Living Retired — ‘Can You Believe This?’
Living Retired — ‘Can You Believe This?’
By Gary Chalk
I have been writing Living Retired for eight years. So you know by now that I don’t make this stuff up — well at least not all of it. Todays column is a factual account of what happened in the Chalk household last week.
Thursday evening, I stretched out on the sofa in the family room to watch the first game of the NFL preseason. This is when it all started…
I picked up the television remote and noticed brown soot all over the one end. There was even dirt on the tabletop where the remote had been left. Hmmm? I held the evidence until Jan arrived. I considered placing the remote in a baggy and stretching some of that yellow ‘DO NOT CROSS’ police tape around the crime scene. But that would have been overboard. I didn’t have enough time to grab my winter trench coat to do my impersonation of Colombo when Jan walked into the room. I began my interrogation…
“Dear, there is brown dirt on the remote control. I am baffled how this could happen?” I waited, thinking Jan would feel uneasy.
“Oh, I can explain Gary. Remember last night when you cranked open the outdoor umbrella on the patio? There was some dirt stuck up underneath. You told me that it was the remains of a wasps nest.”
“I remember Jan but how does that explain the soot on the television remote here in the family room?”
“Gary, at the time I was holding the remote in my hand so I used it to reach up to sweep the dirt off. You were standing right beside me and watched me do it.”
I was gobsmacked. My sensible, well-educated wife used a television remote control to clean some crud off a patio umbrella?
“You know Gary you have done your share of dumb things in the past.”
I became defensive. “Okay Dear name 10.”
“Gary don’t be a smart aleck. Here’s one. Remember the time ice froze on the garage door and you couldn’t open it to drive your car out? So, you put the car in reverse and slowly backed up. Your gentle tap left a crease in the garage door. It’s still visible today.”
“That’s not how I remember it. Name 9 others.”
Jan began reeling off more examples of my misdoings…
“There was the time we were assembling an IKEA bookshelf for Tyler at university and you decided to use a rubber mallet to secure the shelves — you totally missed and punched a hole the size of a softball right through the particle board. Tyler hadn’t even gone to his first class and you ruined his dorm furniture!”
She continued…
“There was the time you Crazy Glued your fingers together when you tried to repair a coffee cup you broke when you smacked a fly that landed on it with a flyswatter.”
“And don’t forget that time you pretended you were Zorro with the weed wacker out on the front lawn. You sliced the electric extension cord in half. The neighbours stall laugh at that one.”
I protested. “Jan that wasn’t me. It was your father who did that!”
“Doesn’t matter Gary. I’m on a roll. Then, there was that time…”
‘WHOA! OKAY JAN I GET YOUR POINT!”
She wasn’t about to stop…
“How about when we celebrated your 40th birthday in New Orleans? You drenched your Cajun-spiced shrimp with hot Tabasco sauce then rubbed your eyes. You spent the night back at our hotel standing in the shower pouring cold water over your eyes to stop the swelling! So much for enjoying Bourbon Street.”
I tried to interrupt but there was no stopping Jan…
“How about your classic blooper when you were a radio announcer. Who can ever forget the time you were supposed to say, ‘knitted tote bags’ and you said, ‘knotted tit bags!”
I was at a loss for words. Time to change the topic.
“Soo Jan since I have the television remote in my hand what program should we watch?”
Jan didn’t miss a beat, “Let’s watch ‘Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader?’“
Living Retired is written by humour columnist Gary Chalk.
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