MY 2023 BEST RIDER COMMENTS

In 2019, my first full year of driving, I wanted to give some of my passengers a gift around the end of the year for the holidays. I decided to put together a list of my favorite rider comments and people really enjoyed reading them.  I learned quickly I could only give them out when they were getting out of my car. The list I created at the end of 2020 I gave out the entire 2021 for some of my riders.  

Below is my list for 2023. Each year it has been difficult to narrow the best comments down to 20-24. These are 24 comments and some are strange and some are funny and some are both.  None of these comments were made under the influence of alcohol, as far as I could tell. Hundreds of my riders will enjoy this list in 2024 and I will enjoy giving it to them.

                                                        

She: "One of the 6 tattoos I have is an eye on the back of my head-my neck. I used to tell my three kids that I needed eyes on the back of my head, and I've had one for twenty years."

She: "A week before our honeymoon I told my husband he was too hairy, and I waxed off a lot of his hair on his chest.  His nipples were bleeding, and he was crying." 

The man said, "When that balloon from China was flying over our area, it had chemicals that came out of it, because people started sneezing a lot afterwards."

"My wife had to kiss a lot of toads before she found her prince, I married the first person I kissed, I didn't think it was going to happen again." (Married 42 years)

Me: "How did you two meet?" Him: "It's a funny story.  She ran a stop sign and drove into me. We talked about the damage to my car for a couple weeks and I finally said, "How about I drop everything if you let me take you out to dinner." (Together 6 years, married one, from Wisconsin)

The woman from Minnesota said, "I'm a lawyer and a Danish Knight. I'm an Honorary Counsel to Denmark since 2014 and I'm going to be officially knighted in a ceremony soon."

The Cleveland Browns fan, "When they win the Super Bowl, they'll probably burn down the city. I may burn my house down."

She: "I once had to borrow my stepfather's hearse to go to work.  I stopped at a McDonalds and ordered two cheeseburgers at the drive thru.  The cashier asked, 'Is there anyone in the back?" I said, 'That's why I ordered two cheeseburgers.'"

Me: "My wife and I decided again not to buy a  TV, after five years without one." He said, "It's un-American, even people in third world countries have TV's." Later, I said, "I like to stop driving and head home between 6-7 pm." He replied, "Why go home, you don't even have a F'N TV."

When the rotisserie chickens are ready at the Lowes supermarket, the woman said, "We yell out, "Yi-ha, come and get it and then we do a chicken dance to music."

Physicist: "My dad taught me all about physics in how he disciplined. His hands were as big as dinner plates and his fingers were like sausages."

I told them that a Trauma nurse said she relieved stress at the end of the day by going into her car in the parking garage and taking her badge and bra off. The woman said, "That's what I do when I get home from work. If you wore a jockstrap all day, you would take it off immediately too." 

She: "My daughter was wearing a mask in kindergarten and when I cleaned the mask, I realized she had been wearing lipstick under it."

She: "My sister owns a dental lab.  My kids thought they didn't have to brush or floss because Aunty would get them new teeth."

Married 29 years, I asked the couple from Minnesota, how did you two meet? Him: "We met going through a windshield together. We were in the front seat with a mutual friend driving and she hit a brick wall and we both went through the windshield and back inside the car. I was okay and went to Mexico and she broke her neck." 

I asked the tall man, "How tall are you?" He said, "I'm 7 feet 8 inches tall. I once played against the Harlem Globetrotters."

He was a very busy executive, now retired: "I didn't watch TV for thirty years. I didn't even know what ABC and NBC were."

When he was younger he told a priest, "The most important things in a marriage are not going to church and having a lot of sex."

Married 29 years, I asked her, "What's the secret of a successful marriage?" She said, "7 words: please, thank you, I love you, and I'm sorry."

The intelligent and creative guy explained about a woman he used to date: "I fell in love with all the moons that circulated around her."

He got in the car in a good mood and told me he just took his name off the credit card that he shared with his wife of three years. "She bought a $9,500 Prada purse to get back at me, it's her responsibility now.

She: "My friend was a dentist for 37 years and then she became a lawyer, and she defends clients against dentists. Her hobby is hunting alligators, she skins them and makes things for her house."

A woman told me, "The best comment I ever heard in an Uber was when my male driver in Chicago asked me, 'Where is the closest Starbucks? I need to make a bowel movement."

Last year the young woman was going to a reptile convention; she helps rescue exotic animals. This year she said, "I  rescued three tarantulas and the first day the biggest one got loose and my sister found it crawling up my back.  I was screaming and gave them all to someone else that night."

