Category Archives: 100 words or less

Thirty second Drill

I’m doing this one without a clock, because, really, who gives a rat’s ass?

I can see by this freckle on the back of my hand that my time is about up.

I really do have to make that overdue appointment with the dermatologist.

They Might Really Be Insane

I sometimes wonder about it, where the exact line is.  It’s hard to say sometimes.   A person can be fully justified, and still insane.  Oversensitive, obsessive- compulsive, “crazed”, psychotic — where the precise line is?  Fuzzy.

You can leaf through the DSM and find every one of your friends, relatives, colleagues.  We’re each the product of long-programmed reactions, prejudices, actual knowledge, fears, suspicions, notions of success and failure, collected tics.  

The actual line is not so bright, that’s all I’m saying.

 

koan

 

The Noble Toble was given the tit,

Griff fought the breast;

it was not offered to the baby.

The Dumbest Lawyer in New York

My mother was once wrangling with some guy at a desk in Florida.  She asked for my advice, which I gave her for free.

The next time we talked she said the guy said “your son must be the dumbest lawyer in New York!”.   It turns out she’d grasped the principle I’d explained, just had the action to take reversed.

“Ah,” she laughed when I told her.  I was only mildly indignant, the guy had a point if you considered only the benefit of the bargain I got for the law degree, licensing fees and dry cleaning bills.

Anger is Bad Policy

And so we see that while we may be right, and righteous, and on the side of the angels, and provoked terribly, mercilessly even– anger is not a good option.

“So, you slammed your arm across your desk and swept everything on to the floor, in front of your third graders?”

“Yes, but….” is a very poor answer, no matter how compelling the long ‘but’ is.

That was more than twenty years ago, a thing to lament when recalled during a somber moment every decade or so.  I’m grateful that I can lament it now, the high price already paid.

Rubber Crutch

They’re making them so realistic looking these days, it’s often impossible to tell what a crutch is made of until it’s time to depend on it.   Damnedest thing.   I could have sworn this was metal and wood.

“Tell that to your broken ass,” a casual observer suggests.

New World Odor

The old cartoon comes to mind.  Guy lying on psychiatrist’s couch saying “nobody listens to me,” and the shrink, behind him, is looking out the window, staring intently at something, or doing a crossword puzzle, checking his Blackberry.  “I’m sorry,” says the shrink “did you say something?”

Take a deep breath, friend, that old joke has become the new joke, the new world odor.   The smell of distraction is the prevailing stink.  Look at it this way– if you weren’t distracted, hoo boy.