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JIm Pfiffer

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  1. JIm Pfiffer
    “Rain, rain go away.”
    “I don’t want to friggin’ mow my lawn again today!”
    I’ve been uttering that ditty all summer and fall because of all the !@^%$! MOWING I’m doing because of all the !@^%$! RAIN. (Editor’s note: Upper case letters and exclamation points signify that the writer is really @^%$! PISSED OFF!!!!!)
    My lawn has more mow lines then the outfield at Fenway, and they are deep enough to grow corn.
    My life revolves around a series of repeated lawn aggravations: Mow. Wait for rain to stop. Mow. Repeat.
    I have a double lot, and the adjacent lot is nothing but grass. I call it the “North 40,” but of course it’s not really 40 acres. (It’s more like 38-39 acres). It also has a hedgerow that is so long it covers two time zones and takes me four time zones to trim it.
    My lawn is so large, that when I’m done mowing the last of it, I have to go back and mow the first section, because the grass grows so fast.

    The high and thick grass hides the gazillion piles of dog poop from my dog, neighborhood dogs and even dogs from outside the hood, who bus in just to do their business on my lawns. It’s a regular poop-o-rama.
    I mow with a TORO self-propelled push mower. What I need is a John Deer S690 combine and thresher. My TORO is a mulching mower. It cuts the grass into tiny pieces and deposits them back into the lawn. All that mulched grass has increased the height of my lawn so much, that when I mow, I can see the curvature of the Earth on the horizon.
    I used to reward myself with a cold beer after mowing, but not anymore, because I can’t afford to buy that much brew and my liver can’t afford any more cirrhosis.
    To get a better idea of my mowing blues, here is the ten-step procedure I endure each time I mow:
    I search through the garage clutter for the gas can, only to discover that it’s empty because I neglected to fill it the last time I used it. So, I have to go get gas, but first I have to refinance my home to afford the ridiculously high price of gas. I try, but can never, fill the mower gas tank without spilling it over the mower, my hands and my sneakers. For the rest of the day, I smell like a Molotov Cocktail. As I try to weave the mower out of my cluttered garage I clip bikes, a gas grill, a kayak and a recycling bin, tattooing them with dents, twists and scrapes. My mower, like all mowers, is designed to never start until I pull the cord so many times, my arm falls off. (It is during this “yank period” that I unleash my most torrid, raw and venomous string of cussing. Sometimes I kick the mower, stub my toes and dance about in pain.) The triceps in my right arm are three times the size of their left arm counterparts. Once I regain feeling in my arm, I yank away at the starter cord until it breaks (swearing, kicking and dancing in aggravation) or the engine eventually turns over. My mower has a deadman safety lever, on the handle, that I must hold closed while mowing or the engine will stop. As I move the picnic table, lawn furniture or neighbor kids out of the mower’s path, I must lift them with my right hand, because I’m dragging the mower (with lever held tight) behind with my left. My left arm is now three inches longer than my right. (Yes, I know I should move those obstructions prior to mowing, but that’s not how I do it, OK! If you don’t like it, you do it, you snotty-nosed know-it-all!) It rains so often, that the grass doesn’t have time to dry. Wet grass and dog poop clogs up the underside of the mower until it’s too heavy to push and the rpm’s drop so low that the grass actually giggles from the slow-turning blade tickling it. To remove the clogged grass, I turn the mower on its side, gasoline leaks all over the hot muffler until it smokes or bursts into fiery explosions. I have to go to the garage to get a screwdriver, skin my shins on the “who left this damn kayak in the middle of the floor?” return to the mower, use the screwdriver to stab away at the thick carpet of congealed mower grass and leave behind a steaming wet pile of clippings large enough to ski down. At least once, while mowing, I mow over a hidden tree root or rock and the mower blade screams out in a shrill and loud metallic pain or stops all together. (I also mow over the screwdriver that I forgot and left lying in the grass). The blade has more nicks in it than my shins. 10. When done, I return the mower to the garage, leaving behind a trail of wet grass and dog poop skid marks, from the mower’s wheels, on my driveway, sidewalks and garage floor. 11. Wait. I forgot. There is one more step in the process. My once-white sneakers are dyed chlorophyll-green and covered with sticky wet grass clipping, dirt, dog poop and screwdriver fragments. If I forget to remove my sneaks before I go in the house, the remainder of my day will be spent sweeping, scraping and vacuuming up the grass while listening to my wife explain, in minute detail, why I am such a moron. I’ve read about homeowners using goats to maintain their lawns. I’m going to do that.
    As soon as it stops raining.
    Jim Pfiffer’s humor column is posted every Sunday on the Jim Pfiffer Facebook page and the Hidden Landmarks TV Facebook page. Jim lives in Elmira with his wife and many pets and is a retired humor columnist with the Star-Gazette newspaper.
     
     
     
     
  2. JIm Pfiffer
    Several months ago, my wife, Shelley, and I lost our best friend and soul mate. Her name was Sammy. She was our pet dog of a dozen years. She had cancer and we had to end her suffering. I’m still grieving the loss.
    I’ve had pet dogs all my life and I’ve had to decide when to end the lives of five of them. It never gets easier. I’m never sure if I’ve made the right decision. Did I end their lives too soon, when they still had many “good days” ahead of them; or did I wait too long, because I wasn’t ready to “goodbye,” and my pets suffered needlessly?
    It was more than a dozen years ago that Sammy came into our lives. She was a beautiful brindle-hued Heinz 57 mix that we adopted from the local SPCA. Before that, Sammy had been a stray that animal control officers caught while she was eating from a deer carcass in the grass median of Route 328 in Pine City.
    I became her adopted dad and she became my best friend, always eagerly and excitedly waiting to greet me at the door every time I returned home as if I had been away at war for years. She would meet me with a smile on her face and her tail wagging so rapidly it wiggled her rear end. Her tail wagged through her heart.
    Dogs instinctively know how to be kind and share unconditional love. It takes people years to do the same. That’s probably why dogs don’t live as long as we do. They are born with life’s lessons deep in their hearts. She shared those lessons with me. I learned so much from her.
    She was my constant companion and a respite of happiness and stress relief at the end of a difficult day. She loved to be loved and petted. She would lie next to me on the couch with her head on my lap, as I read or watched TV. If I stopped petting, she would gently nudge me with her paw or nose to get me back into petting gear.
    She was friendly to everyone she met. She taught me not to judge people and to not be too hard on myself when I made mistakes.
    She loved car rides, with her head out the window, ears flapping in the wind, and her nose savoring the countless fragrances that blew by her.
