2015: Forget About It.

Should old acquaintance be forgot,
and never brought to mind?
Should old acquaintance be forgot,
and old lang syne?

2015 is an old acquaintance that should be forgotten and never brought to mind. Any year that begins with the death of Ellie Mae Clampett deserves to the forgotten.

Speaking of forgotten, does anyone remember who won a Grammy this year? Or who was even nominated?

Does anyone remember why records, pardon me, vinyls, became obsolete in the first place?

Remember the 2015 Super Bowl? Sure you do. Tom Brady and his deflated balls, ha, ha.  The Patriots won by the way.

Remember that great commercial during the Super Bowl from Nationwide Insurance about a child dying? I'd rather seen Peyton Manning humming their jingle for a minute.

How about The World Series? Remember that? It was just a couple of weeks ago. It was won by Kansas City.  I think Golden State won the NBA championship but that was a long time ago.

Does anyone remember Scott Walker?  He's the governor of Wisconsin and was supposed to be the acceptable candidate to the both The Establishment wing and the Tea Party wing of the Republican Party.  That didn't quite happen.

Does anyone remember an excuse Hillary Clinton has ever given that sounded plausible?



Have we all forgotten about David Letterman? How about Jon Stewart ( I know I have.)

Remember when "Mad Men" was the best TV show ever? Then, like time, it marched on to the 70's and featured Roger Sterling with a goofy mustache.

Does anyone remember a time when Donald Trump was not mentioned on the news? Or on the phone giving an interview? Or saying anything that was not ludicrous from the get-go? ("You can get bacon from a cow. It is called Cow Bacon and it is fabulous and it going to be the next big thing. Oh look, I just increased my lead in the latest Wartburg College poll of Iowans who have heard of Donald  Trump. Look Jeb Bush is now at a minus eight in popularity. That's because he is a loser and has an irregular menstrual cycle.  I saw Carly Fiorina naked on a rooftop in Jersey City celebrating 9/11 with a bunch of Mooslem Mexicans here illegally. I didn't even check out her breasticles because I couldn't get over her face. Anyway, that's why I want to make America great again.")

Does anyone remember when Ben Carson was celebrated as a skilled brain surgeon instead of portrayed as a sleepy weirdo because of his opinions on Egyptian pyramids?
 

Does anyone remember a time when you didn't think of Larry David when you saw Bernie Sanders?

Does anyone remember when it was at least chilly at Christmas time?

Does anyone remember exactly why they voted for President Obama?

Does anyone remember a time when people didn't try to win every  discussion or disagreement? Or a time in which you were not called a "bigot", "racist", "homophobe" et.al for having an opinion that the President of the United States had in 2008?

Let's not remember those times. Instead, let's remember the family of the victims of the church shooting in Charleston, South Carolina telling the killer, not even 48 hours afterward, that they forgave him.

Let's remember my buddy, Wayne Clancy, who went way out of his way to show high school kids that all of them was worth something to somebody.

Two personal things I will always remember. My son married his  college sweetheart. My wife and I became "empty nesters" which is great for reasons I won't go into because it makes my younger readers sick.

The second was a call from my wife saying the bone lesion on her vertebrae was benign. You never forget something like that.

I Hope You Wobble.

This is sort of late in life to announce this: I am a dancing fool.

Find Me

Actually, more "fool" than anything else, but I have decided that at weddings, class reunions, etc not to be a stick in the mud, but to actually get out on the floor and boogie.

Getting out on the floor and booging was big back in the 70's, the time of my youth. There was a genre of music back then called "Disco" (better known in Latin as "Realiter Sugit") which wanted us to get up and boogie. They also wanted you to get up to get down. It was a decade of mixed signals.

It was a decade when people put on their boogie shoes. I don't think I had any.

The first time I ever danced, in front actual people, was my senior prom. Personally, I thought I was amazing. I remember doing something resembling the modern dance of the period, which I think was The Hustle or maybe it was The Bump. It could have been The Robot, which if you ask me, is an annoying dance when someone else does it. All I know is that for the first time in my life I remember being very sweaty in a tuxedo.

It just so happened that my classmates didn't know how to dance either. I guess I don't need to explain I went to an all white high school. Except for one of my fellow white guys.

The lead singer of the band that played (Brookwood Station, really) announced "We have a dancing machine!" and out stepped this guy who began to really dance, above  the"American Bandstand" level but a little below the "Soul Train" level.

This boy was putting the boogie in the boogie-oogie-oogie. We were all standing around, watching and clapping for him. It was kind of like "Saturday Night Fever", except with heterosexuals. Then it happened.

