Mike Taylor explains the joy of 6ex

This week’s column deals with adult themes and issues. If you’re easily offended by a three-letter word synonymous with the human reproductive process, please stop reading now.

I mean it. Stop. Now. 

Still here? OK.

“Six.” That’s the word. Well, not “six,” exactly, but a word that’s spelled the same, save one letter. 

It’s a word that has created more trouble in my life than any other, and I’m including “tequila,” “algebra,” and “Sister Sulpice,” which is technically two words but still gave me a lot of grief back in fourth grade.

My problems with six can be traced to my parents, as any good shrink could tell you. Mom and pop were enlightened, liberal products of their time, heavily marinated in the Dr. Spock-ish literature of the era and determined to make sure I wouldn’t have to learn about six “on the streets” as had their generation.

So instead of picking up inaccurate sixual tidbits in the school yard and from the half-hidden covers of Playboy magazine at the drugstore (as nature intended) I was subjected to not one, not two, but three books on the subject. These I read, under great duress, as my parents hovered nearby to answer any questions I might have.

If there’s a more nightmarish scenario for a fourth grade kid, I don’t know what it is.

Until the afternoon my folks sat me down with these allegedly educational tomes, I had considered six not at all. I had no questions, I had no interest. (Though both showed up in spades a few years later — thank you Debbie Kowalski!)

It didn’t matter; according to some “expert” my parents had seen on TV, it was time to deliver “the talk.” I was their first child and they were determined to discharge their parental responsibilities, even if the embarrassment killed me in the process.

The books were written with children in mind, but children maybe four years older than I was at the time. Most of what I read I understood not at all, but I will admit to being thoroughly captivated with the illustrations. So much so, in fact, that I think my parents began to have second thoughts about the entire project even as I worked my way toward the final passages.

At some point they started to realize they had delivered into my grubby, grass-stained hands the fourth-grade equivalent of the Kama Sutra. It was an experiment they never repeated with any of my younger brothers or sisters.

I remember almost nothing about those books now, other than the near total mortification which accompanied reading them in front of my parents.

That and one other thing: One of the books described the six act as “feeling a lot like a sneeze.” 

To this day, I’m abnormally fond of pepper.

I’m losing my manhood over a busted toilet

My manhood. That’s what’s at risk here. All because of a busted toilet.

I’ve been a man my entire life, since I stopped being a boy, at any rate. (Yes, I am aware there are those who contend I never did stop being a boy, but I don’t listen to my ex-wives and neither should you.)

Being a man comes with certain responsibilities. Among these are a) taking out the trash, b) opening car doors for your true love, and c) fixing stuff around the house. I am a trash-takng-out machine! But my talent with regard to home repair projects has traditionally been somewhat suspect.

I’m thinking here about stuff like the storm windows that fell out and the porch light that nearly electrocuted my most recent ex-wife (which, all things considered, might not have been an entirely bad thing). The horror stories surrounding my home improvement efforts are myriad and terrifying.

But I’m a man with tools and I am constrained by the dictates of my sex to use them.

Incompetent as I am, I have always been at least slightly more competent than the person to whom I was married at any given moment. My wives have all been cut from a similar, traditional cloth when it comes to gender roles. 

I’m not talking the “Me Tarzan You Jane!” 1950s white male reality here. My past relationships have all been enlightened and liberally spiced with feminist ideology; I like strong women, after all. Yet in each case, when it comes to fixin’ stuff, I’m da man.

Until now. I’m with Lori now. And while I may still look like da man, I’m no longer sure that’s the case.

Why? Because of the busted toilet, that’s why.

A few days ago the little flusher thingy (sorry for the technical jargon) broke. Inside the tank, there is a plastic tube thingy attached to a metal arm and copper ball thingy which, when properly adjusted, allow the toilet to flush. 

All that stuff broke.

I was going to fix it. Really. This despite the fact my plumbing projects often wind up resembling that Three Stooges episode in which Larry, Moe and Curly imprison themselves in yards of leaky copper pipe.

But Lori beat me to it.

She has tools of her own, see, and not the cute little “homemaker” tools in a pink case. They’re the real deal. I’m talking Milwaukee, Snap-On, Bosch. The good stuff. She also has the skills to go with them. In less time than it would have taken me to strip some bolts and bust some pipe, Lori fixed the toilet.

