Let’s explore the topic of living with women in the digital age

There are too many women in my life. Yeah, I know this a goal a lot of guys work toward their whole lives, yet never achieve. Young guys, anyway. Geezers like me are smarter than that.

Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy having one good woman in my life; hence, The Lovely Mrs. Taylor. Without her I wouldn’t know how fast to drive, which parking space to use at the mall, how to fold a bath towel … I’d be helpless, or so she believes.

The truth is somewhat different, but certain topics are best left unexplored. If I know what’s good for me.

No, it’s the extra women – women brought into the house by Mrs. Taylor herself – who are starting to get on my nerves. As of last week, there are four of them, improbably named Cortana, Siri, Maggie and The New Girl. They’re here and they’re listening. It’s creepy.

Siri arrived first, with my new iPhone. Her, I didn’t mind. I’d ask her a question, like, “Hey Siri! Where can I get a decent burrito around here?” She in turn would recite the Wikipedia entry on Mexican General Santa Anna and his role in the battle of the Alamo. Then I’d Google Mexican restaurants and go buy a burrito.

Siri was mostly useless, but she was confined to my phone like a genie in a bottle, so I could for the most part ignore her. If she felt slighted, she never mentioned it. In a way, she represents the most successful relationship I’ve ever had with a woman.

Then Mrs. Taylor bought me a new desktop PC. I’d been on Macs up until then and was surprised – startled, even – the first time Cortana offered her assistance. I tried to tell her I could bore myself to death on Facebook without her help, but Cortana wouldn’t listen. It’s been months and she still pops up every so often to let me know I’m doing things wrong. Some days her nagging is so bad I feel like a bigamist.

But at least Cortana is stuck in my computer and can only get at me when I’m online, either working or dorking around (or, most often, doing both at the same time. I’m big on multi-tasking).

Maggie is the least obtrusive of the four, since she lives in my car. She’s mounted on the dashboard and takes over the responsibility of telling me where to go and how to get there when Mrs. Taylor is busy with other things.

Despite the fact Maggie is the pushiest of the lot, I still appreciate her. I fully admit I’m directionally challenged and couldn’t find my own backside with both hands without her constant input. Like Mrs. Taylor, Maggie doesn’t waste a lot of time listening to anything I have to say; she just reminds me of the dire consequences awaiting me if I don’t follow her instructions.

I named her Maggie because she reminds of Sister Margaret, my fifth-grade teacher at St. Isadore Elementary School. Like Siri and Cortana, Maggie is conveniently confined to a small box, which I can switch off at will. Or, I can simply get out of the car and walk away, leaving her alone, sometimes for days at a time.

Not so The New Girl. Her name is Alexa and she is ubiquitous and omnipresent. I came home from a night out last week to find Mrs. Taylor had installed Alexa’s eyes and ears all over the house. There’s not one room in which she doesn’t now listen in to everything I say.

When I want to hear some music, I just tell her what I’m in the mood for and she plays it throughout the house. If we’re out of peanut butter and sardines, I say so and Alexa adds them to my grocery list. If I’m interested in the latest presidential wisdom making its way across the Twitter-sphere, she’s there to read it to me.

In theory, Alexa only pays attention when I say her name. But Mrs. T has an extension of Alexa in her office over 30 miles away and she can “drop in” on me anytime from there. In theory, again, I can also drop in on her from home, but I don’t know how to do this so it never happens.

“Drop in” is a cutesy euphemism for “spy on me,” by the way. Mrs. T claims she has better things to do than listen to me talking to the cats and chickens all day, but I wonder. Frequently, the cats, chickens and I are discussing her, and it’s not always complimentary.

Working from home as I do, I used to feel a bit isolated and even lonely at times. I missed the office, my co-workers, even my boss. But these days? Not so much. Not with all these women around, hanging on my every word.

MTaylor325@gmail.com

(616) 745-9530

So, what’s changed about ‘The Old Farmer’s Almanac?’

Either it has changed or I have. I’m talking about The Old Farmer’s Almanac. I’ve purchased a copy every autumn for the past 40 years and to all appearances, it’s the same book it ever was. Same yellow cover, same weather forecasts, same advertisements, same folksy humor.

It’s the one thing in my life that remains the same, while everything else around me changes. It’s comforting; a cozy relic of a simpler era; an era I perceive as simpler, anyway.

But for the past few years, I’ve felt differently about it. I first encountered the Almanac at my grandmother’s house, Christmastime, 1977. A copy was sitting on the coffee table. I was immediately taken with its “old-timey” look and content.

Planting tables, best times to harvest, fish and hang out laundry. In-depth articles on the mating habits of the Smooth-toothed Pocket Gopher. A cornucopia of useless information I would never, ever need in real life unless I wound up as a contestant on Jeopardy. Naturally, I wanted more.

My grandmother dug out several dog-eared copies from previous years and gave them to me. I was hooked. I’ve bought a copy every year since.

The best part of the Almanac for me, or at least the most entertaining, was always the advertisements. If you’ve ever read the Almanac yourself, you know what I’m talking about.

There are ads for clairvoyants, ridiculously extravagant gardening equipment, ultrasonic bat eradicators, voodoo curse removal services, Viagra alternatives that promise miraculous results, even on nights you’d rather just watch reruns of “Murder She Wrote” and go to bed … the list goes on. Even the more “mainstream” ads are pretty hilarious. Or, rather, they used to be.