He decided to do a split and it split his pants.

I've never had anything embarrassing like that ever happen to me. Nope, I don't need my pants to split to cause people to remember my dancing.

How would one describe my dancing ability? It is part Elaine from "Seinfeld", part Chuck Berry, part Chubby Checker and part Mikhail Baryshnikov. What I lack in rhythm and grace, I make up for in pure spasticity and enthusiasm.

My basic dance is free form modification of "The Twist" except I look like I'm stomping out a floor full of cigarettes most of the time. Believe it or not, I can get by with this type of dance most of the time.

The problem is the line dances.  This is when people get on the dance floor and they have to dance the same dance in a line, which for a renegade like me is difficult.

The music for the line dances is very bossy, It is always telling you what do-which leg to shake, where to stand, hop, jump around, and cha-cha,

One new line dance is called "The Wobble". My son learned to do "The Wobble" while he was a student at Georgia Southern University, so don't tell me my money was well spent.

At the past couple of weddings, I have had boogie fever. So much so that my son tried to teach me to "Wobble", so I wouldn't bring disgrace to the family.  His instructions: "First, you jump like this. Then you do this. Then you do that".

Well, we went to a wedding last weekend for one of his high school buddies.  To prepare myself for the reception. I watched a YouTube instructional video. The instructions: "First, you jump like this. Then you do this. Then you do that."

The time for dancing came. I was amazing during "Uptown Funk", especially when I realized I was the oldest person on the dance floor.

The big moment arrived:  "The Wobble". First, I jumped. Then I did this. Then I did that. If I was being graded on a curve, I might have past a Wobble test, if the instructor was blind.

I did manage to impress someone. A lovely lady said I was "something". Okay, it was my wife but I think she meant it.

No Offense

On the behalf of myself and the other Boomer parents, I would like to apologize to the world for creating the most spoiled rotten bunch of weenies ever to step forth on earth.


Which is an accomplishment itself considering we the worst until this current crop came along.


Most of our parents were raised during The Depression.  Just in case this isn't discussed anymore in American History (which is a distinct possibility) The Depression was caused by Republicans because they wanted to take the working man's money. That's how my Dad explained it.


The Depression made everyone walk three miles to school, in the snow (even if they lived in Florida) and it was uphill both ways.  Everybody's family had twenty kids and they all slept in the same bed.


For reasons my Dad never explained, The Depression lasted about ten years after a Democrat was elected President. Then, came World War II. After World II ended the soldiers came home and had sex. This sex lasted about 18 years from 1946-1964.


In comparison to the previous generation, we Boomers had it made because our parents didn't want us go through what they went through: poverty and war.


We grew up with television. It wasn't the big screens we have now. The screens were smaller and YOU HAD TO GET OUT OF YOUR CHAIR AND TURN A KNOB TO CHANGE CHANNELS.

Lord, when President Johnson gave a speech, it was an important event and it was on every channel. We only had four or five channel and your evening was shot because after President Johnson spoke, the old men on TV had to explain what he just said. Of course, if you ever heard President Johnson speak, this was a necessity. ("Mah feller 'Mericans. Ah com to ewe wid a heavy heardt")


We had it rough.


So when we had children, we didn't want our children to go through what we went through: self doubt that you are not the most precious thing ever created in the universe. Or missing your favorite show, like "Flipper".  "Flipper" was about a dolphin and his goofy looking human friends who would fight crime by swimming.

Now we have a crop of young adults who become offended at every little thing. Witness Yale University where people have become unhinged over "offensive" Halloween costumes. These are our best and brightest children. I would advise you to sell your bonds.


Witness what happened at The University of Missouri. There may/may not have been a swastika of feces (Swastika of Feces opened for The Cars in 1984). There may/may not have been a mean person driving around using racial slurs. It could have been somebody driving around listening to hip-hop music really loud. Nobody really knows for sure. But several high ranking college officials lost their jobs so it had to be important because it is hard to lose a college job.


Witness Bruce/Caitlyn Jenner. When Jenner decided to become a woman, I thought it was a joke. Honest. Then when he became Caitlyn, we all had to celebrate it, even though me lady still has a wang-dang.  There were some very serious Twitter tweets warning that everyone would have to call Jenner "Caitlyn" even though some of us have been referring to him as Bruce for forty years. It would have been nicer if he she came up with a name like Brucella.

Here's the dirty honest truth about life. People are going to say and do things that you don't like. Some of those people are going to be related to you. Some of them are going to hold political beliefs that are contrary to yours. They may want to express those beliefs. There's not much you can do about it.

I hope you don't take offense to that.