encouraged it’s employees to come into the office and infect their colleagues with the latest plague that was making the rounds. Each year on the day the sick lottery drawing was held, I called in sick. My wife, always the ethical role model, refused to participate in my lottery rebuke charade. She did stay home when she was legitimately ill, though, eliminating her chances of winning. I, on the other hand, won in my own way every year thereafter.

Trashercise

The leaders at the defensive contractor came up a plan to reduce the janitorial expenses by removing employee's trashcans. One bin was located centrally on each floor. Since what we did at the company didn’t really matter, they didn’t care if a salaried engineer had to walk twenty paces ten times a day to discard garbage. A colleague of mine tipped off Scott Adams of Dilbert fame resulting in this comic strip which appeared in print on September 12, 1995.

Teeth in Lieu of Brains

Once the head of Human Resources of the small software company I worked for came up with a policy, endorsed by the CEO, to ensure that all employees filled out their weekly timecard in a timely manner. At an all hands meeting, she announced,

“All employees who fail to complete their timecard by 5 pm on Friday will lose a days vacation.”

I had two whole weeks per year of “personal time” at this crap company, and a manager who declined vacation whenever anyone put in for it. Now, I was going to lose a day if I forgot to gin up my timecard at the end of the week. There was only a few employees who chronically forgot to fill out their time sheet. Instead of leaning on them, we all were impacted with a mindless rule like often done in middle school. My boss explained at the next meeting,

“We wanted to put some teeth into it so we decided to impact your vacation.”

Being a consummate dick my whole life, I said,

“You should have put some brains into it first.”

While this angered my boss, I knew that punitively removing something of monetary value from salaried workers often results in lawyers invoking provisions in the Fair Labors Standard Act of 1938. I also knew that when a company lumped sick time and vacation together as personal time employees didn’t have to ask to take time off. A short time later I left before the announcement of my third strike.

Today I work for minimum wage, that is, nothing per hour. Christine’s career took off making it less lucrative for me to stay employed as my paycheck looked like a banking error compared to her's. Worse yet, I was taxed at our combined income making my take home as a professional software developer less than a living wage.

So there you have it. Now you know why I have all this free time to pen such quality pieces about vomit, colonoscopies and celebs while turning down lucrative offers for advertisements. Recently, I was contacted by a website that said they would include my blog in their list of top humor blogs for a small fee. The outfit wanted me to pay even though they actively portrayed their site as an independent tabulation of the internet's funniest blogs. Their email read,

"For a modest fee, we'll list <insert blog name> as one of our top humor blog discoveries!"

I explained to them that I would've done it, but unfortunately I didn’t have any money.

Editor's Note: Originally posted on October 2, 2018.

Pot in Every Chicken

This summer the People's Republic of Connecticut became the 19th state to legalize recreational marijuana, leaving Rhode Island and New Hampshire as the lone New England hold outs. In the Granite State, pot is decriminalized up to 3/4 oz for medical use only. It's no wonder that grass remains illegal in New Hampshire since the state has the fourth largest English speaking legislative body in the world with 400 members. Imagine how difficult it is to win a majority with so many voices who drive trucks with at least one door a different color. Today, we are voting in my town on a referendum to decide if people will be allowed to get high on public property. You can't openly drink alcohol here, but after today we might be able to toke up in the borough while strolling by the antique shops, bookstores and bistros. I'm doubtful that my fellow citizens will be brave enough with their vote to tell their inner child that this is just not a good idea; after all, most of them eat danish for breakfast.

My sum total of drug usage began and ended on Halloween in 1980 when I was 16 years old. After egging the telephone booth outside the local 7-Eleven, Frank Lamb and I took off up the street. When far enough away, we stopped to catch our breaths. Frank lit a joint which he handed to me. I took one hit and gave it back. A few years later while applying to an officer program in the military, I was filling out forms in a recruiter's office. One question read,

"Have you ever smoked marijuana?"

Recalling my days as a hooligan, I checked "Yes."

After reviewing my input, the recruiter gave me another form then advised me to say that my pot smoking was only "experimental" at college parties. I explained that it was before college, and I wouldn't characterize it as experimental.

