Graduation Day!

Graduation Day is coming, June 28th on Shelter Island. There will be wild celebrations, excessive drinking, lewd conduct, and that’s just the parents. Who knows what the kids will do....

For the graduates, I have this advice:
1. There are many ways to serve your country. Don’t put profit ahead of patriotism. Support your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it.
2. Don’t worry, your parents will get smarter as you get older.
3. People can always handle the truth better than a lie. And a lie always gets found out, and usually at the worst possible moment.
4. Pay your own way, pick up your own things, and don’t make excuses; your enemies don’t believe them and your friends don’t need them.
5. Pack your own chute. I saw an interview of a sky diver years ago. The interviewer asked him why he wasn’t afraid to jump out of airplanes, his simple response, “I pack my own chute.” I thought that was a great axiom for many things in life. When it is important, when you are the one most affected by the decision, pack your own chute. Take responsibility for what needs to be done and personally see that it is done right. If your parachute doesn’t open, you’re the only one who pays the price.
6. God exists. And things do have a way of balancing out. Have a little faith.

For the parents I have this advice:
1. Luggage is an appropriate graduation gift. But pre packed, with a plane ticket attached is going too far.
2. Shredding the birth certificate will not help. Even though they move out, they never really move on. They’ll always call for money.
3. Painting the room - you MUST wait for the child to move out so you can do a proper cleaning and defumigation of the room. If you’re in a hurry, try to do a controlled burnout of the room - it worked for the Roman’s when they cleared lepers out of a dwelling, it could work for funky teenage rooms.
4. Before you can have a small bonfire and burn posters, old sneakers, raggy clothes, video games, and other teenage items, you have to obtain a special permit from the Town, a $35 “Parental Mental Health Reclamation Permit”.
5. Hide the vacation brochures and the “101 Ways to Blow Your Kids Inheritance” handbook until after the little darlings leave.
6. Don’t get carried away with your first post graduation food shop. It is a bit of a shock not to have to buy Tostino’s, Mystic Pizza, tortilla chips and guacamole, the four teenage food groups. It takes a period of adjustment to realize you can spend your money on what YOU like to eat and not make do with what you had to buy for them. I’m looking forward to buying fruit instead of single serving frozen pizza’s that taste like cardboard.
7. Music ; Crank up the oldies station and glue the dial in place. Not only will you get to hear your music again, but the sound of good music will drive the kids out of the house even faster.
8. Books : soon you will be able to read books again because you are not constantly cleaning. A wiped table stays nice all day because there is no one there to leave cereal bowls and glasses, scattered papers, keys, and other little messy tidbits for you too clean up when you get home. You will have time to read things longer than a reader’s digest article!
9. Money in your pocket -your money in your pocket! It will be a strange sensation at first, looking in your wallet and seeing $10’S and $20’s in there. And later the same day, the bills are still there - and the money is still there the next day! It’s wild, but so welcome!

Port-a-Potty Blues

PA. crews rescue nude man stuck in portable potty AP Fri Jun. 6, 6:24 PM ET
Rescue crews had to cut apart a portable toilet to rescue a man who got stuck naked inside the potty. Authorities say the 31-year-old man used his cell phone to call 911 on Sunday from inside a portable toilet. Police say the man had been drinking and had taken off his clothes. Somehow, he immersed himself in the holding tank.
Deputy fire commissioner Chris Miller told WPMT-TV, "I've been on the job in one form or fashion for 21 years, and this is the first port-a-potty rescue I've ever had."

We have porta pottys all over Shelter Island, any where where there is construction, which seems to be everywhere these days. And I think everyone has had a memorable porta potty experience at least once.

You’re at an event, or a visitor on Shelter Island, and you’ve got to go, and the only place to go is into the dreaded porta potty. As you try to open the door without touching anything - or letting anything touch you- you are met with that unmistakable smell of industrial strength anti microbial mysterious blue water and raw sewage. As you step in, the porta potty shifts. It doesn’t matter if you’re thin or fat, it shifts and you immediately think, “Oh gawd, don’t let this thing tip over...”. You make your way to the seat. You would’ve put down a paper liner, but they're all gone, or for some reason, the whole tear off pad of liners has been thrown in the tank. So you sit on your hands because you can wash them later.

You can hear people talking about you outside because everyone seems to forget you can hear just fine in a porta potty, matter of fact the sound reception is often enhanced. Someone ought to do a study of the acoustics inside modern marvels.
“Is she STILL in there?”
“Geez, how long does it take?”
“You think she got lost in there?”

I was at a Renaissance Faire once, with two friends. We were having such a nice time until I heard this from inside the blue box.
“Her ice cream cone is really dripping. I’m gonna finish for her, she’s taking too long.
“Are you holding her purse?
“Look inside and see if she has any tissues.”
“Oh wow, look at this. The condoms I understand, but handcuffs?”
“Handcuffs? Her?”

Inside the blue box of humiliation, I called out, “Get out of my purse! The handcuffs are for a play, I’m dropping them off tonight. The condoms are my friends, she’s with her mother and she didn’t want her mother to know she has a boyfriend.”

Outside the blue box of humiliation, they heard, “Mmmmlllllooommmuuummmtaumblah!”

I finally exited the box. The six people in line, all of whom knew what was in my handbag, looked at me suspiciously as I tried to step out with dignity. But I tell you now, there’s no believable explanation you can offer for the combination of condoms and handcuffs in the same location.

Shelter Island Summer Reminders

Just a few notes to start off the summer on Shelter Island.

Watch out for early morning commuter traffic > Happens all over the Island when two work trucks, traveling in opposite directions, stop in the road to converse. They stay there talking until each truck has three beeping cars behind it.

Dare Devil Entertainment > Coming out of Fedi’s, balancing two or more cups of piping hot coffee and Danish's, dodging cars to get to your car parked on the opposite side of the road.

Morning News > Have breakfast at the Pharmacy or Pat & Steve’s to get all the up to the minute news.

Sound bite > No time to stop and get news, but you just need a sound bite of the latest item? Drive slowly past Crissy Gross the Crossing Guard with your window down and yell on approach, “Crissy, what’s the latest?” She’ll give you three updates by the time you roll past her.

School Rules > Please remember that the school stubbornly insists you take home the same child you dropped off. You can’t trade to upgrade in the parking lot, I know, I’ve tried.

No ganging up on treaders > When you see someone treading for clams in the water, you cannot call friends and organize an attack strategy to get the bag as they exit the water. Shelter Island is very strict about this. If you want to steal freshly tread clams, you have to do it yourself, mano a mano. I generally approach the treader as they’re coming out of the water and say, “I think your car is on fire! I’ll hold your bag, you go check the car. I’ll wait right here.” They hand me the bag and run to their vehicle. By the time they realize their car is fine, I’m home melting butter.

Car Notification Program > As I’ve said before, all the men on Island know you by your car. When you get a new, or just different, car, in addition to NYS registration, inspection and all that other stuff, you have to tape a big note to your drivers side door for 15 days announcing that this is your new vehicle.

Cyclist Crunch Limit > All Islanders are limited to running over three cyclists per tourist season. More than three, you need a special permit from the Board.

Honor the Honor System > Most of the little farm stands on the Island have a coffee can for you to leave payment. If you’re a tourist, don’t screw this up. Whether you’re a local or tourist, if you can’t put $5 in a coffee can for fresh veggies or flowers, get the hell off the Island.

No Pointing > One complaint tourists have, and they are right, is that the Island does not provide enough public restrooms. So, when you see a tourist heading into the woods from the roadside, no staring, pointing or laughing please.

MapQuest > When a tourist asks for help as they stand there next to their car with an open map of the Island, resist the urge to get them lost on purpose or tell them that the last boat is at 6 PM and they’d better get in line now.

Island Selective Hearing > There are official periods of time when all Islanders are deaf. At the annual tree lighting in the village square. Despite the variety of keys being sung, you will only hear one key. School Concerts, they are good for the kids and no matter what you hear, it’s Mozart.

Mooning > Mooning tourists is limited to mooning the last boats that leave the docks on summer nights. Underwater mooning, so popular last year, must be reduced. Mooning snorkeling tourists, when we all know things look bigger under water, is mean. They think they’re being chased by a giant soft shell clam.

Sycophant Classes > There’ll be a class held this summer for those who need to polish up their kissing up skills in order to gain access to a boat. What will be covered? How to identify someone who has a boat. How to help them realize how much better their boating experience will be with you on board. Beer selection. Making club sandwiches. Dealing with people who have identified you as a mooch; ways to throw them overboard.

Memorial Day and Clams

Memorable Clams

Most Islanders had a nice Memorial Day, a fun day. I had a terrible day. I was alone and clamless. Usually on Memorial Day, I have the first two pecks of clams (4 pecks in a bushel) in the refrigerator waiting for consumption. But not this day. My brother, whose indian name is Mollusko, failed to wade waist deep in the cold water and bring forth clams. He was full of excuses; the water was too cold, he was tired from a long work week, it wasn’t like I was paying him, why don’t I get my own damn clams, and on and on with lame excuses.

Nothing changed the fact that the house didn’t reek of steamed clams like it should have on Memorial Day. No steamers waiting for their little butter baths, no clam dishes, no new clam shells in the driveway attracting the first shiny green horse flies of the season. Actually, I’m just disappointed, not mad. I can’t be angry with Mollusko the Clam Hunter. I know that soon, clams will appear.