    Sammy didn’t chase sticks, play catch or do tricks. Instead, she fetched fun and love in everything she did. She showed me how to enjoy life’s little moments of glee and wonder. To love and be loved by a dog is one of life’s greatest pleasures.

    We spent hours hiking in the woods, cross-country skiing on nature trails or sitting in the grass next to the river on a sunny day. Often, while hiking, she would run ahead of me, and I would duck behind a tree and hide. When she would look back and see that I was gone, she would stop and perk up her ears, before darting back to find me. I would jump out from behind the tree to startle her and send her tail and butt into hyper-wag, as I laughed hysterically. She would tilt her head quizzically and look at me as if to say, “You’re so immature. What am I going to do with you?” Then she was off and running ahead again searching for more fun and adventure.
    Now, when I hike those trails, I envision her up ahead, glancing back to be sure I was still in pursuit. At times like those, her loss feels unbearable.
    She was the most lovable dog I’ve known. If I sat down and leaned forward, she would come up to me and rest her head against my forehead, and just sit there quietly, head-to-head, as I rubbed her belly.
    At night, she lie next to my wife and me in bed, slowly taking over more and more of the mattress as the evening progressed, until I would awaken precariously balanced on the edge, about to fall to the floor, while she comfortably hogged the rest of the bed, snoring, with legs outstretched and head tucked into her chest.
    Dogs, like all animals, are good a hiding their pain and infirmities, an evolutionary defense that keeps them from being preyed upon by predators looking for the weakest in the pack.
    After he cancer diagnosis I paid close attention to her behaviors, physical condition and her eating and sleeping habits, looking for signs that would tell me “It’s time, Jim. It’s time.”
    As her health grew worse and I struggled with making the heartbreaking final decision, I took her to one of our favorite outdoor spots, beneath a quiet stand of shady white pine trees in Big Flats. She laid next to me on a soft bed of pine needles as I petted her, prayed and asked the universe to give me a sure sign that it was time to bid her farewell. Tears filled my eyes, as they do as I write this column. She crawled closer to me and rested her head on my shoulder to tell me that it will be okay and that she would let me know when it was time to say farewell. I hugged her and wept like a baby.
    Sammy taught me that it was okay to cry.
    They say that losing a pet is one of the saddest and most difficult traumas we deal with in life. It’s true. Her death was a double whammy because she was my rock of strength and she always made it easier for me to deal with loss and sadness. 
    Her death carved out a hard emptiness inside me that I’m still struggling to fill.
    Sammy was true to her word about telling me when it was time to say goodbye. One day, in a matter of hours, she started showing signs of a “vestibular disorder,” of balance. To her, the room was in a never-ending nauseous spin. She couldn’t stand up or walk without stumbling and falling over. 
    I knew it was time. I called the veterinarian, who came to our home to help us end Sammy’s suffering. The farewell was painless for Sammy. She died softly and comfortably in our arms, amid our hugs and tears.
    I try to ease my sadness by telling myself that my deep grief shows that Sammy was loved and had a great life.
    Sammy, old girl, this one is for you in honor of your life, our wonderful times together and all the love and happiness you shared with us. You made my life more enjoyable, joyful and meaningful.
    Best of all you taught me to be a better man.
    And that is one damn good tail-waggin’-and-butt shakin’ Father’s Day gift.
    Jim Pfiffer’s humor column posts every Sunday on the Jim Pfiffer Facebook page, Hidden Landmarks TV Facebook page, West Elmira Neighborhood, SouthernTierLife.com and ElmiraTelegram.com. Jim lives in Elmira with his wife, Shelley, and many pets. He is a retired humor columnist with the Elmira Star-Gazette newspaper and a regular swell guy. Contact him at pfifman@gmail.com.
  3. JIm Pfiffer
    “These rock! I can’t believe how great they sound.”
    I said that after trying on my Bose audio sunglasses that played music from my smartphone. The glasses were a birthday gift from my thoughtful little sister, Pat. The microscopic speakers in the frames produce a clear and deep sound that rivals any full-size stereo system, and they don’t need an extension cord.
    How we listen to music has changed drastically since my high school and college years in the ‘70s. Back then, stereo systems were large, cumbersome, expensive and needed a U-Haul truck to move them.
    Today, that same system fits in the frames of my glasses. Love technology.
    When I was trying to grow up, my generation’s sound systems reflected our status and coolness. If you wanted to make the sweet stereo scene you did so with speakers like JBL, KLH and SOL if you couldn’t afford a top brand. 
    We rocked the Casbah with stereo components by Marantz, Kenwood, Sansui, Sherwood, Sanyo, Phillips, Technics and Pioneer. These electronics had more knobs, dials and switches than a nuclear power facility.
    They had something called “Dolby noise reduction,” which didn’t make sense because we wanted more noise. It was supposed to improve the listening experience. I don’t know if it did or what it did. Neither did most of my friends, but that didn’t stop us from pretending that we did know and were forever asking “Does it have Dolby?” “I want Dolby!” “I need Dolby.” “Do me with Dolby!”

    Big was better. Gigantic was best. We engaged in speaker wars, as they were the most important music system component. We were forever asking, “Who made them?” “How much did they cost?” and “Can they make the neighbors call the cops?” 
    We rocked on to the pulsating pressure waves of speakers that were so tall they had penthouse apartments. The more speakers the better. We had woofers out the wazoos, tweeters ‘tween ten and twenty, and mid-ranges loud enough to be heard in the mid-Atlantic. I had more decibels than common sense. That’s why today I often say, “Could you repeat that? I didn’t hear you.”
    If you were really cool, you removed the foam fronts of your speakers to expose the beat-throbbing black paper diaphragms pulsing out the tunes with sound waves you could actually see compressing the surrounding air molecules at Mach 1 (Of course, you had to do several bongs to be able to see those compressions).
    Big was better and more was mandatory. We went from one speaker mono Hi-Fi to two-speaker stereo, four-speaker Quadra-sound, mucho-speakers surround sound and anything more than that was a live arena concert.
    My stereo system in college took up an entire wall in my apartment and had to be wired into the Tennessee Valley Authority to provide enough juice to pump up the volume. It put the “BOOM!” in Baby Boomers, baby.
    One time, I played a George Thorogood and the Delaware Destroyers album so loud that the spare light bulbs in the hall closet glowed to the beat. If I stood directly in front of the speakers, it would cause me temporary sterility. (My girlfriend, at the time, loved George Thorogood.)