Like the Jitterbug. If you don’t remember the Kennedy administration, chances are you have no idea what a Jitterbug even is. Well, kids, it’s a phone. A phone for geezers. It features a tiny screen with B-I-G text and buttons the size of a helicopter landing pad. It offers an optional “I’ve fallen and I can’t get up” emergency feature.

Basically, it’s a phone even a millennial (as in the past, rather than current, millennium) might be able to figure out. It’s a phone your adult kids gift you for Christmas so they can call once a week to find out if it’s time yet to put your Hummel collection up for sale on Ebay.

There are no contracts with the Jitterbug. I guess the manufacturer figured most Jitterbug users would be dead before the contract expired anyway.

The Jitterbug is the polar opposite of the latest iPhone. I used to think the ads for it were a riot! These days, as I reach for my reading glasses every time my daughter texts me, it seems a bit less funny. Maybe even, I dunno, attractive? There’s a certain nostalgic aspect to the Jitterbug; it reminds me of my first flip phone, the one I owned back before electricity and indoor plumbing.

Then there are all the miracle liniments, ointments and unguents. All guaranteed to make my knees stop hurting. They look like something that might have been sold from the back of a covered wagon in Dodge City, circa 1870 by a guy wearing a plaid suit and porkpie hat. Funny? You bet, at least until a few years ago, when my knees started hurting after every bike ride.

Now? Well, nothing else seems to be working; a bottle of snake oil might be just the thing. (There’s actually an article on the history of snake oil in this year’s edition of the Almanac; whatever else, the editors know their audience.)

Then, of course, there are ads for hair loss treatments, hernia-fixing underwear, weather-watching calendars and memory loss reversal techniques. All of which once made me laugh fit to split. These days the only thing that prevents me from calling in an order are the tiny, virtual buttons on my iPhone.

I dunno, maybe the Almanac hasn’t really changed much in the past 40 years. But for some reason, it seems a lot more relevant.

MTaylor325@gmail.com

(616) 730-1414

Benefit show raising funds for Veterans Facility

JUST A QUICK NOTE HERE: This isn't one of my regular newspaper columns, but a press release detailing my band's upcoming benefit show for the Grand Rapids Home for Veterans. Hope some of you can join us for this important event! Thanks - Mike.

GRAND RAPIDS – For the third year in row, two area bands are hosting a benefit concert to raise funds for the Grand Rapids Home for Veterans. Slated for Nov. 17 at the Knights of Columbus KC Banquet Center, 5830 Clyde Park Ave. SW, doors open at 6 p.m. with live music running from 7 to 11 p.m.

Hosted by West Michigan band The Guinness Brothers, this year’s event also features longtime local headliner, The Boyfriends. Both classic rock groups have been together for decades and have strong local followings; turnout is expected to be strong.

Funds raised during the past two years’ shows totaled just shy of $10,000, with 100 percent of profits gleaned going to the Home for Veterans. According to Guinness Brothers drummer, Calvin Weeks, who is organizing the event, the funds help supply “extras” for the vets.

“Last year, the money went to things like the facility’s Vegas Day, trips for the guys, the vet’s carnival and several trips to Whitecaps baseball games,” Weeks said. “Funds are tight at the facility and without efforts like this, the vets often don’t have much to do. Considering what they gave to this country, I think this is the least we can do.”

There is no cost to attend the benefit, but a free will offering will be accepted at the door. Additionally, several fundraising activities – a silent auction, grab bags and similar happenings – are planned throughout the evening.

Several sponsors have gotten on board this year, including Brann’s restaurants, which is providing signed NFL jerseys, signed photos of professional athletes and other items to be auctioned. Also, the USS Badger has donated tickets to ride the ferry out of Ludington round trip to Wisconsin. Presto Print in Grand Rapids provided all the fundraiser’s printing needs.

“Also, the folks at the KC Banquet Center are letting us use their facility again and providing the cash bar, which is great,” noted Rocky Jett, who plays sax with The Guinness Brothers Band. “It’s an awesome venue and a great place to hear live music. They have a huge dance floor. It’s always a lot of fun.”

Weeks added he is currently in the process of lining up even more donors and trying to promote the event through local media. Those wishing to donate or who want more information can contact Weeks at (231) 923-6024 or visit the Guinness Brothers Band’s Facebook page at facebook.com/GuinnessBrothersBand.

One need look no further for hope than up

The International Space Station cruised over my house last night. It does most every night. At least, every night since I installed the app on my phone that lets me know where it is.

I love the ISS.

I’ll admit what I know about science could be engraved in its entirety on the back of a tin of Altoids. In a big font. I was an English major; I didn’t need to know how things work, I just had to be able to write about them intelligibly.

But even I know the space station is a complicated piece of technology. I mean, first off, it’s in space, man! That in itself is fairly amazing. And something had to get it to space; I can’t begin to comprehend the science that went into that little endeavor. I can barely get myself to my daughter’s house in Detroit without getting lost or sidetracked along the way.

On the other hand, the directions to “space” are easier; you just go up. As I understand it, there’s a little more to it than that, but still, just up.

As impressive a feat as that space station is, however, it’s not the science behind it that causes me to stand in the back yard staring up at the night sky, lost in wonder. It’s what the thing represents. I’m not sure I can even put it into words, but I’m going to try.