There’s so much more to catching clams than people know. It’s not like you stand in the water with a clam rake and they jump into the basket. It takes planning, strategy, patience. One must wade softly and carry a big rake.

We know that clams herd together for protection. Seldom do you find a single, lonesome clam, a rogue. It’s just too hard to live alone as a clam, to find food, to watch for predators swimming overhead (since they have no eyes), to avoid starfish who pry you open and eat you, no, it’s just too dangerous for a rogue clam.

Mollusko finds them in beds, hiding just under the silt trying to avoid detection by his big experienced feet with genetic clam detecting devices in every toe. Once he finds the edge of a clambed, he triangulates it’s location from above the water so he can find it over and over, until the clams become aware of him and start to migrate. Mollusko slowly rakes off the clams at the back of the pack first. Like a herd of running gazelle, it’s the old and sick animals that lag behind. The same is true of clams, it’s the old and lame that live on the edge of the bed. Mollusko is helping the natural selection process when he scoops them up in the rake basket. By eating the old and lame first, we allow the younger, healthier clams to mate and reproduce through the summer before we go after them in September.

I steam the first load of clams first, strain and save the clam broth to cook pasta in later. You can dip the clams in melted butter, or cocktail sauce and eat them with any side dish at all. My Aunt Olive once ate so many steamers, she had to lay on the couch for two days until her stomach ceased rising and falling with the tide.

The second meal we usually make is a clam fetticini. I cook the pasta in the saved clam broth for flavor and add chopped clams bits to a white sauce. Add any green side dish and the meal is complete.

The third meal I make, which is very rare because there’s usually no clams left at this point, is clam fritters. Using a standard pancake batter, I add clambits and deep fry the clam pancake in bacon grease. Only bacon grease will do, it has that smokey flavor and tiny bits of bacon for added texture. This is how my grandmother made them and this is the only way I make them. It should be noted that my grandmother’s clam fritter recipe has been officially condemned by the American Heart Society since 1970. My Aunt Ruth Krsnak of Sayville eats the fritters with maple syrup on them. She’s the only person we know who eat fritters with syrup. We don’t know why she eats them with syrup, it’s just something the family accepts, like the fact that my mother thinks garlic is not necessary for cooking italian dishes. Personally, when I cook italian, I start with garlic and build from there. My mother has had the same clove of garlic in her cabinet since I was in high school. I think she thinks when she opens that particular kitchen cabinet when she’s cooking spaghetti, fumes from that old dried up garlic clove waft out of the cabinet and into the sauce, anything more than garlic fumes will be too much and overwhelm the sauce. Well, that’s what happens I guess when irish people try to cook italian.

The weather is warming now. Soon, Mollusko will wade and invade the local clambeds like Godzilla through Tokyo. I have cocktail sauce and tiny fondue forks ready for battle.

How to Get Your Man to LISTEN!

Wait honey, let me ax you something...

Driving to work this morning, I heard some morning show host giving advice on how women can really get men to listen to them. They advocated three rules: 1. Sit beside the man, not in front of him. Eye contact can be intimidating for men. They are more likely to open up if they are sitting beside you. 2. No distractions. Try to talk to him without any radio, TV, or any other distractions. The reason is that men can’t multitask well. 3. Get to the point. When women build up to something, his mind wanders until he thinks you’re getting to the point.

I think all three of these suggestions are excellent. Especially the third one about getting to the point. I find that more women over explain things to men. They don’t care. They just want to know what you want and when you want it. I recall wanting my ex to paint a room for me. I tacked the color I selected to the wall with a note giving the deadline. I also made a note of the consequences; first no cooking, then no marital privileges, then I would take his fly fishing equipment hostage. The room was painted the color I wanted and on time, without any nagging. I learned a valuable lesson. Don’t nag, they don’t hear it, threaten their toys instead.

There are some other suggestions I have for communicating with men.

Lasagna; learn to make an excellent lasagna. Feed him a big garlicky piece and he will listen to anything you say. Remember that the second piece usually puts them to sleep, so if you need to ask for money or for a relative to visit, wait until you’ve got him in that pasta stupor, you know, when he’s pasta all caring....

Gift Certificate to Lowe's or Home Depot: If you need him to take you somewhere and he doesn’t want to go, get a Lowe’s or Home Depot gift certificate and a sale catalog. Explain to him, that after he takes you to your appointment or event, you and he can go to Home Depot on the way home and he can stay as long as he likes looking at all the lawn tractors, and Barbecue equipment and new tools. I have never met a heterosexual man who can resist this. Tool shopping for them is like shoe shopping for us. There’s always room for a new tool.

Sleep deprivation: I have friend who liked to wait until she had her hubby alone on their boat to let him have it about some issue she had. She was getting nowhere, and he was putting in early rather than listen to her. I suggested she reverse course. Make those day cruises a love-fest and not mention anything unpleasant. Just sail away on a sparkling sea. After you get home, I told her, let him catch you crying softly on the edge of the bed. He’s had a great day and he’s tired from the salt air. He’ll agree to anything to stop the crying so he can get some sleep. And he did.... she said it worked like a charm every time. Find a way to have a great day and then slip in a crying jag at the end. He has to “fix” the problem so he can get to sleep. I love it when a plan comes together.....

My mother has been known to remove men’s car batteries and hide them in the kitchen when she absolutely had to talk to one of my brothers. Very effective, it worked every time. My grandmother wanted a refrigerator. She still had a ice box when I was in grade school. One day, she took an ax to the ice box, threw the ax in the middle of the living room floor where my grandfather was watching TV and announced “Ervin, NOW I need a refrigerator.” I recall we all held out breath, certain he was going to kill her. But there must be something about a woman wielding an ax that melts a man’s heart. He quietly, meekly rose from his lazyboy and got in the car. The next day, Gram had her first refrigerator, it was 1965.

So remember, when you want your fella to listen to you, reduce his distractions, use lasagna if needed, and if all else fails, use an ax.

Beer Can Coffin - PUHLEEZ!!!

Illinois man orders custom beer-can coffin
Sun May 4, 11:13 PM ET

Bill Bramanti will love Pabst Blue Ribbon eternally, and he's got the custom-made beer-can casket to prove it.
"I actually fit, because I got in here," said Bramanti of South Chicago Heights. The 67-year-old Glenwood village administrator doesn't plan on needing it anytime soon, though. He threw a party Saturday for friends and filled his silver coffin — designed in Pabst's colors of red, white and blue — with ice and his favorite brew.
"Why put such a great novelty piece up on a shelf in storage when you could use it only the way Bill Bramanti would use it?" said Bramanti's daughter, Cathy Bramanti, 42.


At the gates of Heaven:
“Louie, just go get St. Peter.”
“But he’s in a meeting with, you know, Mr. Big.”
“Louie, go to the door and tell him we just got a guy delivered in a beer can.”
“Geez, how short is he, Gabe?”
“The can is big, never mind, just go tell St. Peter.”

An hour later:
“Gabe, St. Peter said just use your best judgment and handle it. He’s trying to influence Pres. Bush to take the billions he wants to use to build missile sites in Europe with and use the money instead to rebuild New Orleans. He said he’ll back your decision.”
“He can’t get Bush to do anything right, you’d think he’d stop trying by now.”
“Yea, that’s true. You think Bush knows he’s got the Number One seat in Hell waiting for him?”
“Nah Louie, the guy’s a moron. A Yale frat boy. There’s a whole contingent of his Skull and Bones Society buddies there. He’ll be right at home.”
“So what are we gonna do about this guy in the can, Gabe?”
“Well, first, ah, we gotta get him out! He’s in a big can Louie, walk around it and see if it’s a pop top or if we need a can opener.”

Five minutes later.
“Okay, Gabe, I walked around the whole thing. Who knew they now sell beer in giant cans? When I was there, the biggest thing we could get was a keg.”
“A keg is still the biggest container, Louie. I just got word that this guy had this beer can coffin custom made.”
“Cool. Can we put it in our Coffin Hall of Fame?”
“Definitely. Go find Mario. Tell him bring a propane torch. We gotta cut this guy out.”

Two hours later:
“It’s okay Mr. Bramanti, come out. I’m Gabriel, this is Louis. We’re covering the front gate for St. Peter.”
“Wow! I wasn’t sure where I’d end up really.”
“Well, it wasn’t the best idea to be buried in a giant beer can. The guys in Hell would kill for a cold beer, you almost got kidnapped on the way and if they had opened this can and found you instead of beer, oh man, I don’t even want to think about it.”
“Well, I’m glad you guys got me. Listen, is there beer here in Heaven?”
“Yes, but you can’t get drunk. All the beer tastes like earth’s but there’s no alcohol content.”
“How come?”
“Because alcohol does strange things to people minds, like giving them the idea to be buried in giant beer cans. Any more questions, Bramanti?”
“Nope, I’m good.”

Farewell My Kitty....

Last week we lost a dear, most precious friend, Murray, our fifteen year old, seventeen pound tuxedo cat. He was a beautifully marked black and white tuxedo cat with a white mask and green eyes outlined in what looked like black eyeliner. At a visit last year, the vet proclaimed him, “officially the nicest cat on Shelter Island.” That’s because Murray, ever the cool cat, laid there like a lump while he was poked and prodded. He never protested. He was always too cool.