My Hannukah Miracle

It was the eighth night of Hannukah and I got to experience a miracle.  I am Jewish and my wife and I celebrate Christmas also.  I had not lit any candles or said the prayer in front of the menorah until that night.  With a lot of help from my wife, who is my tech support, and a bit from Adam Sandler and Ray Charles, this was a special night for me.    

This is a different kind of Hannukah story and it involves a 63 year-old man, who was once called by a boss to be, "A technically deficient superstar."  The words, "Technically deficient" are an understatement, and my wife and three children will gladly testify to this.

My story begins about ten years ago when my youngest daughter gave me her old iPod. My two daughters put about 500 songs on it over the years for me and I drove thousands of miles with my iPod playing and me doing a good amount of singing.  Let's say fair amount, good is probably the wrong word to use about my singing.

But, in March, 2022, that all ended.  I bought a new car, a newer model, Ford Transit Passenger Van.  It was great, except there was no outlet for an iPod. My iPod, the chord, the charger, all sat in my wife's car for awhile and then in a drawer in my house. I missed my songs, an unusual mixture of The Beatles, country music, rock, sixties, seventies, ballads, Christmas music, Disney songs and show tunes.

Frequently, I asked my children and my wife, how can I still listen to my songs? I was told I could copy them and listen to them on iTunes or Spotify.  But to a technically deficient guy, that sounds as easy as building an igloo. I just wanted to listen to my iPod.

Twenty months later, in November, 2023, I threw the iPod, chord, and charger into a suitcase and took them to Colorado to plead once more with one of my technically superior children.  She gave me specific details on what to do when I got home. My wife had made a valiant attempt a few months earlier to revive my iPod, but she failed. Now, on the eighth night of Hannukah, I gave it one final shot and I came up empty also. 

My wife decided to make another attempt that night, but it wasn't working on my computer.  My wife  said to me, "Why don't you use headphones?" I said, "Ok, how does it work?" Yes, it's sad, but I have never used headphones for anything.  It took another fifteen minutes of trying a couple headphones my wife had, and she charged the headphones and turned the volume up on my iPod.  

It was a Hannukah miracle. After twenty-one months, my iPod came alive. The below picture is the only time in my life anyone has seen me with headphones on.  I think John Lennon was singing, "Yeah" in "Twist in Shout," or maybe it was, "Oh What A Beautiful Morning" from "Oklahoma." It did not matter, my iPod had returned from the dead and I was beyond thrilled.

But this ridiculous, true story has an even more bizarre ending. I was going to put the headphones on, but my wife turned the volume up all the way. I could hear the music through the headphones while they sat on my desk. Isn't this the way it's supposed to work?  I sat down in front of my computer and started writing this story while I listened to my iPod through the headphones on my desk.

The third song I heard was Adam Sandler singing the Hannukah song.  Three songs later it was Ray Charles singing, "America The Beautiful," and I knew this was meant to be.  After listening to my music for a couple hours, I ended the night and recited the Hannukah prayer, without the candles. What a great Hannukah gift from my wife-thank you princess!

What I Learned On My Colorado Vacation

 Here it is, my final vacation blog, I thought I posted it earlier.

1. Turkey brine is a different kind of turkey. My future son-in-law is an excellent cook. I learned that if you "brine" a turkey it will be moist and juicy. This means soaking it in salt water overnight and you can add extra flavors also.  It was a very good turkey as you can see above and I would eat it now.

2. Onesies are not just for babies. This is our dog modeling a onesie. I'm pretty sure I have never seen a dog in a onesie, but it kept him warm and he looked comfortable in it too.

3. Don't get too close to a big dog. By the look on his face you can tell this a gentle dog, however, if you get too close he's going to use that big tongue on your face and there's no way I'm going to let that happen to me.

4 I'm not a biscuit guy.  When I think of a biscuit, I think of something they bring out instead of bread and you put some butter on it.  I've never been a fan, but we went out to eat and I figured I would get a biscuit sandwich.  The chicken on it was very good and I had ham and swiss and bacon also on it.  The sandwich was good, but the biscuit was just okay.  I would have enjoyed a roll more, but I ate it.

5. Chicken toilet rocks? I heard there were rocks in Michigan that looked like toilets, but I couldn't find any online. I did find an article about toilets that rock, but it's just not the same thing. However, let's just say that they have some unusual rocks in Michigan.

