Time Fries! Read online

  Bywater Books

  Copyright © 2013 Fay Jacobs

  All rights reserved.

  By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of Bywater Books.

  Bywater Books First Edition: October 2015

  Time Fries!: Aging Gracelessly in Rehoboth Beach was originally published by A&M Books, Rehoboth, DE in 2013

  Cover designer: TreeHouse Studio

  Bywater Books

  PO Box 3671

  Ann Arbor MI 48106-3671

  www.bywaterbooks.com

  ISBN: 978-1-61294-078-6 (ebook)

  To BJQ and the Usual Suspects, along with the two party boys who made much of this possible.

  Table of Contents

  Introduction

  Aging Gracelessly in Rehoboth

  2010-2011

  A Rolling Home Gathers No Moss

  Older, Wiser and Climbing Every Mountain

  The Book Fair that Got My Goat

  What Wireless?

  Keeping it Civil

  Queer Camping in Sheville

  Eat What You Want in the Big Easy

  Exercise in Futility

  Somebody Stole my Donut

  After Intercourse Comes Paradise

  Sweating it Out for Marriage Equality

  Sometimes You Get a Wake-Up Call

  One Thing Has Nothing To Do with the Other

  Don’t Hassle Me, I’m Local

  Staycation!

  Let There Be Light

  What an E-mess this is!

  Zippity Do-Dah

  Bring on the Locusts

  A Special Kind of Discount

  It Takes Work to Relax

  Learning to Crawl

  2012

  Contagion!

  Dinner for Seven

  My Angela Lansbury Connection

  Forty Years of Oscar Snark

  The Best of Times is Now

  Campfire Girls

  Out! Out! Damned

  Schnauzerhaven Assisted Living

  It Gets Better than Better

  Paddy, 13, Cover Boy

  Eight Wheels and a Prayer

  Exercise, My Way

  Up the Lazy River Without a Paddle

  Sunset at Campobello

  Hair Today, Gone by Brunch

  Chips Falling Where They May

  The Eyes Have It

  2013

  Health Insurance: May the Farce be With You

  50 Shades of Purple

  Vacation or Retirement?

  Times They are A-maz-in’

  Three Dog Night

  Moxie, 1998-2013

  A Sign of the Times

  One of THEM

  The Ayes Really Did Have It

  Time for the Next Chapter

  Walk, Don’t Run

  The Tony Awards

  It Took 65 Years

  Pride Without Prejudice

  Testing Whether this Nation, or Any Nation

  Downsizing

  Northern Exposure, 2013

  Chester, Nova Scotia

  No Walk in the Park

  Make Mine Moxie

  Mercury in Retrograde

  Remember Me to Herald Square

  Down, Not Out in Resort Heaven

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgements

  A Note About the Author

  Introduction

  AGING GRACELESSLY

  As much as they say the sixties are the new forties, I’m not so sure.

  Jamie Lee Curtis is constipated, Tommy Lee Jones has a reverse mortgage so he can stay home until he dies, and Quarterback Joe Theismann has no testosterone. Have you seen these commercials? How did this happen?

  I just saw a t-shirt with a graphic in the shape of that little plastic gizmo we used to play 45 rpm records. The shirt said, “If you recognize this, you’re a geezer.” Guilty. By association. Say, wasn’t it The Association…or maybe the Beach Boys…singing, “God Only Knows Where I’d Be Without You?” In the 60s it was about true love. Now it’s God Only Knows where I’d be without you reminding me twelve times I’ve got a dentist appointment.

  Most days I feel young, adventurous and bold, until I’m at the threshold of a room, wondering what I’ve come to retrieve. Last week I calmly put breakfast in the microwave, had coffee, left home, and returned hours later to a cold rubbery omelet I could use for a doggie chew toy. And at five bucks a gallon I’m crazed by the amount of gas I use just riding back to the house to see if I closed the garage door.

  After years of boating in the sunshine I have a cataract. It can be removed, right? No. Some insurance company bozo tells me it isn’t ripe yet. What am I a tomato? While I’m ripening, my eyesight is so bad I cannot see the chin hairs I’m sprouting.