"How often did you get high?" he asked concernedly.

"Never," I answered.

"But you just said you smoked pot!" he insisted.

"Yeah, I took one hit off a joint that Frank Lamb handed me on Halloween in high school."

The recruiter grabbed my application and crumbled it up then placed a blank form in front of me while advising that I fill it out again except this time check "No" on the dope question.

The main reason I avoided drugs in my youth was because in the 70s I was too young for the free love, turn on, tune in, drop out counter-culture of the hippy generation. Truth be known, hippies on the east coast were not mellow, peace loving, bohemian, flower children who just liked to get high while listening to Jimmy Hendrix and Peter, Paul and Mary. They were mostly jerks who bullied younger kids like me for just being near them on a day when they ran out of doobage. The first lesson I learned about ganja as a kid was that while smoking pot makes you mellow, most burnouts get pretty ornery when they come down.

I had a longtime friend who unbeknownst to me smoked pot on a regular basis. When we got together for a cookout at either of our homes or dinner in town, he was so down to earth calm that I believed that's just the kind of person he was. Once when I spent a full day with him helping with a home repair, I noticed as the day wore on he became increasingly agitated. When we took a break for lunch at a local sandwich shop, he hassled the waitress so badly that I ordered something different from him just to ensure I didn't get the sandwich with the spit in it. As he left his half of the tip, he dropped four dollars into the pile of cash on the table while retrieving the five dollar bill I landed.

Exiting the sandwich shop, I suggested that we make another trip to the hardware store to exchange the plumbing fitting I recommended earlier that morning. Upon returning to his car, he launched into a profanity laced tirade that included an assessment of my home improvement skills which he deemed "not worth the ink on my grandfather's naturalization papers." As he drove to the hardware store which I believe he thought was Beyond Thunderdome, he tailgated vehicles while spewing a stream of consciousness in critique of their inferior driving abilities. At the hardware store, he was so dissatisfied with the service from the guy trying to help us that he freely associated descriptive terms with his most prominent physical features.

What I didn't know at the time was that the plumbing project he wanted help with was going to last longer than the buzz he put on before I arrived. He never lit up in front of me and had only recently admitted to smoking marijuana frequently, noting that I likely didn't approve. He was right. I don't approve of smoking weed. Not because it's bad for you, or because it's addictive. Not because chronic use will cause stomach ailments or throat cancer. No, I hate it because most people who habitually smoke pot are douchebags when they're not high, and they don't even know it.

There's a lot of myths spread on social media about Mary Jane that don't get censored by the independent fact-checkers as assuredly as comments claiming that the past summer was unusually cold. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and National Institute of Health (NIH) cannabis is addictive, but so many people refute this that they use the term "marijuana use disorder" instead. The younger you start toking up the more likely you are to develop a disorder. Cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome is a condition in which long-term regular marijuana use causes frequent and violent upchucking. The American Cancer Society is against smoking and vaping pot in public because the smoke contains numerous carcinogens. In 2017, the number of fatal car crashes in which the driver was high on hemp doubled in Washington state five years after legalization. A 2019 study published in JAMA Psychiatry determined that marijuana use among 12 to 17 years olds was 25% higher after legalization.

There are plenty of conflicting studies on the internet that indicate usage did not increase after legalization and tout the medical benefits of getting high. But if you look closely at the URLs for these sites, you'll see that they point to some stoner's blog or a site promoting bud. You can find many studies which conclude that pot is not a gateway drug, that smoking weed does not lead to the use of more potent drugs like cocaine. While it is true not everyone who smokes reefer will end up a heroin addict, it’s equally true that most, if not all, hardcore drug users started out with weed.

Recently, I took our ten year old, William, to a routine end of summer checkup. As the examination wrapped up, the doctor asked him if anyone he knows vapes marijuana. William thought a moment then answered, "No." I was perhaps naively surprised that she asked such a question until she informed me that vaping pot is on the rise in his age group because parents consider cannabis to be safe, even beneficial, now that it is legal in many states.