Anyone who reads the news, goes online, watches TV or picks up a magazine knows where the world’s at right now. It’s not a pretty picture. And it seems to be getting uglier all the time.

Fires, floods, hurricanes, wars, politics gone insane, a country divided like no time since the Civil War, maybe. Every day is a bizarre circus of innuendo, angry tweets, accusations, name calling, posturing, threats, counter-threats, wars and rumors of wars (to pilfer a line from Matthew, as in The Book of…).

And so much of the trouble – if not all of it – is caused by us. Yup. You, me, the guy next door who sometimes works on my car for free. We’re the problem. Not some blowhard in Washington or Lansing. Not your boss. Not some infantile despot in North Korea with a bad haircut and a tragic case of short man syndrome.

It’s us. We’re responsible. We could be – we should be – doing more to make the world a better place. Of course, some of us do. Not many. Not me. At least, not lately. Not in a long time, if I’m to be honest here.

Why? Well, like most of us, I’m too busy being outraged. I’m outraged over climate change deniers in Washington. I’m outraged over excessive use of force by police. I’m outraged over whatever stupid thing Kid Rock said at his last concert. I’m outraged by fake news, the liberal media, conservative radio, the right wing, the left wing, the pro-choice people, the anti-choice people, football players who take a knee, vice presidential publicity stunts meant to further divide us, neo-Nazis, racial inequality, government handouts, blah, blah, blah and furthermore, blah!

So what do I do with all this outrage? I post about it on Facebook. Ooh, get me! I’m a regular Abbie Hoffman. Such a daring soul am I.

Let me be the first to say it: Social media is the coward’s soapbox. If Rosa Parks had done no more than post memes on Facebook, African Americans would still be riding in the back of the bus. If Roosevelt had spent his days tweeting about what a mean guy Hitler was, we’d all be speaking German now.

Social media gives us all the feeling we’re doing something about the things that matter to us. We’re not. We’re just talking. And not even talking, really; we’re just blowing noise out into the ether, where it is lost amid the roaring cacophony that is the rest of the outraged online world. Sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Meanwhile, the world burns around us, and we stand like Nero, fiddling with our keyboards, our touchscreens. Yeah, it’s a little depressing, isn’t it?

But I still have hope. Because every night, that space station glides across my little piece of sky, a pinpoint of light in the blackness. To me, it’s more than an aluminum box filled with electronic components and a handful of brave men and women. That space station is a still quiet voice, telling me we’re better than this … this, whatever we’ve become lately.

We’re more than our outrage. We’re more than angry tweets. We’re more than our differences of opinion.

Whether through evolution or creation, we were made to work together for the betterment of all. Every species on Earth does as much, each in its own way. It’s amazing how easy it is to overlook this fact. How easy to forget.

So tonight, around 8:30 p.m., I’ll be standing in my back yard, staring into the darkness, waiting for that small speck of light passing overhead to remind me.

There is hope. There is.

MTaylor325@gmail.com

(616) 730-1414

Hopefully, there will be no white cane in my future

Apparently, I’ve been trying to blind myself for the past four years. This came as news to me when I visited the eye doctor last week. Not sure if he’s an ophthalmologist or an optometrist. He seemed to know a lot about the medical side of eyeballs, so I’m guessing ophthalmologist. Also, “ophthalmologist” is harder to spell, which points to the likelihood of a PhD in there somewhere. Given a choice, I prefer a doctor with a medical degree.

Whichever kind of eye care professional he is, he read me the riot act over the way I’ve been treating my eyes. It’s not as if I’ve been an eyeball abuser on purpose. Far from it; my eyeballs are two of my favorite bodily orbs. Without them, I could never watch girls at the beach or binge on old episodes of “Breaking Bad.”

So, I try to be good to my eyes. I wear sunglasses that block UVA rays, UVB rays, UVC rays, and the backsides of people who weigh more than 400 pounds yet still insist on wearing beige yoga pants while shopping at Walmart. On the rare occasions I use eyedrops, I make sure to stick with the kind distilled from organic unicorn tears and the sweat of newborn butterflies.

My eyes, in turn, have always been good to me. Oh, I’m getting a little nearsighted in my old age. Or maybe it’s farsighted. Which one is it when you start needing reading glasses? That’s the one I am. But other than that, no eye problems. And the near (or far) sightedness isn’t really an issue, because contact lenses fix the problem. I’ve been wearing them for the past four years.

When I first learned I’d need contacts I was understandably bummed. I HATE touching my eyeballs! The thought of having to do so twice each day bothered me greatly.

Then my doctor told me about these newfangled lenses that could be left in for an entire month, day and night! I’d only have to touch my eyeballs once a month. They cost more than the cheesy, plastic discs from previous decades, but (he said) they were super-comfortable and didn’t require daily changing. I was sold.

I ordered a couple boxes and never looked back.

That was four years ago. At first, I took them out every couple weeks, just to give my eyes a “rest.” Didn’t need to (or so I thought), but I figured why chance it. But because I’m lazy and unorganized, that two weeks turned into three, then four. And finally, five or sometimes even six.

The last pair I left in for two entire months. Yeah, my eyes became irritated and red, but I was busy, all right? OK, lazy.

And now, last week, my new eye doctor tells me that, yes, you can, technically, wear the contacts non-stop for a month, but you shouldn’t. In fact, if you do, you can develop scar tissue on the part of your eyeball you use to see with. I haven’t. Yet. But, according to the doc, I would have.

