Ask a Coot Saturday: Question 3

 Posted by at 10:50  Ask A Coot!, Plain 'ol Cantankerous
Dec 112010
 
IMG_1143
Image by PSPMeet via Flickr

Hello there!  I hope this week was full of both Joy and Cantankerousness.  Today we have another Question answered by the Coots.  If you have a question that you would like Bob, Ralph and myself to answer, send it to askacoot@cantankerousoldcoots.com and we will bring 3 different takes on Cantankerosity.

First, I have a small bone to pick with you all, the reading audience.  I have not received nearly the response that I had hoped when we started the Ask A Coot feature.  As a matter of fact, I have no, I repeat NO more questions waiting.  I will have to make some more up.  And again, I really freakin’ confused at why these pictures keep showing up when the text is analyzed.  If you have a suggestion, let me know.

Today’s Question is almost philosophical in scope.  It comes to us from our own Ralph.  He wrote: :  So tell me, since the President pardons the Thankgiving Turkey every year, what does the President eat for Thanksgiving?

A great question.  I think it is only fair to let him answer first.

Ralph:

This seems to be a closely guarded secret leaving this Coot to speculation and reason in search for an answer.  Clearly it would be hypocritical for the President to pardon Turkey 1 and then kill and eat Turkey 2.  The Presidential turkey surely follows the same convention as the Presidential  airplane. Whichever one he is on is Air Force 1.  Applying this logic, any turkey reaching the President’s table is automatically Turkey 1.  Therefore the President cannot be eating turkey without at the same time being a total hypocrite.  Totally unacceptable.

As to what the President does eat, the mind can certainly boggle over the possibilities:  a nice rib rost, maybe a goose or an exultation of roasted larks.  Eating meat at all after pardoning the star seems to this coot to be the beginning of a very slippery slope.  Imagine what PETA would say?

Surely they would demand the pardon of any beasts destined for the President’s Thanksgiving or multiply pardons in the case of larks.  Being surrounded with PR geniuses, I am sure that the President plays it very safe on Thanksgiving.  First, the menu is top secret to protect against any misinterpretation of his sensitivity but second my theory is that Thanksgiving at the White House means the very safe and delicious vegetarian delight – tofurkey.

Justin:

Personally I think that this year he ate crow.   In more ways than one.  But in reality, I think that the White House is only occupied by liars and hypocrites.  Over the years the job has evolved to require it.  I don’t think there is any room in Washington for people to be totally honest anymore.  Abraham Lincoln would be sad.  Thomas Jefferson would shrug his shoulders.  George Washington would probably try to philosophize about the problem.  And all of them would be eating a lovely Turkey Dinner.

There is quite a mentality of “Here is what I believe, this is policy” and “don’t look this way because “policy” doesn’t apply to me.” that happens at the same time in modern politics.  All I can see is a bunch of posturing for cameras and the press, hoping to put a positive spin on whatever crisis is facing the country at the moment.  Behind the cameras, things go on as normal.  Now I am not saying that the men we elect to be president are not good people to start with.  (hold your protests even Jimmy Carter was good when he was a baby)  Politics changes men into people who pander to popular opinion and lie and breed hypocrisy.

Pardoning a turkey is just a silly thing that provides a photo opportunity for the President.  The turkey used to go to Disneyland and live a life of luxury, in turkey terms that is.  The turkey federation has been bringing turkeys to the White House for years, Eisenhower and Johnson ate their birds.  It took Kennedy to let the bird live.  It’s all silly.  Eat the damn bird, that is what they are bred for.  Besides, have you ever actually looked at a turkey?  Ugly as sin walking around, a beautiful thing roasted golden brown with dressing and cranberries.

What should the President eat?  Eat the Turkey.  Maybe we should start a new tradition where the president chops off the turkey’s head right there on national TV and then proceeds to field dress and pluck it.  Of course we would have to start beheading PETA’s people and that would be fine with me.  I don’t know that most of the current presidential prospects could handle dispatching a turkey.  I’ll bet Eisenhower could have without blinking an eye.

Well Folks that is a lot of information, and we have yet to hear from Bob.  he will weigh in in the comments and probably blow us all away.

Thanks for reading, and remember, send in your questions no matter the absurdity of it!  We will answer and change your name for anonymity’s sake.  Submit questions to askacoot@cantankerousoldcoots.com

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Justin

Justin is the young Coot with a Cantankerous Soul who continues to be educated by older, more cootish Ralph and Bob. His Cantankerosity is his own.

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OK! OK! I’m aging (dammit)

 Posted by at 08:00  Plain 'ol Cantankerous, rants
Oct 202010
 

**If you missed Bob’s debut here at the coots check it out here.  If you wan’t to read some sage wisdom about simple living check out his great blog at JuicyMaters.com.  Thanks for another great article Bob, you are most definitely now one of us Coots**

Sheesh!  Lately it seems that this is Old Cantankerous Coots instead of Cantankerous Old Coots.  Ol’ Ralph over there concentrates on retirement over there at his blog, and then links us to other bloggers who talk about retirement, some very active retirement but retirement just the same, and I just sit here, fat and happy, making those funny raspberry noises…phlettttt…

I’ve done my best to ignore the aging issue, and some health problems have conspired to help me do so.   After all, I can blame my inability to thru-hike the Appalachian Trail on diabetes based foot problems, NOT on the aging process.  My lack of endurance I can lay at the feet of my own stupidity, smoking induced COPD, NOT on the aging process.  Same thing with my lack of strength.  A couple of years ago I decided that my shrink in rehab didn’t know what he was talking about, that I could have a drink, just one little itty bitty drink before dinner, and not go back to the half gallon of gin a day I had indulged in for a few years before going to rehab.  Eight months later I found myself in the ICU almost dead from malnutrition and a badly damaged liver.  See?  My lack of strength is due to the booze, NOT the aging process.

