April 24, 2013 Article

The Old Coot stifles a scream.

By Merlin Lessler

There is always one! Get a group of kids together and it’s guaranteed that one of them will be a screamer. And, the screams don’t come every once in a while; them come every few seconds (or so it seems to old coots like me). They scream at everything, especially at the beach. A wave comes in – SCREAM! – the wave goes out – SCREAM! – water splashes – SCREAM! – another kid touches them – SCREAM! And, it’s always one of those high-pitched screeches that carries for miles.

It makes me wonder about the parents; do they hear it? Or, have they been around it so long their brain tunes it out, like the freight train that rumbles and whistles through town at three in the morning. You never notice it until the day it doesn’t come. You wake up and wonder, “What was that?”

It’s not a hard habit to break. When the kid screams, you cup their face in your hands, look them straight in the eye and say, “Stop screaming honey!” Do this every time they emit a screech; five minutes later, the world has one less screamer polluting the environment. With the rare kid where this doesn’t work, a five-minute time out after every screech will get the job done. 

It’s best if a parent takes care of the situation. When they don’t, the old coot method has to be employed. It takes 3 old coots to do this. If you try this when you’re by yourself you can be arrested for harassment. But, with 3, the threat of police action or parent retaliation is eliminated. When the kid screams – we scream. It takes a few exchanges before the kid notices. We’re not just trying to get the message to the screamer; we’re also trying to get the mother or father to put down their cell phone or stop gabbing to a friend and realize their kid is causing a public disturbance.

Sometimes, it works great. Mom or dad does the “face-hold” and tells the kid to stop screaming. The kid gets the message and a pleasant day at the beach is possible. Sometimes, it gets us a dirty look, and the family moves down the beach, away from the old grouches. (That works for me too, but not the poor people at the new location)

If we all pitch in we can rid the world of screamers. They are running rampant – in our parks – on our playgrounds – and especially around water. It’s more than us old coots can handle; we need the rest of you to join in and help put an end to scream pollution.

April 17, 2013 Article

The Old Coot grew up in an unsafe world?

By Merlin Lessler

Every so often the news media will focus on children’s car seats, usually with a report that 70% are improperly installed. They trot out a police officer or a fire fighter to demonstrate the correct way to do it. Two years later, we learn that the “accepted method” has changed. We’re doing it all wrong again. 

It’s a tough world for parents these days. They try to do the right thing, keep their little ones safe, but they get caught in ever changing “official” advice: face the child forward - face the child back - at forty pounds, use the seat belt - don’t use the seatbelt until he’s eight - use the air bag - turn off the air bag. It never ends. We never seem to do it right. It’s especially hard on grandparents; especially old coot grandparents who are super skeptical of “official” advice. We end up getting scolded by both the media and our grandchildren’s parents. 

It’s not our fault. We grew up in cars that didn’t have seat belts, often sitting in the front seat between mom and dad in a canvas pouch hooked over the seat with a toy steering wheel in front of us, directly in line between our body and the dashboard. I can only imagine how that would have worked out in a crash. I vividly remember sitting in mine, turning the wheel to the left when my father turned his, honking the horn, moving the shift lever back and forth. Don’t ask me how I remember something from so long ago yet can’t remember to mail the letters in my pocket when I walk to town.

We were protected back then, even though we didn’t have proper car seats, air bags or seat belts. We had mom’s right arm. The second she slammed on the brakes it shot out and prevented us from hurtling into the dash. It’s hard to imagine that those little, slim, feminine arms were strong enough to hold back a child hurtling forward at 30 miles per hour, but they were. Scientists and public officials say it isn’t possible. They also claim it’s impossible for those same arms to pick up the front end of a car that sits atop a child, but it happens all the time. It’s the mother tiger factor.  

So, what’s a parent to do? Don’t ask me. I’m the guy who drove around with my kids in the back seat (and the compartment behind it) in a VW Beetle, skidding around a shopping plaza parking lot making “donuts” in the fresh fallen snow. I’m the guy who made plaster casts for my daughters to get them to stop jumping out of trees, trying to break their arms so they could wear a cast to school and look “cool.” (It worked by the way; it only took two days for them to beg me to cut them off). No, don’t ask me, or any other old coot what to do about car seats. Or, bike helmets, shin and elbow pads or any other politically correct child safety device. We grew up stupid (and unprotected) and stayed that way. 

April 10, 2013 Article

The Old Coot gets overrun at the racetrack.

By Merlin Lessler

I was at a car race in February, the “Bud Duel” at the Daytona International Speedway. Two, back-to-back, 150-mile races. Danica Patrick had the pole in the first one, Jeff Gordon in the second. Sort of a historical moment, but it was lost on me. I was buried in food wrappers and empty beer cans by the end of the session. I had no idea a race fan was required to eat his way through the three-hour event. But, that’s the rule.