No more girls on the beach. No more “Breaking Bad.” That could have been my future. So now I’m removing them every night. I hate it. I hate it a lot. But, man, we’re talking girls on the beach here.

MTaylor325@gmail.com

(616) 730-1414

Turns out Georgia Satellite had the right idea all along

Lemme tell ya ‘bout my first wife. No, no, it’s OK; I won’t be using any language unsuitable for a family newspaper. I won’t need to; my first wife was just fine. And even if she wasn’t (but she was), our parting was over 35 years ago. I could never hold a grudge that long.

Any bad feelings trailing our marriage like tin cans behind a bridal car were dealt with back in the ‘80s. We’ve been on friendly terms for decades.

Also, the divorce was my fault. I was barely out of my teens when we got hitched. Even now I’m not exactly a paragon of maturity; in those days I possessed the emotional temperament of a teething toddler fighting nap time. The relationship never stood a chance.

But for five years, we were happy together. Linda gets the credit for this. She was patient, forgiving and — sexist though it may be to say this — a real stunner. Her Scandinavian heritage produced in her a blue-eyed, blonde-haired Barbie doll who turned heads wherever we went. Also, she was intelligent, educated and sociable.

In other words, she was out of my league, though at the time I didn’t recognize this fact. Why she married me, I’ll never know. (I’m sure she’s asked herself exactly that question on more than one occasion.)

But like I said, for five years we were good together. We did all the stuff young couples do: movies, picnics, long days reading on the beach. Basically, all the filler scenes from any romantic comedy of the past 50 years.

We even went to the gym together. I know, I know, looking at me now it’s hard to believe I’ve ever seen the inside of a health club, but I swear it’s true.

In those day (and maybe now, who knows? Not me, that’s for sure) most health clubs were segregated by gender; the girls worked out on one side, the guys on the other. All that Spandex, the club management reckoned, was just a tad too distracting.

So our regular routine was to work out separately, and then meet up afterward at the hot tub or pool, which were coed and in another part of the club.

On the day I’m thinking of, I logged my 60 minutes of free weights, the theme song to “Rocky” playing in my head the entire time. Then I showered and hit the hot tub, anxious to let the heavily chlorinated, semi-scalding water massage away the resulting aches and pains (though I don’t remember Sylvester Stallone needing a soak in a hot tub, even after going 15 rounds with that Russian guy).

Through the gauze of fog surrounding the club’s spa like steam over a pot of chicken soup, I saw that Linda was already in there. That made me happy. Seeing her back then always made me happy.

What made me unhappy was the muscle-y guy sitting right next to her, chatting her up like they were old friends. I sucked in my gut, pushed out my chest and did my best to appear muscle-y myself; I was only partly successful.

Stepping down into the tub, I took a seat on Linda’s free side.

“Hey cutie,” I said.

“Um, hey,” she said. Muscle guy did not look glad to see me. Good.

“Water’s hot today,” I said.

“Yeah,” she said. Then she turned and started talking to this other guy again, completely ignoring me!

Well, I wasn’t about to take this sort of treatment! Was I a man or a mouse! Stand up for yourself, I told myself. Establish your dominance!

So I did. I put my hand on Linda’s knee. That got her attention. She turned back toward me.

“Uh, your hand’s on my knee,” she said.

I smiled roguishly. “I know.”

Muscle Guy was properly taken aback. His face clouded over. “Maybe you better take your hand off her knee,” he growled.

“Did you have a good workout?” said a cheerful, familiar voice behind me. I glanced over my shoulder. It was Linda, getting into the hot tub.

It took a few seconds to process. By the time I did, Muscle Guy was standing. His wife, upon whose knee my hand currently rested, remained seated. She wanted a good view of the homicide about to take place.

Profuse apologies on my part, and the fact Muscle Guy’s wife was a spot-on doppelgänger for my Linda, were the only things that saved my life that day.

Moral of the story? Like the Georgia Satellite song says, “Keep your hands to yourself.”

MTaylor325@gmail.com

(616) 730-1414

I don’t know how I’ll die, but drowning seems most likely

My biological father, who I never met, was a man of the sea, a Greek merchant marine. This according to the sketchy account I was able to drag from my mother years after it should have occurred to me to do so. I was in my mid-30s before I finally heard my “origin story.”

I wasn’t particularly shocked by the revelation. My family has always owned more than its share of peculiar, dark secrets, things nobody talks about, but everyone seems to know. I stopped being surprised by these whispered epiphanies while still in my teens.

Don’t get me wrong; we’re not the Mansons, or even the Addamses. If there are murders or witch burnings in my family’s past, I don’t know about them.

However, there are secrets. Or maybe it would be more accurate to call them mysteries, the flotsam of familial life trapped and then lost beneath time’s immutable amber.

Divorces and second, third, even fourth marriages, back in the days when such things just didn’t happen outside of Hollywood. A husband going out for a pack of smokes and never being seen again. A wife disappearing into the night with a toddler or two in tow.

A young bride running away from an abusive husband, moving to the West Coast and showing up on her parent’s doorstep a year later with a newborn Yours Truly in her arms. Which is more or less how and when I entered the family history. My arrival was nothing more than an odd blip on a radar screen filled with blips.

