Jay to the World: May 2018

I see that President Trump has promised our farm families that if the United States does end up in a trade war with China that negatively affects grain prices, he will “make it up to them”. I for one am sleeping much easier, because like my father and my grandfather always said, ‘if you can’t trust a man with six bankruptcies to keep his word and make things right, then who can you trust??’. Ok, maybe it wasn’t them who said that….

I see that the head of the Environmental Protection Agency, Scott Pruitt, installed a $43,000 soundproof phone booth in his office so outsiders couldn’t eavesdrop on sensitive conversations related to our environment. I don’t know, you can call me cynical but is there anything related to the environment that is so private that it requires a sound-proof phone booth?? Heck, I once received the results of a colonoscopy on speakerphone with 3 customers in my office.
I was towel drying Beau’s hair the other night… Apparently a little too vigorously… when he says “dad that probably feels good on your head because you don’t have any hair, but that really hurts.”

Speaking of painful hair, the excitement is building for the upcoming meeting between the world’s two most famous heads of hair, President Trump and Kim Jung Un. I can’t imagine that there has ever been a meeting between two more important people who for whatever reason just can’t seem to get a good haircut. I know they are still trying to come up with a suitable place to meet…may I suggest Supercuts??

I found out at dinner the other night that the topic of conversation on the way to school that day was “why does dad swear so much?” First off, I don’t swear that much, and when I do, it’s always supposed to be only in my head. It’s not my fault that my filter can no longer stop the words before they come out. But I will say this – most of my swearing is due to frustration from getting old, not anger. For instance, when I open a can of peas with the electric can opener only to realize the can had a pull-tab, I’m going to swear because I hate the fact that I’m half-blind. When I burn my hand because I go to stir the Spaghetti-O’s and forget that a fork is a heat conductor, I’m going to swear because I learned that in 4th grade. And I used to give my father a hard time about not aging gracefully. Good grief….

This month’s Song of the Month is Dead Skunk (in the middle of the road) by Loudon Wainwright III. The song was released in November, 1972 and peaked at #16 on the Billboard chart in March, 1973. Now I have no way to prove it, but I’m just guessing that this song was inspired by Mr. Wainwright III seeing a dead skunk in the middle of the road. If I had known it was that easy to write a song from a life experience, I would have penned “High-Centered on a Tombstone” back in 1981. Don’t ask….

And finally, did you read about the squirrel in Turkey that received a prosthetic device after losing both of it’s legs in a trap?? That’s the good news…the bad news is that the device doesn’t leave the squirrel any room for its nuts.

Until Next Time (And there may not be a June newsletter – my editor (Tricia) is on vacation)

Jay