The guy next to me in the nosebleed section showed the way. He waddled through the narrow space between the welded in place, metal folding chairs, hauling a knapsack and a beer cooler, plopped down next to me and sighed. I adjusted my position since large portions of his frame invaded my space. I was sort of cantered in my seat; my head faced forward but the rest of my body was angled forty-five degrees to the right. It was at that moment I realized why people opted for the $200 and $300 seats, not the pitiful $120 investment I’d made in mine.

The races were uneventful. Danica achieved her objective; she finished the race without wrecking her “Go Daddy” car, preserving the pole position for the Daytona 500 coming up 3 days hence. I forget how the second race ended. There were very few lead changes. The inside lane was running slow, too slow to pass the cars running on the outside, so the pack sped along in the outside lane, like a toy train going around a circular track.

No, the real show was in the stands not on the racetrack. At least for me. The seat hog with the big fanny next to me ate his way through the event. Before the Star Spangled Banner was finished, signaling the start of the first race, he had downed an overstuffed, 12-inch sub, overflowing with meats, cheeses, onions, lettuce, tomatoes, pickles and Italian dressing. It was with extreme envy that I watched him munch his way through 1,000 calories and wash it down with two “cold ones” from the cooler between his legs. By the time Danica made her way to safety at the back of the pack, he’d also put away a large bag of red licorice. I’d engaged him in conversation, hoping he’d feel obligated to offer me some. But no, my drooling didn’t move him in the least; he consumed the entire bag himself.

The same lack of sharing was exhibited as he went through a two-pound bag of peanuts, shucking and consuming them over the second race. Apparently, he’d had a different kind of kindergarten teacher than I did. Mine was big on sharing. The shark-like feeding frenzy in row 43 never let up – licorice and peanuts were followed by chips, Snicker bars, ice cream from the concession stand and a bag of Oreo cookies. Interspersed with cans of Bud. The row was littered with his discards by the time we stood to leave. I sloshed out to the aisle and down the stairs. Older and wiser.

I don’t know why I was surprised. I’m the guy who can’t sit through a two-hour movie at the theater without a bucket of popcorn, a super-size container of soda and a box of Good & Plenty. We’re an eating society. Eating our way to extinction. And I’m at the head of the pack.

April 3, 2013 Article

The Old Coot weathers the storm. Sort of.

By Merlin Lessler

 Foreword – I can only hold off for so long, then it bubbles up. This time I set a new record, I went one year and seven months without complaining about the Weather Channel or the US Weather Service. I thought I was cured, but then along came Nemo and then Virgil; that did me in!

A snowstorm named Nemo? Virgil? You’ve got to be kidding. It’s bad enough that they’ve made us afraid of everyday weather: thunderstorms, snowfall, rain, dry spells, wind gusts - that they’ve made us fear the cold by overstating it with wind chill factor - that they’ve taken control of our TV sets, and at every flicker in the atmosphere, blast us out of the room with an awful squawk and report the impending doom in a robotic voice that reminds me of the deadpan tones of Sergeant Friday on Dragnet, “Just the facts maam, just the facts.”

No, that’s not enough. Now they’re naming winter storms, like they name hurricanes. The Blizzard of ‘54 or the Nor’easter of ‘93 wasn’t good enough. So, we’re stuck with Nemo and Luna and Ukko and Athena and Virgil and Helene among other nondescript snowstorm names that the Weather Channel people have put on the list.

It’s time to take back control. To let the weather unfold in all its power and beauty, not fear it for days, because of their (often mistaken) five-day forecasts. It’s time to run through the rain with outstretched arms, to sit on the porch and watch the majesty of a thunderstorm. But, first we must stop the weather people from picking the names. The poor girls and women named Katrina, who carried their moniker proudly, only to have it tainted by the 2005 Hurricane that devastated New Orleans. The same with Andrew, Ike, Irene, Hugo, Wilma, Ivan. Perfectly good names, thrown on the trash heap in the alley behind the U.S. Weather Service.

We can do better, naming hurricanes and snowstorms. With names that have teeth, names that match the impact of the storms. Nemo? Pathetic! How about something more descriptive, more memorable. How about King Kong? Godzilla? Rattlesnake? How about Jack the Ripper? Charles Manson? Now, those are names that match the punch of a ferocious storm. As are, Hitler, Attila the Hun, Lucifer, Dracula. Al Capone and Frank Nitti. Or how about those Wall Street types who’ve wrecked such havoc: Madoff, Ponzi, Enron Corp? Or, the politicians who wooed us and then left office in disgrace; Tricky Dick, Eliot Spitzer, AnthonyWeiner. They sound like a destructive weather condition. Even the names people call us old guys would be better than the list decided on by the Weather Channel. Names like, Grouchy – Miserable – Crusty – Wrinkleface. Just, don’t name a storm Old Coot. I have a hard enough time getting along with the public as it is!