She also can handle electrical work, though she’s promised she’ll give me first crack at any wiring projects that come up. I get the feeling it’s a pity thing.

I suppose I could demonstrate my prowess in the kitchen, but Lori’s also a better cook than me. A lot better. 

It’s depressing. And worrisome. I need something I’m better at and I need it now. My manhood is on the line here.

Maybe I’ll take up ballet. 

I wonder if Lori can dance.

mtaylor@staffordgroup.com

(616) 548-8273

Kid, nobody wants to see your butt over pancakes

I was vacationing up north a few weeks back. For me, no vacation is complete without breakfast in at least one mom-n-pop diner. The rules are these: it can’t be a chain, they must offer chicken fried steak, and their biscuits and gravy must come with the correct biscuit/gravy ratio (50/50).

My vacations are not designed to promote good health or abs of steel.

Guys my age don’t stress too much over things like flat bellies, clean-shaven cheeks or the latest fashions, not when we’re on vacation anyway. This is evinced in the typical “up north” summertime vogue — baggy Hawaiian shirts and baggier shorts.

But apparently some of the under-20 locals do try to keep in step with what the cool kids are wearing. Or so the sign in the diner’s window would have me believe.

“If you can’t pull your pants up, don’t come in here!” the sign warns. “Nobody wants to eat pancakes while looking at your butt.”

Now, I’m familiar with the whole hip-hop-baggy pants-hanging-down-below-your-butt-underwear-hanging-out look. I can’t believe it’s still considered cool by some, since it looks utterly moronic and these days is seen mostly on white kids trying to emulate their cooler black counterparts.

Nothing’s dorkier than a 15-year-old honky from a lilly-white resort town trying to look like he’s getting down with his homies in the ‘hood. But you can’t tell kids that. They’re gonna do what they’re gonna do and no amount of restaurant window signage is going to change that.

If anything, griping about their ridiculous fashion choices only reinforces their belief that they are inherently cool. Teen logic says that if old people like me hate something, it must be awesome.

So, my fellow geezers and restaurant owners, we need to change our strategy. If we’re going to spare our eyes the horror of skinny, teen-boy BVDs poking over the descended waistbands of baggy jeans, we need to fight fire with fire.

To fight the enemy, we must become the enemy. Trust me on this one. If every pot-bellied, balding, ear hair-infested codger in America starts wearing his pants low with his wrinkly rear-end hanging out, the teenagers will immediately cease and desist.

So go ahead, gramps! Turn that baseball cap around backwards, put on a pair of Nikes but don’t lace ‘em up, load up on the bling! If we all do this, by this time next month every teen boy in the country will be dressing like Walter and Theodore from “Leave it to Beaver.”

mtaylor@staffordgroup.com

(616) 548-8273

What kind of phone do I really need? No phone

Continuing a long tradition of purchasing technology just hours before it becomes obsolete, I recently picked up a new iPhone 5s. Exactly one day before the iPhone 6 was announced. By not waiting that extra day, I got the chance to pay $100 more for the thing than I would have 24 hours later.

This episode could reasonably be titled “The Story of My Life.”

I am single-handedly responsible for propelling technology forward. If I buy something — anything — the new and improved version is sure to come out a few days later. This doesn’t sometimes happen, it always happens.

Several years back, I finally broke down and purchased a giant screen TV, one of those rear projection jobs that take up half the living room and can be viewed clearly only from a “sweet spot” directly in front of the set. Television manufacturers responded to my purchase by flooding the stores with flat screen sets; cheaper, clearer, more compact, better in every way.

A few years later when I decided I wanted my living room back, I had to give that giant screen monstrosity away, free. And even then the kid who hauled it away griped bitterly about the sparse feature set on the remote control.

I still haven’t purchased a flat screen TV, but I’m thinking about it, if only to move video technology to the next level. If I buy a flat screen, next week Sony will be cranking out 5-D RealVision with Smell-o-rama or some such nonsense. It’s inevitable.

Which is why I’m so excited by the NoPhone, a project currently seeking sponsorship on KickStarter.

The NoPhone is touted as a “technology-free alternative to constant hand-to-phone contact that allows you to stay connected with the real world.”

