445: Coffee with Mom—They Had Their Way with My Right Hip

A cup of coffee with my, with my mom.

It's like you've never done this before, right?

That was a maniacal laugh. I thought so.
Is there any other kind, really?

Yeah, I think there are a lot of different kinds.

If you were an alien here on the planet trying to make sense of the species and you heard a laugh, any laugh, any kind of laugh from any person in any circumstance, you would conclude they were having some kind of failure, right?

I mean, I mean, you don't think aliens have a sense of humor? You don't think they have that same sort of thing? Legal ones, sure.

You can't leave that. You've just got an eye roll.
You cannot see that.

I'm sure illegal aliens have a sense of humor as well. I've just never seen them laughing at anything, and I'm surrounded by them.
Well, I guess they don't have much to laugh at these days.

I think it depends on the state. Out here in California,

you know,

I don't like the way this is starting at all. So here we all are, ready to start the podcast.

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Hi, mom. Hi, Mike.
How you doing, huh? I'm fine. You look lovely today.

I put my little necklace on.

It's nice.

Chuck, I see you went with sort of a luau kind of thing. Yeah, yeah, man.
I'm just, I'm getting ready for, you know, my pseudo-vacation in a few days. Oh, you're going back east, right?

You're doing the thing we first discussed, the news we initially broke on this podcast regarding your ass and pellets.

Yes, thanks for bringing it up. Yeah, there'll be more of that.

The lady who puts them in me will be be there as well. Yes.

And then I'm going to spend my vacation at the beach with a sore butt.

Just so people understand, maybe there's some new listeners and they've got an image in their mind and it's not really accurate.

So just very briefly, just explain to people what the pellets, your ass,

and this trip all.

signify.

Well, I am taking testosterone therapy, a hormone therapy, which is basically just

they jam testosterone pellets under my skin in my buttocks.

And they slowly dissolve and provide me with the tea that I need to lift heavy objects and curse at people while I drive here in L.A. And remain vigorous and engaged and vital in all things.
Yes.

Yeah, I think we've said enough.

Good. I think so too.
The sound in the background, it's my mother's computer, which obviously is on its last legs. We're minutes away from an explosion.
Mom, I wish you well in the aftermath.

Do you want me to get some more ice? I have ice pads under it so that it's not hot.

It doesn't feel hot. If those aren't working, that's, I don't think more is going to

make it. Well, it sounds like it's...

I think she's just backing away from it. Well, you said it might explode.
Oh, that's not bad. Yeah, keep going, Mom.
Get in the other room. How How old is that thing? You know what?

It's because it's backing away from the microphone.

Yeah. Yeah.

Oh, you already knew that. That actually helps.
Yeah, that's much better.

How old is your computer? It's about

five years old, maybe. Maybe four.
So that means seven. Usually people misjudge by two years.
Oh, really? That's a well-known fact. I really am attached to my computer.
I would hate to see it go.

Well, I mean, it happens all the time, you know. Well, I know, but, you know, there is a bit of a learning curve for a new computer, and some of your apps don't work right away.

Something has to be done to them. Well, you don't have to get rid of this computer just because you get a new one.

You could use the new computer strictly for coffees with mom.

Wow. But I bet you're going to want to use it all the time because it'll be better.
Yeah.

Please, if you're going to sell that to my dad, please have some sort of recording device going so we can get his reaction to the notion of a dedicated computer that's used once a month.

I just want to see his head slowly, you know, explode like the very computer we're talking about. I would love to replace his computer.
It is a dinosaur. He's had it for years.

I won't say the brand because they might be your sponsor.

Why? No, we don't have any computer sponsors. Oh, it's called an Acer.

And I'm sure it was very nice when it was new, but it's kind of old.

And Dad really doesn't know his way around it. And I can't help him because I don't understand it either.
An Acer? What the?

What is an Acer? Have you even heard of that, Chuck? Well, yeah, it's one higher than a Kinger and two higher than a Queener, at least at my poker game. Yeah, A-C-E-R.

Oh, and it's a big one. I'm sure.
I'm sure. I mean, you're on a Mac.
I'm on a Mac. Chuck, are you on a Mac? Yes, sir.
I know. And I tell him he should be on a Mac.

And when I got this new computer, I wanted to give him my old Mac

because, you know, they can talk to each other and

it talks to my phone.

But, you know, when you're 92, it's hard to learn something old. I mean, something new.

You know it's probably hard to learn either.

Well I said 92 and really and just went to old but really it's difficult to learn something new.

It means reading pamphlets and stuff.

It's the worst. It's the absolute worst.
It really is. Oh before I forget the other day I went on your website and I heard you sing the national anthem and it was really so nice.

You know that's one of my pet peeves hearing people stylize the national anthem and you hardly recognize it.

It seems like almost a sacrilege.

You know, I wasn't looking for like easy likes or, you know, cheap praise, but wow, the response to that, so many people

are so similarly annoyed. with the way the Star-Spangled Banner has become just totally performative.

