The Old Coot is broke. A 03/15/2023 Pennysaver Article

 The Old Coot is penniless?

By Merlin Lessler

 When was the last time you walked around in a store or across a parking lot and found a quarter, a dime, or a nickel? Oh, sure, there's an errant penny lying on the ground here and there. Hardly worth bending down to pick up anymore. Not like it used to be. A kid could get rich with found pennies. If you got your hands on two pennies when I was growing up, you could get a piece of Bazooka Bubble gum and a foot long licorice stick at the penny candy counter in a neighborhood store. If you found a soda bottle, you didn't need the two pennies. You could trade it in for 2 cents. If you found a prized, quart bottle, you got a nickel and that would buy you a full size Milky Way or Baby Ruth Bar. Today, those 5-cent “full size” candy bars are smaller, and cost well over a dollar.

 As a kid, I counted on those discarded bottles and lost coins. Not anymore. I throw the pennies in a box; when it’s full, I put them in a plastic bag and slip them in with things I take to the Open Door Mission. You just don't find coins laying on the ground these days. I know. I look. I ride my bike through empty parking lots most every day, on my way to coffee. Ten years ago, I usually found something on my journey. People don’t use cash; they use plastic. Bummer! Because, they don’t drop coins when fumbling around in their pocket, often for car keys. Keys, that are disappearing from common use as well. When I first had a credit card, it was a Mastercard. You could use it in most major chain stores. But, there was a catch; you had to buy at least twenty-five dollar’s worth of merchandise. Today, people use plastic to buy a single bottle of soda. When I was a young kid and couldn’t find loose change in the retail area near my house, I could always count on some at Saint John’s Church, several blocks away. I’d search row by row, until I came up with enough to buy a bag of penny candy, or on a good day, the twenty-five cent price of admission to see a movie. It never dawned on me that I was stealing from the church. I lived in a “finders keepers, losers weepers” world. I’m glad I’m not a kid today. I’d be broke. No penny candy, no Milky Ways, no free movies.

 Comments? Complaints? Send to mlessler7@gmail.com

The Old Coot loves the word, ouch! Article # 1018 published March 8, 2023

 The Old Coot is a complainer.

By Merlin Lessler

 I walked down the hall in the condo we were staying at the other day; an old guy (younger than me but still, an old guy) came out of his door. As he was locking it, he turned to me and said, “Nice day, huh?” And it was, 75 degrees, a gentle breeze blowing off the ocean, sun shining below a blue sky with a few wispy clouds. I responded, “Yes it is. It will be a challenge for me to find something to complain about.” He said, “Why bother? Nobody will listen.” I countered, “It doesn’t matter; it just feels good to air it out.”

 Tossing out a complaint is just as therapeutic as yelling, “Ouch.” You bang your shin on the edge of a table; it hurts like heck! You let out a loud, “Ouch!” (Or two.) The pain starts to ebb. Ouch is one of those perfect words. Ow, or Ooh works for lesser injuries, but doesn’t have the pain easing properties as Ouch. It’s among the few words in the English Language that perfectly suits the reaction to a sudden, sharp pain. Oh sure, swearing can be used to relieve pain or frustration, but it's not my go- to. For the most part.   

 My father used to say, Sucker!” When we heard it, we could be sure a hammer missed the target and creamed his thumb or a wrench slipped off a nut, sending his knuckles into a sharp metal edge. We heard it a lot in the spring of 1949 when he decided to build a travel trailer in our garage. It slept four, had a kitchen table, an “ice” box and plenty of storage space. He got the idea, and the plans, from a Popular Mechanics Magazine. Our garage was soon filled with lumber, power tools, angle iron and other supplies. He filled the air with a plethora of, “Suckers!” He never swore, except for that. It was his Ouch!.

 Sucker was his; ouch is mine, as it is for many people. It makes the injury feel better, to a degree, and announces our suffering to anyone within listening distance. My complaint habit works in a similar way, clearing my angst. It may make everyone around me feel worse, but that’s their problem. They can say Ouch, to relieve the pain, or do some complaining of their own.

 Complaints? Pass them on to mlessler7@gmail.com – Ouch!

The Old Coot saves his hand. An Owego NY and environs article. 03/01/2023

 The Old Coot won’t shake on it.

By Merlin Lessler

 There are a lot of handshake bullies out there. You stick out your hand and find your fingers in a vice. The bully looks at you with one of those “gotcha” grins, and squeezes. You hear your knuckles crack, feel the joints buckle. You fight with everything you’ve got to hold back the tears.

 When he’s done crushing your hand, you don’t have enough strength to go through it again. Your hand needs a day to recover. So, you grin and bear it and put a note in your memory to be prepared the next time you run into him. It won’t work; the bully puts a picture of you holding back the tears in his memory. When you see him again and stick out your hand, ready for his maneuver, he doesn’t make a quick grab for your fingers, he ducks down and gives you a “friendly” punch in the gut, “Ha Ha, got cha again!” The only thing to do then, is to stomp down on his foot with everything you’ve got, and say, “Oops, sorry. I tripped.”