A passionate pothead colleague of mine once said that I didn't have a clue what I was talking about because I "don't smoke pot." He was right. I don't smoke pot, but I'm unsure as to why he thought regularly ingesting a mind altering drug would lend credence to his opinion. The exchange reminded me of comments made by author and columnist, Fran Lebowitz, in the Martin Scorsese's Netflix docu-series, Pretend It's a City. Lebowitz said,

"I do have friends who are around my age or even older who I know to have been daily marijuana smokers for 50 years. These are not the most acute people on the planet. Let me assure you that there is an aggregate effect. Because I knew them maybe when they started, OK? So they're not like, dangerous people, but maybe they're not the people you would consult anymore."

While you may no longer seek their advice and they may not be threatening, I’m pretty certain that many of them are also assholes.

A Secure Business Model

A few years after we moved to a rural part of town, a series of break-ins got the locals all up in arms. Security warning signs started popping up in many of the driveways. We followed the crowd and signed up with a well-known company. Admittedly, I wasn't keen on the idea of getting a security system. For one, I believed that it was highly unlikely that anyone would ever break into our house. We lived on a hill such that the house was not visible from the road. A prospective thief couldn't readily ascertain if we had a security system without casing the place via an elaborate ruse. I also figured that security companies break into houses to drum up business. That's why most of the people who were victimized on our road reported that nothing was stolen.

Either way, our house was prewired for a security system so my wife, Christine, wanted to have one installed. After researching the current technology in home protection, she determined that ADT had the best equipment and monitoring service. She emailed me a link to a color console panel that I thought was real cool. They had door and window sensors along with motion deterctors. It all looked good to me so I asked Christine,

"What does ADT stand for?"

"Advanced Detection Technology I think," she answered.

After our home security system was installed, I noted that the screen on the wall panel wasn't color. It was black and white and the graphics were crude. No splash of pigment or flashy animations for us. When I asked Christine what gives with the crappy display she told me they said that was all they had. So okay, they didn't have the technicolor control panel they bragged about on the internet. They had the equivalent of a 1969 black and white tube television set. The technician who installed the hardware showed Christine how to set and disarm the system. There were multiple buttons on the display, but she was instructed to use just one.

"What do the other buttons do?" I asked.

"Nothing," she answered.

So I had an ancient piece of hardware nailed to my wall that had several function buttons that didn't do anything. She showed me how to select "Night Mode" which we were to set every evening after the remains of the day. Night mode activated all the sensors on the first floor and none on the second floor where we all slept. I didn't want to ever set night mode as I was sure it would trip off in the wee hours of the morning from a fly buzzing in the kitchen or something. I also disliked the idea of cowering in my bed with the covers pulled up to my chin while worrying about intruders breeching the outer perimeter. Christine insisted on setting night mode before we went to sleep.

Our foray into the world of safe houses was uneventful for a few days, then for some unknown reason the alarm sounded at 3 am. I tried to used the crummy control panel in our bedroom to turn the thing off. Through the panic brought on by the wailing siren, I entered the wrong code. The shitty display returned,

"Incorrect Code."

I tried again, but to no avail. On my third failed attempt, the system locked me out all while the alarm blared ceaselessly. Christine was looking through the paperwork to find a phone number to call. After some time the phone rang. It was Claire from the ADT monitoring service. As she spoke I heard every other word due the volume of the blaring siren. I handed the phone to Christine who convinced Claire that we were not taped to chairs as hooligans ransacked our house. She was kind enough to help Christine silence the alarm. After things calmed down, I asked Claire what tripped the alarm. Checking her monitor which I'm sure was colorful, she said that a sensor in the kitchen detected motion. Like what, a mouse? A ghost? It couldn't be a ghost because our house was new construction so no previous occupants appeared where they tragically perished. We were the first owners so we'll be the ones to haunt our house someday. Couldn't have been mice either. No droppings. While I had her on the phone, I asked Claire what ADT stood for.

"Access Detection Technology," she answered.