How does NoPhone accomplish this? By being a plain, non-functioning, solid block of iPhone-shaped plastic. 

That’s right, it can’t be used to text, surf the web, make phone calls, email or check the weather. It won’t function as an alarm clock, timer, GPS device or eReader. 

It won’t do a thing.

And according to NoPhone designers, it will never become obsolete or require software upgrades. If you accidentally drop it in the toilet, it will continue to function exactly as it did before, which is to say, not at all.

Though the manufacturers don’t mention them, I can think of a few other selling points for the NoPhone:

• Your boss can’t call you on it.

• Your wife can’t call you on it.

• Your girlfriend can’t call you on it.

• Your girlfriend can’t call your wife on it.

• Nobody can call anybody on it.

Right now the NoPhone is offered only in basic black. I want one, bad, and plan to make the purchase just as soon as they hit the shelves.

And you can bet the following week, they’ll come out with the chrome, non-slip NoPhoneIIs.

Life would have been easier had I let my daughter choose my dates

This past weekend my band played a singles “mixer.” From the stage I watched men and women as they went through the complicated dance that is the early stages of courtship; the light banter, the knee-touching, the feigned interest in personal histories.

Familiar territory. Because of my personality — which my kinder ex-wives refer to as “difficult” — I’ve spent a good deal of my life single.

Not all my relationship problems have been the fault of my lousy personality, though. Many were brought on by my equally lousy choices in women. For years, I was looking for all the wrong things.

I should have been searching for kindness, honesty, understanding, patience. Instead, I spent years burning through hotties upon whose backsides one might be able to crack a walnut. Though I’m still a fan of backsides, I have come to understand this should not be the sole factor in choosing a mate.

At any rate, playing for that singles group got me thinking about my early dating years, back when I was a single parent of two young children and trying to balance work, school and parenthood while maintaining some sort of rudimentary social life. It wasn’t easy.

My kids, four and six at the time, rarely met the girls I was dating, but sometimes it just happened.

I’m thinking of one particular afternoon about 30 years ago; I was having an early dinner with my daughter, Aubreii, at a downtown restaurant. At another table, a group of 20 or so girls were whooping it up pretty good. Balloons and a pyramid of brightly-wrapped boxes on the table spoke of the birthday party going on there. Based on the party’s volume, I assumed the girls were taking full advantage of happy hour drink prices.

Aubreii and I ignored the noise until one of the girls, a willowy redhead, detached herself from the group and approached our table.

“Mike,” she cawed. “I thought that was you! Oh, is this your daughter? She’s soooooo cuuuuute!”

“Yup,” I said. “This is Aubreii. Aubreii, this is Lucille, a friend.” 

Lucille was a little more than a friend. We’d gone out half-a-dozen times, at least. She was a dancer at a west side nightclub, and though very sweet, she was not the sort of girl you bring home to mother.

Lucille (who, it turns out, was the birthday girl) and Aubreii chatted for a few moments. Lucille invited us to join her birthday party, I demurred. Eventually, she returned to her own table and recommenced with the apple-tinis. 

Aubreii was quiet for a while.

“What’s on your mind?” I asked.

“She seems like a nice girl.” Aubreii said.

“She is,” I said.

“But…”

“Yes?”

“Well, she’s not very smart, is she?” Aubreii said.

When your six-year-old daughter can tell, it’s time to change your standards. It took 30 years, but I think maybe I finally have.

mtaylor@staffordgroup.com

(616) 548-8273

How much are you willing to pay to whine?

I’ve gotta start charging for it, now that I’m in a relationship. 

Until now, I’ve been giving it away for free; my attention and understanding, I mean. I do this nearly every night, shortly after Lori arrives home from the office.

“How was work?” I ask. I don’t really care, of course, any more than she cares about the quality of my workday. But that doesn’t stop her from telling me A) who acted like a jerk, B) who called in sick even though everyone knows he or she was really just hung over, C) how much unfinished work was piled on her desk at the end of the day and will be waiting for her there in the morning.

She gripes for a few minutes and then it’s all over and it’s time to uncork the wine and start supper. This is a scenario played out nightly in virtually every household in America, yet — until now — nobody’s figured out a way to make a buck from it.