They say that losing a pet is like losing a child. I hesitate to make that analogy because nothing compares to losing a child, and yet, the elements of loss and pain are all there, just in a weaker concentration.

Murray and his sister Missy, were rescued from a woman who was going to have them put to sleep at age six because her new baby was allergic to cats. My brother took them. They had never been outside. For some reason, the previous owner had them declawed front AND back! Why the back claws? They couldn’t even scratch their ears!

With us, clawless though they were, they ran free. They caught, but couldn’t even hold butterflies. And they spent hours sharpening their toes on the corners of the couch. I tried many times to tell Murray, this was a pointless activity, but he never listened and stubbornly tried to sharpen those phantom claws. Murray took up permanent residence on my son’s bed. I know the electric blanket had nothing to do with it. Murray spent hours with his big head in my son’s lap, being petted and loved. They were best friends.

We will miss the way he sat on catnip. We never quite understood this particular method of absorption. He’d eat some, then sit on the pile. Maybe it’s a cat thing, maybe he was guarding his kill? He was always slow moving, but on catnip, he ran like a gazelle. Crashed into furniture, but still, like a gazelle would crash into furniture.

A few years ago, a gray kitten was added to the group. She attacked Murray, all 8 ounces of her, and she’d dig her claws into his fur and hang on like a lion cub trying to bring down an adult water buffalo. Murray would walk all over the house wearing this kitten, it was hysterical! He’d lay down and she’s attack from all angles. He never lost his temper. And up to the end, “Two Socks” as she came to be known, could still attack him and sit on his head without any protest. I think it was a May-December thing they had going on, there’s no other reason for a mature cat to share his catnip.

He was playful up to the the last few days. Then, his great little cat heart, just gave out. The vet gave us a very nice coffin shaped strong cardboard box for him. We wrapped him in a towel and had a proper Irish wake. The body was displayed in the box on the dresser. My son put in Murray’s favorite toy, a penlight. Murray loved to chase the little spotlight on the floor. My brother put in one of his deerskin slide on slippers. Murray loved to put his front paws inside the slippers and sleep. He looked like he was sledding. I’m not sure why my brother only put in the one slipper - what can he do with the other one? I found a rosary with a St. Francis medal (patron saint of animals) and we looped it around him. We wept, we laughed, we toasted him with Ovaltine. We inscribed his name and a celtic cross on the top of the box with a personal note from all of us.

He was a good cat all in all. Never drank or smoked. Never killed a mouse. Was good to his sister, unless Pounce treats were involved. He never threw up in the house. Could have done a little better covering things with litter, but let’s not speak ill of the dead.

Farewell my dearest pretty boy, Murray.

Marriage: The Good, The Bad, The Compromises

I found this charming collection of advice from kids about marriage and I had to share it as we enter bridal season; forewarned is forearmed.

The Question: What do you think about getting married? (written by kids)

You got to find somebody who likes the same stuff. Like, if you like sports, she should like it that you like sports, and she should keep the chips and dip coming.
-- Alan, age 10 (spoken like a true man’s man)

No person really decides before they grow up who they're going to marry. God decides it all way before, and you get to find out later who you're stuck with.
-- Kristen, age 10

You can tell if two people are married if they seem to be yelling at the same kids.
-- Derrick, age 8

What do my Mom and Dad have in common? Um, both don't want any more kids.
-- Lori, age 8

Dates are for having fun, and people should use them to get to know each other. Even boys have something to say if you listen long enough.
-- Lynnette, age 8 (isn't she a treasure)

On the first date, they just tell each other lies and that usually gets them interested enough to go for a second date.
-- Martin, age 10 (great strategy kid, truth is over rated)

If your date is going bad, I would run home and play dead. The next day I would call the newspapers and make sure they wrote about me in all the dead columns.
-- Craig, age 9 (what happened to Hop on the bus, Gus?)

When is it okay to kiss someone? Oh that’s easy, when they're rich.
-- Pam, age 7 (a girl after my own heart)

The rule goes like this: If you kiss someone, then you should marry them and have kids with them. It's the right thing to do.
-- Howard, age 8 (so, Republican are BORN, not made after all)

It's better for girls to be single but not for boys. Boys have to get married because they need someone to clean up after them.
-- Anita, age 9 (from the mouths of babes)

The important thing to do if you got married, is to tell your wife that she looks pretty, even if she looks like a dump truck.
-- Ricky, age 10
 
 The kids aren’t so far off the mark. If you’re getting married for the first time this Spring, here’s some things they don’t tell you in the bridal magazines.

“The Romance Stops Here”, should be a sticker on the back of the marriage license. Men engage romantic gestures for only three purposes in life: 1. to get you in the sack 2. to get out of trouble 3. on Valentine’s Day, but only if you remind them, and only because they have to, otherwise they view Valentine’s Day as a costly nuisance.

Whatever household chores they were able to perform pre-nuptuals, they lose the ability to perform post-nuptuals. Before marriage, men were able to live independently. They could cook, clean, do laundry, and even remember to take out the garbage. Within six months of marriage, they lose the ability to do any of these things. Something in way the wedding band constricts their finger cuts off blood flow to the part of their brain that knew how to do chores. They become eight year old boys again. Suddenly they can’t do anything but watch TV. It happened to all my friends husbands too. Suddenly, we, the liberated women of the 70’s, were doing all the work our unliberated mothers of the 50’s did, plus we got to work full time jobs. Just once, it would have been nice to come home to a nice dinner already made - take out doesn't count - but in 18 years, it never happened to me. I don’t know of any women, unless married to a chef, who ever came home to a home made dinner.

Fence Mending - it’s all on you. Prior to marriage, there is a chance he’ll accept 10, maybe 20%, of the blame for something he did. After marriage, HA! Once married, it’s either your fault, or we don’t discuss it. And regardless of whose fault anything is, it is you, the wife, who must be the first one to make the peace. All fence mending is done by you, period. Men can’t admit they are wrong, or apologize because it burns a hole in their tongue, otherwise, I’m sure they’d be happy to admit error for that prenuptial 10% of the time.

Lastly, your handbag. Once for your personal items, it must now carry his wallet, sunglasses, reading glasses, important papers, cigarettes and lighter, keys, garage remote and cell phone. Don’t believe me? Look at a single woman’s purse, look at a married woman’s purse. I rest my case.

 

Polygamy, the game the whole family can play!

The Old Testament is full of polygamy, but it worked then because so many women died in childbirth, having a back-up wife made sense. I believe that’s the reason Mormonism thrived on the American Frontier where one in four women died in childbirth. Having a back-up wife, or two, could literally make the difference in survival. Islam allows a man four wives, so long as he can support each one equally, which creates a self leveling system. The four wife limit also created a stop to a man marrying throughout his life to feed his lecherous ego. I recall reading that Brigham Young, the leader of the Mormon Church in the west, had seventy three wives, the youngest being 13 years old when he married her in his seventies. That’s not a survival marriage, that’s legal rape.

As I watch the events unfold in Texas, all I can think is what great system this is for a man. You get to acquire new sex partners throughout your life - with your church’s blessing - and none of them are allowed to complain. If I were a man and there was a religion where women were raised to be silent and compliant and I could have as many as I wanted, I’d sign up so damn fast...

The men made all the rules and they make all the decisions. The women aren’t allowed to wear make-up or cut their hair, and they all have to wear the prairie dresses and they are all indoctrinated that to disobey in any way will cost them their immortal souls. Wow! I’ve got to hand it to Jeff's, he has managed to acquire complete control over hundreds of people who think he talks to God. Amazing.

Clearly, a woman has to be born into this cult. I don’t think any of us who had a brain could check it at the gate before joining this cult.

Penny, age 30 (who joined the cult a year ago): “George, are you gonna mow the lawn today?”
George, age 48: :”Not today, sweetcakes, I’ve got to get Lucy pregnant, God’s commandments come first.”
Penny: “Not Lucy, she’s your daughter, remember? I think you’re supposed to plow Jennifer today. But how long can that take? You can still get the lawn done.”
George: “Have one of the boys do it.”
Penny: “Can’t, they’re at the Temple studying Polygamy 101: Don’t Bother With Names, Call Them All Sweetcakes.”
George: “Well, you do it then and stop bothering me. I command you to mow the lawn and forbid you to bring it up again.”
Penny: “Okay, then you’ll need to order someone else to make spaghetti for 37 kids for dinner.”
George: “Oh, were you on for dinner tonight?”
Penny: “Not anymore, I’ll be doing something I can’t mention.”
George: “37? Are we up to 37 kids now? How did that happen?”
Penny: “Well, I could give you a clue. But instead, how about you just count your total kids once a week. You know how many chickens you have, right?”
George: “142.”
Penny: “I’m not sure where it’s written in the Bible, but I bet a man is supposed to keep track of his children at least as well as his livestock. Something like, “Counteth not thy children before they hatch.””
George: “I know being the leader of this family looks like fun and games to you, but I work hard for all my twenty one wives, you know.”
Penny: “Twenty wives, you said you married me to replace Constance.”
George: “Constance? Where did Constance go?”
Penny: “She cheated on you with Bill. She’s his seventeenth wife now.”
George: “Well that makes us even, I stole Susan and Patrice from him.”
Penny: “Constance left her kids, seven kids.”
George: “Left me with seven kids? I’ll have her shunned for that!”
Penny: “They’re your kids too, George, aren’t they?”
George: “Who knows? I’m so busy trying to keep everybody pregnant, if one slips by me, how am I gonna know?”
Penny: “On the outside, they’d say, “it’s tough out here for a pimp.”