So we soldiered on with our home security system, never again setting it at night. Occasionally it lit off even though it wasn't armed. It was always for some reason like a dead battery needed to be replaced or a hardware update was required. After a few years in which the monthly bill climbed from $15 to $24, I saw a commercial for an exterior camera. I called ADT and inquired about the new piece of monitoring equipment. After some data exchange to verify my identity, a guy named Hal said,

"The camera isn't available in your area."

I wanted to ask Hal if he was in fact a robot himself, but instead I opted for,

"Tell me, Hal. What does ADT stand for?"

"Asynchronous Defense Tactics," he said confidently.

A few more years passed with more periodic false alarms emanating from our security system when I received an email indicating that I could now opt to control the thing from a smart phone. I was paying almost $40 a month now so I figured they certainly wanted me to expand my system with more technology. If I accessed the alarm via my phone I could ignore the wall panels altogether. This also allowed me to silence the alarm when it sounded sporadically for no reason at all. Once again I called ADT. This time I got Angela. She told me right up front that the smart phone interface wasn't available in my area. We weren't living on a prairie in the Midwest. We were in New England in which the population density exceeded just about every other place in the country. When I asked Angela what ADT stood for, she answered,

"Assistive Development Trends."

As time passed we embraced major life events like our son, Aidan, entering middle school and the birth of his brother, William. And of course, we also were periodically frightened out of our wits by a blaring horn reminiscent of the road rage one experiences upon crossing paths with a truck driver sporting one of those Ted Nugent bumper stickers. By now we had built an outbuilding which wasn't covered by our security system. I called ADT to inquire if they could include the building and my garage bays as well. I spoke to Phil. He told me that I would need to install a separate system for the outbuilding as there was no way to get wires back to the house. He also said that the garages could be covered, but "it will be an expensive install." Not being able to get what I wanted, I asked Phil what ADT stood for.

"Access Developer's Toolkit," he said assuredly.

That was the last time I tried to modify our security system. Months collected into years as Aidan graduated from high school and William climbed into 5th grade. Recently I got an email from ADT indicating that the 3G phone used by our security system was being phased out of existence, and we needed to call to make arrangements for an upgrade. The last time I had a 3G phone I called the local Blockbuster to see if one of the five copies of Smokey and the Bandit was available. I reluctantly contacted ADT. Crystal made arrangements for a technician to come the following Thursday to perform the necessary upgrades. When I asked her what ADT stood for, she said,

"Accelerated Degradation Testing."

With no sign of the ADT technician, Thursday came and went like a bad odor in an elevator. Upon checking with the home office, Mark told me that they hadn't the part, and when they got it, they'd give me a call. I told Mark to forget it, that I wanted to cancel my subscription. By now I was paying $60 a month as a longtime customer when I finally realized that they had me pigeon holed as an old guy who accepted the outgoing hardware without complaint. Mark offered to drop my monthly charge to $40, but I explained that I never got what I wanted from ADT so lowering the price for such poor service simply didn't make sense. He was disappointed as he told me that my subscription would take a month to cancel, and that no one will be coming by to uninstall all the equipment. Of course not, that shit belonged in a museum. Before he hung up, I asked him what ADT stood for. Mark responded,

"Abstract Data Type."

Two weeks later, I got a call from Mike, who said he was a regional director for ADT. He knew I was quitting and humbly asked me to tell him what transpired such that after 12 years I wanted to part ways with “the leading home security provider in America." I asked Mike upfront what ADT stood for. He said,

"Safety, quality and customer service."

"No, the letters," I said.

"Oh, it's the name of the original company. American District Telephone."

I thanked Mike for reaching out, but I really didn't want to go over a dozen years of subpar service, partly because my mind was made up, and I didn't want to recall what a moron I was for tolerating such a poor product for so long. When I was about to hang up, Mike made one final pitch. He offered $15 a month with no contract for a year, and they would come by and install everything I wanted with the latest equipment for no charge. I told Mike that they should've offered that deal when I was a clueless, loyal customer. I would've believed for the rest of my life that they were the best company in the world. With that we parted ways with ADT.

Oh, and by the way, it’s American District Telegraph, not telephone.