  Okay, and whatever you do, promise me you will never, ever put a magnifying mirror down on a flat surface, bend over and gaze into it. My God, gravity exacts its toll and I look like a Char Pei.

  Have you been to an organ recital? You know, evenings where all your friends start reciting which of their bodily organs are deteriorating. Who thought I’d ever spend more time talking about meniscus than money, polyps than politics, reflux than religion. We used to speculate about who was naughty, and might be into S&M and handcuffs. Now it’s all about colon health and rotator cuffs.

  Do you sinus wash? It’s all the rage for avoiding germs and staying healthy. You take a little plastic pitcher with a watering can spout and siphon saline solution and warm water up your nose. Try it and you’ll understand the horror of water boarding. I think I got the Dick Cheney model.

  Which brings me to heart health. So far so good. But last week we were at a party where somebody at our table had a tiny oxygen meter he’d clip to his finger to test his oxygen level. Naturally, we all had to pass it around and see if we were still alive. E.T. Call Home. My god, I remember the days when we’d all pass around a nickel bag of weed; now we’re passing an oxygen meter. Please don’t tell Mick Jagger.

  Or, for that matter, don’t tell Gloria Vanderbilt how many times in the last six months I have gotten dressed in the morning only to discover, once out in natural light, I’m wearing black pants and a navy shirt. And don’t get me started about clothing. Trying to find attractive age-appropriate garments is like trying to find a drag queen at NASCAR. All the fashionistas think they’re doing a good thing by making trendy looking clothes in large sizes. Those huggy, midriff showing lacy things look great on Snooki and the Kardashians but trust me, nobody wants to see a baby boomer belly button.

  And those commercials! For every advertised remedy, the side effects are a gazillion times the benefits. Am I alone here, not wanting to swallow something that warns “infections, some fatal, may occur?”

  Which all goes to say that I’m feeling my age. Or am I? I’m so far past menopause I’m symptom free with not so much as a hot-flashback. I’ve stuck with the gym, continue to play lousy golf and feel pretty darn healthy. My friends are having civil unions left and right, many simultaneously celebrating 25 and 30 year anniversaries. We’re all up on the dance floor, hands waving in the air, dancing to “I Will Survive” and “I Like the Night Life.”

  What the dickens, it’s the youngest times, it’s the oldest times. I like it.

  September 2010

  A ROLLING HOME GATHERS NO MOSS…

  My mate and I upend our lives every decade or so. For new readers, I’ll catch you up: In the 80s we bou
ght a boat (a hole in the water into which you throw money); in the 90s we moved said vessel to Rehoboth Bay (Dewey Beach drunks and steel drums at 1 a.m. UGH!); at Millennium’s dawn we moved ourselves full-time to Rehoboth (okay, so who needs a decent paying job anyway?); and now we are on the move and downwardly mobile once again. Ever financially imprudent, we now own a great big depreciating asset—a 27-foot recreational vehicle.

  And while the land yacht lifestyle is fantastic, it has a learning curve. We’re still in first grade.

  Frankly, it’s a good thing we took to RVing instantly, because on Day One, we had only 45 minutes of flight instruction before leaving Tampa, FL for the journey home in the Hindenburg. Amateurs, rev your engines.

  My spouse drove fearlessly; me riding shotgun. We were lucky not to take out mailboxes and parked cars on both sides of the street as our blimp lumbered towards I-95. But within minutes, my mate had expertly judged the big rig’s midsection, checked out the giant funhouse mirrors flanking the bus and learned to love the back-up camera. We set out at 8 a.m. and by noon we were maneuvering it like a Mini-Cooper, tooling down the road with the Schnauzers asleep in their beds on the floor.

  Lesson One: Like a boat, it is prudent to secure all contents when underway. Braking for a red light sent a 2-lb bag of M&M Peanuts bouncing, then rolling into every crevice in the vehicle, immediately followed by occupied doggie beds sliding and twisting forward like Olympic curling stones. From now on, we batten the hatches and seat belt the dogs.