When I, you know, once upon a time, I remember going to baseball games with Nana and you, and, I mean, everybody around us was singing it. It used to be participatory.
Yep.

And somehow or another, it's become totally performative to the point where even if you wanted to sing along, I mean, it's challenging enough. The song is rangy as hell.

And it's hard for people, especially when nobody around you is singing, to be the only one standing there singing. But the performers don't encourage participation at all.

It just struck me as a shame. So yeah, thank you, Mom.
Yeah.

And the reason I went on to see it, I had forgot, I had been really busy, and we were having dinner with friends, and both of them, and they both happened to be former barbershop participants.

They had seen me.

And one of them said, oh, I was so happy to hear Mike say that. People need to know how to sing the national anthem and how not to sing it.

Did you tell me that somebody was in Denver at like the international barbershop event? Oh, yeah. And they played it? Yes.
Kepi.

She loves barbershop. She's been a sweet Adeliner her whole adult life.
She has traveled to all of the performances.

She's gone to Hawaii. She's gone.
Oh, she's traveled internationally. She just loves it.

She said that,

so what she does is she subscribes to something so that she's able to stream all of the competitions. Oh, right.

And she went to one virtually out in Denver and she said, oh, and they played Mike.

She loved it because she knew. They played me singing the national anthem from the lake house where I just was.

Well, I didn't see it, but she just said singing the national anthem. Is that where you filmed it at the lake house? Yeah.
Oh. Yeah.

And you did that on the 4th of July. I did, yeah.
Yeah, actually, I think I did it the day before.

I was up there around Tahoe. Fallen Leaf Lake is the place where we go.
Yeah, I wanted to post something, and I just thought, well, why not, you know?

I I wonder if I can do it in under a minute. And as it turns out, yeah.

And it didn't seem rushed.

It didn't feel rushed.

I remember years ago, Rosie O'Donnell came. Oh, Lord, where was she? Was she in Baltimore? She was at a ball game, and she did the national anthem.
And at the end of it, remember what she did?

She like gave it the finger to like flipped off the crowd or something. Oh, she grabbed her crotch.
Oh, that's right, yeah. I think you're conflating Rosie O'Donnell with Roseanne Barr.

Roseanne Barr is the one who did that. She spit and she grabbed a crotch.
She thought she was just pretending to be a baseball player because they do that a lot. Who's Rosie O'Donnell?

Rosie O'Donnell used to be on The View, and now she lives in Ireland because Trump is president, but she still weighs in on everything Trump does for what Ireland, so it's not helpful.

And she's a well-known crotch grabber. And I'm sorry about that, Rosie O'Donnell.
I hope you're not listening to this. It was Rosie.
Oh, I'm sure she is.

I'm sure Rosie O'Donnell O'Donnell hangs on to every word of the way I heard it. She might.
You'd be surprised who listens. When she's not spitting and grabbing herself, she's hanging on to.
No,

again, you're conflating Rosie O'Donnell with Roseanne Barr. I don't think I am.

I think it's

I'm living in a world where more than one Roseanne has the ability to grab their crotch and spit.

You know,

I wonder if Rosie's name is Roseanne. What do you think?

I don't know. But I know at O'Donnell, it does make sense she would go back to Ireland.
Anybody who's that disaffected, you know, would go back, I would think, to their homeland.

Where would you go, Mom? I'm pretty sure she was born in America. I guess she was too, but O'Donnell is pretty Irish, you have to admit.
Sounds it, yeah.

I think so.

And I wanted to thank you for sending me

that

link

just before we went on. I had time to listen to Samuel Barber's Adagio for Strings.

Oh, man. But it wasn't, it was a choral group, strictly vocal.
There was no accompaniment. It was so beautiful.
I stopped my rock. I was out for a walk this morning, Chuck, and,

you know, just doom scrolling as you do. And I came across a recording, a recent recording, of Samuel Barber's Adagio for Strings.
Or

agnes day i think it was originally called anus day uh

can you hum a few bars so we could recognize it

oh so slow and so

remember the end of platoon when oh yes oh okay so he's got his arms in the area

right that's barber so the the first time i heard a dog for strings i was in the opera so it would have been like 1984 and i went went over to somebody's brownstone not far from the lyric, and four members of the orchestra were there.

It was just a little party, but they came armed, you know, two violins, cello, the it was a classic string quartet, and they played that in this brownstone.

And it was

so simple and beautiful, and it made me weep. I wasn't sad at all.

Exactly. It will bring tears.
It's so amazing when music does that. I mean, some songs you cry because they make you so sad, you just can't believe it.
But this doesn't make you sad.

It just somehow coaxes the moisture out of your eyeballs.

It transports you to every

horrible

scene you see on the news. You see children dying in Ukraine.

I mean,

it it does. It takes you to those sad, dark places.
It does me, maybe not you. Well, not entirely.
It is part of it. Obviously, it's evocative of calamity, but it's also just so beautiful.