Unsplash

https://unsplash.com › photos › wind-turbine

6. Wind turbines cost $1 million each and Texas has more than any state. For some reason the pictures of turbines did not show here when I typed them, but when I check the preview of the post, it comes out fine.  Use your imagination if you can't see the turbines. (They are large, usually white and they go round and round just like the wheels on a bus)

7. McDonalds removed Apple Fritters and Cinnamon buns from their menu due to low sales last July.  Still, my wife checked at every store we went to. Below is one final apple fritter for her.

                                               

8. I never heard of Koi Fish, but my wife educated me that they are very popular and they look something like this.

9.  I learned how to set-up a contact on my phone-seriously, I know how ridiculous that sounds.

THINGS YOU USUALLY DON'T SEE, I SAW ON VACATION

 Here is my list, some with pictures and some you have to use your imagination:

1. When you walk up to the urinal in the men's room at a rest stop on a highway, I'm guessing you've never seen this. Sure enough, in the lobby was the guest book and I signed it.  They wanted to know how long I was going to be in the state and I think I wrote, "30 minutes."

2. This was at a high school in Colorado. It's a combination of steps and a wheelchair/walkway path that circles around the steps.  You can use either one, but I've never seen them combined like this.

3. If you live in Colorado or a state with a lot of mountains, this might be normal. This is a tremendously large field/park that you can walk around, but the cool thing is the snow covered mountains in the background.  It was a beautiful site in person, it looks like a postcard.

4. This was in a hotel bathroom in our room.  I had to continue reading this many times to figure it out. I was thinking of a Seinfeld bit: I'm hanging my towel up to save water? But the water is already on the towel and it's going to dry. I had to get advisement for my wife to understand that they want us to use our towel a second day so they can save water on cleaning towels. How many towels do they need hanging to save money? Couldn't there be a different way of saying this?

5. You like to have a good view when you look out your hotel room, but I'm betting you've never seen this. You are looking not at one baseball field or two or three, but there are six baseball parks here. If you doubt it, look at how many of those big lights there are and how far back they go.

6. My daughter told me about this, but here she is modeling her treadmill while she works.  She insisted I post this picture and I am clearly lying about that.  I am amazed that some people will spend a couple hours a day exercising as they work.

7. Driving on a highway I saw a car for a driving school and it said, "Driving school trained by police officers only." I wonder if they train you while they are in uniform? Probably not, but unusual for sure.

8.Sitting in the backseat of a car I looked to my right and saw a young guy on a skateboard. He was dressed up, had a backpack on and in front of him on the skateboard was a suitcase.  I tried to get my phone out and snap a picture, but he was going too fast. Where was he going?

9.The sign on the highway said, "Spread Good Cheer, Not Covid."

10. Another sign said, "Drive As If Your Grandmother Is With You."

DOGS MAKE LIFE BETTER

I saw these words in my son and daughter-in-laws house in Colorado.  My first thought was when and my second thought was how? When I stood outside in Colorado in sixteen degree temperatures cheering my dog on, "Go potty, go potty, potty, potty, potty," I realized the answer. There are only so many times you can do that with a straight face in freezing temperatures without starting to laugh.  I did not take a selfie at that moment, sorry.

The next day, an article popped up and gave me more answers and none of them had to do with laughter. So, when I got home I did some research and this is what I found out:

1.  Dogs keep you more active and healthier. People who regularly walk their dog actually live longer and you, "Improve muscle tone, increase mental clarity, control obesity, and reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease." Why am I taking vitamins?

                                                 

2. Pet owners have lower blood pressure? Is that what happens when I can't get our dog Odin inside at night from the yard? I don't feel my blood pressure diving. The article said that people who don't have dogs have a 20% better chance of getting a heart attack. But I'm picking up gallons of poop, is that really a good deal? And then, I have to put the little bags in the garbage bag to go out to be picked up!

3. It said, "Dogs reduce stress and improve mood." When they are asleep they do?  I was just in Colorado and there were four dogs running around me, four!  Okay, they do say it increases levels of serotonin which is associated with feelings of happiness.  So, when I go into the bedroom in the morning and Odin just woke up and I sing to him,

"Good morning, good morning, and how are you today.  

Good morning, Good morning Odin, it's gonna be a great day.

I guess I'm feeling happy, but my wife is listening to me sing and that is just annoying and it's Odin's fault. They say that playing with your dog, "Changes your brain chemistry." (For the better??) Pictured below is Odin trying to wake my wife up while she hiding under the blankets.

4. I love this one: "Dogs boost immunity and fight allergies." Again, I'm taking vitamins for that, do I really need more? Do they know what vitamins cost?  They say that having a dog you get used to some dirt which helps you build up immunities. Isn't it easier to take vitamins?