Those Annoying TV Pop-up Ads!

“Night of the Hurdling Curdling Death Tues. Apr 6 8 PM”

It started about ten years ago. TNT began placing its logo in the lower right hand corner of the TV. A sheer, onion skin logo. I remember being annoyed when I first saw it. It distracted me from the program. But I let it slide, figuring that Ted Turner needed to label things that are his, the same way Trump has to label everything that belongs to him.

Soon after, other networks decided to put onion skin labels in the corner too. We all got used to it and trained our eyes not to notice them.

Then some network got the idea of announcing the title of the program you were watching on onions skins in the left lower corner. “You are watching Night of the Living Dead on the SciFi Channel”. I figured that was to benefit people who fell into three categories: 1. People who were distracted by someone for a moment and turned back to the TV having completely lost track of what show they were watching. 2. People who were walking behind the couch while someone else channel surfed and the show title would cause them to say, “Wait, I wanna see that a minute.” 3. People who had fallen asleep in front of the TV and upon waking would need to know immediately what program they were missing.

The next phase of the onion skin pop-up labeling was to advertise what the next show would be. Prior to this, the onion skin labels were just identifying the channel and the show, now they were advertising the next show before I was through watching this one. It wasn’t enough that I had to mute through eight minutes of commercials every six minutes, now they were cheating by adding thin strips of advertising for Flavor of Love right over kids’ face who was crying at the height of a dramatic scene.

Then, another Ad Exec thought, well hell, why just advertise the next show? Let’s advertise upcoming shows! I have a clear memory of watching a Christmas special on USA and while the chorus was singing, there was a strip ad for the movie “Race with the Devil at 8 PM Next Tuesday”. I really don’t want to see ads for satanic movies in the middle of ‘O Come All Ye Faithful’. It just proves that the strip ads appear according to a time schedule without regard to how incongruent they may be to the program they are defacing.

Recently, I have seen ads for programs that are on at the same time as the one I’m watching. “Now Showing: Gomez vs. Alverez on HBO Boxing”. This confuses me. Do they want me to stay with the show I’m watching or turn to another one on a different channel - is it better than what I’m watching now? Do they want me to turn back to this channel for the next show on this channel, or should I stay with the other channel?

Apparently people are not paying enough attention to the onion skin ads, so now they have to animate them.

Case in point. This past weekend I was watching a 1940’s movie with Barbara Stanwyck and John Payne. She’s very short. He was holding her by the shoulders, her eyes were smoldering in that film noir way and he began to lean in for the big kiss, when a small airplane shot out from her ear and circled the screen, heading towards the bottom left corner where the image of King Kong on the Empire State building had appeared. The plane zoomed him and he batted it away as another plane came from behind her head, now kissing John Payne, and flew towards King Kong with little machine guns flares shooting at him all the way. The strip ad told me King Kong was showing on that channel at 9 PM, obviously something I needed to know at exactly that moment.

If TV execs are trying to get us to watch more of their programming, they need to throttle back on these ever increasing pop-up ads. I never watch TNT, USA or BET anymore because they load their programs with so much pop-up advertising, it really ruins your ability to get lost in the story, which is why you turned it on in the first place.

The Importance of Getting Ahead in Life

Apr 2, 2008 LONDON (Reuters) - Children playing on a Scottish beach discovered a woman's severed head in a plastic bag, police said on Tuesday.

Any Beach, Shelter Island; two single Moms sitting on towels among many other single Moms on towels with kids swarming all around.

Mom 1: “My kids love the beach. They love making treasure maps and digging for treasure.”
Mom 2: “I know what you mean. My kids are alway making castles and digging up weird stuff. I think half my baking tools and pans are scattered all over this beach.”
Mom 1: “Me too. Somewhere on this beach is my best spring loaded cake pan, it made the best castle foundation you know. I lost my spring pan, but last year the kids found me a really nice blue silicone ladle with a matching baking sheet. Obviously part of a set.”
Mom 2: “Somebody’s missing that.”
Mom 1: “I know. I always worry somebody will be over for a visit and recognize something in my kitchen that should be in theirs.”
Mom 2: “That’s every Mom on Shelter Island.”
Mom 1: “Look at the kids, they’re all congregating. Somebody found something.”
Mom 2: “Don’t get up, they’ll drag it over here in a minute. Last week my kids found a conch filled with beach glass and hermit crabs. We had to take it home and put it in the sink so the hermit crabs could have water.”
Mom 1: “They can’t live in fresh water.”
Mom 2: “The kids don’t know that. If I told them that, then I’d have to bring home a bucket of salt water along with everything else. The hermit crabs lived a few hours and by then the kids had lost all interest in them, I rinsed off the beach glass and shells and put them in yet another jar somewhere in the house.”
Mom 1: “I think I have five jars of “beach treasures” in my house. Off-island people always think we’re nuts. We got jars of sand with glass and parts of crabs and shells and whatever else was on the beach that day.”
Mom 2: “Your kids are putting something in your car.”
Mom 1: “It’s the big find of the day I’m sure.”
Mom 2: “Here they come, get the sandwiches out.”
Kid 1 : “I saw it first. I said it’s real, but Jacob thinks it’s plastic. It’s real isn’t it Mom?”
Mom 1: “Eat your sandwich with your back to the wind, hunny, so the sand doesn’t blow on it. I’m sure it’s real. We’ll rinse it off at home and put it in the living room.”
Kid 2 : “It’s not real. But maybe you could make a lamp with it. My aunt made a lamp with a plastic pumpkin.”
Mom 2: “Okay, give me your juicy juice boxes. Let’s keep the trash under control. You guys can have another hour, then we’re going home.”
Kid 1 : “What if we find more of it?”
Mom 1: “Well, if it’s icky, don’t touch it.”
Kid 1: “But if it’s not icky, we can take it home too?”
Mom 1: “Yea, sure.”
Mom 2: “Gotta monitor that “ick” factor. My kids tried to bring home a dead chipmunk they found on the beach once.”
Mom 1: “Eeeeew. (calls to her child) It’s not a dead squirrel or something, the thing in the car?”
Kid 1 : “No Ma, not a squirrel. You wanna see it?”
Mom 1 : “Yea. You better bring it here.”
Kid 1 brings the package.
Mom 2: “AAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!”
Mom 1: “Call 911! Put that down now!”
Mom 2: “Oh my gawd... is it someone we know?”
Mom 1: “Just call 911. KIDS! Get in the car, NOW!”
Kid 1: “But you said we could look for more of the lady if it wasn’t too icky. You said we could stay another hour.”

When is too much fun too much?

Sat Mar 29, 11:18 AM ET
MUNCIE, Ind. - William M. Bowen woke up after a night of drinking with friends and realized he was inside a commercial trash-collection truck full of waste. The driver had just emptied a commercial trash bin into his truck and was about to activate its compactor when he heard Bowen screaming.
"He looked up and this gentleman was standing out the top of our truck," said Larry Green, market safety supervisor for the Rumpke waste disposal company. Green said the only thing Bowen said to the driver was that he was cold.
"This gentleman was extremely intoxicated," he said.

It’s clearly Spring. I see little dirt piles everywhere indicating that the worms are turning. I see ants in the house. I hear birds chirping in the morning. In a short time the Island will be green.

I’ve also noticed that summer people are starting to trickle in already! As a public service to our summer residents who come here to relax and enjoy themselves, I thought I might review a few indicators that you have overdone the whole, “What the hell, I’m on vacation,” theme.

If you wake after an evening of reveling and find yourself face up on the golf course with a tee in your mouth, and a golf ball on the tee, and someone is about to tee off from your head, you had too much fun the night before.

If you find yourself tied to the railing on the ferry with a multitude of ferry tickets taped to you because you passed out on the deck and have been riding the ferry all night, you’ve been having too much fun. But at least you know you were polite to the ferrymen because they tie the rude people to the outside of the railing.

If you wake to find yourself floating on the raft behind The Dory wearing only your underwear and the Christmas tree lights, you’ve had too much fun and probably made the cover of The Reporter.

If you wake to find ten fire department guys thirty feet below you, looking up at you and shouting, “Don’t move! You’re caught on the windmill! Wait for the cherry picker!” You’ve had too much fun.

If you wake to find yourself in a huge nest made of rough sticks and you see egg yolk on your pants, and a very large bird is looking at you as if it’s deciding which of your eyes to pluck out, you’ve had way too much fun and hopefully, you have a cell phone handy.

If you wake to find yourself on the little kids playground and you have been sick all over the seats of the toys, and you are surrounded by angry mothers who are looking at you as if trying to decide which of your eyes to pluck out, you’ve had way too much fun and a cell phone won’t help you. However, if you can summon any of your sprinting skills from high school, this would be a good time to engage them.