It's just so beautiful. And years later, I heard it live in DC.
The National Orchestra played it. I just thought, gosh, it just can't get any better than that.

And then I went down a rabbit hole years ago on Spotify, just listening to different versions of it. But this morning, I stumbled across a young choral group who did this in a cathedral somewhere.

And you know what? We'll put the link in the notes just so people can listen to this. It's that good.
And it just made me two things. It made me sit on the curb and listen and

cry a little. And then I sent you a link.
And then I totally forgot about it. Isn't this a crazy world? You can be just absolutely thunderstruck when you're out for a ruck.

You send your dear old mother a link, and then you just, it was an hour ago, and I've already forgotten about it. It's never.
It's so busy, Mike. Yeah, that's true.

You're always multitasking,

which is a good thing.

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You know what I just did?

I just wrote a commercial for Pure Talk.

And the title is called Multitasking.

And it starts, these guys are are basically letting me do virtually anything I want. It's the greatest commercial relationship.

And I told the story of the time I dropped my phone in the toilet at the airport

and picked it up and wiped it off and just kind of went and got on my flight. And what else can you do?

So they've got this new phone that they're introducing, whatever.

And I just thought, oh yeah, that's a good reminder that maybe it's time for people to upgrade their phone because I Googled number of people who drop their phone in toilet every year.

And the estimates are between 19 and 25% of all Americans do this every year.

Millions and millions of people are in the can,

not focused on the job at hand, and the phone gets away from them. It totally happened.
Sometimes it falls out of their pocket, you know,

when they're, you know, arranging things. In the back pocket yeah I can see how that would happen I mean I don't think that would ever happen to me but I might lose my air pods in the toilet

yeah have they ever fallen out of your ears yes they do from time to time and so I try not to walk around with the men I mean I'll I'll sit while I'm exercising and and use it or seated or in bed and do it but I don't walk around normally you may not have the correct little rubber parts.

Yeah, they come in different sizes. You could maybe get a bigger one that would fit.
I don't have any rubber parts. Oh, yeah.
Oh, you got the old school one. Are those acers? Do you have the acer?

Those look like beecers. Those are bees.

I feel like we should be playing a doggio for strings while we do this.

Because they're dying. My computer's dying.
You know what I saw yesterday?

I was on my walk yesterday, and a woman was walking toward me, and she was on the phone and uh she had a dog with her and her airbud fell out and she went to grab it and sort of caught it but it bounced in her hand and then she reached with her other hand and then basically she starts juggling this thing and she's running toward it and every time she goes to grab it she just knocks it up in the air and this goes on for like five steps and then she eventually just trips and falls on her face in the airbox oh no i mean i know It's not.

Talk about a Dashio for straight. That should have been the soundtrack for it.
It all happened very quick, but I'm sure for her

slow motion.

I would have gone with the Benny Hill theme. Yeah.

Too on the nose.

That's called

Yakity Sacks. Yes, that's right.
Yakety Yakity.

Well, your father's not here at home right now because there is a new club formed and it's the Veterans Club. They've never really had such a thing before, the Veterans Club.

So this is their first meeting at 2 o'clock today. Mom, they're everywhere.
They're called the VFW and they've been around for many years.

This is right here at the home for some people maybe who can't go out.

And I hope he can hear some of what's said.

Maybe he'll sit in a place where, you know, he's close enough that he can hear it. But

I'm going to tell you something you won't believe we have a fairly new resident here he's been here three months

he is 105

he moved into this facility at the age of 105

and let me tell you he's a veteran

he was on Omaha Beach a D-Day no way

yeah

really amazing and when I heard about it, I was down in physical therapy. And there's no gossiping there, but this was such an interesting story that the young man told me that

he was taking care of somebody who was 105.

What kind of therapy were you in the midst of when this is happening?

Oh, I'm having a problem with a little bit of bursitis in my right hip and a little bit of lower right back pain, maybe in the sacrum.

But anyway, so they're going to fix me up. They're really good.
I had bursitis when we first moved here, and

after about 10 or 12 treatments, it went away. I don't know.
It might have gone away anyway, but...

So you're getting a massage, basically, while you're gossiping about this? Oh, my God. This old man?

Oh, Mike. It's more than a massage.
I mean, it's a really good massage. It's still a family show, Mom, so I don't want to hear any happy endings at the beginning here.
No, dear.

I mean, they have to do it right on the skin.

And so I have to lie on my side and reposition my clothes. And

then they do it on the skin, and they massage, and it really feels good. And

they use warm,

it's not oil, but it's a kind of a thin cream, and their hands just glide over it's really i look forward to it the first part of the treatment it's an hour the first part of the treatment is work and i have to do all these exercises leg raises and bridges and

there are names for everything i can't remember what they are and then after that's all over and then i get up and get on the new step and i you know

I'll use the bands and a ball, all those

PT toys. And then comes the good part

I get to lie down and they have their way with my right hip

and it feels pretty good so after that listen to this what kind is this TMI I'm hanging on every word believe me the audience those remaining are riveted mean to create a visual for you don't do that don't go there

all right and then you're face down and your pants left size I'm on my left side Yes, and my pants are lowered, but there's a towel there.