    Back then, there was a popular magazine ad for high-end speakers (I don’t remember the brand) that showed a dude sitting in front of his speakers and the sound waves were knocking over his drink, blowing back his hair and pushing back his chair. That was my sound system goal – using acoustics to move solid objects. 
    We equated loudness with good times, good parties and good chances that our ears would bleed. The more we drank, the louder the tunes. Give me more Budweiser’s, more watts, more amps, more channels, more decibels, more mega-hits and more bleeding eardrums. The louder the tunes, the more we drank. The more we drank the louder the tunes. Today, my liver quivers thanks to listening to Thorogood’s “One Bourbon, One Scotch, One beer” with the volume turned up to “rattling windows.” 
    My sound system featured a: turntable, receiver, amplifier, tuner, cassette deck, reel-to-reel tape deck, two speakers, mixers, boosters, pre-amps, post-amps, amplified amps and an extensive collection of albums, 45s and tapes.
    Today, all that is packed into my sunglasses frame, featuring the “revolutionary Bose open ear audio design” that lets me listen to George and his Delaware Destroyers without destroying my eardrums, and still “hear the world around me at the same time.” An online tutorial explains how they work, how to use them and how to control the volume. But it doesn’t answer my one pressing question.
    Does it have Dolby? 
    Jim Pfiffer’s humor column posts every Sunday on the Jim Pfiffer Facebook page, Hidden Landmarks TV Facebook page, West Elmira Neighborhood, SouthernTierLife.com and Elmira Telegram.com. Jim lives in Elmira with his wife, Shelley, and many pets. He is a retired humor columnist with the Elmira Star-Gazette newspaper and a regular swell guy. Contact him at pfifman@gmail.com.
  4. JIm Pfiffer
    Aging slows me down. Everything takes longer, especially my body’s plumbing. It’s leaky, no longer up to code, and a hassle to prime the pump, especially in the middle of the night, when it wakes me up to play “red light green light” at the toilet.
    Many guys my age have the same problem and will try most anything to be able to pee at will. Some of them talk to it, trying to coax it into action. (Not me. Not my style. Besides, it wouldn’t listen to a word I say.) I imagine that one of those other guys’ conversations would go like this:
    Some other guy: (Standing in the dark, bare shins pressed against cold porcelain for support, trying to stay semi-asleep so he can quickly fall back to sleep while waiting for it to get flowing.) “What’s the deal? You woke me out of a sound sleep at 3 a.m. mumbling about having to go ‘like a racehorse,’ and now you sit there doing nothing. What’s the holdup?”
    It: “You’re standing at the side of the bathtub, you idiot. The toilet is behind you.”
    Some other guy: “Screw you. I’m half asleep? Get a move on. We don’t have all night.”
    It: “I’m doing the best I can at my age (the sound of a few dribbles that slowly becomes a sporadic stream). 
    Some other guy: “Was that so hard? Why do I always have to threaten you to get you to behave? When are you going to grow up and act your age?
    It: (Suddenly stops in midstream).
    Some other guy: “WTF? Why did you stop? You know how hard it is to get going again. Do you want me to really grab a hold of you and give you a good shaking?”
    It: “Cut me a break, okay? It’s your prostate’s swollen ego that’s causing all the delays. Get in his face, not mine!”
    Some other guy: “OK, I won’t yell anymore. Here look, I’ll even turn on the faucet and run the water to help you get into the right stream of consciousness.”
    It: (A tinkle, a sprinkle, a spurt and finally a strong stream).
    Some other guy: “That’s a good boy. That feels a lot better, now, doesn’t it?"
    It: (Nods in agreement.) “Yo, dude! Watch where you’re going! Stand closer. I’m not as big as you tell everybody.”
    Some other guy: “YOU just pay attention to what you ARE doing, okay? You don’t have the mental capacity to do more than one thing at a time.”
    It (muttering): “What did I do to get stuck with you? I’ll never know.” (Retaliates by suddenly turning down the spigot to “water torture drip” and giggles).
    Some other guy: “You think this is funny, huh? Keep it up and I’ll slam the seat down on you so fast it will make your head spin. We’ll see who laughs last.”
    It: (Grimaces and shrinks back in fear, but quickly returns, ready for business. It takes aim, but nada). “Damn that prostate! Looks like he’s in a tizzy again. We’re shutting down again until he takes a chill pill.” 
    Some other guy: (Grabbing the toilet seat and threatening to slam it) “I got you ‘chill pill’ right here, mister. You get a move on, or so help me god, this seat is coming down hard and fast.”
    It: (lets loose with a powerful stream that would make a firefighter proud, strip paint, and win a sword fight).
    Some other guy: “Was that so hard? Why do we have to get into a pissin’ match every time we do this? We’re partners, remember? Let’s get some sleep and we’ll discuss this further in the morning.”
    It: “Whatever, dude.”   
    Some other guy: (Getting back in bad and quickly falling asleep, but suddenly awakened 20 minutes later) “WTF? Now what?”
    It: “I guess I wasn’t done. I gotta go again. I’m sorry (snickers).”
    Some other guy: “You can stuff your sorries in a bag, buster. I’m not getting up. You’re going to have to hold it ‘til morning.”
    It: “Suit yourself, but there’s an old saying, where I come from: ‘Better to wake up and pee than to pee and wake up.’ Looks like I’ll be getting the last laugh.
    “By the way, I heard, from a reliable source, that the writer of this post not only talks to his plumbing, but he also whines, begs and grovels trying to get it to cooperate. Pitiful. I’d hate to be connected with that guy.”
    Jim Pfiffer’s humor column is posted every Sunday on the Jim Pfiffer Facebook page, Hidden Landmarks TV Facebook page ElmiraTelegram.com and Twin Tiers Living.com. Jim lives in Elmira with his wife, Shelley, and many pets and is a retired humor columnist with the Elmira Star-Gazette newspaper.
     
     
     
        
  5. JIm Pfiffer
    I’ve always been curious. That’s why I became a newspaper reporter, chasing after the five W questions of life. It’s also why I’ve been punched a lot.
    I have some feline curiosity in me. I also have a lot of stupidity in me. That’s why I’ve burned eight of my nine lives. I’m trying to temper that ignorance by learning and asking “how” and “why” about things that we don’t think twice (or even once). Here are my top ten.
    1.   Telling someone to “Bite me.” If you are angry at someone, why would you insist that they bite you? That brings you pain, and the target of your ire will not suffer, unless you taste bad. We should be saying “Bite you,” and then you bite the person, first checking to see that they’ve had all their shots. Even more confounding is “bite the big one!” I’m not sure what the “big one” is, but I have an idea, and I don’t want anyone biting it. Ouch! And I’m not sure it’s as big as you think.