If you wake to find yourself in the girls locker room, dressed in a cheerleader outfit, and you are neither a girl nor a cheerleader, you have had way too much fun and you also have evil friends.

If you wake to find yourself with one arm around a huge coffeepot and a big coffee mess all around you and several half asleep workmen surrounding you with a look of “Give me coffee or I’ll kill you” look in their eyes, you have breached the Holy Coffee Grail at Pat and Steve’s. Step awake from the coffee pot, don’t make any sudden moves. Any amount of fun you had the night before will be canceled out soon by the beating you are about to receive if the coffee doesn’t flow.

If you wake to find yourself in the cabin of a beautiful boat, and you come up on deck to a sunny morning with no land in sight, just the sparkling water surrounding you, and no one else is on the boat, and you don’t own a boat, not only did you have too much fun, but somewhere there is a group of stranded people. Go back in the cabin and look for the ship to shore radio and a bottle of tequila. Hit the May Day button, take the tequila up on deck and get hammered because you’re going away for a long time. On Shelter Island, the rule is one year in jail for every ten feet of boat. If you’re on a 25 footer, that’s two and a half years.

Have fun, but not too much fun!

All Natural Flight...

Fly naked on nudist holiday flight
Tue. Jan 29, 9:13 AM ET
German nudists will be able to start their holidays early by stripping off on the plane. OssiUrlaub.de, said it would start taking bookings for nudist day trips from the eastern German town of Erfurt to the popular Baltic Sea resort of Usedom.
“The passengers will have to remain clothed until they board, and dress before disembarking,” said Enrico Hess, booking agent. “The crew will remain clothed throughout the flight for safety reasons.....I wish I could say we thought of it ourselves but the idea came from a customer," Hess told Reuters by phone. "It's an unusual gap in the market." Naturism, or "free body culture" (FKK) is well known in Germany. "There are FKK hotels, restaurants, shops naked, for example," Hess said. "For FKK fans, it's nothing unusual..... We're a perfectly normal holiday company."

“Sally, this is so great. How did you book a flight so late?”
“Pure dumb luck Patty! There were 17 vacancies on this plane - all the other flights were sold out! I don’t know why they had so many vacancies, but I checked it out, it’s a reputable airline. They’re just making one stop en route to Lucerne at a place called Erfurt.”
“Fantastic!”
“The booking agent said everyone will be flying natural, he wanted to know if we’d have a problem with that.”
“A problem traveling natural? No make-up and sweat clothes? Sounds like heaven to me.”
“Me too, Patty. I hate putting on makeup when I travel. It always smudges and crumbles and I look like a raccoon by the end of the trip.”
“I’m going braless.”
“Whoa Patty! Living on the edge now!”

(one hour later)
“Nice smooth takeoff. Everybody is socializing. What a friendly group, Sally!”
“They sure are. Looks like a club.
“Oh my gawd! Sally! That guys is.. is he? He’s stripping! Call the attendant!”
“I’m hitting the button now! There’s another one - that big guy - and his wife?!?”
“Hello, I’m Helga, how can I help you?”
“Hi, look Helga... all these people are taking off their clothes!”
“Ya, it is a natural flight. Ver you not toldt?”
“We were told it was a natural flight, yes, but we thought that meant you could dress casually.”
“Vell, it means you don’t have to dress at all. Have a nice flight.”
“Oh Patty... I think we’re going to be the only ones with clothes on. What are we going to do?”
“I’m calling Helga back.”
“She can’t help she said.”
“She can bring vodka!”
“Look, that woman’s had three c-sections. Poor thing! Look at all the open heart surgery scars, Patty.”
“These are not ‘le bode beautiful’, none of them.... I can’t believe all the hairy backs and butts, Helga better leave me the whole bottle.”
“Boy, Patty, you sure can spot the implants.”
“I don’t want to spot anything. I’m not even going to be able to hold down my lunch!”
”Patty, one of them is coming this way, a man. Oh geez....”
“Hello, I speak english, I am Karl. Are you ladies joining us today?”
“No, we’re just on our way to Lucerne.”
“Vell, it’s very nice to go natural. You might like it. Ve’ll be together for four hours you know. You have nothing to be ashamed of. Ve are all born naked. It’s just brainvashing that ve need clothes. Look at me.”
“Oh, that’s okay, Karl, we’d rather not. You’re so, so... so close.”
“You can’t tell if I’m a bum or a corporate lawyer. All the lies are gone.”
”You’re right Karl, clothes make us lie. I guess you can tell from my attire that I’m a three time Karate champion.”
“I make you nervous. I understand. I’ll leave. I’ll send you a gift, just to be a friend.”
“That’s not necessary, thank you just the same.”

(Karl leaves and shortly returns)
“A whole bottle of blue label Stoly... this is the good stuff, Sal. You should have some.”
“I don’t think I should. I joke about drinking, but you know I don’t drink.”
“This is a good time to start.”

(one hour later)
“Sally! SALLY! No more Stoly! Where are your clothes? You have to get dressed before we descend! NO! I don’t want to learn any german drinking songs with you! Karl - stop encouraging her! Now see that? They’ve called the pilot to come here and settle you down. You be nice. He said, sit down - he’s not going to let you fly the plane naked. C’mon Sal, sit down. I’m covering you with this blanket Good girl, you just sit there and sing.”

(the next day)
“..so I did my best to find something to dress you in, Sally, and here we are in our nice little hotel.”
“I’m so sorry, Patty. I don’t remember a thing.”
”I know.”
“Are you going to tell me why I have a heart tattoo on my boob with the name Karl in it?”
“No, not today. Maybe tomorrow, after I explain the tattoo of the Stoly bottle on your rump.”

No More Money for the Whore

Now Being Served: Client No. 9

I genuinely pity Eliot Spitzer, seen above telling the public that the distance between his fingers is actually eight inches (how many women have heard that before!). He went to Harvard and Princeton, married well, three lovely daughters, worked his way up to govenorship of New York State. At only 48 years old, if he did a good job in NY, he might have been chosen as a VP on the Dem ticket in 2012, from there, the Presidency. Yes, it was all going so well. But power corrupts. I could almost nominate him for a Darwin Award for being phenomenally stupid. Talk about shooting yourself in the foot, okay, maybe a little higher, but he essentially ended his life. He lost his job, position, will probably, and deservedly, be disbarred. His wife, I’m betting, will divorce him as more revelations surface about how long he used professional services. And his teenaged daughters, who have now seen their mother weep bitter tears, won’t ever feel the same about him again. And you can bet that as adult women, they will have major trust issues with men. Eliot probably thinks he’s the only victim here. Will he ever understand how it hurts his wife when he chases young babes, while she allowed three pregnancies to ruin her body? Mrs. Spitzer, such a trained political wife, stood neatly dressed behind him, as he carved her heart out with a spoon. I hope she cleans him out. She deserves the best possible life she can get hold of now. God Bless her.

It’s a good thing Eliot wasn’t a Shelter Island man. Most of the gals on the Island would not have stood quietly behind their cheating husband while he announced how penitent he was. I’ve taken an informal survey and I’d like to advise any men in Shelter Island politics, not to expect their wives to stand behind them in their moment of betrayal, they have different ideas for atonement. An Island woman would have beaten Eliot to death with one of the folding chairs from the front row.

Now, with horror, Mrs. Spitzer and the country get to watch the whore rake in the profits with centerfold spreads from stroke magazines and TV interviews, and movies of the week.

When did shame go out of style? As a parent, I made certain my children understood that there are behaviors that are shameful and your should feel guilty and remorseful. Society uses guilt and shame to curb aberrant behavior - but apparently ban is lifted if you make a lot of money doing it, or if it involves someone famous.

“Hi Mary, you busy tonight?”
“Hi Sally, no, what’s up?”
“I’m short for the rent money, I thought could service some guys at the bar.”
“Sally! That’s horrible! You’re kidding right?”
“No, no, you don’t understand, the guy at the bar I’m targeting is in the Suffolk County Legislature. He’ll pay me not to publish the pictures. I’m bringing whip cream and a chicken, the kinky stuff really brings in the bucks.”
“What pictures?”
“The ones you’ll be taking.”
“That’s prostitution and blackmail!”
“No, no, it’s a public service, we’re exposing a county official for the two timing lying cheat that he is.”
”Wait, that’s still wrong. I can’t be part of that.”
“Yea, but we’ll get about $5000 from him for the pictures and the newspapers will give us even more.”
“But if we sell the pictures to him, we can’t double cross him and sell them to the newspapers. He’s a county executive, he’s a powerful guy.”
“Please, he’ll resign ten minutes after pictures come out, no threat there. I think I should get my hair done for the TV interviews. They pay like $50,000 each. You and Don can get the new boat.”
”$50,000? Boy that’s tempting. But I’ll be selling out my integrity. Everyone will be talking about me.”
”Well that’s the nice thing about owning a boat, you can’t hear people talking about you over the roar of the engine and the clinking ice in your glass.”
“Hang on, Don just woke up. Let me put him on the phone with you.”
“Okay.”
5 minutes later....
“Hi Sal, so what did Don say? It’s a bad idea right?”
“Nope. He said he’s going upstairs to get the better camera for you to bring. He wants a double outboard.”

