ivman's blague

today’s instant vacation…

My wife and I have long since gotten over the initial sting of when we first started being offered seniors discounts. What bothered me when I was offered a discount for the first time, I wasn’t yet old enough to be eligible! (So what does that tell you?!) Now we actually ask if we’re eligible! Quite the reversal, huh? Today’s iv is a couple of my favorite bits of senior humor.

The 84-Year-Old Bride

A local news station was interviewing an 84-year-old woman because she had just gotten married for the fourth time.

The interviewer asked her questions about her life, about what it felt like to be marrying again at 84, and then about her new husband’s occupation.

“He’s a funeral director,” she answered.

“Interesting,” thought the newsman. He then asked her if she wouldn’t mind telling him a little about her first three husbands and what they did for a living.

She paused for a few moments, needing time to reflect on all those years. After a short time, a smile came to her face and she answered proudly, explaining that she first married a banker when she was in her early 20s, then a circus ringmaster when in her 40s, later on a preacher when in her 60s, and now, in her 80s, a funeral director.

The interviewer looked at her, quite astonished, and asked why she had married four men with such diverse careers.

“That’s easy, son,” she smiled. “I married one for the money, … two for the show, … three to get ready, … and four to go!”

This is Rob again. We actually learned recently that a long-time friend, a widower, will be getting married in August. This octagenarian met his wife-to-be on eHarmony.com! Neither of them is living in what are typically thought of as places where retirees choose to live, where these senior romances seem to abound. Here’s the second bit of senior humor:

In Florida and Arizona (where retirees abound), the personal ads have become rather long-in-the-tooth. Here is a sampling:

FOXY LADY: Fashion-conscious, blue-haired beauty, slim, 5′ 4″ (used to be 5′ 6″), searching for sharp-looking, smart-dressing man. Matching white shoes and belt a plus.

LONG-TERM COMMITMENT: Recent widow who has just buried fourth husband looking for someone to round out a six-unit plot. Dizziness, fainting, shortness of breath not a problem.

SERENITY NOW: I am into solitude, long walks, sunrises, the ocean, and meditation. If you are the silent type, let’s get together, take our hearing aids out, and enjoy quiet times.

WINNING SMILE: Active grandmother with original teeth seeking a dedicated flosser to share rare steaks, corn on the cob, and caramel candy.

GROOVY: I still like to cruise in my Camaro on Saturday nights. If you were a groovy chick, or are now a groovy hen, let’s get together and listen to my boss collection of eight-track tapes.

MEMORIES: I can usually remember Monday through Thursday. If you can remember Friday, Saturday and Sunday, let’s put our two heads together.

MINT CONDITION: Male, 1932, high mileage, good condition, some hair, many new parts including hip, knee, cornea, valves. Doesn’t run, but walks well.

Our latest reminder of being seniors was yesterday at the World of Coca Cola in Atlanta, where 55+ is considered “senior.” My wife and I spent the day in Atlanta yesterday to see friends who were visiting from France. They lived in Greenville in the mid 1990s and we got to know them well. The last time we were in France with a team of students in 2001, these friends came to see us one weekend in Rouen. We had a wonderful time together, renewing our ties with them. A new Atlanta experience for us, in addition to being in Atlanta in the summer and having the temps be in the mid 80s with low humidity, was getting all over the place on MARTA. It got us very close to everywhere we wanted to go - including to a bus stop right across the street from one of our Atlanta favorites the Dekalb Farmers Market. The MARTA workers were extremely friendly and helpful - several even spoke French to us! What more could you want for an eight dollar, all-day pass?

Back to the World of Coca Cola for a second…. The new museum has some neat new features, but we still prefer the old Coke Museum. Do any of you who have visited both the old Coke museum and this new one share our opinion?

quotation…

“Bad people don’t become good people by rules.” - J. D. Crowley

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Rob

Senior pick-up line… A well dressed gentleman in his mid-eighties enters a local diner. When he spots an immaculately groomed lady in her mid-seventies seated at the lunch counter, he goes directly to the counter and sits down on the stool beside her. He looks at her slyly and says, “Say, do I eat here often?”

Tags: aging, Atlanta, France, senior citizens, weddings and marriage

Well, wedding season is already in full swing. Since we are in a university context, we are invited to many weddings. This past week we had two weddings - one Tuesday evening where I sang in a duet, and one Friday afternoon - the wedding of a teaching colleague.