    2.   Free gift and free estimate. If it isn’t free, it’s not a gift. Nuff said. Have you ever heard of any business, a contractor for example, charging a fee to tell you how much it will cost to do work on your home? Nope. The “free estimate” is advertising double talk, like the phrase “Order now and get a second one for free, just pay an extra fee.”   
     3.   Bad guys love large daylight? Why are daytime crimes always done in “broad daylight?” Every Yin has its Yang, so there must be a “narrow daylight,” and if so, why don’t criminals commit crimes when the light is skinny and there is a slimmer chance that they will be seen or caught?
     4.   Catdrops and Mud poodles. Who the hell came up with the phrase “it’s raining cats and dogs”?  Was it someone who hated animals? Whatever they were on, can I get some?
     5.   Hiding in low-cal air. When someone disappears, without a trace, they do so into something called “thin air.” Yes, air is thin at 50,000 feet, but we’re talking about folks who go missing at sea level. Where is this lite air? Is there fat air? Is it easier or harder to get lost there?
     6.  Dis-what? We often hear about a “disgruntled employee,” walking off the job, calling in sick or telling his/her boss to “Bite the big one!” Again, nature’s duality, means there must also be a “gruntled” employee, as in “We have some of the best employees in the industry because they are all gruntled.”
     7.   WTF was with Franklin and his pennies? Benjamin Franklin, one of the fathers of our country (although he never paid any child support) penned many pithy idioms, like “a penny saved is a penny earned,” or is it “a penny earned is a penny saved? Doesn’t matter because no one saves pennies. Hell, they give them away by the cupful at checkout counters. I think Ben flew his kite one too many times.
     8.   Kruller to dollars? A friend once bet me “dollars to donuts” that my Boston Red Sox would lose to those damn Yankees. I didn’t take the bet for fear that I had to put up cash to win a glazed donut. Instead, I bet him his dollars to my Ring Dings. He took the bet. Need I say more about Yankee fans?
     9.  Lost in the middle again. Most of us have been lost in an unfamiliar place with no landmarks or signs of civilization. You may not know where you are, but we’ve all been there. It’s called “the middle of nowhere,” as in “My car broke down in the middle of nowhere”. Nowhere doesn’t exist. Everywhere is somewhere. And if there was a nowhere, how would you know it’s center point and why would you always be lost there? Why can’t we get lost on the edge of nowhere?
     10. It never fails. This is another bullshit phrase “failure is not an option.” Oh really? Spend time with me and you will see that I can fail and fail big.
    But not so big that you have to bite it.
     
     Jim Pfiffer’s humor column is posted every Sunday on the Jim Pfiffer Facebook page, Hidden Landmarks TV Facebook page, Twin Tiers Life.com and TwinTiersLiving.com. Jim lives in Elmira with his wife, Shelley, and many pets and is a retired humor columnist with the Elmira Star-Gazette newspaper.
  6. JIm Pfiffer
    It’s interesting how our changing culture dictates what body part is the sexually attractive appendage de jour, from implanted breasts and collagen-filled Donald Duck lips to six-pack abs, protruding pecs and thigh masters.
    There is one body part, shared by both genders, which has always been a sex symbol: the two large fleshy halves of the posterior known as the buttocks. Fashion culture decided that it’s time for Americans to shake their booties and enlarge them with cosmetic surgery called a “Brazilian Butt Lift,” or BBL.
    Here’s how it works: A plastic surgeon uses liposuction to suck excess fat from the patient’s hips, abdomen and lower back and injects it into their butt. WTF?
    (FYI: “Lipo” is Latin, meaning “ridiculous misuse of a Dyson,” and “suc” is Latin for “WTF?”).
    Ridiculous and dangerous medical procedures have never stopped Americans from partaking in the latest body marring trend. That’s why the BBL is the fastest-growing cosmetic surgery in the world.
    It’s also environmentally friendly because the fat is being recycled, and it has turned the phrase, “fat ass,” into a compliment.
    According to an article in the U.S. Sun tabloid (motto: “We don’t let facts get in the way of our reporting.”) bum size depends on how we’re doing financially.
    “When there’s financial stability women tend to be happy with themselves and it shows in the shape of their bottoms, which are generally flat and square,” reads the article. “When we fall on hard times — for example during recessions — women tend to focus on balance and symmetry, which means a full, round butt is desirable.”
    Monitoring derriere sizes may be a clever way to predict the stock market. Buy small. Sell large.
    It’s no surprise that the BBL was invented by those wild and crazy fashion-lovin’ Brazilians. I guess they figured that after giving us the “Brazilian Wax,” a painful process that rips away body parts, they felt obliged to introduce another trend that adds body mass.
    Titanic behinds have been hip since the 1980s, popularized by songs like “Bootylicious,” by Destiny’s Child; “My Humps,” by The Black-Eyed Peas and “My Big Bootie Got a Backup Alarm,” by Pfif Daddy and the Rumpsters. (I made up that last song, but I think it would be a hit.)
    Our gluteus maximus are the largest muscles in the body. That’s why I’ve seen people whose keisters are so large they don’t need a butt lift. They need a forklift.
    I’m talking about booties so big that they have their own sovereignty. I’ve seen bodacious butts so big that they form a ledge off the side of each hip, where you can easily set a can of beer, cell phone or a Mini Cooper (with turbo).
    There are plenty of people with enough excess body fat that it could be used to make a whole other person, or two. Call it lipocloning.
    I’ve seen colossal behinds do some serious swaying, bouncing and jiggling. They could use a lift. But the BBL doesn’t actually lift the butt, it shapes it to the butt owner’s specs.
    There is one segment of the population that could use BBL. I’m referring to guys who have absolutely no butts. Their backsides are a flat plane from waist to thighs. Truth: Science calls it “dormant butt syndrome” or DBS.
    Plastic surgery is expensive and rarely covered by health insurance. That’s why we should start a nonprofit butt fat repository where individuals could donate their extra fat to those in need, much like blood drives. Something to think about.
    (FYI: You can get a do-it-yourself BBL by eating a lot of BLTs).
    I think it’s unnatural and unhealthy to move body tissue around willy-nilly.
    What’s next, moving entire body parts?
    Will doctors in the future be able to transplant your junk in the trunk to your shoulders, creating an actual butthead? (Ha! That’s a good one! Sometimes I make myself laugh.)