Overreaction to Children???

“What we have here, is a failure to communicate,” from Cool Hand Luke.


German puts out cigarette with fire extinguisher Tue. Feb. 19, 2008

BERLIN (Reuters) - A virulent anti-smoker in Germany was so angry when his girlfriend lit up he emptied a fire extinguisher to put out the cigarette, caking her and their apartment in powder.
After the woman ignored his request not to smoke, the 42-year-old sprayed the contents of the extinguisher all around the flat shouting abuse, police said.
"He said he wasn't bothered by the damage it caused," the spokesman said. "And that he's through with his girlfriend."

Yes, those reformed smokers can certainly be emphatic. But haven’t we all had moments when we overreacted to something? Or is it just me?

In a police station fifteen years ago:
“Now Ms Flynn, I know you don’t think you did anything wrong, but driving a Bobcat through the sliding glass door and scooping up your children's toys and then driving and dumping them in a landfill is a little extreme, don’t you think?”
“You don’t know these kids, Officer. I swear they are the spawn of Satan! I can’t keep up with them! One is three the other is two, together, they have the combined destructive power of a Category Five Tormado.”
“You mean tornado.”
“No, I mean tormado, that’s what my daughter, the evil one, calls it. They call down the powers of hell and in the three minutes it takes me to run to the bathroom and back, they have gotten toys I have never seen and filled in the remaining spaces on the rug, trapped the cat in the dishwasher, kneecapped the mailman with a wooden spoon and ground up my glasses in the sink disposal. I think they communicate telepathically with other children and systematically select one mother at a time to drive insane. It’s their goal to take over the world. I think Mr. Rogers is their ring leader. I think he sends them messages through the TV.”
“Now, Ms Flynn. Stop and think how that sounds.”
“You’re right. Mr. Rogers couldn’t do it alone. The Teletubbies must be in on it too. It’s that Tinky Winky...or maybe Po, no Po isn’t bright enough, definitely Tinky Winky.”
“You know what you need? You need to take some time off during the day, treat yourself a little, give yourself a break.”
“Right, and whose gonna watch the twin pillars of peril?”
”How about your husband? Won’t he watch them awhile?”
“Not in this life.”
“Maybe you should get a little medication, to lower your stress level. Get some valium from your doctor.”
“Now there’s a idea I can use! Valium, better living through chemistry, why didn’t I think of that?”

Two weeks later, in the same police station:
“Ms Flynn, we’re all real glad that you’ve stopped using construction equipment as a means of housekeeping and child rearing.”
“Yes, things are so much better now.”
“Can you tell me why your children just sit on the couch now? They don’t even watch TV, they just stare into space.”
“I move them every hour.”
”Yes, I’m sure you do. But why are they so floppy and why do they need to be positioned on the couch?”
“It’s your plan, it’s working extremely well, I’m very happy.”
“My plan?”
“You suggested I go a see a doctor and get some meds to help me deal with the stress of raising two children under five.”
“And you did that?”
“Yes. I’ve been giving the kids regular doses and everything is just wonderful, there’s no fighting, no destruction, no screaming, nothing. It’s perfect. I get up in the morning, water the plants, position the children, then I might bake something, or watch Oprah. I can’t thank you enough for your advice.”
“Actually, I meant that you should take the medication.”
“They didn’t have enough control before? You want ME to medicate MYSELF and give them all the strategic advantages in this parenting war? I think not.”
“It’s called child abuse.”
NO - it’s called self defense!”
“Give me the medication, Ms. Flynn.”
“Here’s my purse, get it yourself.”
“What the hell is in this bag? Everything is sticky and damp!”
”My kids poured maple syrup in my bag before I put them on meds.”
“I see. You know, perhaps I’ve been a little hasty.”

Shelter Island Isolation

Island Vision

CableVision claims to give all its customers excellent service, but it ignores the needs of the two thousand residents of Shelter Island. CableVision should assign one of its executives to live on the Island through a winter, then they’d understand.

We need CableVision to stop running commercials that unfairly torture us and run commercials that we can use.

We don’t have any chain or franchise stores here; no McDonalds, Burger King, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, KFC, nuthin’. Every time we see a commercial for a Whopper, we cry, because to get one means a $15 ferry ride and a 45 minute drive to Riverhead. A Whopper costs us nearly a hundred bucks, twenty for the ferry and gas, and another eighty for the food. Eighty for food? Hell yes. As soon as anyone finds out you’re making a fast food run to Riverhead, they put in orders, “If you’re going to Burger King, can you loop through McDonalds and get me......?”. You return with a car full of food. You have to have an extra bag of fries to eat on the way back so you don’t pull over and raid all the bags. Once you’re on the ferry, you have to remember to open the window only a crack to give the ferryman your ticket, you must not let the aroma of Big Macs, Whoppers and fries escape! If you do, they’ll call friends to intercept you on your way home and McSteal your McStash.

All the movie commercials need to stop. The closest theater is a ferry ride and a half hour drive after that. Movies cost us about $50; $20 for ferry and gas, $30 for tickets and treats. Unless it’s a four star movie, it’s not worth our time.

All the Viagra and similar commercials to be banned on Shelter Island in the winter. We don’t have any time for that. Winters are financially tough for everyone, there’s not many full time jobs, most are part time. Most Islanders work three part time jobs (I have four) to keep going. Nobody has any time for Viagra, we have to get to work.

We don’t have a Macy’s, Penny’s or any big store, so all those sales just make us sad. The Home Depot ads are especially hard on the men. They see rows of hardware in the commercials, rows and bins of stuff they can’t pick through. It’s just so sad to see a grown man pointing to the TV showing a sale on Table Saws and whimpering, “I want that. I could go there and get that today if I didn’t live here.”

We hate the e.harmony matchmaking commercials. We just know that one of the compatibility questions will be; Where do you like to live?
A] City with lots of excitement
B] Urban community with access to many activities
C] Country where it’s peaceful and quiet
D] On an isolated island off the east coast with absolutely no amenities.

We need Island oriented commercials. A glow in the dark ferry ticket holder that clips on your car visor. A set of special headlights that signal to the ferries in morse code: “I’m an Islander, I know I missed the last boat, but please come back and get me or promise to feed my cat in the morning.”

We need commercials for memory booster pills; “Live on Shelter Island? Can’t remember who’s related or married to whom? Take MemoJack and the next time someone asks,”Is he a Clark or an Olinkiewicz? YOU will know the answer!”

Or a mini-generater; “Electric out again because some moron in Sag Harbor or Greenport hit a pole? No problem with Black & Decker’s new Island Home Buzz Me Big Boy portable mini generator!”

We need magnetic car panels. On Shelter Island, you are identified by your car. If you get a new car you practically have to announce it in the paper. If you sell your car to another Islander, all hell breaks loose from the confusion. We need big 2 foot square magnetic car panels that we can put on the drivers door that announces our name, or any change in ownership, or any other intentions; “Used to be a Kaasik car, now owned by a McGayhey” or “Going in for repair, I will be in a loaner next week”.

A Venison Teleportation Device is desperately needed here. “Tired of the deer eating everything in your flower or veggie garden? Tired of seeing those commercials about children starving in the third world? Solve two problems at once with the New Ronco Doe Go! Space Age Teleporter. The next time you see a deer munching on your rosebuds, aim Doe Go at her, and in a flash, she’s dinner for a whole village!”

Coffee - Black or Light?

Black or Light?

I was never much of a coffee drinker growing up. I was a tea drinker until I had my first child. Getting up to feed her two and three times a night and still work full time for an unreasonable boss who demanded conscious employees, drove me to drinking coffee. As time went on, like most, I needed that morning kick to get started.

You wouldn’t think that coffee could become an issue of contention in a marriage. But those who have lived long enough know that ANYTHING can become an “issue” in a marriage. I know a couple who fought over which end of the tub you should step into with the shower running. He stepped into the showerhead side and she would step into the other end and walk into the shower spray, which drove him crazy. Why? No reason, that was just one of his pecadilloes. For me, it’s reading over my shoulder. I can’t explain or justify it, but nothing will incite me to homicidal thoughts faster than someone reading over my shoulder. My ex thought that was unreasonable, so he read over my shoulder whenever he could to help “break” me from my issue with it. I made a case to respect each other’s idiosyncratic behaviors, but what a fool am I, men don’t have any idiosyncratic behaviors, everything they do is logical for those with eyes to see.

I like any kind of fresh coffee, light and sweet. I don’t care about the brand, or how it was prepared. I just need it to be in a cup with sweetener and creamer.

My ex was a pain in the ass coffee cononseur. He used the Chemex coffee system. We purchased whole fresh beans which were kept in the freezer. When you wanted coffee, you put a kettle of water on to boil, then you got the beans from the freezer, ground them in the tiny grinder, stopping twice to lift the lid and stir the beans so you got a perfectly even grind. Once the water reached boiling, you take it off the burner and let it cool for exactly two minutes so that it is at the optimal brewing temperature. While the water is cooling, fold the filter correctly and put it in the top of the Chemex all glass “V” shaped pot. Put in the coffee and a small amount of water, just enough to wet the grinds. Now pour in the hot water s-l-o-w-l-y to facilitate a slow drip. Do all this while you have a toddler wrapped around one leg and you are holding a baby in one arm. If you had some caffeine in your system, you could make an argument for a normal coffeepot and even ignore his threats to throw out any Mr. Coffee you bring home. He was a purist, it was perfect coffee or no coffee.

