YOUR AROUND TOWN SPONSOR

As I child I often wondered why Grandma smiled all the time. In my later years I figured out why she smiled, because I have the same problem. She couldn’t hear a word they were saying.

Grandma and Grandpa went to church. Halfway through the service, Grandpa leaned over to Grandma and said, “I just let out a silent fart. What do you think I should do?” Grandma leans over and replies, “Put a new battery in your hearing aid.”

My Grandmother had a lot of wise sayings. One day I was in the kitchen with her and she said, “I’ll just give this a lick and a promise,” as she quickly mopped up a spill on the floor without moving the kitchen table and chairs.

“What is that supposed to mean,” I asked, envisioning someone licking the floor. “It means that I’m in a hurry and I’m busy canning tomatoes so I am going to just give it a lick with the mop and promise to come back and do the job right later.”

“A lick and a promise” was just one of the many old phrases that I remember my mother, grandmother, and others, using, that they most likely heard from generations before them. Many old phrases have become obsolete or even totally forgotten.

Below is a list that I have put together over the years:

• I have a bone to pick with you (a grievance to talk out)

• Bee in your bonnet. (focus on one thing)

• Cattywampus (Something that sits crooked such as a of piece furniture sitting at an angle.

• Been through the mill (had a rough time of it)

• Dicker (To barter or trade)

• Hold your horses (Be patient)

• Madder than an old wet hen (Really angry)

• No spring chicken (Not young anymore)

• Persnickety (Overly particular or snobbish)

• Straight from the horse’s mouth (privileged information from the one concerned)

• Kit and caboodle (the whole lot)

As Grandma said, “Hold your horses I reckon I’ll get this whole kit and caboodle done. Please don’t be too persnickety and get a bee in your bonnet because I am tuckered out. You know I ain’t no spring chicken!

And as for me as I write this column, I am going to give it more than just a lick and a promise.

One late afternoon a police car pulled up in front of Grandma’s house, and Grandpa got out. The polite policeman explained that this elderly gentleman said that he was lost in the neighborhood park and could not find his way home. “Pop,” Grandma said, “You’ve been to that park for over thirty years! How could you get lost?” Leaning close to his wife’s ear so that the policeman could not hear, Grandpa whispered, “I wasn’t lost, I was just to tired to walk home.”

Grandma had a missed to a few Sunday sermons so the preacher stopped by her house to visit. As he sat on the couch he noticed a large bowl of peanuts on the coffee table. “Mind if I have few”” he asked.

“No, not at all.” Grandma said.

They talked for a while and as the preacher stood to leave, he realized that instead of eating just a few peanuts, he almost emptied the bowl. “I’m terribly sorry for eating all of your peanuts. I really just meant to eat a few.” The preacher said.

“Oh that’s alright,” Grandma said. “Ever since I lost my teeth, all I can do is suck the chocolate off them.”

A concerned grandpa went to a doctor to talk about his wife. He said to the doctor, “I think my wife is almost deaf because she never hears me the first time and always asks me to repeat things.” “Well,” the doctor replied, “go home and tonight stand about 15 feet from her and say something. If she doesn’t reply, move about five feet closer and say it again. Keep doing this so that we’ll get an idea of her hearing loss.”

Sure enough, the husband went home and did exactly as instructed. He started off about 15 feet from his wife in the kitchen as she was chopping some vegetables and said, “Honey, what’s for dinner?” He heard no response. He moved about five feet closer and asked again. No reply. He moved five feet closer, and still no reply.

He got fed up and moved right behind her, and spoke into her ear, and asked again, “Honey, what’s for dinner?” She replied, “For the fourth time, vegetable stew!”

I’ll leave you with Grandma’s nine important facts as you get older.

• Death is the number 1 killer in the world.

• Good health is merely the slowest possible rate at which one can die.

• Give a person a fish and you feed them for a day. Teach a person to use the Internet and they won’t bother you for weeks, months, maybe years.

• Health nuts are going to feel stupid someday, lying in the hospital, dying of nothing.

• All of us could take a lesson from the weather. It pays no attention to criticism.

• the 60’s people took acid to make the world weird. Now the world is weird, and people take Prozac to make it normal.

• Life is like a jar of jalapeno peppers. What you do today may be a burning issue tomorrow.

And Grandma’s favorite saying: “As you go through life one learns that if you don’t paddle your own canoe, you don’t go anywhere.