    Listen, I have nothing against curvy and voluptuous buns, when the goal is to achieve tight and symmetrical C-shaped Jay-Lo behinds.
    But when you romp the rump and that C grows to the size of a municipal parking garage, I get concerned, cuz big booties are unwieldy and can cause a lot of collateral damage. If the caboose owners aren’t careful and are unaware of their surroundings, they knock things over and break them.
    I once saw an intoxicated and dangerously derriered booty poppin’ man take a stumble and tumble. Fortunately, he landed on a chair to break his fall.
    Unfortunately, there was a poodle sitting on the chair.
    It took doctors and veterinarians several hours to safely remove the poor pooch from the man’s cheeks crack. The poodle was shaken up, but uninjured.
    In addition to lookin’ all Kim Kardashian, there are several advantages to high end hind ends:
    ·      Great for sitting on your hands and the hands of nearby people to warm them up.
    ·      Built-in cushion for sitting on hard chairs, bleachers and pews.
    ·      Your hams continue shaking and baking hours after you stopped twerking.
    ·      Great for crushing cardboard boxes, cans and enemies.
    ·      Ability to leave people with lasting images when you exit a room.
    ·      More square footage for people to kiss it.
    ·      Gives you more ass to kick.
    Most trendy body augmentations are for women. Eventually we ‘ll see a male-only body enhancement. I bet I know what it will be called:
    Brazil Nuts.
    Jim Pfiffer’s humor column is posted every Sunday on the Jim Pfiffer Facebook page, Hidden Landmarks TV Facebook page and TwinTiersLiving.com. Jim lives in Elmira with his wife, Shelley, and many pets and is a retired humor columnist with the Elmira Star-Gazette newspaper. Contact him at pfifman@gmail.com.
     
     
  7. JIm Pfiffer
    Christmas season is a time of unending parties, celebrations and social gatherings.
    It’s a perfect time for me to try and do something I’ve wanted to do for most of my adult life.
    Become a socialite.
    It goes back to 2004, when I watched a no-talent, marginal-IQ Paris “Hotel” Hilton become mad wealthy and insanely famous by just standing around and looking good, toting a tiny yapping dog and over-using the phrase “that’s hot” to describe anything that’s cool (she actually copyrighted the phrase. True).
    Then came the Kardashians, an entire family that became wealthy and famous by being spoiled, whining and doing nothing more productive than changing their nail colors and revealing their boobs.
    They all became famous by being famous.
    “I could do that,” I told myself. “I’m retired and adept at doing nothing. I don’t have the good looks or big boobs, but I can make up for that with my skills at partying and standing around. My dog, Sammi, is too big to carry, but maybe I could ride her around. My cool catch phrase would simply be “That’s chilly most!”
    Now that I’m retired and holiday parties are booming, I’m going to give it try. H ang with the fashion elite, wear outrageous eye-catching ensembles, get invited to all the must-attend gigs, clubs, soirees, openings and closings. If successful, I can get paid for it.
    There is a major downside. I’ll have to make a scandalous sex tape, leak it to the media and then defend myself on the talk show circuit. Hope my wife is cool with that.
    What is a socialite, anyway? According to Google, it’s “a person, usually from a wealthy and aristocratic background, who plays a prominent role and is very frequently involved in high society and spends a significant amount of time attending various fashionable social gatherings, instead of having traditional employment.”
    I’m not sure of how much fashionable society exists in Elmira. If it does, I doubt it is as sophisticated and expensive at it is on a national level. Think about it. High society in Elmira means meth, bongs and rolling papers.
    That’s why E-Town is such a great place to start climbing the social ladder. There’s little competition, the rungs are easy to hold, and you don’t need a private jet. I call it becoming a “Social Lite,” because it’s less filling and has fewer caloric requirements than other socialites.
    You can become one too. It’s not that difficult. That’s why I offer the following list of one dozen online tips on becoming a Social Lite. With each suggestion, I’ve dumbed it down, to include tips on becoming a Social Lite in Elmira:
    1. Online: Wear expensive fashions, jewelry and shoes.
        Elmira: Don’t wear pajamas in public, sport homemade tattoos and plastic Dollar Store clogs. (Bonus tip: make sure your fly is zipped).
    2. Online: Build a social media platform on Facebook, Twitter, Spotify, Instagram, etc.
        Elmira: Build a social media platform with hand-written flyers stapled to utility poles and community bulletin boards at the bus stations.
    3. Online: Dye your hair blonde, lose weight and cap your teeth.
        Elmira: Wash your hair xxx and remember to put your dentures in when you ge t up in the morning.
    4. Online: Wear fashions by Dior, Balmain, Celine, Hilfiger and other famous designers.
        Elmira: Wear camo clothes designed by Carhartt, Duluth Trading and John Deer.
    5. Online: Be class conscious.
        Elmira: Just be conscious.
    6. Online: Become involved in community fund-raisers.
        Elmira: Become involved in random drive-by shootings.
    7. Online: Be seen in public with an expensive and annoying purebred lap dog.
       Elmira: Be seen in public with a ferret or boa constrictor. (Bonus tip: Do not go out in public if you have pending arrest warrants).
    8. Online: Be sure the paparazzi follow you wherever you go.
        Elmira: Be sure to avoid bail bondsmen following you wherever you go.
    9. Online: Sit in front-row seats at all public events.
        Elmira: Bring a lawn chair and sit wherever you can until security throws you out because you don’t have a ticket.
    10. Online: Get invited to A-list parties.
         Elmira: Dress like the caterer to sneak into A-list parties.
    11. Online: Gain social media clout and be and influencer.
         Elmira: Get busted for driving under the influence
    As you can see, becoming a local social lite is easy. But I still need your help in making my high society dream come true by inviting me to your holiday parties and swarming me in public for photos and autographs.
    It would be really nice if you paid me to attend your events.
    That would be chilly most.
    Jim Pfiffer’s humor column is posted every Sunday on the Jim Pfiffer Facebook page, Hidden Landmarks TV Facebook page and TwinTiersLiving.com. Jim lives in Elmira with his wife, Shelley, and many pets and is a retired humor columnist with the Elmira Star-Gazette newspaper.
  8. JIm Pfiffer
    Here’s a great way to make dining out exciting, fun and aaah-inspiring: do it with year-old identical twin bonus grandsons.
    My wife, Shelley, and I recently had a restaurant lunch with the twins, Remy and Leo, and their parents, Allie and Matt. (For the record, I still can’t tell the boys apart. The look identical to me, thus I will refer to them as Remy/Leo in both the singular and plural).