This morning though, I got slapped in the face with the cold dead fish of reality.  Oddly, it was not a physical limitation that woke me up, but a mental unwillingness to do what I used to do.

A little you need to know about me so this make sense.  Either I am Oscar Madison or Oscar Madison is me.  I purchased my housekeeping skills at Oscar Madison R Us.  My philosophy tends toward, “Wash the dishes?  Why?  There are still clean dishes to use…”

Combined with that has always been a college kid’s nonchalance toward left over food storage.

OK…  With that background, I ordered a pizza last night.  Not a personal pan size pizza, not even a large pizza, but a super sized great big humongous pizza.  After all, the difference in price between a small pizza and a ginormous pizza these days is about 37¢, and (college kid thinking here) the leftovers would make  a fantastic breakfast this morning, right?

Well, I got up this morning, fixed my coffee, and felt my stomach say “feed me, feed me”.  I walked into the kitchen, saw the pizza box on the counter (where any college kid would have left it), and started to eat the remainder for breakfast.

“Started to” is the operative phrase here.

Shit!  Maybe I am getting old(er).

Bob@HayleStorm Interactive

Bob comes to us with a skeptical attitude and a full cup of Cantankerousness. He also writes about homesteading and yurts over at JuicyMaters.com and rants about politics at Common-Sense-Conversation.com Most of the time, though, you'll find him at HayleStorm.net, cranking out great websites for clients OR writing tutorials teaching them to build their own sites.

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On Being Cantankerous and Piratical

 Posted by at 12:38  Coot Law, Plain 'ol Cantankerous, Up With
Sep 172010
 
International Talk Like a Pirate Day
Image via Wikipedia

If you start thinking about pirates what comes to mind?  Those fools in Somalia that may be effective but ultimately are hunted by every Navy in the world including the British, French and the Good Old USA and then shot with pinpoint accuracy in high seas by the greatest fighting force the world has ever known?  Or do you think (as you should) about the so called Golden Age of Pirates, that time between 1650 and 1750 when pirates and privateers ravaged the Spanish fleets, all for gold stolen from the indigenous peoples of America.

That era holds a romance and fascination for this Coot that is for sure.  That is why this weekend will be so fun.  Today is my birthday as Ralph has so pointed out on Wednesday in this post, but contrary to his opinion the big celebration this weekend is for International Talk Like a Pirate Day!  If you have never heard of TLAPD, now is the time to amend your ways.  It is a day to celebrate pirates, and most things pirate.

Look at it this way, Pirates really were bad people.  Rape Pillage and Plunder was their Modus Operandi and stealling other peoples ships is not very nice.  But then again it was the Spanish….but I digress.  Many pirates were larger than life characters with reputations that would never hold up today with a quick google search and the AP following their every move on sattelite.  But over 300 years ago stories were spun and fear grew from the exploits of a few men.

Fast forward to a time where these stories are all that is left.  A time when Hollywood was just getting started and needed stories to capture imaginations.  Stars were born and pirates were movie stars.  See the Sea Hawk or Captain Blood with Errol Flynn, they are still great adventures.  Walt Disney loved pirates so much he made a whole ride dedicated to them.  And then came Treasure Island.  A movie based on Robert Louis Stevenson‘s book (go read it if you have not, it is great and the movie barely does it justice) that truly defined an imaginary world of pirates that we have all fallen in love with.

It was Robert Newton who played Long John Silver that has perpetuated much of how we think pirates were in the past.  They may have been nothing like that but here we are now and pirates are cool.  Look at the success Disney had with the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, movies based on a freaking amusement park ride!  People love them so much they had to modify the ride to fit the movie that was based on the ride!

But that brief and only partially accurate history brings us to two guys who had a screw loose and decided not to tighten it but to talk like pirates on an international holiday.  John “ol Chumbucket” Baur and Mark “Capn Slappy” Summers created this fantastic lunacy and I have been celebrating faithfully for 5 years now.

Here is your assignment for this weekend.  Go watch a pirate movie.  Wear something black and Talk like a Pirate on Sunday!  It is a bunch of fun.  There are phrases and helpful hints over on the pirate guys website http://talklikeapirate.com.  Spend some time there, download some songs, especially Tom Smith’s talk like a pirate day anthem.  Oh and use this google address: http://www.google.com/webhp?hl=xx-pirate&q=&oe=UTF-8&tab=dw it will make google speak pirate at you…it’s pretty cool.

Be a pirate this weekend, you can be truly Cantankerous as a saltly sea dog!  Now I just have to figure out how to teach Sunday School in Pirate….

-Justin

Justin

Justin is the young Coot with a Cantankerous Soul who continues to be educated by older, more cootish Ralph and Bob. His Cantankerosity is his own.

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