A Million Dollar Smile

When I was a kid every time I went to the dentist, a tooth was pulled. As I got older, I was introduced to the pain of cavities which inevitably led to an extra visit to the chair for a shot of Novocain and some drilling. By the time I reached adulthood, good dental hygiene coupled with yearly cleanings resulted in a mostly uneventful experience at the dentist's office. As more techniques in the field of periodontal health were developed by the scientific braintrust of organizations like the American Dental Association, I found that all the preventative care I routinely performed each day wasn't enough even though four out of five dentists said it was.

When my wife, Christine, and I moved to a different town, we found a new local dentist. On my first visit I learned that the silver fillings in my mouth, some as old as thirty years, were bad for me. First off they weren’t silver. They were a material called "amalgam" and according to my dentist contained mercury. For years I’ve had mercury in my head. So over the next four months our old fillings were removed. Little did I know that in the world of dentistry, people my age with a mouth devoid of any silver were branded for special treatment.

After we had all the metal in our mouths removed, my dentist recommended that we do X-rays every year. Seemed harmless enough although they put a lead blanket over my nuts and always asked my wife if she was pregnant before they dart behind a blast shield to fire off the beam of particles into my head. The X-rays offered the dental team, which now included the actual dentist and a dental hygienist, a diagnostic tool to ascertain cavities that hadn't yet sprouted. So as the frequency of candids of my teeth increased so did the number of times I went under the drill. Lucky for me the technology to intercept cavities in the larvae stage came at the right moment. My mouth was falling apart, and I was fortunate to be under the care of a skilled crew of highly trained professionals. To think of the sacrifices they made, the debts they incurred, the good times they missed all so they could save my teeth. My dentist wasn't just a doctor; he was an artist, and my mouth was his canvas.

I especially appreciated the quality care I received from my dental hygienist before I was examined by the big guns. She ran her fingers over my neck to check for cancer. She started me on an in-office fluoride treatment plan even though I was in my forties. She advised me to use picks as well as floss twice daily. She recommended straightening my teeth and a treatment for bad breadth. After finishing a cleaning, she would call in the dentist who looked into my mouth then counted all my teeth. He identified which needed to be watched by a whole number. When he was done, he provided his recommended treatment plan for my decaying pie hole. Some of the teeth that he drilled preventatively for cavities had such thin enamel that I now needed a crown. This made me feel important, you know, like a king or something.

You can imagine how harrowing it was when I learned that my dentist up and quit. Just like that he was gone; off on his sailboat in the Caribbean having just retired at 42. My new dentist was a woman fresh out of dental school. It's a good thing she replaced the ole dentist we had because on my first visit she told me that I had bacteria in my mouth that if crossed the brain-blood barrier I would get Alzheimers. She measured the size of the "pockets" between my teeth. I'm glad she cleaned out my pockets otherwise I might have ended up getting lost on my way home. She advised me that I should undergo a "deep cleaning" which included three aggressive scraping and picking over the next year in lieu of the single routine cursory cleaning covered by my dental insurance.

After a year of eradicating all the bacteria that's been in my trap since third grade, the dental hygienist remeasured my pockets which were found to have stabilized but not shrunk in size. Evidently, my daily brushing, flossing and picking as well as multiple deep cleanings was not enough to stem the inevitable invasion of a flesh eating bacteria. The dentist warned me that the brain-blood barrier was only a millimeter thick and if one bacterium made it through, my head would explode. She recommended another year of depth charging my face hole.

On the next visit my dentist noted that my teeth were worn in spots which indicated that I grind at night. Not the good kind of grind, mind you; the kind that gets you fitted for a mouth guard the construction of which involves a full scan of all your teeth followed by a 3D printout of a model used to make a casting. Not covered by my insurance, the customized rubber guard cost $600. She told me that I would have to bring in my guard for modification every time I underwent a new procedure. In 1975, when I played Pop Warner football in middle school, my mother made the same thing by boiling a piece of pliable plastic, purchased at K-Mart for three dollars.

The constant bad news I absorbed from my dentist made me think that all this extra preventative care was pointless. I never received any paperwork like when I visited my doctor either, and quite frankly, I couldn't remember when the last time I had X-rays or which teeth were on the watch list. Was it 13 and 15, or 17 and 19? So I started taking notes after each office visit. You know, I would record "Almost puked from fluoride treatment" or "full X-rays of my puss again." In a few years my new dentist moved on to greener pastures in California.