    Everyone knows that it’s a common curtesy of civilized society, that anytime toddlers are out in public, the public must repeatedly “oooh” and “aaah” over them, and remark how “cute” and “adorable” they are, as if they were the first toddlers every seen in public. (For added effect, you should hold your hand over your heart to indicate that the toddler’s total cuteness is causing your heart to palpitate with sheer joy).
    As luck would have it, we were seated near a table with another set of young twin boys. When you have that many cute and adorable twins in one place it creates a critical mass of adorableness that causes everyone in the restaurant (and even people in the parking lot and in passing cars) to go into hyper-chronic fawning mode. There was so much “ooohing” and “aaahing” that pictures and posters started falling off the walls.
    Remy/Leo was on one side of the table. And Remy/Leo was on the other side, sitting next to me. I supported his fine dining experience by giving him sips of water through a straw, spoon-feeding him applesauce and playing peek-a-boo with cucumber slices, from my salad, held over my eyes. (The twins and I hit it off well because we’re all at the same maturity level).

    When you are seated next to a toddler in a restaurant you must always be alert for incoming pieces of flying food pelting you from many directions. The boys get so excited when dining out that their little arms and legs start flaying about, and food and utensils start flying about.
    Stupidly, I tried to eat some of my meal, and didn’t pay attention to my surroundings, which were under a foodstuff mortar attack. I suffered heavy casualties. There’s no way the dry cleaners will be able to remove the ketchup stains.
    Dining with twins is a great way to reduce your caloric intake because you don’t have time to eat. You’re too busy helping feed the boys, laughing, ooohing and aaahing and picking pieces of hamburger buns out of your clothing.
    And don’t forget pictures.
    You must photograph every frame of the kids’ every action and save them on your phone where they will be lost forever amid the 10,000 other photos of the kids.
    Enjoying a meal with the twins is always a rewarding treat. I may leave with an empty stomach, but my soul is filled with laughter and hilarious memories.
    I wish I could remember back to me carefree highchair days. (Hell, I wish I could remember what I did yesterday). What fun I must have had, because mealtimes for toddlers are some of the greatest times of their lives. Here’s 10 reasons why:
    1. Let’s eat. You’re safely strapped into a chair with a tray of food in front of you and a bib around your neck. You’re psyched and ready for some serious consumption.
    2. Silverware? As if. You eat with your fingers, hands and feet, and no one yells at you.
    3. Unlimited eating surfaces: Who needs plates when you can eat off a tray, table, floor or pick off pieces of hamburger off your forehead and the face of the grandfather next to you.
    4. The big swipe: When your highchair tray is full of food scraps, spilled beverages and pieces of drool sodden napkins, you simply brush it all away, with one swipe of your arm, letting the spiraling debris scatter and fall where it may.
    5. You don’t have aim for your mouth. Hell no. The food can go anywhere on your person, clothing and the very surprised lady sitting at the table behind you.
    6. Within arm’s reach: You can quickly, and without warning, snatch away food, utensils, the waitress’s pen and anything else you can reach. When you get it, immediately put it in your mouth.
    7. Center of attention: People at nearby tables are laughing, pointing and taking photos of you as you use your greasy spaghetti-covered hands to snatch grandpa’s glasses off his face and throw them to the floor. “Ha-ha! How cute,” grandpa is required to say as he steps on his glasses and crushes them.
    8. Wipe me: When you spill food or smear it all over yourself, someone is always there to wipe it clean with a napkin, towelette or grandpa’s sleeve.
    9. You can do no wrong. In fact, if you do something wrong, like knock over grandpa’s glass of expensive craft beer, you don’t get scolded. Instead, everyone laughs, takes your picture, kisses you and never offers to cover grandpa’s dry-cleaning bill.
    10. After dinner treats: You don’t have to worry about diving up the bill and how much to tip the waitress who is still combing pieces of French fries out of her hair.
    And here’s the icing on the cake. Once you are sated, done making a mess and posing for photos, someone drives you home, gives you a warm bath, zips you up in a cozy onesie and tucks you in for a nice eight-hour slumber.
    Jim Pfiffer’s humor column is posted every Sunday on the Jim Pfiffer Facebook page, Hidden Landmarks TV Facebook page and Twin Tiers Living.com. Jim lives in Elmira with his wife and many pets and is a retired humor columnist with the Elmira Star-Gazette newspaper.
  9. JIm Pfiffer
    Oh goodie! We now have another number to add to our long and growing list of numbers and passwords needed to survive in our electronically connected world.
    As of October 24, when you make a local call in the 607-area code you must include the area code when dialing. The reason: officials don’t want people mistakenly dialing the newly created 988 national Suicide Prevention Lifeline.
    I’m all for reducing suicides, but I can’t deal with adding another number to my swirling sea of digits, passwords, pass codes, PINS, logons, WIFI, license plates, phone numbers, Social Security cards, DOBs, zip codes and the points spread in today’s St. Louis Rams game.
    For security reasons, we’re told to commit all these meaningless, random numbers, letters and special characters to memory. Sorry, but the average person – me being one of them - cannot do that. Hell, I can’t remember my cell phone number, because I rarely call myself. When I do, I don’t answer, because it’s probably another robocall. That’s why I wrote my number on the back of my phone. I try to use a simple, easy to remember password, but the website says “Nope.” It must be at least eight characters long and include numbers, punctuation, upper- and lower-case letters, Hieroglyphics, holograms, gang signs, pi to the 120th digit and that weird symbol used by the artist formerly known as Prince.
    There is simply no way a person can remember hundreds of unique long and complex passwords. I spend most of my online time clicking “forgot password” links. To make the impossible demand on human memory even more impossible, we’re told not to write down our passwords.
    Yeah, right. I never do what I’m told. I have more passwords and secret ID numbers than all the James Bonds, Maxwell Smarts and Austin Powers combined.
    I write them in notebooks, random slips of paper, envelopes, magazine margins, checkbook, the wall next to my computer, my dog’s flea collar, the back of my hand and the grocery list attached to the fridge with a magnet.
    I signed up for an online service that saves and retrieves all my passwords in a protected file. I can’t access the file, because (you guessed it) I forgot the password.
    I’m going to use this tip that I found on the Internet: change my password to “Incorrect.” Then when I erroneously enter it, my computer will tell me that my password is “incorrect.”
    When I forget my password and username, I get nervous while trying to logon because I have only three chances to get it right.
    Worse, I can’t see what I’m typing because the letters are converted into those silly little stars, in case a snoop is standing behind trying to steal my password. How about this security idea: I spin around, stand up and tell the idiot to “get the **** outta here or you’re going to be seeing stars!”