5. "Dogs help detect disease." Why am I going for a check-up with my doctor when I have a dog?  The article really says that dogs can detect cancer and changes in their owner's body including abnormal blood levels. You have got to be kidding me!

                                       

I understand that they are great for companionship and affection and for some people it helps also with depression.  But, if having a dog is so great, shouldn't everyone have two of them? NO!

What Time Is It Really?

It all started this past month with The Beatles.  They put out a song that was written in 1977 and then it was worked on in 1995 and released in 2023.  That can be confusing enough, but going through daylight savings time and then driving out to Colorado and experiencing time changing on four different days? It was amusing and confusing and I'm not rhyming either.

On Sunday, November 5th, about a month ago, the clocks changed. My wife and I experience this very differently.  In my head, I'm thinking, spring forward and fall back.  All I want to do is make sure that when I wake up the next morning it's the right time and I know what devices have to be changed. My wife on the other hand, she spends the next week or so adjusting to the new time and I never give it a second thought. The next morning, I woke up and my phone and computer were right, but my car did not change-until hours after 2 am. I made things worse by changing my car time before it changed itself.

When we travel to Colorado from Myrtle Beach, we do it in three days.  The first day we stop in Tennessee and gain one hour in time, but on the second day to Kansas City, there is no time change.  I've confused the third day twice this year.  Heading to Colorado on the third day, we lose (really gain) only one hour while I expected to lose (really gain) two hours.  Once the time changes, it doesn't concern me.  My wife keeps saying things like, "It's really this time." Adjusting to the time change is no big deal to me, but my wife's sleeping and eating schedules are messed up.

When we turn around to head home of course, we lose an hour on two days. At one point my wife thought we were losing two hours and I said, "Really, it's just one hour. You trust me, right?" She said, "No." Time travel can be challenging and frustrating. The important thing to know is, what time is it really?

COSTCO IS SHORT ON ROTISSERIE CHICKENS!

I had to interrupt my endless vacation blogs with this shocking news: rotisserie chickens are missing at Costco! You have got to be kidding! If anyone is watching the news out there, I hope they are reporting on this.  How could Costco be short on chicken?

In 2022, they sold 117 million rotisserie chickens! Do you know how many that is a day? They sell over 320,000 a day, how could they be short? Where did it start? It started in Denver, Colorado and I was just in Colorado. I only ate one and I'm not sure if it was from Costco. The story I read listed New Jersey and Myrtle Beach as places that have shortages in their warehouses, but it's not a problem in all states.

What are people eating if there are no Costco rotisserie chickens for $4.99? I guess other people have rotisserie chicken that costs more, but it is chicken. There's still KFC, Bojangles, Zaxby's, and of course your local supermarkets.  In 2018, there were 900 million rotisserie chickens sold in this country, it's even more today.

Pictured below are some rotisserie chickens, I would gladly eat any one of them....now. Let's hope this shortage doesn't go into 2024.  What is the world coming to if there aren't enough rotisserie chickens?

December 8, 1980

Today is a good day to be a little sappy and sentimental. Last month I blogged about the final Beatle song coming out, "Now and Then." I wasn't going to blog about it again until I realized that December 8th was just around the corner. It was forty-three years ago today that John Lennon was killed.

The first time I heard the song, I liked it.  It was haunting. John's voice was so clear it sounded as if he was in my house singing.  I think it's an appropriate and beautiful ending and a tribute to The Beatles. You can interpret "Now and Then" in many ways.  You can think about Beatlemania and how it exploded across the country and the world in 1964 and you can think about how important their music still is today. 

To hear John singing, "I miss you," is how we feel about him.  Was he talking about his fellow bandmates or his wife and son who he was re-starting his life with?  It's a simple love song and simplicity and love are common themes throughout their music. As far as I can tell, the song has hit number one in England, Austria, Japan and Germany and reached number two in The United States.  Not too shabby for a group that broke up fifty-three years ago.

On the night of December, 8, 1980, John returned home with his wife Yoko to the Dakota Apartments in New York City where they owned several units.  He signed an autograph for a fan and walked away.  The troubled fan shot John in the back four times at close range.

Thirty-four miles away, I sat in my college room in Madison, New Jersey. My roommate and I were watching the news.  They said, "A man reported to be John Lennon has been shot outside the Dakota apartments." Thirty minutes later, the news was over and John was gone. I remember they ended the news with a large picture of John and I'm pretty sure they played the song, "Yesterday."  Although it was clearly a "Paul" song, the words, "I believe in yesterday," seemed to fit the moment.