The next dentist was also fresh out of dental school. She specialized in cosmetic dentistry. On my first visit after I completed my second year of deep cleaning, I expected her to comment on the depth of my pockets, but she completed her examination without mentioning them. Just two short years ago my mug pipe was about to be overrun by regiments of bacteria, and now no one from my dental team was even mildly interested in offering an assessment of the treatment. She also did the teeth counting thing as if the tally was going to changer or something. When she wrapped up, she suggested that my teeth should be whitened. I underwent the same procedure as with the first guard which involved yet another scan of my cake hole to make two "trays." The trays held some stuff containing chlorine used to brighten teeth. So now along with regular doses of neutrinos, I had bleach in my head.

My second visit to the chair of pain with my new, new dentist didn't go well at all. She determined that I had a cavity in 13 and 15, and needed a crown on 19. She also said that I was overdue for X-rays. I checked my meticulous notes I kept on my phone. The teeth on the watch list for the past year were 13 and 17 and the filling on 19 was six months old. She insisted 19 was on the watch list. Even the hygenist refuted her. Also, my last X-rays were taken eight months earlier. After my dentist moved to the adjacent patient from over the partition I heard her tell him that he had four cavities with one in his incisor which needed to be pulled right away before it developed into an abscess. She wanted to construct a partial for him to hold a new, fake front tooth. When he asked why all these cavities didn't hurt him, she explained,

"There's so much calcification over the nerve that you don't feel the cavities."

I had just been through a decade long magical mystical mouth tour, and I was convinced that my teeth would've fallen out of my jaw if it wasn't for all this expensive dental intervention. At that moment I realized that I didn't have two cavities and wasn't in need of a crown. What I needed was a dentist who wasn't trying to pay off an astronomical college debt via creative diagnoses.

The ADA recommends X-rays every two years, but for some reason I was getting full scans of my brain bag every year. It’s a good thing I got all that mercury out of my mouth and replaced it with routine bombardment of subatomic particles. Fluoride treatments for adults are useless. Cavities don't really show up early on X-rays. I got up from the chair wondering if the bleach in my mouth used to whiten my teeth was going to rot out a part of my body I actually need.

As I left the office, I didn't make the follow up appointments. The receptionist sensing dissent called over the dentist.

"Is there a problem?" she asked.

"No, no problem," I answered.

"Then why aren't you scheduling the follow up?"

"Because I want a second opinion," I said.

My dentist was noticeably miffed by my suggestion that her diagnosis might need to be double checked.

"It's your mouth!" she said dismissively as she turned and walked away.

Yes, it certainly is and from it comes words of caution. If your dental prognosis is looking atrocious after routine brushing, flossing and picking, find another dentist. Preferably one old enough to have already paid off dental school.

First Car

Back in 1982, I had just graduated from high school and was on my way to the University of Rhode Island to study engineering. I planned on living at home for the first two years even though most of my friends were moving to campus to be "on their own." Now, many parents prefer their kids to live at school so they experience independence even though lodging and meals are all taken care of for them. The only decision most college students must make is whether they should attend or skip class. A lot of kids want to immerse themselves in the "campus life." I was mainly interested in getting good grades. Since my parents couldn't afford a prep school, I had to be introduced to underage drinking at bonfires in the woods during the summer. Unfortunately, one does not meet influential people who they will network with later in life by hanging out in the back forty of a farmer's fallow field while drinking Mad Dog. That's probably why I never ended up on the Supreme Court.

When it came to purchasing my first car to commute to school, my father elected not to go with me. His childhood was pretty rough with an absent father who was murdered when he was 11 years old. He always said that his dad was never much in his life so likewise as a father he had difficulty relating to his son. When it was time to choose a car, like many things in my youth, I was on my own.

After looking through newspaper ads, I went to a local used car dealership where I met Russell who I'm sure saw me coming from a mile off. He showed me a wreck which he insisted "just needed a paint job."