And there's a curtain that goes around so nobody else can see me because there are other

people walking around.

So this is the really interesting. And who is this therapist? I won't tell you his name, but he's.

Dirk Diggler. Actually, three of them.

Dirk Diggler.

Three of them have done this for me. One, two, three.
Four, actually, counting yesterday. But I've had maybe 10.

Yesterday was my 10th treatment. But anyway, okay, and then comes this part.

Have you ever had an EKG where they stick those leads on you? Probably not. Yeah, I've had it.
No, not yet. Chuck has one every morning.
Every morning. That's a good thing.
Rain or shine.

Well, anyway, they stick these big round...

oh, there's a good name for them, but I don't know it. Leads.
Anyway, they're connected to electrical wires.

electrical wire.

And so I've got three of them all around my hip, and they're all stuck there.

And then they put cold pack over that.

Okay, so I'm sitting up at this point. Uh-huh.

And then they turn on the machine and it tingles. It's like

in a good way.

Well,

I do that for like 15 minutes. That timer always goes off too soon.
It is so nice. And they hand me my phone so that I can listen to a doggio for strengths

or something a little more provocative.

I've experienced that before, Peg. I had a cyst in my wrist years ago, and someone suggested acupuncture.

And I didn't have a lot of money at that time. And so I went to a school, an acupuncture school, to let the students work on me.

And of course, they have a teacher who's there the whole time. And they stuck all these needles around in my wrist, my arm, and then in my thigh and my calf down my leg.
And they had it dialed.

And they said, you know, turned the dial and said, you know, can you feel that? And I said, no, no, I don't feel that. Can you feel that? No, no, no.

And they were like, you know, and they're all looking around. Can you feel that? Can you feel that? You know, it just kept going.
I'm like, no, no.

And then all of a sudden, like all of a sudden, it just went boom, and both my arm and my leg went up in the air, up and down, involuntarily, and I couldn't stop it. And they freaked out.

The students were kind of going, like, what, you know, what's going on? And they would start talking. There was a guy who was standing next to me, and these two guys are fighting.

Everybody's Asian but me, and they're speaking in a foreign language. And I go, I go to the guy next to me, I go, What are they saying? And he goes, I don't know, I don't speak Korean.

and then anyway

what happened the instructor came back in and you know and they just pulled the cord and then it just you know and then I was like

what's his name in

Skin Deep

Ritter John Ritter

in that scene and you know where he's got the electrolysis and he's shaking

that was funny that was a Blake Edwards movie

good one skin deep or skin tight something like that I think it was skin deep yeah very funny Great point. It sounds like you were electrocuted, sort of, just to the point of almost.

I couldn't feel it. They kept turning it up and up and up.
And I don't know. I don't think it was working until it got to 11.

And then.

Well, this might be a stretch, but it reminds me of the first time I saw the AccuJack

being used. It's a mechanism in artificial insemination at this place called the Circle X Ranch.

I was hoping that's not what it was about.

Oh,

I remember you talking about it. I swear, it's, I tell the story sometimes, you know, when people hire me to go give speeches and stuff.
You got to loosen them up with a story.

And I don't know if I've told you this, Mom. I'm sure you've heard it.
The one with Hunsuck Commander.

I remember the show.

Hunsucker Command.

Yeah, it was a giant Brahmin bull, and they run that probe into his butt. It's like a foot and a half long.

It looks like a deck of cards about the size.

It's basically a battery that's attached to the back of this probe, and the leads come out of that, and they go into a device in this thing I call the tackle box from Amsterdam, because it's full of lube and all kinds of other

suspicious devices.

Anyway, this cowboy, you get situated underneath the bull with a styrofoam cup, cup and he turns that first knob and a little bit of electricity goes through that vacujack and stimulates the prostate and that bull presents himself and it's stunning and then the second knob of course increases the jolt and that's when

yeah

you know if you're me you're just down there with that styrofoam cup getting yelled at by a cowboy don't spill it mike that's white gold boy

i'm sure peta loved that episode I bet you got a lot of complaints. Oh, my God.
That file never left my boss's desk. We called it the AAA.
It was the Army of Angry Acronyms, and PETA was near the top.

PETA, HSUS,

OSHA,

the EPA. He even got a letter from the FBI once.
Every acronym was offended by Dirty Jobs at some point in time. Anyway, I'm sorry, mom.
You were half naked, lying down

in a sitting position, and some guy with very smooth, slick hands is rubbing your hip and your buttocks.

Right. Well, no, we've gotten past that.

I was wiped off. That was the third 15 minutes of my hour.

Wiped off?

And then the last 15 minutes, well, you know, there's that creamy, oily stuff that they use, and they wipe it off with a towel so that the leads will stick.

The electrode things.