My ex drank his coffee black, because he said, that’s the only way coffee should be drunk. My mother drinks hers with a half teaspoon of milk and a quarter packet of any artificial sweetener. When either of them fixed me a coffee, it was as nearly black as it could be without actually being black. Just a teaspoon of milk and half packet of sweetener, because I couldn’t possibly want it any lighter or sweeter, could I? Somehow that would defy all the laws of coffee drinking, it wouldn’t taste like burnt acid with all that creamer and sweetner in it, it might taste very nice with some outside help from Coffeemate, well, we can’t have that. The people who take coffee black or close to it, willl just never understand those of us who prefer it light and sweet I guess.

Recently, a friend offered to get me a coffee to go from a deli. “How do you like it?” she asked.
“Light and sweet. Put in 2 packets of sweetner and 25% of whatever they have for creamer. It should look like chocolate milk when you’re through with it,” I responded. I thought my instructions were fairly clear.
She brought me my coffee and I thanked her. Popping off the plastic top, I saw nearly black coffee.
“Is it too dark?” she asked. “I take mine black. I didn’t think you’d want all that creamer in there.”
“No. This is fine,” I said, once more reisgned to my fate that only another Lite & Sweet person knows what light and sweet means.

Valentine's Day Revenge

I wrote this column for Valentine's Day 2000. My friend Patty, who is a very bad influence on me, insisted that I put this column up with the newer one behind it. Hope you all laugh as hard as she did.

Valentine's Day 2000

It's interesting how tragedies and misfortunes in our lives sometimes become laughable events in retrospect. I am clearly the stupidest women I know when it comes to men. In the Parade of Fools, my face is on the first three floats.

I hate Valentine's Day. On Valentine's Day in 1981, on our second Valentine's Day as a married couple, my ex-mistake gave me a dozen beautiful long stem roses. I love roses and as I recall, this was an exceptionally beautiful bouquet. I set the vase on the table and sat down to look at my roses. As I filled with feelings of love for my spouse, he chose that exact moment to confess a ten month affair with a co-worker.

In the Guide to Being a Lousey Husband Handbook, Chapter 7, is called "If She Don't Ask, Don't Tell". This chapter explains the many benefits of not confessing affairs that your wife has no clue about. I don't think my spouse read that chapter. I stayed with him of course because he swore he'd never do it again and he meant it because he gave me expensive jewelry.

Fast forward four years, Valentine's Day again. I am putting the finishing touches on an 18 month project for my degree in Hospital Administration. I am exhausted to the bone. I must completely focus on this project. My spouse had been hammering at me all day to go to a fertility clinic because he wanted to start a family and he was angry that I wasn't pregnant. I suggested it might be HIM. He chose that exact moment to tell me about another affair with another co-worker oh, and by the way, the woman he told me about four years earlier had gotten pregnant and aborted. I thought I was in a Woody Allen movie. Anyway, he was sorry again and I got more expensive jewelry to prove it.

In the Guide to Being a Lousey Husband Handbook, page 87 clearly states, "When attempting to induce your wife to become pregnant, resist the urge to cite the number of other women you have gotten pregnant since your marriage began."

Since I came back to Shelter Island two years ago, I've been asked out three times, by married men. Well, I'm fat does but not desparate. I can't imagine putting another woman through what I went through.

I thought I'd share some more tips from the Guide to Being a Lousey Husband Handbook.
Don't charge flowers for your girlfriend on your wife's credit card.
Don't charge your girlfriend abortion on your wife's credit card! (How fucking stupid can he be?)
Don't ask women out in the grocery aisles, your wife could could be in the next aisle - dummy.
A strange hairbrush in the bathroom with short blond hair will be noticed by a wife with long auburn hair.
We both know you don't shower before you come home from a poker game.
Don't call out the wrong name in bed.
Since when did you start buying new clothes for yourself? Especially new underwear...
All of a sudden you're eating healthy?
Just when did you realize you should've seen the dentist years ago?
You bought yourself a gold neck chain? Right....
You saw it on Oprah? When did you start watching Oprah?
Why should we get a new unlisted number? Who are we evading?
Why can't she call a plumber? How come you have to go look at her sink?
When caught "en flagrante" don't even bother trying to talk your way out of it. Do not say,
"Hey, who ya gonna believe? Me or your lyin' eyes?"


My ex begged me not to file for divorce. He said he believed marriage was forever. I admit to being a bitch. I wanted to go for counsuling and I kept demanding he give up the girlfriend...

On December 25, 1996, he gave me a faux mink coat from Neiman Marcus to die for. Most real looking fake I have ever seen.

On December 26, 1996, I filed for divorce .... and I wore the coat when I filed....

Hey Honey, I gotcha Valentine right heah....

Valentine's Day - Oy Vey!!!

Valentine’s Day: ICU means I Love You

Valentine’s Day. The day when all men must answer the question, “how much do you love me and why isn’t it more?”

I feel sorry for men on Valentine’s Day. They know they have to get it right, but they are so lost on how to do it. When men are courting, they truly want to get it right because they want to build the relationship. But after the foundation of the relationship, and you, have been laid, Valentines Day becomes a nuisance to them. A maintenance task like mowing the lawn or changing the oil.

Men struggle to find the cheapest and easiest gift they can get you that will still fulfill the female need for yet another protestation of love. Courting men try to choose the cheapest gift they can get that will still make her feel obligated to show her appreciation. Married men no longer hope for any intimate access for their efforts, they just don’t want to get in any trouble. THey don’t want their woman slamming kitchen cabinets the next day and finding the single fake rose they bought stuck to the cabinet with a steak knife through it. Please don’t feel bad if that happened to you, all men in a long term relationship make the mistake of buying the last minute fake rose with a crappy card once, but just once. If they make that mistake twice, we move them into the divorced, or soon to be divorced, man category.

All of the flower and candy companies have a range of gifts for men to select from. I recall a male friend looking at a FTD type newspaper insert that showed all the different flower & gift combo’s he could choice from. His eyes scanned back and forth in desperation, finally he slapped the table and said, “Well hell, I don’t know what to pick.”
“How much gratitude do you want?” I asked. “This tiny rose plant in a coffee cup you’re looking at will get you a hug and a kiss on the cheek.”
“You mean, there’s a system?” the fool asked incredulously.
“Yes,” I said nonchalantly.
“How would you know?” he asked, mistakenly thinking that a middle aged woman who looks like a PTA mom, has no past (let me tell all you guys right now, we all have a past).
I gave him that well practiced icy stare that all women have. The one that shrinks them to the size of a bug. “Ask the crew of the Nimitz,” I said very quietly.
“Ouch! I’m convinced. Will you tell me how this works, please?”
“Absolutely. There’s a direct correlation between the amount of thought and money spent on a gift and the amount of appreciation we feel obligated to show you to insure that we’ll get another great gift next year as well.”
”Okay. How much appreciation could I get for a dozen red roses?”
“You could get a decent make out session.”
Well, what if I, if I, ah, would like a little more appreciation?”
“Depends on the vase. Send the roses in a plain glass vase wouldn’t get you any extra points. But send them in the murano glass vase, you could get a lot of appreciation for that,” I answered.
“Is there anything in this flyer that could get me anything ah, exotic appreciation?”
“Sorry, there’s no kinky sex bouquet. You have to add jewelry to roses and candy to get anything like that.”
“Did your husband know about this system?”
“Yes, he did. I got a pair of emerald and diamond earrings totaling 4 carats one Valentine’s Day.”
”Wow, what did you have to, I mean, I guess you had to show a lot of appreciation for that.”
“Oh yes, he was well appreciated that night. He didn’t complain once the whole next week when he was in the Intensive Care Unit.”

So, for all you guys shopping for the Valentine’s gift this week, get real flowers or real (sterling or 14kt) jewelry. Buy a nice card, I don’t care if it costs you $5, you don’t want to see your card with a steak knife through it, do you? And if you get a really spectacular gift, you too, could wind up in ICU.

Rich Bitch & Boy Toys

Bait and Switch

“For the mature woman who has everything: a boy toy.
By Robert Campbell (AP Jan 30, 10:49 AM ET)
Wanted: rich older women interested in hot younger guys. Applicants must be over 35, earn at least $500,000 a year or have a minimum of $4 million in liquid assets, entrusted assets or divorce settlement.
That's the basis of a speed-dating event organized by a New York entrepreneur bringing together 20 "sugar mamas" and 20 "boy toys" vetted by an elite New York matchmaker. "Symbiosis has allowed ugly rich men to attract young, gorgeous, money-hungry women for centuries; it's now the women's turn," proclaims pocketchangenyc.com.”