    On my first login attempt, I try one of my commonly used passwords and usernames. The computer flashes the dreaded red letter “incorrect” warning. I shake my head and cuss under my breath. I try a different password. It’s correct, buy my username isn’t. The computer slaps me a second time. I cuss out loud. By the third attempt, I carefully search my mind’s memory banks until I shout, “I got it! I remember the password.” I take a deep breath, wipe my sweaty palms on my pants and slowly and carefully type each character, one at a time, but miss the “shift” button on an uppercase letter and its three strikes and “yer out!” (Sometimes, I can actually hear the computer laughing at me).
    Now I have to reset my password and go through the hassle of checking my e-mail for the reset code, typing it in and creating a new password. By the time I do all that my laptop battery is dead.

    I get a new code and enter it just as my phone rings. I answer it and by the time I hang up, the pass code as expired. I get so angry that my blood pressure spikes, and I fear that I’m going to expire. I jump up screaming and leaping around like a lemur on crack. (Another snoop standing behind me flees in wide-eyed terror). When I do reset my password, the computer scolds me for not creating one complicated enough. (i.e., One that hackers can’t guess, and I can’t remember). If I do remember my username and password – and type them correctly – I have to answer a security question, like “What was your favorite food as a child?”
    “Oh shit,” I say. “I think I said ‘pizza.’ No, wait! It’s fried chicken or maybe pork chops? Oh God. Why did I choose that question?” Many times, when asked to create a password, I use one of my old passwords, but the computer tells me I can’t because “It’s been used.” 
    “No shit, Sherlock!” I shout at my screen as I pound on the keyboard. “It’s used because it’s mine. Gimme the $@>+^* thing back!”
    This is usually followed by my wife shouting, from the other room, “What’s all the yelling about? Are you trying to logon again?”
    Look, we all agree that the password and ID number systems don’t work. There must be better means of authentication. Why can’t we use our fingerprints, the capillaries in our eyes or dental records as our universal passwords? I’m going to suggest that to Microsoft officials in an e-mail.
    As soon as I remember my Microsoft password, username and the name of my favorite pet.
    Jim Pfiffer’s humor column is posted every Sunday on the Jim Pfiffer Facebook page, Hidden Landmarks TV Facebook page and TwinTiersLiving.com. Jim lives in Elmira with his wife and many pets and is a retired humor columnist with the Star-Gazette newspaper.
  10. JIm Pfiffer
    Do kids dance anymore?   When I was a kid, schools and churches held teenage dances almost every weekend, featuring live bands, chaperones and underage kids puking from drinking Boone’s Farm Strawberry Hill wine.   If you are a Boomer, you remember Boone’s Farm wines, or maybe not, because Boone’s Farm wines contained formaldehyde, for real. If you drank it, you’re lucky if you can remember your name.   Fortunately, I only drank enough to forget my last name (I have it sewn into tags on all my clothes).   Anyway, what the hell was I talking about? Oh, yeah, dances.   Dances were as much a part of growing up as pimples, skipping class and after-school detention.   We never had DJs at our dances. Hell no. We grooved to live music by local bands with totally hip and cool names like Ma’s Apple Pie, The Puzzle and The Boone’s Farm Boomers. (I made up the last one, but wouldn’t that have been a great name for a groovy Boomer band?)   Dances provided us the opportunities to work on our social skills, meet girls and get beat up. Every dance, in every grade, had at least one oversize bully who had flunked so many times he was dating the female teachers. Every dance also had at least one big mouth wiseass who got punched by the bully.   That wiseass was me.   My friends and I didn’t go to dances to actually dance. Hell no. “Dancin’ was for nerds” was our motto. It was a great motto because we didn’t know how to dance, even though some of us, after our second or third bottle of Boone’s Farm, tried to dance, but we always ended up looking like nerds stricken with a neurological disorder that made us jerk about like fish flopping around on shore.   There were always a couple of guys who were good dancers. One of my close friends, Tony, was one such guy. All the girls wanted to dance with him. Of course, we made fun of him, for it, to compensate for our dancing disabilities and to make us feel better because we knew he would be holding hands with a pretty girl as he walked her home after the dance, while we would be stuck holding hands with a National Geographic magazine.   So, if we didn’t dance, what did we do at a dance, you may ask?   I’ll tell you what we did. We practiced dance segregation. We spent the entire dance standing around on one side of the gym, punching one another in the arms and making farting noises with our armpits, while secretly watching the girls, on the other side of the gym, and wondering why it was cool for them to dance together and go to the bathroom together. I still don’t get it.   One time, I tried dancing with a guy, as a joke.   Got punched in the mouth.   Slow dancing was a different story. Every guy can slow dance. Put your arms around a girl and move from side to side, hopefully in time with the beat and without kicking her ankles.   “Hey Jude” by the Beatles, was my favorite slow dance because it lasted nearly as long as eighth grade (the first time). I was never sure where to put my arms around a girl while slow dancing -- her neck or waist, hold her hands or grab her by the shoulders like she was in for a good shaking. So, I stood there with my arms limp at my side and let the girl position them (usually tied behind my back).   It was during these slow dances that I realized I was the closest I was going to get to kissing a girl for a long long time and I wanted the song to last a long long time. I tried to impress the girl by softly singing along, in her ear, to “Hey Jude:” “Remember to let her into your heart, then you can start to make it better, better AAAHHH!” I know I impressed her, because she whispered back, “Your singing voice sucks, you’re spitting in my ear and if you don’t get your hands off my butt, I’m going to retie them behind your back.”   In sixth grade, when everything in life was awkward, I thought girls were icky. We had to dance with them in gym class. I think we did the foxtrot, cha-cha or some other lame dance we would never again do in our lives. I didn’t hold my dance partner close back then. Nope. I held her so far away that I was in the locker room and she was on the gym floor.   In seventh grade, most girls had a growth spurt and were taller than the boys. When I slow-danced, my head was at just the right height to rest on my partner’s bosoms.   Got slapped in the face.   One time, on a dare, I asked our really hot junior high French teacher if she wanted to dance. She didn’t have time to answer before I got punched in the face. How was I to know she was engaged to the class bully?   Que diable?   Now that I think about it, I know why kids today don’t go to dances, because those dances make memories that will last a lifetime, no matter how much counseling you undergo trying to erase them.   Jim Pfiffer’s humor column posts every Sunday on the Jim Pfiffer Facebook page, Hidden Landmarks TV Facebook page, West Elmira Neighborhood, SouthernTierLife.com and ElmiraTelegram.com Jim lives in Elmira with his wife, Shelley, and many pets. He is a retired humor columnist with the Elmira Star-Gazette newspaper and a regular swell guy. Contact him at pfifman@gmail.com.