And so I felt it sooner than you did so that I could say, Oh, I feel that you can turn it.

But the thing is, if you stop too soon, you don't feel anything, it tapers off, so that you have to have a little bit of

you have to notice a little bit, otherwise, it doesn't premature voltage. I believe they call that.
I don't believe they do. I don't believe that for a minute.
I don't

dump

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But anyway,

I was talking about that old 105 year ago.

Yes, you're gossiping with your gigolo down there in P.T.

Well, he mentioned him, but he didn't. He said, I can't give you any names.

But he's 105.

That kind of rounded it down to maybe two people

at most. I ask a lot of questions.
He was telling me what he loves about his job.

First of all, he loves the fact that he never has to take anything home with him, like patience

or whatever.

And it has never affected his family life. And the second thing he loves about it is talking with the patients, the clients, the residents.

He said they are so interesting and they have so many good stories. And that's when he told me about this elderly man.

Well,

of course,

I mean, my curiosity was piqued.

So

I found out what the man's name name was

and I called him

because I'm doing another book.

There's so many stories here, good stories. So I'm doing another book and I thought, wouldn't this be a nice story? You know, this 105-year-old veteran who was shot in the neck and still has shrapnel.

It's a good story.

So I called him up and I was really nice.

And, you know, I told him that I was a neighbor and I said that I've written some books and it strikes me that you have a wonderful story and I think it would be a story that people here would love you know would love for me to tell if you would share it with me.

I said how would you feel about that and he said no

unequivocally no.

He said, I've done this so many times.

I've had television interviews, you know, all kinds of people have been curious about my experiences. I've been back to Normandy nine times, he said.

I've been on all kinds of shows and

he said, I'm just tired of talking about it, tell you the truth. And I said, well,

I could come to your apartment and, or we could meet in the cafe and talk over a cup of coffee and and it would be easy. He said, no, no, I've just gotten too old for this now.

You know, it's too much. It's too hard.

So I thanked him for talking with me. And I said, I am your neighbor.
I hope to meet you when we're out and about sometime.

So

next time I went down to PT,

there's this elderly man sitting and talking with one of the therapists. His back is to me.

And she's asking him about, I don't know if it was his previous, his first visit or not but you know they like to get your background physically what you've been through and so forth and I heard him say well I was shot through the neck and I have some shrapnel and I knew right away who he was because he you know he looked old from behind so then they came out to get me so then I walked in

and I stopped walking because I could still hear him talking.

So what he had said to me was

anything you want to know about me you can find on the internet all of those interviews that I've done were televised

and they're all out there

so sure I can get that part but I would love to sit down with him and get his personal story you know did you go online though I did.

I went online and I read everything there was to read about him, but there's not a lot of personal stuff. I would like to know why he's here and what his family thought about what he did.

And did he share all of the horrors of that day, you know, with his family previously?

Because the other story I did about Chick in my other book was so well received. People loved it.

And the fact that when I interviewed him and he shared everything with me, his wife was sitting feet away in another room, but I could see her. She was drinking coffee and listening.

And when I left that day, she said, Peggy,

and Chick was in his 90s. She said, all these years,

he has never, ever told me those stories that he just shared with you.

And she hugged me and she said, thank you.

I'm glad to know that.

I thought, isn't that amazing? All the years they lived together and he had sons and a daughter, never shared those stories with his children or his wife. I'm just wondering if this fellow

is similarly, you know, disposed that he,

but now, of course, he has shared it.

That's the thing that, I mean, that's why I'm chuckling. It's so odd.
Like, I'm doing this thing with

my friend Angela Roberts runs U.S. Money Reserve, and she's very, very interested in veterans.
In fact, they did this whole

series of coins commemorating famous World War II battles. And separate and apart from our relationship, she asked me last year if I would present a set of these coins to a guy named Charles Bird.

who she had read about. He was about to turn 100 years old, and he was one of the guys who went to fight in the Second World War and left high school to do it.
They were that young.

And so he went and he fought and did his time and came home and went to work in the coal mines and did that for 40 or 50 years. Never finished high school.

And so he winds up going back to get his diploma and he graduates with his great-granddaughter or his granddaughter. I don't remember which.

Oh, what a nice story. So my friend Angela sees this and says, we should just go

give him these coins that we make and sell just, you know, just to say thanks. We don't need to make a big deal of it.
And I was like, well, actually, I think we do need to make a deal of it.

I think we should bring cameras and I think we should get to know him. And I think I should.
present him with these coins, you know, and thank him on your behalf.

And so we we did that and we shared the video and everybody loved it. I did it with another guy.
What was his name, Chuck? Saros, George Saros. Oh, yeah, right.

Yeah. And he was at Normandy and he's 101 now.

And so,

you know, hearing this story about a reluctant 105-year-old, it's just so, like, I never think about it.

I think about it in both ways. On the one hand, these men spend their lives with all of this bottled up inside inside and they never talk about it.

