Don't Feed the Baboons

A friend of mine toured around South Africa with his ex-wife (another story--I'll call her his wife). They visited tourist sights and kept seeing the warning signs: DON'T FEED THE BABOONS.

One of their stops was the Cape of Good Hope. They parked the car and saw the token baboon sign. As they began walking down to the rocky cape, someone started motioning back toward their car yelling, "Baboon!"

Looking back, they saw a baboon opening their car door. He got in and closed the door. He took the cap off a bottle of water and drank from it. My friend and wife ran back to the car, opened the doors, and with time and help, shoo'ed the baboon away. Unfortunately, the baboon left carrying his wife's purse, which held her ID and passport.

The baboon ran up the high rocky cliffs that overlook the Cape. He stopped on a wet outcroping, many feet up, still holding the purse. They and others threw rocks at the baboon. After a while, the baboon left--leaving the purse up on the ledge.

A young European precariously climbed out on the wet rocky ledge and retrieved the purse.

My friend offered him a reward. The man asked who he voted for in the last election. My friend said Kerry. The European would not take the reward.

Tough Love

I helped with the city-wide prostate cancer screening today. For five dollars, men could get a PSA test and the feared digital rectal exam. Screening is important for early detection of prostate cancer; later is probably too late.

Men, for whatever reasons, error on the side of putting off screening forever. But many have significant-others that heavily influence their decision to get screened--like these two women.

A women came up to the signup table holding out five dollars and pulling her husband behind her.

An oriental woman came in with ten dollars in her hand. She was escorting two men who appeared to be her husband and father.

An African-American guy I was manning our prostate cancer information both with told me that they have been frustrated in trying to get black men to get screened. Most have no interest. He said that their new strategy is to aim their sales pitch toward women.

Hell hath no fury...

Blow Hard

During my annual physical, my doctor prescribed a lung capacity test as a base line. The doctor left, and two nurses entered the room with an electronic whizmo which does the test.

One nurse demonstrated how to blow into the tube connected to the whizmo, saying that I would do the same test three times.

Test one. I filled up my lungs and blew and blew into the tube. The nurse looked at the whizmo printout and showed it to the other nurse. They said they had never seen such a result -- so much air and for so long.

Test two. Since I had done well the first time, this excersise had become a contest--like trying to hit the carnival gong in front of one's girl friend. I pumped up my lungs, added another breath, and blew into the tube as hard and as long as I could.

Showing the second nurse the printout, the first nurse said that she had never seen such a result; the meter was pegged.

Test three. I was well prepared, and blew hard into the tube. Nothing registered. We tried the test two more times with no result. The machine was busted. Well, maybe whizmo just had to have it's power turned off and on.

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I know, I know. This story is all about me. But, it is something to brag about my old friends down at the coffee shop.

What Are The Odds?

My daughter Rebecca had given me a my favorite kind of gift--doing something together. More explicitly, something in Denver. What to see? My choice. I deliberated as we drove the sixty miles from Colorado Springs and I finally decided on the Ocean Journey aquarium. But, when we were on the south end of Denver, I changed my mind and we veered to the right to go to the Museum of Nature and Science instead.

As we stood in the admissions line, we saw that the planetarium show started in ten minutes and decided that we could make it if we hussled. We enjoyed the two o'clock planetarium presentation about mysteries of the universe. We then lunched and spent the rest of the afternoon touring the museum. Fun.

We drove back to the Springs. After leaving Rebecca's house, I drove home--about twenty minutes away. Just as I approached the turn to go up the hill to my home, I remembered that my wife Lois would not be home until late, and I decided to turn into Applebee's for a beer.

After walking up to the bar, I met an electrical engineer in town from Boston for a couple of weeks. He worked for Intel. We had a great discussion about engineering things. We also talked about things to do in local area. 

"What have you been doing this weekend?" I asked.

"Well, today I drove up to Denver. Went to the Museum of Nature and Science," he said.

"Wow, I was up there too, with my daughter."

"I enjoyed the planetarium show."

"We saw that; what time were you there," I said.

"Two o'clock."

"Good grief, we were at the same show--and there were only twenty or so people there."

 

What are the odds that I would make last minute decisions to:

*Go the museum rather than the aquarium?

*Go to the next planetarium show?

*Turn into Applebee's rather than go home?

*Talk to a Boston stranger who just happened to decide to drive sixty miles to Denver, go to the same museum, and then just happen in to the same planetarium show?

These were a series of forks in my path that set up this synchroncity happening.

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I know, I know...I only notice the related incidents and overlook the unrelated ones. But there are just enough of these sychronicity incidents in my life to be a bit spooky. If everything has a cause...