We’re excited for all these young couples as they begin their lives together, but we’re also saddened to learn of some young couples who are working through marital problems. I believe that most if not all problems in marriage have their root in selfishness on the part of one or both spouses. I think some of the problems stem from unrealisitic expectations - expecting that any one human can be your source of happiness.

Today’s iv is a light-hearted look at this issue.

The Husband Store

A store that sells husbands has just opened in New York City, where a woman may go to choose a husband. Among the instructions at the entrance is a description of how the store operates:

You may visit the store ONLY ONCE! There are six floors and the attributes of the men increase as the shopper ascends the flights. There is, however, a catch … you may choose any man from a particular floor, or you may choose to go up a floor, but you cannot go back down except to exit the building! So, a woman excitedly goes to the Husband Store to find herself the perfect husband….

On the first floor the sign on the door reads:
Floor 1 - These men have jobs and love the Lord.

The second floor sign reads:
Floor 2 - These men have jobs, love the Lord, and love kids.

The third floor sign reads:
Floor 3 - These men have jobs, love the Lord, love kids, and are extremely good looking.

“Wow,” she thinks, “I should probably stop here!” But she feels compelled to keep going.

She goes to the fourth floor and reads the sign:
Floor 4 - These men have jobs, love the Lord, love kids, are drop-dead good looking and help with the housework.

“Oh, my goodness!” she exclaims, “I can hardly stand it!”

Still, she goes to the fifth floor and sign reads:
Floor 5 - These men have jobs, love the Lord, love kids, are drop-dead gorgeous, help with the housework, and have a strong romantic streak.

She is so tempted to stay, but she goes on up to the sixth floor where the sign reads:

Floor 6 - You are visitor 4,363,012 to this floor. There are no men on this floor. This floor exists solely as proof that some women are impossible to please. Thank you for shopping at the Husband Store. Watch your step as you exit the building, and have a nice day!

The Wife Store

There is actually also a Wife Store, right across the street from the Husband Store. It works the same way as the Husband Store - it also has 6 floors, you can enter only once, and there is only one direction to go.

The doors read:

Floor 1 - These women are beautiful.

Floor 2 - These women are beautiful and have money.

What is on the other floors, nobody knows. No man has ever gone past the second floor!

Megan and Drew arrived safe and sound shortly after noon on Saturday. Drew did very well on his first flight. We decided to surprise Nora by celebrating her birthday a month and a half early since we wouldn’t all be together on her actual birthday. That’s about the only way we could ever surprise her. Here she is blowing out the candles on her keylime cheesecake….

Of course Becka enjoyed having our three kids and our grandson here for Mother’s Day. Here’s a picture of our little guy on our kitchen floor this morning. I’m sure there will be more pictures to share later this week.

The house wrens have been busily filling the bird house with sticks. Here’s what things looked like inside the house this morning….

Here’s what this bit of “prime real estate” looks like from the outside…

Who says there’s a housing crisis?!?

quotation…

“There are five Gospels: Matthew Mark, Luke, John, and the Christian, and some people will never read the first four.” - Irish evangelist Gypsy Smith

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Rob

Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so.

Tags: birds, men, shopping, weddings and marriage, women

This was one week where *real* bloggers could have posted something interesting almost every day. Monday was St. Patrick’s day. We received some great pictures of Drew for that occasion. Here’s one…

Yesterday was the day the swallows come back to Capistrano each year. Here’s a bit of the story…

The famous cliff swallows of the Mission San Juan Capistrano, in San Juan, California, leave town every year in a swirling mass near the Day of San Juan (St. John’s Day - October 23), They go to their winter home 6,000 miles south in Goya, Corrientes, Argentina. Five months later, almost to the day, they land at the Mission San Juan Capistrano on or around St. Joseph’s Day, March 19, to the ringing bells of the old church and a crowd of visitors from all over the world who are in town awaiting their arrival and celebrating with a huge fiesta as well as a parade.

Then today is the first day of spring. Tomorrow is Good Friday, and Sunday is Easter. As I said, bloggers could go wild this week. I’ll refrain from doing so.

Bible Conference has been a huge blessing so far, and there’s still more to come! Several have told me how glad they were to learn that they could listen in online as the messages are streamed.

With spring in the air, young people’s minds turn to romance. I found something in my files that brought a wry smile to the face, but then I’m a word person. The humor in this one is that the writer has masterfully used the positive version of many of the negative expressions in the English language that, in actuality, have no positive version.

How I Met My Wife - a positive experience
by Jack Winter
Published originally 25 July 1994 in The New Yorker

It had been a rough day, so when I walked into the party I was very chalant, despite my efforts to appear gruntled and consolate.