Finding out about my Greek, seafaring father changed little in my life. Nothing, in fact. But it did explain some things: my ability to spend shirtless hours in the summer sun without burning (my siblings, Irish and English by birth, fry like bacon on a hot skillet); my passing but intense teenage interest in Western philosophy, primarily the Greeks; my almost debilitating love of life on the water. Especially that last one.

Since the time I could walk, I’ve been drawn to the water. If I’m near it, I want to be in it. I’ve never taken a short trip to the beach; once I arrive lakeside, I can’t pull myself away. I’ve seen a lot of sunsets over Lake Michigan and more than a few sunrises over Lake Huron.

As a kid, at my grandmother’s summer cottage, I would stay in the water until my fingers resembled overripe prunes. It mattered not at all if the lake was cold, the day overcast or even rainy. My truculence when it came to remaining in the lake was such that my mother (a former lifeguard) sometimes had to dive in and drag me out, kicking and screaming.

 Her former lifeguard training came in handy on many other occasions when I was still a toddler. If I spied water, I beelined directly for it, always. The fact I could not swim and had very nearly drowned on several previous attempts didn’t wise me up at all.

Though I eventually became an excellent swimmer, my tendency to nearly drown myself was not diminished in the least. I can’t begin to guess how many times I’ve fallen out of boats, large and small. A dozen? Maybe more.

One night I was camping along the shores of Lake Michigan (there was once a stretch of shoreline that hadn’t been developed by condo builders, believe it or not). I decided to go for a midnight swim. A cloudless night, the Milky Way wheeling overhead like a ring of impossibly bright jewels.

I swam alone; I was all of 17 and knew nothing could kill me. Each stroke pulled me farther into the gently undulating blackness. I don’t know how long I swam; a long time. Long enough for my arms to grow tired.

When I finally relented and turned toward shore, I realized I could no longer tell in which direction it lay. The wind and waves had picked up. I didn’t panic. Not quite. But I’ll admit I struck a lot of bargains with The Almighty before finally spotting a dim glimmer on the horizon – the parking lot of a state park.

Obviously, I lived, but it was a near thing. And still, my memory of that night is a good one, just another little adventure in a life filled with little adventures.

Do I feel that way because my father – who never knew of my existence, by the way – grew up on the isle of Crete, surrounded by the blue waters of the Aegean Sea? Or is my love of all things aquatic simply blind chance? I’ll never know. But the pull is … strong.

And if it seems, dear reader, that this column has no point, that’s only because you don’t know my birthday’s coming up and I’d like The Lovely Mrs. Taylor to reconsider that bass boat idea I brought up at dinner last night.

MTaylor325@gmail.com

(616) 745-9530

When it comes to kale or death, it’s still a tough call

I’ve been trying to eat healthier lately. Because I don’t want to die.

So far, I’m not sure it’s a fair trade-off. There are days – sunny, late-summer days – when I can hear the rack of ribs The Lovely Mrs. Taylor stuck in the freezer back in May calling to me.

“Mike,” they say. “You’re not fat. Not at all! And if you are, it’s the beer that’s making you that way, not we poor, nutritious ribs. All we want is to make you happy.”

They would, too. I know from past experience that ribs make me very happy. So does steak. And burgers. Hell, even a can of store-bought tamales can bring a smile to my face if I cover ‘em with enough cheese.

But it’s the stuff I cook on the grill that really makes my life worth living.

It’s more than just the food, it’s the whole process. Firing up the coals, adding the apple wood or mesquite chips, marinating the dead animal du jour, the smoke, the sizzle, the obligatory beer between each critical step.

If you think I’m torturing you, think what I’m doing to myself! I’m writing this while drinking my lunch. No, not in the fun way (out of a martini glass), but from a “juicer” container. At the moment, it holds a concoction of apple slices, peaches, blueberry yogurt, kale, and ice, all whipped up to a consistency I’m sure my one-year-old granddaughter Juniper would absolutely adore.

To me, it barely qualifies as food. And what is kale, anyway? Until a few months ago, I’d never even heard of kale. Turns out it’s some unholy marriage of lettuce and spinach that tastes a lot like the stuff I mulch up with my riding mower every Sunday. If kale were the only food in the world it would take me about 20 minutes to resort to cannibalism.

As to the guy who invented the juicer machine, he’d be first on my human-centric menu. I mean, who decided food is somehow healthier once it’s been turned into some sort of Soylent Green glop?

The apple, peaches, blueberry yogurt and yes, even kale, that I put in the blender a half hour ago all looked like things I might eat. I probably wouldn’t, but I might. The stuff I’m actually eating now? Not so much.

Seriously, it has the exact same consistency as the adhesive I used to put up the wallpaper in the guest room. And about the same taste. I suppose anything that tastes that bad must be good for you. If it’s not, then what’s the point?

So is it worth it? That’s the part that’s impossible to know for sure.

Yeah, yeah, I’m feeling much healthier since I started watching what I eat. I find it easier to exercise, I have more energy. Life in general just seems better.

All that is great, but none if it is enough to keep me from that rack of ribs in the freezer. Only the threat of an early demise can do that.

I’m not a kid any more. My kids aren’t even kids any more. And if I go on treating my body the way I’ve been doing for the past 60 years plus change, the Grim Reaper is almost certain to come knocking on my door long before I reach my target age of 120. After that? No more ribs, no more burgers, no more beer. As I understand the afterlife (which, believe it or not, is just about as well as anyone understands it though there are those who claim otherwise) even kale is absent.