It took the Chinese — the same people who can somehow manufacture an iPhone case and sell it on Amazon for .38 cents — to monetize bellyaching. 

In China, for about five bucks a day, you can dial a number and whine to a person of the opposite sex (or the same sex, if that’s what blows you hair back) about your boss’ bad breath or the overdue Murphy contract that that young kid from the fourth floor is trying to steal away from you.

The person on the other end of the line will provide plenty of commiserating feedback like 可怜的宝宝 (poor baby), 这就是这么不公平 (that’s so unfair!) and 你是如此的权利生活太臭 (you are so right; life stinks!).

Basically, the same things I listen to Lori say every night for free, or used to before I found out I could entice her to open her wallet.

The quality and type of sympathy depends upon choices made while signing up for the service. Guys can choose a virtual girlfriend (that’s what they call ‘em) with personalities  like “mature women”, “doll-like girls” and “girl next door.” Women can choose from “men in uniform”, “handsome men”, and “comforting men.”

Nowhere do they offer a “bitter ex-wife” model, which — if I know anything about ex-wives and I should since I have more than my share — would spit out remarks like “get over it!” and “grow up already!” But apparently nobody wants to pay five bills for that.

According to Zhang Xiaoli, head of the China Association of Mental Health and a man with far too many odd letters in his name, most clients are trying the service out of plain old curiosity.

I’m not so sure; I think there may be a real market for this sort of thing. I’ll know for sure tonight when Lori gets home. 

If I wake up five bucks richer tomorrow morning, I may have to invest in a toll-free phone line and Paypal account.

It's about time for me to pop the question, I think...

Maybe I’m moving too fast. I don’t know. It’s been a while since I’ve been in a relationship. 

At first I tried to take it slow. After all, I enjoy being single; I’m self-sufficient and rarely feel lonely, lost or worthless just because I’m not joined at the hip to a member of the fairer sex. Also, movies are cheaper when you’re only buying popcorn for one.

But being the irresistible stud muffin I am, it was only a matter of time before some lucky girl snatched me up.  (Look, if you don’t recognize irony when it’s being troweled on this thick, I can’t help you.)

I’m pretty crazy about Lori, but even so, I dragged my feet the first couple months we were dating. I didn’t want to give up my lakeside apartment. I didn’t want to move to her house in the country. I didn’t want to, well, be a grownup again.

A single guy can remain indefinitely in a state of quasi-adolescence, an existence defined by nights out with the guys, sleeping in until noon on Sundays and a lawn that grows waaaaay too long before feeling the mower’s blade.

A guy in a relationship has, um, what are those things called again? Oh, yeah, responsibilities.

I hate responsibilities, yet I’ve managed to get myself into a relationship. A serious one. So serious, in fact, that this past weekend, after a lovely “mini-vacation” up north with my sweetie, I decided to take that next, Big Step.

It could have been the warm, post-vacation glow that dulled my resistance to commitment. Or the second glass of wine with dinner. Whatever the case, I made up my mind to pop the question.

I wanted everything to be perfect. I waited for the right moment, until we were home in front of the fireplace, lounging in the flames’ benevolent radiance.

“Babe,” I said. “I have something important to ask you.”

Lori’s eyes gleamed expectantly in the firelight. “What is it?” she said.

“Well, I know we’ve only been together a while,” I said. “I mean, you know, really really together, and…”

“Yes?” she said.

“Um, that is to say, I think it’s time…”

“Yes? Yes?” she said.

I cleared my throat and plunged forward. “I think it’s time we bought a grill.”

“A grill?”

“Yeah,” I said. “One of those big, family-sized ones. You know, for when we have the kids over or whatever.”

Lori’s reaction was not as enthusiastic as I’d expected, but we made the trip to the mega-store later that day and picked up a five-burner, stainless steel beauty that is now the envy of the neighborhood.

And believe me, that decision to purchase a grill says more about my commitment to this relationship than any piece of jewelry ever could. A grill, particularly a big, expensive grill, speaks of a future together, of longevity, permanence.

That grill says that for richer or poorer, in sickness or in health, we’ll be making burgers together for the foreseeable future. If that’s not love, what is?

mtaylor@staffordgroup.com

(616) 548-8273