  Lesson Two: At our first campground they assigned us site 57, Kilimanjaro. With the left side of the camper listing to port, we broke out the wood chocks (how much wood could a wood chock chock if a…), put them under the left side tires and backed up onto them. After several daring tries (“back up, no, go forward, STOP, you’re not back far enough, oh, hell, now you’ve driven over the chock…”) we were still caddywhompus but parked. When we went inside for martinis, it was a little like cocktails on the Titanic.

  Lesson Three: Upon our return we stopped at a local campground for a sewer hook-up. I was enlisted to stand with my foot holding down the hose while we emptied our tank. Once I was firmly in place my co-pilot ran, laughing, 50 yards away from the stench. Next time I will hold my breath as I hold my mate over the hole.

  Lesson Four (corollary to Lesson One): These RV newbies didn’t have any idea how to stow our stuff. I bought closet organizers with little cubby holes for shoes, shirts and shorts. Every time we stopped the rig, gravity lurched the clothes forward and every night, we opened the cabinets to an avalanche. Our digs looked like a reality TV hoarder episode. Trolling Walmart for a solution, I bought a pair of old geezer suspenders, stretched them from top to bottom in the closet and kept our shorts and shirts tucked in. It’s a look.

  Lesson Five: Before you unhook the car you’ve been towing behind the RV, engage the car’s emergency brake. Kneecapping yourself is no way to start happy hour.

  Lesson Six: Make a pact: no yelling. Then buy walkie talkies so nobody else hears the inevitable yelling. And plan 45 minutes for disembarkation—detaching, disengaging and otherwise undoing yourself from plugs, hoses and bung holes. With most couples there’s the doer and one who watches the doer do. I just stand around holding the bag with the pins and chocks and pliers, etc. That’s me, left holding the bag.

  Lesson Seven: Campsites, regardless of their marketing brochures go from the sublime to the ridiculous. One day we’re nestled in a tree-canopied site overlooking a gorgeous rocky ocean cove, then we’re sleeping in a gravel-filled parking lot overlooking somebody’s rusty double-wide. We’ve relaxed at quiet sites down by the old mill stream (literally) or atop mountains with wild turkeys running around. Then we wind up back to back, belly to belly with a hundred rigs in parks resembling Saturday morning on Route One. When somebody sneezes, you hear a dozen “Bless Yous.” Or, there are worse things you overhear, just sayin’.

  Lesson Eight: GPS is not perfect, MapQuest often has its pants on fire. Once, as we searched for a campground we were pointed to a sign boasting camping/landfill. Houston, we have a problem! A night atop Mt. Trashmore is not my idea of luxury accommodations.

  Lesson Nine: Boondoggling (staying someplace free, without electric, water or sewer) has its challenges. Walmart is a famous boondoggling site, as are some highway rest stops. But when we slept at the 24-hour Walmart, I couldn’t sleep. People were shopping. I kept hearing car doors slam. I knew people were carrying purchases. No rest for the weary shopaholic. It was like being in detox. So much for boondoggling.

  Lesson Ten: That which doesn’t kill us makes us RVers.

  From Chincoteague to Amish country, Maine to as far as Nova Scotia, we’ve had grand adventures so far. Besides, the bus can be an annex for overflow summer guests. And we never know when it might be prudent to get out of Dodge ahead of a hurricane or tourist flash mob.

  With our load levelers, e-z hitches, clamps, coils, hoses, walkie talkies and thirsty gas tank (a hole in the highway into which you pour money?) we should probably have our heads examined. But here we are, planning the next excursion.

  Closets wearing suspenders? Check!

  Schnauzers seat-belted in? Check!

  Wide loads secured in the wide load? Check!

  Rollin’, Rollin’, Rollin’, keep those doggies rollin’…

  October 2010

  OLDER, WISER AND CLIMBING EVERY MOUNTAIN

  I do not feel old. But apparently I am.

  The other day I went to buy tickets for the RB Film Fest. It’s one of my favorite days of the year, standing in line with the regulars outside the Film Society office on the first day of sales. I get to see people I haven’t seen in 365 days, picking up conversations like it was yesterday. This year, the society staff handed out numbers to us early birds and put out a bunch of chairs.

  So there I am, walking up to the throng, and a woman seated in one of the chairs looks in my direction and asks, “Do you need a seat?”