And on the other hand, once they start talking about it, we're so desperate to tell their stories and we assume that they're just standing by, eager to have their stories told.

Maybe they're not. You know, I mean,

who's to really say? And so you've got a guy who's 105 living there.

He's your neighbor. He was at Omaha Beach.
That's the first wave. That was.

He was in the second wave. Okay, so...

In one of these interviews, I heard him say that 5,700 and some people were killed.

It's just hard to imagine. I would like to know

how

that experience has impacted the rest of his life.

I mean, I know that's a very broad question, and there are so many different aspects, so many different ways to go with it, but I wonder if he's had any PTSD. I'm sure.
It probably wasn't.

I wonder if he's outlived his family. Exactly, because if he's 105, his children could be 85.
You just never think about that.

I could be his daughter. You probably are.
Oh, there's a nice angle.

Here's an angle.

So what's the plan? You've already embarked on what sounds like an eavesdropping campaign. Do you think it'll progress to full-on stalker

as you attempt to to

gracious for your next big book

he was gracious enough to take my name and my phone number or he said he was taking it maybe he didn't really write it down if I had it to do over again I would use another approach I would just be neighborly you know and I would just be his neighbor here

so uh

so you're familiar with dirty jobs you watch a lot of TV there Oh, you know what? And I thought, I'm not above using Mike. So I said to him,

have you watched much TV?

Good start.

And he said,

no.

I like sports.

If I watch anything, it's sports. So much for dirty jobs.
You didn't do many sporty things on there. No.

I did sing the national anthem at a minor league ball game.

You did?

Took batting practice, yeah, with those guys.

You did it well.

Yeah, and you slid headfirst in the basement,

I did.

And that hurts. Boy, they don't really, you know, you just see, you grow up watching grown men slide in baseball.
You think, oh yeah, look at that.

Yeah, I mean, there's a point where you get where you just shouldn't be throwing yourself headfirst into the dirt. It's very violent.
Exactly.

And we were out there that night. I worried about you.
I also worried about you singing the national anthem a cappello,

but you did well. Thanks.

Yeah, it sounds good.

What is that noise? That's the computer going into its final death rattle.

It sounds what's happening. Oh, there's a machine outside.
Just a noise machine? Oh,

no, they're probably sweeping up the grass or sucking up

leaves.

My windows are all closed. Okay, just curious.
Oh, I guess they just stopped. No, no worries.
Sorry.

Chuck hears everything. I don't know about that, but I hear a lot.

But there are

a lot of old people here. I have a friend who's 101.

I'm sorry about that. Why? She's 101.
She'd be proud of that. She's 101.
And her name is Madeline. And she is the cutest thing you ever saw.
Sharp. I mean, mentally, she is 20.

She is just so sharp. Well, I met her the other day.
She was out for her daily walk, which, and it's very ambitious. She goes through all the neighborhoods.

101.

In fact, I did a post about her.

I happened to be sitting across from an elevator talking with another friend when she came by, and we always always talk when I see her.

After a minute or two, she said, oh, well, I have to go because she has a significant other. She said, and he worries about me when I'm out by myself.
He's worried I'm going to get picked up.

And I said, and rightly so. And then she said, he's only 96

on a cougar. She said, 101.

I said,

Madeline, are you living in sin?

And she said, oh, Peggy, I don't think I would remember how.

You should find, there's an old song. Gosh, I wonder when it was written.
It was probably written 100 years ago called Paddling Madeline Home.

Oh, yeah, I know that. Oh, she likes that song.
She said that's her claim to fame. Yeah.
Yeah.

First, I drift with the tide, then pull for the shore. I hug her and kiss her and paddle some more.
Then I keep paddling Madeline home until I find a spot where we're alone. Oh, she never says no,

so I kiss her and go. Paddling Madeline, sweet, sweet Madeline, paddling Madeline home.
Paddling Madeline.

And it's so sing-songy, but when you really think about it, this is just a metaphor for a slut

really

going out and getting her ashes hauled. I mean, really, so many of those nice old songs.

Oh, she did say I never say no, so that's what makes you think that. She never says no's, so I kiss her and go.
Paddling Madeline's, like, what does paddle and Madeline mean?

Like, I mean, literally, like, I guess you're in a canoe and you're just paddling her home, but it doesn't take a filthy mind

to just take it one click further and realize you're just, it's just the oldest story in the world.

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Mike.

Well, you want to hear going right to the naughty place, Dad and I were finishing brunch on Sunday morning.

And this elderly man

walks past our table and stops at the table in front of us where there are three women sitting.

And he said, how would you ladies like to see my walking stick?

Well,

I couldn't see him at the minute, at the moment.

And I thought, oh my God, that has to be the most clever pickup line ever. How would you like to see my walking stick? Well, apparently they said yes, and he did have one.
I'm sure he did. So

he had one. He had carved it himself.
He makes walking sticks and sells them at the bazaar, at the Christmas Bazaar. Nothing says Christmas like a hand-carved walking stick.