"This is a classic," Russell exuberantly exclaimed.

Luckily, the car looked too much of a mess to appeal to my inexperienced, youthful, impractical mind. Eventually, I settled in on a 1976 Ford Mustang II hatchback with a standard transmission. I didn't know how to drive a stick but that didn't worry me. The looks of the car appealed to my superficial, immature side. Russell referred to the car as a "creampuff." With his used car salesman instincts, he knew that I hadn't a clue about all that stuff under the hood. I had a friend who could drive a stick bring the car to my parent's mechanic to check it out.

For some reason my father always bought yellow Ford Country Squire station wagons. I think he had five of them in all. The simulated wood side panels were a distinctive feature that clearly articulated,

"I'm the type of guy who shouts at the television screen when I have a load of green peas in my mouth."

He had so many of them because each lasted only about 60,0000 miles before the transmission fell out or the chassis cracked. Today, cars are much more reliable than when I was a kid. Almost no odometers in my youth rolled up to six figures. In fact, one of the Country Squires had such a bad transmission, the car didn't shift out of second gear. There was no lemon laws back then either so it was common for people to be making payments on a car that wasn't running at all.

Many mechanics were crooks too. Sometimes when you had your car serviced, you'd get the "sunshine treatment" which was when someone at the dealership moved your car from the spot you parked in when you dropped it off to a new location making it appear as though your car was serviced. Instead, your vehicle which the service department claimed was ready to go really just spent a day in the sun. And to think they took money from you as well.

A mechanic at the dealership which sold my father his last Country Squire, the one that wouldn't shift, secretly told my dad to get rid of it. Back then vehicle transmission problems were not uncommon and yet impossible to fix. The dealership insisted there was nothing wrong with the car so my father, orchestrating a brilliant chess move, announced that he wanted to trade it in. Since the car was less than a month old and they insisted nothing was wrong with it, they were obliged to give him top dollar.

Just before he was to drop off the car, it snowed heavily overnight. For some reason my father use a metal shovel to clear the snow off the hood. My dad was prone to bonehead moves, and this was a big one. He scratched the paint extensively. Thinking fast, he piled the snow back on to cover up the damage. He told me that all winter long when he drove by the dealership on his way to work, he would spot the used shit box parked in the lot with a big sign over the windshield that read "LOW MILES." He said with a chuckle,

"Yeah, low because the car doesn't move."

Eventually in the spring when the snow melted and the scratches on the hood were discovered, they probably thought that my dad damaged the car in retaliation for sticking him with such a poorly running vehicle, but that wasn't the case. While my father was prone to poor judgement, he was particularly adept at scamming his way out of any jam he found himself in.

His first car was a 1950 Ford that he owned with his brother. At the time my father was in the army and my uncle in the navy. Along with two of their service buddies, the brothers were driving home to Rhode Island when they got into a car accident. Even though they were in an unfamiliar town, my father managed to find a mechanic who said he could fix the car. A few days later when they picked it up, my father noticed the alignment was off pretty badly. In fact, he said unless you gripped the steering wheel tightly, the car couldn't drive in a straight line. My father had the repairs done without contacting his insurance company. When he arrived home in Rhode Island, he brought the bill to an insurance adjuster who admonished my dad for not first getting approval. He told my father that the car should have been totaled. My dad was in his uniform and acted clueless. The adjuster reluctantly agreed to process his claim.

My father knew at a very young age that perception is reality, and he used this to his advantage throughout his life. He often told a story that on Mother's Day he and his brothers would collect a few coins that they scrounged up for a bouquet of flowers. Instead of going into the flower shop himself as a cocky kid without much money, he sent in his little brother, Ronnie, who with snot running down his nose dumped the meager pile of pennies on the counter as he asked,

"How many flowers can I get for this much?"

My father said Ronnie would always meet them on the sidewalk carrying a huge beautifully arranged bouquet.