And speaking of the afterlife, if there is one, I’m not sure that’s going to be such a great deal for me, personally. My past is, um, checkered, and if one’s eternal destination is determined even in part by merit, I’m in deep trouble.

So my best bet is to simply stay alive as long as possible. Eating right might help with that.

Might.

That’s the word that makes it all so tough. If I knew for sure I’d make it to 120 eating a healthy diet, I’d happily choke down kale every day for the rest of my life. But I don’t know for sure, do I?

It’s all a cosmic crap shoot and there are no guarantees. The best we can do is play the odds and hope for the best.

With that in mind, I think I’ll defrost those ribs. I mean, ONE decent meal’s not gonna kill me. Right? I wish I knew.

MTaylor325@gmail.com

(616) 745-9530

There’s nothing quite so disgusting as nature

Alfred Hitchcock couldn’t have done it better. Neither could have Stephen King nor Clive Barker.

When it comes to producing creepy stuff, stuff that makes your skin crawl and forces any sane man to run for cover, nobody beats Mother Nature.

This point was driven home to me with a vengeance during a recent bicycle ride. As regular readers of this column already know, I love to ride my bike. I put in at least 10 miles a day, and that’s at top speed. Admittedly, “top speed” in my case means old folks with walkers and toddlers just learning to ambulate on two feet occasionally pass me, but still, I’m out there trying, man!

It’s all about the journey, not the destination. That’s what I tell myself anyway.

Point is, I was out riding one of my favorite trails. The trail wends around a protected wetlands area. Lots of marshes, flocks of geese, the occasional pair of cranes picking around in the shallows; it’s pretty and mostly flat, the topography preferred by cyclists like me (i.e. lazy).

It’s my favorite part of this particular ride.

The day was perfect for riding. Temps hovering around 78, a little breeze but not too much, low humidity, the scents of late summer/early autumn everywhere.

My high pressure tires were pumped to capacity and I’d finally gotten my new, English leather bike seat adjusted just right so it neither forced me to slide forward, nor did it slowly anesthetize my “boy parts” after an hour on the road. (Which is one reeeeal strange feeling, lemme tell ya.)

I’d already put in about eight miles on other parts of the trail when I came to the nature preserve/wetlands loop. Despite the temperate temperatures, the sun had been shining brightly the entire ride and I was more or less covered with sweat.

Because I am by nature fat and trying not to be, I often crank up the speed when I come to the loop, doing the bicycle equivalent of sprints. It’s only for a mile or so, after which I slow back down to let my heart resume beating before I collapse in a heap by the side of the trail.

Leaning into the handlebars, I put the pedals to the metal. I wasn’t going fast by racing standards, but I was moving along at a respectable clip.

It was at this point I noticed the gray cloud, maybe 20 yards ahead. Just a mist, really. It covered the path like fog, rolled over the center of the loop area, and hovered around the other side of the trail as well.

At the speed I was traveling, I had just enough time to think, “What the…?” before barreling into the fog.

Only it wasn’t fog. It wasn’t mist. It wasn’t a cloud.

It was bugs. Millions of ‘em. Maybe billions. Carl Sagan couldn’t have counted their number with the help of a Cray supercomputer and an army of robot abacuses.

About 200 (I’m estimating) flew directly into my open, surprised mouth, where they soon met an untimely demise in my gastrointestinal tract (I hope).

Another 7,418 (estimating again) slammed into my sunglasses, my face, my chest, my exposed, sweaty arms and legs. Still more were sucked up the legs of my shorts.

I was literally covered with these repulsive, winged demons.

In a panic, I put on the speed, thinking to “push” my way through the insectile cloud. But in the words of John Belushi, “Noooooooooooo!” The cloud went on. And on. And on. A quarter-mile later, I was still enveloped by bugs.

The lenses of my sunglasses were by this time so bug-covered that I could barely make out the trail ahead of me. Yet I pushed on, praying for a break in the disgusting mass of flying bug-flesh.

Eventually, I rode through it to the other side. Despite the fact it was early afternoon and there were other cyclists on the trail, I screeched to a halt and stripped off my shirt, shorts and shoes. Standing there in only my Spandex bicycle underwear (which is in no way a good look on this body on a sunny day, believe me) I beat my clothing against a nearby tree in an attempt to dislodge to critters that had taken up residence there.

Then I used the (mostly) bug-free shirt to brush the rest of them from my skin. There wasn’t much I could do about those I’d eaten other than empty the contents of my water bottle down my throat.

I managed to get dressed and back to my car without winding up on a sex offender registry and charged with indecent exposure, so there was a bright spot to the day.

From now until the fall “hatchings” are over, I think I’ll be getting my exercise at the gym.

MTaylor325@gmail.com

(616) 745-9530

Trying get the spark going gives me the blues

The Lovely Mrs. Taylor and I have hit that point in our marriage where simply being together is no longer, in and of itself, cause for excitement and celebration. These days we need to “do stuff” and go on “date nights.”

It’s supposed to keep the spark in our relationship, which, in my opinion, is sparky enough already. But this is not the sort of decision I get to make. Mrs. T is in charge of overseeing the emotional well being of our plurality and applying the techniques required to keep it healthy. I’m glad she does, too; based on my track record, the job isn’t one I’m particularly good at.

So last Friday she booked us into a painting class. For a mere twenty bucks per person, an expert artist would teach us to paint a vase filled with blue flowers. The class where you got to paint trees (my first choice, because it looked easier) was already booked solid.