John, 

We missed you then, 

We miss you now,

And the world will always miss you.

And yet, your voice will be with us forever.

Too Much Meat?

When you take a long road trip with your spouse there are always a bunch of things to talk about.  One subject we discussed on our 27 hours of driving over three days from Myrtle Beach to Colorado, was our diet.  On the nine hour trip from Tennessee to Kansas City, my wife said that we eat, "Too much meat." She's probably right as she is usually, but it was funny hearing this since we were driving again to Joe's Barbecue. 

I think it's the only place we've eaten on the four stops in Kansas City the past 18 months and we were looking forward to this visit.  We had a light brunch and we figured we would eat well at Joe's.  When we arrived around 4 pm., I was hungry and I ordered more than I expected to get.  This slab of ribs was for 2-4 people and I ordered it for myself since I didn't eat a lot that day.

I could have finished the ribs, but the last three were the biggest ones in the middle and I figured it would make for a great breakfast the next day.  It was about 9:30 am and I had something to eat around 4 am, so it was close to lunch time for me.  We pulled into a McDonald's in Illinois and there wasn't really a place to go to eat it.  I knew the McRib had returned, but this was real ribs.

I was going to stand under the McDonald's sign and eat them, but instead settled for eating out of my trunk.  This was not the first time I've eaten ribs out of my trunk, but they were incredible.  I enjoyed every bite and it was messy.  

That would have been a great ending, however, you should know this: on the way home we stopped to eat in Kansas City and we did not go to Joe's Barbecue.  I knew I had enough ribs for the trip and somehow I didn't gain any weight.  They were good ribs, but I probably won't order as many next time.

Odin and I Enjoy The Snow in Colorado

Last summer, we were invited by two of our kids to spend Thanksgiving in Colorado.  After saying yes I immediately thought, "I just want a couple inches of snow." I love watching the snow fall and I hadn't shoveled snow in over six years when we were in New Jersey.  I brought a shovel to South Carolina, but who knows how long I'll have to wait until I use it.

When we arrived a few weeks ago in Colorado, I was constantly checking the forecast-and there it was! A possibility of snow on Black Friday and the temperature was going to be low enough.  I was excited to see it happen so I could shovel, but I also knew that our almost three-year old dog, Odin, had never seen snow. We knew he was going to enjoy it almost as much as I would. Here's how the forecast looked looked on that day:

Odin had a ball in the snow, he thought it was food.  I don't know how much he ate, but all the time he was outside he had a white beard.  This picture shows how much snow he had on him every time he went outside to play.  He ate for days.

We only got a couple inches, once in the morning and once a little later.  This is how it looked as I watched the snow fall.  It's very difficult to take a picture of snow, but you can see it here.  It was a very easy shoveling job, but still a lot of fun.

The above picture shows snow on our car which is right in front.  It is not as much fun brushing snow off the car, because you have to push it on to the driveway that you're shoveling.  Last winter or the winter before, we had snow flurries in Myrtle Beach, maybe this is the winter we get a couple of inches here? I'll be ready with my shovel.

Have You Ever Woke Up Looking Like an Alien?(spelling correction in title)

Have you ever woken up in the morning and looked in the mirror and you scared yourself? Did you look so bad or scary that you looked like an alien? Did you ever give it a thought that something was really wrong with you?

After our first day of driving nine hours to Tennessee, we went to sleep pretty exhausted.  The next morning I got up without an alarm and went into the bathroom.  Throwing some water on my face and stretching a little I did not notice who was in the mirror.

Of course I knew who it was, but when I looked in the mirror I was shocked. No, I didn't look like the alien pictured below, that would have been a bit much.  When I looked at my eyes, they looked odd.  My eyes were square, both of them.  I threw more water on my face and took another look-my eyes were square.

I'm not the most observant person, but even I would have noticed that my eyes were square. Did I eat something yesterday? Am I having a reaction to the medicine I'm taking? Am I imagining it? I'm not one to start listing negative answers, but I was 600 miles from home with 1,200 miles to go to Colorado.

About thirty minutes later my wife woke up and I broke the news to her gently, "I look like an alien. I looked in the mirror in the bathroom and my eyes are square."  Very calmly and casually she said, "Your eyes are fine, it's the lights reflecting in the mirror, the lights are square." When I looked into the living room mirror, I knew she was right again.  The next night our bathroom mirror had two rows and that's how my eyes looked.  No problem, I knew I was fine. 

If I looked like the alien below, I'm sure my wife would not have responded so calmly.  The next time you look in the mirror after just getting up, remember, it could be much worse.