With the insurance check in his pocket and both hands firmly on the wheel, my father drove the wayward Ford to a well known used car dealership in Providence owned and operated by Jake Kaplan, the namesake of many Jaguar and Land Rover establishments in Rhode Island today. My father traded in the wreck for a used Mercury. A few days later my dad returned to the dealership because a turn signal on the Mercury burned out. When Jake Kaplan saw my father in his army uniform, he ask,

"Are you the GI who brought in that Ford a few days ago?"

"Yeah, the turn signal on the car I bought doesn't work," my dad exclaimed.

My father was always amused when he recalled Mr. Kaplan's response. He said that Jake Kaplan himself yelled right in the showroom,

"HOW MANY PEOPLE DIED IN THAT WRECK?"

My father’s savvy side didn’t last into his later years. For some reason my dad always trusted a local mechanic who had ripped him off countless times. Whenever he got screwed over, he went out and bought the exact same thing from the exact same people as if this time would be different. And now it was my turn to assume my father's post as a consumer sucker by bringing my perspective first car to his mechanic who had been mining my father's wallet for decades. They were fully aware that if I purchased this junker, they would be tasked with fixing it. After the inspection, a mechanic handed me an envelope with notes scribbled on the back indicating that "the compression was way up" and there was "no leaks of any kind." That was good enough for me. The following day I purchased the crap box for $3000.

The first time I pulled my new used car in the driveway, my father immediately noticed it was leaking oil. After I paid $400 to fix the rear main seal, on my first trip back from school the brakes failed. Even though I was new to driving a standard, I was able to downshift to bring the car to a stop. I discovered an odd beige colored fluid pouring out from under the car. As far as I knew (and I didn't know much), there was no single fluid in the engine that was that color. It turned out that if you mixed oil, brake and transmission fluids together you got beige. A few weeks into the semester a wheel fell off on the highway. All these repairs went to my father's mechanic, the guy who inspected the car before I bought it, and I stupidly paid the bill with every dime I earned the past summer washing dishes and mowing lawns.

The most notable mishap occurred the following year. I delivered the local newspaper as a part-time job, the money from which I used to keep the piece of scrap metal masquerading as a vehicle running. In the afternoon, I picked up bundles of newspapers at the press and deliver them to stores and carriers. As I cruised down the road loaded up with stacks of newspapers, my car caught on fire. I pulled over then threw open the hood. A ball of fire shot out of the carburetor. Not having an extinguisher I grabbed a bundle of newspapers and beat back the flames. By the time the fire truck arrived, I had the situation under control.

The local paper reported,

"Many newspapers boast of accurate coverage of fires, but yesterday The Pawtucket Valley Daily Times was actually used to extinguish a fire."

The article chronicled my car troubles which included the brake failure and the errant wheel as well as spotlighted my freshman status as a mechanical engineer. It ended with this final sentiment,

"Languedoc said that he didn't think the vehicle had it in for him, then added, 'All in all, it's a good car when the brakes work, the wheels stay on, and it's not on fire.'"

Today, young people are unaware of how poorly built automobiles were back in the day. Now cars are very reliable even those built in less developed countries. My dad often said that "Ford" stood for "Fix Or Repair Daily." Millennials don't realize how common it was to buy a new car right off the lot only to discover the next day that it won't start when you turn the key. Our oldest son, Aidan, asked me recently why we put up with such poor quality back then. It's not like we didn't know any better because we did. My parents had stuff handed down to them from their parents that still worked just fine. My mother had a Kirby vacuum cleaner that was her mother's. It had an attachment that could be used to sand floors. My cousin has woodworking tools that were his grandfather's.

There was a time when stuff was built to last, then later when it was my turn, things were built half-assed. There wasn't much we could do about it because most things you bought back then were cheaply constructed. After being screwed over many times, everyone's expectations were suitably lowered. I suppose market forces, competition, supply and demand, all pushed industries to build things better, but even today we still don't expect appliances to last much more than ten years.

I found my mother's Kirby in the back of the hallway closet the other day. It has a cloth covered cord and must weigh thirty pounds or more. When I plugged it in and flipped the switch, the light shown brightly and the motor sprung to life. I ran it over the rug in the family room. It worked wonderfully. And just in case you didn't know, they still make them.

Editor's Note: Originally published on October 16, 2018.