“Sally, you’ve cooked up some crazy ideas before, but this one is crazy enough to actually work.”
“I think it has a shot. All the single women on the Island complain all the time that there’s no one new to date. Dating on Shelter Island is like playing musical chairs. Everybody is somebody else’s ex. All the men have been recycled.”
“That’s true, I’ve cycled through the available Island guys twice. So, the plan is, we send some real rich Island women to this event as bait to lure some of these hot guys back.”
“I know two gals, stinkin’ rich. They’ll go to the event if I tell them that the guys are shoe designers who select the women whom they think are attractive enough to wear their shoes. You know rich people can’t handle rejection. These women will bribe the guys to come to the Island with their goods to see if the shoe fits....”
”How do we get rid of the rich women after they get the guys here?”
“Simple, we tell them the truth. The men don’t have any designer shoes and worse, they have no money. They’ll drop them like a ferral cat at the dumps.”
“How do we keep the guys on the Island, Sally?”
“Ah, that’s where my true genius comes in. We are on an Island after all. We bribe, threaten, or blackmail the ferrymen to ban these new guys from the ferries. Next, we find married men with boats to patrol the Island and stifle any escape attempts.”
“Married men with boats?”
“Of course, they are constantly looking for any excuse to get out of the house before She Who Must Be Obeyed can assign any chores. And any excuse that gets them on their boat is welcome. By patroling the waters around the Island and preventing any escapes, they get out of the house and in their boats. If we add beer, it will be perfect.”
“What about if the captives call for help on their cell phones?”
“We’ll frisk them for cell phones, or any communication devices, but if one of them manages to make any off-island contact, we’ll just stonewall whomever comes. We don’t know anyone by that name or description.”
“I love it.”
“I’m telling you, it can work. I figure we can keep them here for at least a year. We’ll put them on a rotation list so everybody gets an equal shot at each new guy. If we don’t like them, we just let them go.”
“Just like that? What if they report us to the authorities?”
“Who’s going to believe them that they were held captive on a tiny Island by wild single women? The cops will think they just swallowed too much sea water, or they might get committed, either way, they’ll never sell the story.”
“Gosh, a new man on Shelter Island, wow, it doesn’t happen very often, Sally.”
“Yep. I almost feel sorry for the poor slobs. One rotation with the Island gals, won’t be nothin’ left of these boys but their shoelaces.”
“Serves them right for trying to marry women just for their money.”
“Remember the old saying, when you marry for money, you earn every penny of it.”

I Got More Rolls Than a Bakery...

The Scarlett C

Apparently I struck a real chord with last week’s theme about society’s tacit approval of TV shows that humiliate overweight people; shows like How to Look Good Naked and Biggest Loser, that are sold to the public as “entertainment”. But, we fatties can’t hog the spotlight. Television goes after anyone with a problem and calls it ‘entertainment’.

For a society that allegedly values privacy, we have completely sold out. The new thinking seems to be, I’m entitled to privacy, but you’re not. And the more problems you have the less privacy you’re entitled to (Brittany Spears, case in point). It wasn’t so bad when we just invaded the privacy of celebs, because the money we pay to see their movies and listen to their music entitles us to have them hounded, harassed and hunted for our additional entertainment. But now, with shows like Intervention, we are going after anyone whose humiliation we can watch. The Networks say they broadcast this crap ‘to inspire others to get help’, oh please, like the Networks care about you. I think these shows encourage the exact discriminatory and judgmental attitudes they portend to discourage.

“Sally, what are you doing sitting here? When the hell did Shelter Island get punishment stocks and start locking people in them? And why are you in your red mink?”
“Hi Joyce. New orders from Suffolk County. I’m the first person to be put into the Town’s new Mea Culpa, Youa Laugha program. You know last week when I walked through town in my underwear and the Town bought me this mink for a cover up?”
“You made the front cover of the local paper.”
“Well, the PETA people found out that I like to wear fur so I have to do public penance because a group with media coverage says so. And of course, because I let it all hang out, the Town says I have to put it all back in, so I have to hold out this cup while I sit here and beg for money to go on Jenny Craig.”
“That’s outrageous! Nobody can tell somebody else what to do, this is still a free country!”
“Apparently not. SlimFast, TrimSpa, Weight Watchers, and other diet companies are coming by to take picture of me. I won the “Before” Picture of the Year award and they all get to use me in their ads. But Dr. Phil will be by around 3 to do a show on why the diet people shouldn’t exploit me. After him, around 4, Barbara Walters is coming by to ask me if I feel exploited by Dr Phil.”
“This is nuts, Sally! How long does this go on?”
“Just 9 am to 6 pm daily until the Town stops getting offers on me. They’ve almost made enough to put a new roof on the school. The Town has me signed up for the show Intervention, they get me last.”
“But that’s a show for drug addicts.”
“Right, Dateline NBC was here this morning filming me for their new expose, Carbohydrates are the New Crack. They’ll establish the addictive properties of carbohydrates and by the end of the week, 98% of the country will be classified as addicts, they call us Carbies.”
“Now I feel terrible. I brought you coffee and a buttered roll from Fedi’s.”
“Oh, thanks! I haven’t had a thing to eat since they locked me in these stocks at 7 am this morning.”
“I thought you said this punishment started at 9 am?”
“Yes, the appointments do, but the driveby humiliation starts early so people can point and laugh on their way to work.”
“You don’t seem upset.”
“Nope. I caught a glimpse of whom the Town is locking up in the coming weeks. Do you how many druggies, drunks, carbies, smokers, tokers, cheaters, liars, chocoholics, caffiends, and nail biters this town has?”
“Sally, I fit two of those categories!”
“I know, you’re scheduled for a week in May. The weather should be nice. I’ll come sit with you. I’ll bring my Yatzee game.”
“NO! Not fair! Everybody in town fits into one of those categories!”
“Don’t panic, the Town is building more stocks. The new ones will have cup holders and little canopies, very chic, the latest in public humiliation.”
“What this hacksaw on the ground?”
“Oh, that’s if you can’t stand it anymore. You can pick up the hacksaw, a sensor in the handle triggers a camera somewhere and it records you sawing off your legs for freedom. They put the footage in a movie and you get residuals.”
“Oh my gawd, I need a drink.”
“Join the club, babe.”

How to Look Good Naked - NOT!!!

That Touch of Mink

Let me start off with a disclaimer that I have lots of gay friends, so I don’t want anyone writing any letters that I'm gaybashing. However, I reject the assumption that being gay means you automatically have better taste than a straight person. Style, taste and decorum are not linked to sexual preference.

With that said, I’m going to kill Carson Kressley. He’s so far over on the ego dial, the next click starts over with Mother Theresa. He’s so far over on the gay dial, the next click starts over again at Russell Crowe. I know he has periods, because he obviously has PMS as we see from all his hissy fits. "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" was bad enough for embarassing straight people, now he’s gone too far with his new show, "How to Look Good Naked".

Somehow he has convinced otherwise intelligent and socially appropriate women to appear on camera in their underwear. I think he does it to gross out straight men and increase the gay population, and I bet it’s working.

You see, there’s a reason for clothes. People weren’t naked in Prehistoric times for very long. Our ancestors were content as gatherers until the first scarry hairy female cromagnon girls sat naked across the camp fire from the boy cromagnons. They took one look at things they never wanted to see and promptly decided to find something for the girls to wear, even if they had to steal the skins off of animals! In the process of separating the skin from the meat, some meat fell into the fire and that’s where they got the inspiration for Barbeque. If those first female cromagnon girls hadn’t shown up, we’d all still be vegetarians today and none of us would have any nice furs.

Ever since then, it’s been a fact that people look better with their clothes on. The only exception is the very young, or the very nipped and much tucked. The rest of us know better and we also know it’s only a matter of time before those perfect people end up in sweats with the rest of us.

Now Carson is swimming upstream. Under the guise of “freeing themselves” he’s getting women who are far from perfection to face full length mirror’s in their underwear which is A} cruel to the woman B} brutal on the film crew C} unthinkable as entertainment. He even got a group of them to march in the street in bras and panties. They should have surrounded and eaten him.

This would never have happened on Shelter Island.
“Stop where you are Ms. Flynn, we’ve got you surrounded!”
“You’ll never make me put on my clothes again, Officer! I’m free of shame, I’m proud of who I am, I love my body!”
“You are alone in this pursuit, Ms. Flynn. Don’t move. We have weapons drawn. Now, Officer Smith is going to hand you a tarp.”
“NO! No tarp! As a matter of fact, I’m taking off the bra and panties! Carson is right! I want to feel the air touch my skin!”
"Who the hell is Carson?"
"Carson Kressley, the gay man who is devoted to setting straight fat girls free!"
"We don't give a damn what the takin' it up the butt boy says! Don’t take anything else off, Ms. Flynn! Officer Johnson went blind and two of my other officers are throwing up in the bushes. You have to stop! Okay, Ms. Flynn....Sally.... I just got a note from the Town Board, they’ve got a real mink coat being helicoptered in now. The note says it’s dyed red, your favorite color. Now won’t you be a nice lady, Ms. Sally, and take the mink so we can all go home?”
“You think I’d sell out my authentic existential awakening for a fur?”
“Okay, we’ll send it back.”
“Well, you’ve already gone to trouble of getting it..... what size?”
“Tall girl, half acre, just like your shirt tag said.”
“I am feeling cold. Oh it’s here! It’s gorgeous!”
“Okay, I’m handing it to you on a stick. That’s a good girl, you just put on that mink and go home.”
“Do I have to pay the Town back?”
“No, Ms Flynn, it fit the criteria for the Emergency Disaster Relief Fund.”