And it was all,

what do you call that? Like twirled. Twirled and nodded, corkshrewed?

Yes.

And it was very attractive. But

you hear a lot of stuff here.

I'm just thinking that panel. I can't get over that.

I'm just thinking, since you invoke Kepi and barbershop and the old songs, it's amazing, Chuck, the stuff we used to sing that would have gotten us immediately canceled today.

Hey, guess what? Course of the Chesapeake was here two weeks ago. No way.
Sang on a Sunday afternoon.

Kevin King

directed.

And remember back in the day when there were like a hundred of you? Yeah. There were 19.

Oh, wow. Just 19.

And there were a couple who looked like maybe they were in their 60s.

And everybody else looked like everybody else here at home. Wow.
They were all elderly. But you know what? They sounded okay.
There were a couple of places where,

and I'm no expert, I could hear wasn't quite right. But for the most part, they sounded pretty good.
Kevin worked so hard to get the best out of those guys. And really, they sang with feeling.

It's a good thing. And the audience loved them.
Well, Kevin had the best teacher. Yeah, he did.
Yes, I know he did. We sang with that chorus back in the 70s and 80s, I guess.

We went back to the early 80s. 79, 78, 79, 80.
Yeah.

Longer than that, actually.

That's where Mike learned to drink beer afterwards. They all went out to a bar somewhere.
Yeah, Johnny.

That's where I learned to drink coffee because that was the only thing they had to drink at the rehearsals was, you know, a big pot of coffee, like no water nothing yeah keep every

keep you awake yeah i think there are probably still some younger men in there i just think they can't come out for sing outs like that you know it was always

like the chorus would do those events year-round and very few

i i didn't participate in most of them because i either had a job or was busy or or whatever but it's an important thing there i know this is an obvious thing to say but when a chorus comes in when a magic act comes in a a piano player comes in,

dancers come in, I mean, that's a big deal, I would think, for the residents.

It is. It's the Sunday entertainment.
We have concerts on Sundays. They're screened.
They don't allow just anybody to come just because they think they can, you know. Old people are easy.

Old people are not easy. They've been around.
They've seen a lot. And as desperate as some of them are to be entertained, they are discriminating.

We've had some excellent entertainment. Actually,

a lot of people would like to come here who are not worthy. You mean in terms of their talent?

Of performance.

Well, I'll tell you, man, Chuck, I don't know if this is on your mind at the moment, but Just to bring all of these elements together, one of the very first times we ever sang in public in a barbershop quartet back when we called ourselves the Clipper 4

yeah was in a nursing home do you remember where it was

no I don't I don't remember where it was wait a minute who were you the four of you it was me Chuck Mike and Bobby you and Chuck Mike Price Bob

oh before you

Yeah before you change shoes yeah we were called the Clipper four I think it might have been like Stella Maris or Stella Maris.

I forgot that. I don't even remember that.
The Clipper 4. We picked the Clipper 4.

You know, we started singing, and then all the older barbershoppers were like, you know, there was a Clipper 4 back in, you know, aught 7 or whatever. So we changed our name.
Yeah, we had no idea.

It's a semi-formal F-O-U-R-M-A-L because we were terribly clever. Yes.
I know it's a rough picture. It's a bad picture.
Heavier picture. Yeah, you put it in one of your books, too.

I'm wearing a powder blue tuxedo.

I bought those secondhand online. Or actually not online out of a catalog.

And tennis shoes makes you wonder who wore them. We just thought anybody anywhere would be delighted to hear us under any circumstances because we were young and just full of confidence.

And we wore red v-neck sweaters and black trousers. Yeah.
And we got a gig in a nursing home for like $20.

And we were standing there singing everything we knew. Does your mother know you're out, Cecilia? Does she know that I'm about to steal you? I don't even, we might have sung Madeline, Madeline Home.

Oh, my God. I thought you were going to say Felia.

So tell me this. Were you any good? In hindsight, no, I doubt it.
We thought we sounded pretty great.

We did come in fifth in the first competition we were in. We won novice quartet.
Oh, yeah, yeah, we did. Yeah, we did.

So you were better than you remember. Well, but

yes.

No, actually. I remember as being tremendous, and I know we weren't.
We were not that. We were not.
But we were just too young to understand that

We were being given a lot of grace by people because we were young.

Had we been all grown up, just bursting out in a song in a restaurant, we probably would have been beaten to death and deservedly so.

But we were young, so it was like, oh, you're like, oh, we hear somebody is having an anniversary.

So of course we would just walk over and say, perhaps you would like to hear us sing when your old wedding ring was new.

And so we would. And they would clap, but I think mostly because they were, you know, awkward and it was weird.
And maybe some people found it delightful. I don't know.

All I know is we sang everything we knew at this nursing. All the time.

And in the front row, they had wheeled a guy in early on, and he was just as old as a person could be. And he was sleeping.
It was difficult to know. He wasn't moving.
His eyes were closed.