 This is why some guys don’t shake hands. Some younger guys hug, do a fist bump, a shoulder bump or a high five. Anything, to avoid getting trapped by a handshake bully. Old coots don’t do any of that stuff; it’s too complicated and we’re too uncoordinated – we’d miss the other guy’s fist in a fist bump and end up punching him in the upper arm – an attempt at a shoulder bump would find us staggering past the guy, headed for a spill  – a high five would end the same way and we don’t know how to hug. We step back, tip our hats or salute and say, “Howdy; good to see you Governor.” It makes us look like an idiot, but who cares? Handshake bullies don’t get us in their vice grip anymore.

 Comments? – Send to mlessler7@gmail.com

The Old Coot goes slow. A Courier and Pennysaver Article of 12/22/23

 The Old Coot moves in the slow lane.

By Merlin Lessler

 A guy was in line with me at the pharmacy the other day. His nose was red, puffy and a little crooked.  I asked him what did he do? Run into a door, and laughed, “Ha- ha.” He said, “That’s exactly what happened. It was an automatic door, I wasn’t paying attention and ran right smack into it. It opened too slow.” I immediately identified with his mishap. Automatic doors open too slow or too fast. And, even worse, they make you think that all doors will automatically open, and you bang into one that doesn’t.

 A slow opening, auto-door like the one he encountered, is a perfect example of why getting around gets trickier and trickier as you age. They are not as bad as revolving doors, which should have a warning posted on them saying, “No seniors allowed.” But back to the guy who had an encounter with a slow opening, automatic door. It’s an issue that can go either way. The opening speed is based on an architect’s assessment of how fast the people using it can walk. The designer has to pick between someone with a stride like Wilt the Stilt, or someone who creeps along with tiny baby steps, like Tim Conway, playing an old man on the Carol Burnett Show. The architect for this facility opted for a Tim Conway stride; the guy in the pharmacy met it with his face.  

 If you’re scratching your head and wondering why anyone would walk into one of these slow opening doors, you don’t understand old coots. Slow or fast, we aren’t paying attention; we’re fumbling in our wallets or pockets in a panic, to make sure we have our insurance cards and the list of questions we want to ask the doctor, or a shopping list when going to a grocery store. And, even though we checked to make sure we didn’t forget when we left the house, and when we got out of the car, we check yet again as we approach the door. We get distracted. I don’t know why I bother with the questions for the doctor. I always get the same answer, “You have to expect that at your age.”

 A week or so later, I was going to the store where the mushed face guy ran into the door.  I checked to see how the doors opened. They were slow, but perfectly timed for me. It made me realize how much my walking speed has decreased. I doubt I could beat Tim Conway in a foot race. At least my face is safe.

 Comments? – Send to mlessler7@gmail.com

The Old Coot keeps his knee. - An Owego NY article published on 02/15/2023

 The Old Coot explains the “knee” generation.

By Merlin Lessler

 The Baby Boomer Generation was designated as the “Me-Generation” by author Tom Wolfe in 1976. (Me, Me, Me - I want it all and I want it right now!) But, I think it would be more accurate to call it the “Knee Generation.” That’s the subject that infiltrates their conversations. My crowd, the old coot generation, have knee issues, but we’re not obsessed with them the way the knee generation is. Our knees creek, grown, snap, ache and “kill” every once in a while. We wait it out, hope it goes away, and use it to get sympathy.

 But, not the knee generation. They are experts on the joint between the femur and the tibia. They get technical – “What’s your problem?” someone will ask. “Is it the meniscus, the MCL, LCL, ACL?” That’s a lot of “alphabet” talk, the kind that sends me searching for my old anatomy textbook. Old coots simply say, “My knee hurts.”  

 I think the me-crowd, over reacts to their knee condition. They get Symptom Disease. It’s a condition that usually affects medical students. When they study heart disease they think the next twitch in their chest is a heart attack. The next headache is a brain tumor. Every mole is skin cancer. The more they study, the sicker they get. We all suffer from symptom disease to a degree. The pharmaceutical industry exploits that susceptibility, and flood the airways with symptoms that they can cure. Just buy their magic pill. They have us right where they want us, our wallets too! So much so, that we hardly pay attention to the possible side effects.

 If you discuss your knee ache with a Knee Generation person., they will ask about your meniscus, your medial and anterior collateral ligaments. That’s when you need to get up and leave! If you don’t, they’ll convince you that surgery is the answer. Sure, some people have an issue so bad it requires knee surgery or replacement, usually after years of chronic pain. But, many others get caught up in the science, fall victim to Symptom Disease.” Knee surgery has become a status symbol. It introduces a whole new line of conversation that starts with, "Who did yours?”

 The knee is a marvelous, flexible joint, but it gets mad when we mistreat it. And, it lets us know. Old coots know this better than anyone. We don’t know if it’s because of the ACL, MCL or another of the knee structures. We do know how to use it to get out of unpleasant tasks: shopping, weeding, art shows, operas. It doesn’t seem to hurt when we go to a car show or wander around the golf course. Use it or lose it, is our motto. Not the knee, the excuse!