Great Expectations

A few weeks ago, my wife Lois and I attended the wedding of our friend Mary's daughter. As we drove to Denver, Lois updated me about  Mary's brother Joey.  Joey, with Down syndrome, had lived with his mother all forty-one years of his life. Recently, the mother of and Joey and Mary turned ill; mom and Joey had to move in with Mary and her husband.

When Joey heard that his niece Rachel was to be married, he insisted that he be the best man. Although Rachel told him she had other plans, Joey would hear nothing of it.

When we arrived at the church we were seated. The procession started; it was lead by the priest and Joey. On the program, Joey was listed in the wedding party with a fancy name for alter boy. In his tuxedo, he stood beaming in front of all the wedding guests. After the Rachel and the groom were married, Joey followed the wedding party down the aisle with the priest. As we left the church, Joey was in the receiving line.

At the reception, Mary told me that Joey was to give a toast.  He had been practicing in front of her for many days. The toasts began. First the wedding party principals and then the father of the bride. Next it was Joey's turn.

Joey went a bit off script; his words were hard to understand--but not his conclusion-- that he loved them both very much. I teared up.

After the dancing began, Joey was active in dancing to "Y.M.C.A., the "Chicken Dance," and "We are Family." Then guys could dance with the bride for a buck or more. Joey was standing in line with money his brother-in-law had given him.

Joey didn't stick out; he just was having fun like everyone else. Impressive, was the support and acceptance that all Joey's family gave him.

When Lois and I left, the party was slowing down, but Joey was still having a great time.

Mary told Lois later that Joey crowed all week about what a great job he did.

Maybe didn't understand that he wasn't the real best man, but there was no doubt that he was the "best man."

The Telegram

Circa 1978

On vacation, a call from home seldom bodes good news. While staying with relatives in Wisconsin, I received a call from my neighbor in Colorado. The Western Union man had just left her a telegram from my father. He said it appeared to be urgent and asked if she could contact me. She read these ten carefully selected words:

WAYLAID BY BRIGANDS I'M OK SEND $250 AMERICAN EXPRESS COPENHAGEN=
DAD=

Great! My father had gone off to Europe for the dream trip of his life -- half cocked, as usual. Now he is in another bind and sends us a cryptic note from somewhere in Europe? A master wordsmith, this was conciseness to a fault.

Brigands? I had to check the dictionary. Thieves! Was he hurt? Where was he? No way to know.

Send $250? I didn't have that kind of money with me -- had to borrow it from my uncle. From the bank office, it was like sending money to outer space.

Not being able call Europe and ask, "How's George?," we just had to wait. We returned to Colorado a week later to find a letter from Dad, postmarked a week before the telegram. Recovering in a Paris hospital, he wrote that a thief had thrown him off a standing train onto the live track side -- but not without a fight from my 67-year-old old man. He suffered a skull fracture, concussion, and broken collarbone. He felt okay; French food stank; and the nuns treated him well. In a few days, he planned to continue on to October Fest and then the Scandinavian countries. 

We didn't know any more until he returned home to Montana and gave us a call. He had to borrow $11 from a stranger at the Calgary airport to finish his odyssey back to Helena.

We learned the most about his travel adventures from a series of columns he wrote for a local newspaper. Dad brought back dozens of fabulous realities. Enough material for many  fascinating stories -- where the reader, like his son, asked: "How could you get yourself into so many stupid situations?"

Dad not only observed crazy fabulous realities, he created them.

Who Cares?

Last night Lois and I attended a basketball game at St. Mary's high school. At one corner of the court, a guy sat at a table that held some electronic equipment. Since the scorekeepers were on the other side of the gym, I had no idea what the guy was doing. So, I asked him.

"What are you up to here?"

"I'm announcing the game for La Junta tonight."

When I was a boy, my father was in the radio business and I went with him on remote broadcasts. I remember that besides the announcer, it took an engineer to set up the equipment, connect it to a special telephone line, and to balance the sound from the microphones.

Back at St. Mary's gym, I noticed a small helical shaped antenna. I asked if the antenna connected to a sound truck.

"No," he said, "it's a cell phone antenna. I use a cell phone connection to broadcast to the station."

"How do you talk to the station if you need to coordinate something?" 

"Just use this cell phone," grabbing the phone on his belt.

"So, you do all of this by cell phone?"

"Yep, except when I don't have cell service, then I have to use a phone line. That's a pain."

He then spent five more minutes telling me all about his life as an announcer and about all of his broadcasting equipment--which would fit in a shoe box.

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For many, this is not much of a fabulous reality, but for an electrical engineer, it is fabulous. I doubt that anyone else in the gym noticed or even cared.