I was furling my wieldy umbrella for the coat check when I saw her standing alone in a corner. She was a descript person, a woman in a state of total array. Her hair was kempt, her clothing shevelled, and she moved in a gainly way.

I wanted desperately to meet her, but I knew I’d have to make bones about it since I was travelling cognito. Beknownst to me, the hostess, whom I could see both hide and hair of, was very proper, so it would be skin off my nose if anything bad happened. And even though I had only swerving loyalty to her, my manners couldn’t be peccable. Only toward and heard-of behavior would do.

Fortunately, the embarrassment that my maculate appearance might cause was evitable. There were two ways about it, but the chances that someone as flappable as I would be ept enough to become persona grata or a sung hero were slim. I was, after all, something to sneeze at, someone you could easily hold a candle to, someone who usually aroused bridled passion.

So I decided not to risk it. But then, all at once, for some apparent reason, she looked in my direction and smiled in a way that I could make heads or tails of.

I was plussed. It was concerting to see that she was communicado, and it nerved me that she was interested in a pareil like me, sight seen. Normally, I had a domitable spirit, but, being corrigible, I felt capacitated - as if this were something I was great shakes at - and forgot that I had succeeded in situations like this only a told number of times. So, after a terminable delay, I acted with mitigated gall and made my way through the ruly crowd with strong givings.

Nevertheless, since this was all new hat to me and I had no time to prepare a promptu speech, I was petuous. Wanting to make only called-for remarks, I started talking about the hors d’oeuvres, trying to abuse her of the notion that I was sipid, and perhaps even bunk a few myths about myself.

She respsonded well, and I was mayed that she considered me a savory character who was up to some good. She told me who she was. “What a perfect nomer,” I said, advertently. The conversation become more and more choate, and we spoke at length to much avail. But I was defatigable, so I had to leave at a godly hour. I asked if she wanted to come with me. To my delight, she was committal. We left the party together and have been together ever since. I have given her my love, and she has requited it.

quotation…

In a message about Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego (Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah)… “You will be given many opportunities in life to choose whether to bow or to burn. Choose to burn.” - Craig Hartman

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Rob

Boy am I happy! My IQ Test came back negative!

Tags: English, holidays, language, weddings and marriage, writing

With Valentine’s Day one week away, I thought I’d post some fun things about the relationships between men and women.

A couple drove down a country road for several miles, not saying a word. An earlier discussion had led to an argument and neither wanted to concede their position. As they passed a barnyard full of mules and and donkeys, the husband broke the silence by asking a bit sarcastically, “Relatives of yours?”

“Yep,” the wife replied, “in-laws.”

***
A journalist had done a story on gender roles in Iraq several years before the war, and she noted then that women customarily walked about 10 feet behind their husbands.

She returned to Iraq recently and observed that the men now walked several yards behind their wives.

She approached one of the women for an explanation.

“This is marvelous,” said the journalist. “What enabled women here to achieve this reversal of roles?”

The Iraqi woman replied, “Land mines.”

***
A husband, proving to his wife that women talk more than men, showed her a study which indicated that men use on the average only 15,000 words a day, whereas women use 30,000 words a day.

She thought about this for a while and then told her husband, “Women use twice as many words as men because they have to repeat everything they say,” to which he replied, “What?”

***
A man was walking along a California beach and stumbled across an old lamp. He picked it up and rubbed it, and out popped a genie. The genie said, “OK, you released me from the lamp, blah, blah, blah. This is the fourth time this has happened this month, and I’m getting a little sick of all these wishes, so you can forget about three — you only get one wish!” The man sat and thought about it for a while and said, “I’ve always wanted to go to Hawaii, but I’m scared to fly and I get very seasick. Could you build me a bridge to Hawaii so I can drive over there to visit?”

The genie laughed and said, “That’s impossible! Think of the logistics of that! How would the supports ever reach the bottom of the Pacific? Think of how much concrete … of how much steel! No, I’m sorry, you’ll have to think of another wish.”

The man said OK and tried to think of a really good wish. Finally he said, “My wife always says that I don’t care and that I’m insensitive. So I wish that I could understand women … know how they feel and what they’re thinking when they give us the silent treatment … know why they’re crying … know what they really want when they say ‘nothing’ … know how to make them truly happy….”

The genie said, “You want that bridge with two lanes or four?”

***
New Seat Belt Law in the USA

This regulation becomes effective July 1, 2008, in all states and will soon to be law in all Canadian Provinces.