 Comments? Send to mlessler7@gmail.com

Creases in jeans bothers the Old Coot (an article published on 02/08/2023)

 The Old Coot pans creases in jeans.

By Merlin Lessler

 I come from the “crease” generation. It’s a component of the “steam iron” era. Our pants had creases down the front. In my case, because my mother pressed them in with her steam iron.  Some guys did their own; when I tried it I ended up with a double crease or a crease where it didn’t belong. Mothers ironed everything back then, even sheets, pillow cases, handkerchiefs and underwear.

 We wore khaki pants to school. On cold winter days, we wore corduroy or wool pants. All, had a crease down the center of the leg.  You couldn’t wear jeans to school back then. That’s what you wore when you got home and changed out of your school clothes. 

 So, what the big deal? Pants still come with creases. BUT NOT JEANS! And, that’s what I have a problem with. When I see one of my kind (an old coot) wearing a pair of Levi’s with a crease, it hits me like fingernails scratching down a blackboard. Which, incidentally, no longer decorate classroom walls. That’s too bad. Kids miss out on a lot. – “Go to the board & finish the math problem” – “Go to the board and write I will not talk in class, 100 times – “Please go to the board and erase todays lessons” (That one was a privilege). “Tomorrow’s assignments are on the board; write them down in your assignment book.”

 We lived and learned in a blackboard world, sitting in wooden desks with ink wells, using ink pens that we dipped in the ink – ballpoint pens didn’t exist back then, neither did white-out, to cover up mistakes; we used an abrasive ink-easer to fix errors. If we were not careful, the eraser would tear the paper and leave a hole. I used the “cross-out” method. No holes in my paper, just a messy bunch of words crossed out. It looked a lot like documents that government officials redact before releasing to the public.

Sorry about that, I got distracted, wandered into the past. You have to expect that of an old coot. Now, back to my original thought on “creases” and those guys who grew up in my world and walk around in Levi’s with creases down the legs. They make the rest of us old guys look bad. Out of touch! The whole purpose of denim jeans, back then, and still today, is to wear something that is low maintenance, that only needs to be washed every month or so AND DOESN”T NEED IRONING! Some Levi, aficionados believe they never should be washed; it’s enough that they get a bath when we use them to dry our hands, or sit on a wet bench. My friend John presses his Levi’s with a steam iron set on high. I give him a pass on the creases because he’s Fonz (from Happy Days), to me. He snaps his fingers to start his truck, Harley and Jeep. When he next sees me, he’ll probably snap his fingers, causing my coffee spill all over my shirt. Oh well, it’s worth it! 

 Complaints? Send to mlessler7@gmail.com

The Old Coot can't open anything - an Old Coot article published on 02/01/2023 (in New York State)

 The Old Coot is helpless!

By Merlin Lessler 

 I can’t open anything! I tried to get into a box of Cheerios the other day. I unflapped the cardboard top. No problem. Then came the plasticized wax paper bag, heat-sealed at the top and bottom. If you grip it on opposite sides you are supposed to be able to pop it open with a quick tug, and hope you don’t spill the contents all over the kitchen. My grip wasn’t up to the task. I had to get a pair of scissors to get at those round toasted oats. I dumped them in a bowl and reached for the milk. It was in one of those waxed, cardboard-ish containers, the kind that’s folded and sealed at the top and has an arrow pointing to where you should open it. I wasn’t paying attention and opened it on the wrong side, forming a jagged spout. The milk came out in all directions. It wouldn’t have made a difference if I’d opened it correctly anyhow. Half the time the designated end has so much stick-um on it that it comes out just as jagged as when you open the wrong end.

 But, it’s not just cereal boxes and milk cartons that give me trouble; it’s everything: potato chips, pickles, peanut butter, toys, condiment packets, little creamers, on and on and on. Overzealous bureaucrats in Washington foisted childproof bottles on us forty years ago following the Tylenol scare, where seven people died after ingesting cyanide laced Tylenol capsules. Prior to that, old coots with arthritic tinged fingers were capable of opening an aspirin bottle. They could gobble down a couple of pills and keep their lumbago at bay. Not long after, it was decided that parents weren’t capable of keeping medicine away from their kids and criminals chose to tamper with commercial products.

 Tamperproof packaging is on my case for a whole slew of products. Today I sat with a bag of Snickers in front of me, trying to appease a sweet tooth attack. I couldn’t find the scissors. A peanut butter and jelly sandwich might have gotten me over the hump, but the peanut butter jar in our cupboard hasn’t been opened yet. I know I can unscrew the top, but I won’t be able to pull off the disc that’s glued to the rim; the tab is too small to get a good grip on it.

 I’m in trouble! A “package challenged” old coot. It’s just a matter of time before I’ll have to hire a professional opener to come by every few days, to untwist, unseal, uncap, or otherwise open things for me. Either that, or I’ll be pushing a shopping cart full of unopened food products around town with a sign on my back that says, “Will work for food. Help me open it!”