  11. JIm Pfiffer
    I used to be a competent gift wrapper who created neatly wrapped gifts and bows. But as I aged, I lost patience and my wrapping skills took a bad rap.
     Today, my gifts look like they were wrapped by vandals on crack.
     I don’t understand why we invest so much time and effort to wrap a gift when it is going to be torn apart by the giftee.
     It’s like making my bed each morning. Why do it if I’m just going to mess it up at night?
     I’m trying to recapture the gift-wrapping spirit I had when I was younger. Each Christmas I tell myself “This year I’m going to get into the holiday spirit and make gift wrapping fun.”
     So, I set the scene: Put on Christmas music, light pine-scented candles, don a red Santa hat, get our dog to rest comfortably at my feet and lay out all the needed tools and materials on the dining room table.
     It’s no use. Gift wrapping has become such a hassle that my holly-jolly-Christmas wrapping quickly deteriorates and morphs into “Just put the friggin’ gifts in brown paper grocery bags and be done with it. Hell, ‘Feliz Navidad,’ my ass.”   

     To better understand why this occurs, I offer the following example of my gift-wrapping descent into hell.
     I pour a mug of eggnog, sit comfortably at the table and hum along with the 12 Days of Christmas.
     I start by selecting an easy-to-wrap boxed gift. No need to measure the paper. I can tell, just by eyeing it, how much is needed. I’m a pro. I cut a sheet off the roll and get to wrapping.
     “You got to be kidding me!” I cry. “How can the paper not fit? I eyed it. Must be cheap paper.”
     Next, I try the “it’ll never work” trick of moving the box around on the paper, hoping to discover just the right spot, which defies all laws of physics, which will allow the paper to cover the box. Wrong. I set aside the paper in my “mistake pile,” for use on smaller gifts.
     I measure and cut the correct size of paper, place the box in the center and bring the two sides of the paper together on the box top and hold them down with fingers on my left hand, while using my right hand to pull off a short length of Scotch tape, except I yank off six feet of feet of tape that curls over and sticks to itself and my fingers.
     “Ha. Ha,’ I say. “I sure wish those nine lords a leaping, were here a wrapping. This is sooo much fun.”
     I refresh my mug of nog with a strong shot of Captain Morgan (Hell, might as well do two shots. It’s Christmas).
     I pull off a correct length of tape, but I can’t get it to tear on the dispenser’s serrated edge. Now, I have a length of tape, with the dispenser dangling from it like a kite tail, hanging from my fingers. I angrily shake it off, sending the sticky mess sailing across the room where it lands behind a table. Fortunately, I have a second roll of tape for such emergencies.
     (For the record: Scotch Tape should be called “Botched Tape” and the public should file a class action suit against the manufacturer).
     I carefully remove several short lengths of tape and stick their ends to the table edge for easy access. I successfully wrap and tape the paper together and then execute that dope little trick where I fold the paper into triangles on the end of the box and tape them down. But the trick goes south when I can’t locate the second roll of tape. I frantically search for it, under the rolls of paper, ribbons and name tags, but find the scissors. I eventually locate the tape and lose the scissors.
     In end-of-my-rope anguish I shout, “Will someone PLEASE turn down that damn Christmas music? Who the hell thought it a good idea to let friggin chipmunks sing Christmas carols?”
     I tape down the triangles on the fifth or sixth try and search for the red store-bought bow with the adhesive backing, that I saw here just a few minutes ago.
     “Where the @#$# could it have gone?” I spew as frantically fumble around on the mess on the table searching for it.
     I decide, after downing my second mug of The Captain, I make my own ribbon. I cut two lengths of thin red ribbon and do another dope trick where I scrape the ribbons over the edge of the scissors to form them into festive curlicues. I wrap the ribbons around the box and tie them together in a handsome knot at the top (at least I think it’s the top, but who knows or cares, by now?) I hold down the curlicue with my thumb, grab one of the pre-cut lengths of tape to tape down the bow, but instead tape my thumb to the box. When I undo my thumb, I rip the paper.
     My “mistake pile” of paper continues to grow larger, as the rolls of paper get smaller.
     “Screw the bow,” I declare, as my Christmas spirit searches for more bottled spirits. I down a gulp of The Captain straight from the bottle.
     The table becomes more and more cluttered with paper scraps, ribbons, boxes, tissue paper, tape dispensers, markers and several Christmas cards I forgot to mail last year.
     In aggravated desperation, I use a clear roll of stronger and wider packing tape but nix the idea after spending 20 minutes trying to find the invisible hidden end of the tape to unroll it. (Another class action suit, in the waiting).
     “Hell with it! I’m using duct tape,” I mutter as I notice that I forgot to put the “To:” and “From:” tags on two wrapped gifts, and I can’t remember what’s inside the boxes or who they are for. I have to unwrap them, identify the contents and rewrap them.
     The background music tells me of chestnuts roasting on an open fire and Jack Frost nipping at my nose.”
     “Right about now I’d like to roast Jack Frost on the friggin fire,” I vent in aggravation.
     I angrily jump up and step on the dog’s tail, sending her yelping and rocketing across the room with several wads of tape stuck to her fur.
     I go to the kitchen to refresh my drink and discover that The Captain bottle is empty.
     “’Ho, ho, ho’ if friggin figures,” I mumble as I pour myself a stiff scotch and bourbon on the rocks.
     I return to the table, which now resembles a landfill (there are even gull circling overhead), slump into my chair and survey the scene.
     “Why is it so *!@&% difficult to tape a piece of paper to a box?” I ask myself.
     I finish my drink and do what I should have done hours ago:
     Go to the supermarket and get a bunch of brown paper bags. While waiting and thinking to myself “It can’t get any worse,” a lady behind me says, “Sir. Do you know you have a crushed red bow stuck to your rear end?”
     I embarrassingly remove the bow and shake my head in “I give up” resignation, as my brain turns into a sleigh bell jingle-ing, ring ting tingle-ing goo.
     Jim Pfiffer’s humor column is posted every Sunday on the Jim Pfiffer Facebook page, Hidden Landmarks TV Facebook page and TwinTiersLiving.com. Jim lives in Elmira with his wife, Shelley, and many pets and is a retired humor columnist with the Elmira Star-Gazette newspaper.
     
     
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