The national Highway Safety Council has done extensive testing on a newly designed seat belt. Results show that accidents can be reduced by as much as 45% when the belt is properly installed.

Correct installation is illustrated below….

Please pass on to family and friends.
THIS MAY HELP SAVE A LIFE!

***
One of my projects over the Christmas break was painting our dining room. The time I had after the holidays was insufficient, and the project has gone into the beginning of this semester. After this past Saturday’s hanging of the window treatment my wife had made and getting the new ceiling light in place, all that is left now is painting the baseboards. Phew! Anyway, here’s a picture of the almost completed room….

Here’s a close-up of Becka’s window treatment….

special request…

One of our campus sons (Tim) from the mid-eighties here at BJU has kept in touch with us through the years since he graduated. (It’s kind of scary that Tim’s son could be our campus son in not very many years! Yikes - our first campus grandson!) Well, anyway, yesterday Tim asked me in an e-mail if I would put a link on my blog to a survey he’s doing as part of the research for a book he is writing.

If you would be so kind as to take this anonymous survey, I would really appreciate your helping “our son” in this way. There are only ten questions and it will take you very little time to finish it. You can get to the survey by clicking here.

quotation…

“Lord, give me firmness without hardness, steadfastness without dogmatism, love without weakness.” - Jim Elliot

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Rob

Misers aren’t much fun to live with, but they do make great ancestors!

Tags: holidays, home improvements, men, Valentines, weddings and marriage, women

Often my blog posts are related to something happening in our lives, and this one is no exception. Since Friday morning, I’ve been battling a head cold - something I haven’t done in a long time and something that’s making the rounds right now. During classes Friday, I was quite miserable, with a nose that had been replaced by a faucet. After dinner Friday evening, I went to bed at 6:30 and slept for 12 hours straight - something I never do! Our cats - Adelaide and Clementine - were a riot! Adelaide, whom we lovingly call “Florence Nightingale,” was curled up next to me the entire 12 hours! At 6:15 Saturday morning, Clementine started digging at the closet door to try to wake me up, and Adelaide started walking around on the bed, crying, and sticking her nose in my face - I guess to see if I were still breathing. I fell back asleep and immediately dreamed that I was staring at a computer, and an e-mail notify message popped up from our two cats, concerned about my having slept so long. I woke up laughing, which felt good. I slept away a lot of the weekend getting 31 hours of sleep totally! But I feel much better this morning to face a week of classes.

My dear wife has been so sweet this weekend. (Can you even imagine her being anything but sweet?!) She made a big pot of her wonderful cabbage soup to help speed my recovery. It made me think of something I’ve had in my files for a long time. I share that with you today.

Some years ago The Saturday Evening Post ran an article that was entitled “The Seven Ages of the Married Cold.” This article revealed the reactions of a husband to his wife’s colds during their first seven years of marriage. It’s a rather humorous look at a not-so-funny reality - the potential decline of a marriage, as seen through the common cold. I hope I do better than the husband in what you’re about to read!

The Seven Ages of the Married Cold

First Year: “Sugar dumpling, I’m really worried about my baby girl. You’ve got a bad sniffle and there’s no telling about these things with all this strep going around. I’m putting you in the hospital this afternoon for a general checkup and a good rest. I know the food’s lousy, but I’ll be bringing your meals in from Rossini’s. I’ve already got it all arranged with the floor superintendent.”

Second Year: “Listen darling, I don’t like the sound of that cough. I’ve called Doc Miller and asked him to rush over here. Now you go to bed like a good girl, please, just for papa.”

Third Year: “Maybe you’d better lie down, honey; nothing like a little rest when you feel lousy. I’ll bring you something. Have you got any canned soup?”

Fourth Year: “Now look dear, be sensible. After you’ve fed the kids, washed the dishes, and finished the floors, you’d better lie down.”

Fifth year: “Why don’t take a couple of aspirin?”

Sixth year: “I wish you would just gargle something instead of sitting around all evening barking like a seal.”

Seventh year: “For Pete’s sake, stop sneezing! Are you trying to give me pneumonia?”

***
I found a great picture online somewhere during the Christmas break - the way one student dealt with the pertussis scare we had at BJU in early December. I hope none of my students come to class looking like this today, fearful of catchin my cold….

quotation…

“Magnifying God isn’t making Something small big. It’s focusing on Something that, from our perspective, seems small and seeing how big He is.” - Dr. Drew Conley

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Rob

If a man caught a cold in the middle of a forest where no one could hear him, would he still make whining sounds?

Tags: cats, men, sleep, students, weddings and marriage, women