  I looked behind me to see who she was talking to. I was alone.

  Okay, the woman may have been a few years, or perhaps decades younger than me, but did I really look like I couldn’t loiter upright for a half hour? Hell, I once stood in line for eleven hours for Billy Joel tickets. The operative word is probably “once,” as in “upon a time.” Crap.

  Later, the UPS truck pulled up with a package from Bonnie’s doctor. It was an inflatable device to be used in the bedroom. Now before you start gagging and hollering TMI, listen to this: it’s a blow-up wedgie for the head of the bed to help with digestion. That’s right, an anti-Reflux device.

  To be clear, I only have reflux in two situations—first, drinking a Mimosa. It’s not the bubbly, it’s the acidic juice. So now I just have straight champagne, no problem. The only other time I get reflux is when I see Karl Rove on TV, and who doesn’t?

  However, my mate does suffer from the occasional bad night caused by food and beverage. Hence, instead of putting unsightly phone books under the legs at the head of the bed, we’ve installed an unsightly inflatable airplane chute.

  I’d like to say that the last time I inflated something at bedtime it was a blow-up doll, but I was never that naughty. Now, we pump up the wedgie to raise the head of the mattress and try, just try to get into bed. With half the length of the bed propped up by a beach ball, you have to be a gymnast to get into the sack. The first time we tried, it was like high jumping onto a waterbed. Then we had to figure out how to sleep sitting up and laughing.

  But that was easy compared to what happened when I got out of bed to turn off the hall light. Bonnie, remaining somewhat prone, saw her side of the wedgie mattress suddenly deflate, while my side shot up like Space Mountain. I’d have to pole vault to get back in. I suggested that my spouse roll to the middle to give me a fighting chance. A rope and mountain climbing crampons might have helped, but I finally hoisted myself back aboard.

  Unfortunately, the incident repeated itself when Bonnie got up to pee at 3 a.m. With no
warning at all, my side of the bed went limp and a Schnauzer rolled off, followed closely by most of me. It would have been all of me but I grabbed the headboard and hauled myself back up Pike’s Peak. Doing chin-ups on the headboard is not my idea of bedtime relaxation. Okay, so there will be no more “now I lay me down to sleep at our house.” It’s like spending the night on K2.

  My being a mountain goat aside, I refuse to believe I’m actually as old as it says on my driver’s license. I mean Bonnie complains that I still have more energy than the Washington Redskins. Although I don’t think she’s referring to how well they run the ball, but how well I run my mouth.

  Even so, there are insidious reminders of my biological age cropping up everywhere. Today in Walmart I didn’t recognize any of the singers on the CDs labeled just released, but I found Simon and Garfunkel dumped in the bargain bin. Then I saw that most of the stuff in my shopping cart said “for speedy relief.” Would I remember where my car was in the parking lot? Would |I drive home with my left turn signal blinking the entire way? Could this really be happening to me?

  Well, the answer is yes. And no. While it’s sad but true that in an antique store the other day I heard myself say “I remember these,” I maintain that I am not your typical aging boomer.

  I dressed up for Halloween, I do not eat dinner at 4 p.m. (okay, there is the sushi happy hour where you have to order by 6 p.m.), and nobody has to worry about calling my house at 9 p.m. and asking “did I wake you?”

  Also on the plus side, the criminal amount I’ve paid in health insurance is my only investment that’s starting to pay off. The other day a comic said old people have it pretty good–in a hostage situation we’re most likely to be released first. That’s comforting.

  But the real trick is having the best of both worlds. I may be retired from 9-5, but I’m working harder than ever as a full-time writer and publisher—and loving it. It also doesn’t hurt going to the mailbox once a month and getting a government check.

  But the trick to navigating this getting older thing is knowing exactly when to cave. Recently, a great big truck backed into my driveway (shameless plug alert!) and delivered thousands of copies of my book, For Frying Out Loud—Rehoboth Beach Diaries. In preparation, using age and experience to advantage, I contracted with several strapping young women to move cartons around while I stood and watched. I even sat in a beach chair to ogle. Although, I repeat, nobody needs to get up to give me a seat on the subway or anywhere else. Ask, and I’ll slap you.