Now, I’ve never felt a desire to own a picture of a pitcher of blue flowers, let alone two, but I figured what the heck. Mrs. Taylor puts up with a lot of my baloney; it wouldn’t kill me to sit for three hours painting blue flowers. Small price to pay to keep the home front sparky.

And as I later discovered, they serve wine at these things. Overpriced wine, but still, wine. If things got too tedious, I had an alternative to rampant creativity.

Mrs. T was worried I might be bored with the class, since I – believe it or not – actually have a bit of experience with the Wide World of Art. My first job out of school was as a commercial artist for a religious book publisher. Book covers, record album jackets; that kind of thing. I lasted about six months before deciding the job wasn’t “artsy” enough for me. I was young and stupid (as opposed to my current status: old and stupid).

My exit from that job marked the end of my involvement in all things artsy. My artistic skills, mediocre to begin with, quickly atrophied. At this point, 40-odd years later, I reckoned, even painting a vase of blue flowers would be a challenge.

As it turned out, the task involved not one, but several challenges. The first was fitting in with my fellow students. They – all 20 of them – lacked something I’ve had since birth: a Y chromosome. Everybody else there had two Xs. The common term for this lack of a Y is called, in the scientific community, “womanhood.”

I was the only guy there. Half the class, in fact, was a bachelorette party getting started on what was shaping up to be a long and boisterous night. Mrs. Taylor suggested I pose as a male stripper to pick up a few extra bucks, but in these, my waning years, I’m not confident young girls would be willing to pay me to take my knickers off. To put them back on, maybe.

At each seat was an easel, a blank canvas and a jar containing three brushes of varying widths. A young girl stepped to the front of the room and instructed us as to which end of the brush went into the paint and which was to be waved about to get the waitress to bring more wine.

The bridal party immediately waved that end.

The painting we were all supposed to reproduce was actually so simple anyone could have painted it with one eye closed. Maybe both. My somewhat atrophied artistic sensibilities gurgled to the surface and I decided I would apply myself and impress Mrs. T with a masterpiece to rival Van Gogh’s “Sunflowers” or “Starry Night.” She, after all, deserves my best effort.

From that point on, I essentially ignored the instructor. I, after all, was once PAID to do this sort of thing. Yeah, that was 40 years ago, but still, how rusty could I be?

As it turns out, rustier than an abandoned roll of Civil War era barbed wire left out in the rain and occasionally doused with saltwater.

Oh, my painting looked great. At first. Mrs. T even commented that my “showing off” was unseemly. But then I kept painting. Adding, adding, adding. A little white here, a little black there, a little blue wherever things looked bare or unexciting.

The mess I ended up with by the time the instructor wrapped the class and pushed the bachelorette party out the door to the waiting limo was … well, let’s just say nobody’s going to mistake if for Van Gogh.

The family nature of this newspaper prevents me from using the words that might accurately describe my painting, but if I did, a lot of those words would have four letters.

Mrs. Taylor’s painting, on the other hand, looks great. Genuinely great. We’re going to frame it and put it up in the guest room.

She’s such a show-off. But I have to admit, I’m feeling a bit sparky about her at the moment. Vive l’art!

MTaylor325@gmail.com

(616) 730-1414

I want a sandwich, not an expedition

I’m trying to talk The Lovely Mrs. Taylor into starting a private detective agency. She would be so good at it and heaven knows we could use the extra cash.

Why a detective, rather than a car wash attendant, Navy Seal or matador? Simple. Mrs. Taylor knows how to find things. I assume this skill will easily transfer to finding clues, lost children or evidence of a spouse cheating on his or her alleged beloved.

Mrs. T, as far as I know, has no special training in this area. She’s never been a cop, never even worked as a school crossing guard. But there’s no denying she has the gift.

It could be a psychic thing. You know, Stephen King-y mental powers that help her locate stuff by just humming “ohhhmmmm” under her breath and waving her index finger around. I’ve never seen her do this, but she could be hiding it from me, waiting until I’m not looking to pull out her supernatural bag of tricks.

Or maybe she possesses some sort of extraordinary gestalt; she glances around a room, sees a bunch of seemingly unrelated stuff, and then is somehow able to put it all together into a coherent vision revealing a lost item’s location.

However, she does it, it’s downright spooky.

I first noticed it not long after we took up residence together. Before that, I was single. I knew where everything was in my little apartment. My shoes were here, my socks were there, my week-old pot of leftover cream of mushroom soup was there. Everything had its place and I knew where that place was.

Then I moved in with Mrs. T. Suddenly, I couldn’t find my backside with both hands and a flashlight.

The first problems arose in the refrigerator. It was a Tuesday. I knew there was Genoa salami in there somewhere. I looked and looked. For a long time. And yes, ladies, I really tried to find it. Really.

“Honey,” I finally said. “Did you eat the last of the salami?”

“It’s in there,” she said. “In the meat keeper. Under the second shelf.”

I looked in the meat keeper. Under the second shelf. No salami.

“I can’t find it.”

Heaving a heavy sigh, which so far as I know can only be accurately voiced by a wife forced to attend to her husband’s needs, she came into the kitchen, edged me out of the way, reached into the fridge and pulled out the salami.

“Where was it?” I said.

“In the meat keeper, under the second shelf.”

As God is my witness, that salami had NOT been there 15 seconds earlier.

This sort of thing happened over and over. There was food in the refrigerator, I was told, but for the life of me I could not find it. Mrs. T tried to explain her “secret” to me, but frankly, it was unfathomable.

Apparently, if I wanted to find something in the refrigerator, I was now required to “move stuff around.” Large items, she said, sometimes obscured smaller items. A gallon of milk, say, could easily hide a jar of cocktail olives. If I wanted the olives, I had to move the milk.

I know, I know, sounds crazy to me, too. For me – and for most husbands, I’m guessing – those olives might as well be invisible.

But the problem extends far beyond the refrigerator. The bedroom, my office, even the garage – typically MY domain – were not sacrosanct.

I would put a new tire on my bicycle, then leave the tools lying on the garage floor (where they belong!), only to come back later and find them all missing! Sure, I would later locate them in my tool box. But that’s not where I left them, so finding them again was really just a matter of luck.

Shoes I left under the piano in the living room would magically relocate to my closet. Mrs. T would know where they were, but I would not.

If I left some cheese on the kitchen counter (so I could find it later, just in case I needed a bedtime snack) it would be gone when I went back for it. Where to? Well, the refrigerator full of invisible food, that’s where!

It’s little wonder I’m losing weight lately.

At any rate, I’m hoping Mrs. Taylor’s detective agency keeps her busy enough that she doesn’t have time to keep things tidied up around here. Maybe I’ll be able to make a sandwich without organizing a search party.

MTaylor325@gmail.com

(616) 730-1414

Establishing I.Q. based on bicycling choices

I’m smarter than I look. I know, there are those who say that just has to be the case, but if you’re going to listen to everything my ex-wives say, we’re never going to get anywhere.

But I am. Smarter than I look, I mean. Sometimes, this is more apparent than others.

Take my new bike, for instance. For years, I rode the same bicycle, a crazy expensive carbon fiber/composite triathlon bicycle worthy of a serious, competitive athlete. I am neither serious, competitive nor anything remotely resembling an athlete.

But I got a good deal on the bike several years back, so I bought it.

Unfortunately, I was involved in an accident a little over a year ago; broke my leg. A surgeon fixed the break just fine, but the anesthesiologist – who apparently had more important things on his mind that day – screwed up the nerves in my leg to the point that riding the triathlon bike was no longer an option. I just couldn’t lean over for hours on end, peddling away,  while maintaining a position reminiscent of a peeping Tom at a keyhole.

Rather than give up cycling entirely, I decided to buy a “regular” bike, what they call a commuter or touring bike. You know, upright handlebars, seat big enough that there’s no danger of actually impaling myself on the thing if I hit a bump, five speeds instead of 20.

I can’t say the idea of downgrading to a Joe Suburban bicycle appealed to me, but I wanted to ride. And even though I was no longer going to be cruising in state-of-the-art style, I wanted a nice bike, something reliable, sturdy, well made.

I did a little research and settled on a Raleigh. They’re made in England; Nottingham, in fact, ancestral home of Robin Hood’s nefarious sheriff. Quality stuff.

Unfortunately, that quality comes at a price. The base model for the bike I wanted runs about $600. Not expensive by triathlon bike standards, but substantially more than you’d expect to pay at any mega store featuring a large M, K or W in its name.

This is where my aforementioned smarts enter the story. Rather than buy a ticket to England, I fired up my iPad and did a quick online search. Turns out there were used Raleighs a’plenty, close and cheap.

I bought one – a classic fixer-upper  from 1965 – from a guy in Portland for $50. It wasn’t until I got it home that I realized the gearing wasn’t quite right; it needed work. Another $50 spent at the bike shop took care of the problem. Then I discovered the bike’s frame was a little small for me.

The Lovely Mrs. Taylor was happy to take it off my hands. She’s currently turning it into a rolling art project of some sort, doing all the mechanical work herself, which impresses the heck out of me.

 I bought another  bike from a Craigslist ad, this one for $90.

The second day I owned it, I took it on a 28-mile tour. This was enough to convince me I needed a new, high-quality seat. At my age, my backside needs all the pampering it can get.

That was $150 at the bike shop. While I was there, I figured I should probably put on new tires and tubes, if I was going to do any serious riding, which I was. And as long as I was getting those, I also figured I’d get new wheels as well, since the old ones were slightly out of true. That ran another couple hundred.

A week later, I discovered it was just too much work peddling with the gears the bike came with, so it was back to the bike shop, where the mechanic convinced me to also drop in a new crankset (the pedals, front sprocket and so on). Couple more hundred.

It was at this point that I began considering starting up a meth lab to make a few extra bucks to pay for all this stuff. Mrs. Taylor said no to that. Also, it turns out running a meth lab is illegal. So I had to put off further improvements for a few weeks.

Three weeks later, I bought new brakes, genuine vintage cork hand grips, derailleur (the shifter thingy), and a chain. By this point, I’d quit counting the cost; it was just too depressing..

It was yesterday, toward the end of a 38 mile ride on the Pere Marquette Trail, that I realized I had – with the exception of the frame – purchased a new bike after all. And I’d saved at least $15 over what it might have cost me to travel to England and buy a new one from the Raleigh factory.

Now that I think about it, maybe I’m not smarter than I look at all. In fact, Mrs. T assures me this is almost certainly the case.

MTaylor325@gmail.com

(616) 730-1414