There were machines next to him, and there were tubes coming out of the machines and vanishing under his gown, right? So he's connected to things, and

fluids are draining and so forth. And I mean, he's just in a heck of a state.
And he's about,

he's probably four feet in front of us. And we're on a little stage and we're singing to this room full of old people.
And we sang everything we knew. And so for an encore, we sang the song.

that the Course of the Chesapeake closed every meeting with, which was Nearer my God to thee.

And it didn't occur to us until we got about

a bit on the nose, you might say. We're in Evan's waiting room, singing Near My God to Thee, and looking out at these faces, and they're looking up at us.
And it was so clear in my mind that we,

yeah, I mean, we just never should have begun that song, but it got so

unbelievably tragic. I think

in the second verse, it's a solo and Chuck is singing, right? That was you.

Though, like a wanderer, the sun gone down.

And the three of us are behind him, just oohing our different parts.

And I swear to God, mom, right in the middle of a

right at the end of a phrase.

During during a breath, it was, I think it was,

oh my God, nearer my God to thee

right and then we would put our hands on each other's shoulders and then sing and then come in

yeah yeah I mean really sweet in that pause

yeah the old man with the tubes

that had been wheeled in in front of us exploded and there was really no other I mean technically it was a sneeze it was something like this he was like this and he just went,

yeah.

And

his ass came out of the chair. I mean, it was a violent, violent sneeze.
And at that point, we had thought he may have been dead the whole time. We didn't know.
It was a weekend at Bernie's moment.

But the old man erupts. And out of his, I don't know if it was out of his mouth or out of his nose.
Oh, no, it had to be his mouth. It was big.

Yeah, it was something about the size of an oyster, like with its own circulatory system

came flying out of that old man and smacked right into the ground right at chuck's feet and rolled a little bit before it stopped

you know i got my hand on mike's shoulder and we're looking we look at this thing it looked like like the thing an alien that popped out of the guy's belly and then just took off running it just defied imagination everything about it was so stunning to hear him explode and then to see this

thing that looked like an organ fly out of his mouth. And then, of course, he immediately goes right back into whatever.

He's out, you know.

And so now we have about six bars left to sing very quietly. And when you're trying to go, ooh, ooh, ooh, and all you're doing is smiling, you can't even really make it a human sound.

You just more like, ooh,

ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh. So poor Chuck.

So we're like in a semicircle behind him, and Chuck is just out there, like doing this solo in front of all these people with something that could be an organ lying at his feet with his three best buddies behind him laughing as they're trying to sing.

And we finally get to Amen. And it's just, ah,

then we just wave and ran off the stage. I don't know if we got our 20 bucks, but my God.

Well, it sounds like you were worth every dollar.

You know what?

You have to remember that when you say nursing home,

There are different divisions, different levels. Independent living is where we live, and they are

people who are up and about and pretty healthy. This guy was not independent, for sure.

And then there's assisted living, and then there's the care center where they do everything for you, and then there's memory care. So you were probably good enough for somewhere between memory care

and assisted living. Yeah.

And comatos. We were not quite.
I don't think that was the independent crowd.

No, no, I don't think so.

Because

there are expectations

from the independent crowd.

Oh, my, that was a funny story. I'm sorry it wasn't recorded.

I would like to have seen that. What I wouldn't pay not quite to see that.
Oh, yeah. Well, it's not quite the same.

It really is something that's, man maybe the ai will have a way to figure out how to take your memory and turn it into a you know oh that's scary i don't know if i want to do that

i would like to see that and i would like to see when we performed at the um at the lyric theater in baltimore yeah to see if we were any good at all

i was there oh good

You were. Well, of course, I was a little bit, I can't be objective, a little bit biased.

But I thought you guys really did a nice job. And the audience loved you.
Of course, they were probably all family members of the chorus in the audience.

Well, listen, do you remember when your grandfather retired from the county?

Now, for years, he was an electrical contractor in business for himself. And then after he retired, Baltimore County hired him to be an inspector, an electrical inspector.

So I don't know how many years, maybe 10 years he worked for them.

People loved him. And when he retired, this big group got together and had a dinner and party over at, I think it was Papa's restaurant.

Quick sidebar, mom, just so people understand why everybody loved Pop so much. I mean, there were a lot of reasons.
He couldn't have had an enemy. Everybody loved him.

But during that 10-year period, Chuck, he inspected all of the rides on the Midway

for any carnival in Maryland, including the state fair. Right, I remember you did all this, yeah.

He was uncorruptible, unbribable, but it didn't stop the carneys from giving him large stacks of tickets, free tickets to maybe for the rides, yeah.

And so we had

free tickets for any ride on any carnival midway. And that was like in the early days of like right what's a perk that's a perk if you're that guy's grandson that's a perk

and isn't it a shame that all of our children were afraid to go on rides bumper cars were great the only ride the only thing you took advantage of was bumper cars they loved the bumper car oh yeah the day it was called they wanted to just stay on

I don't think they had a roller coaster at the fair

did they No, yeah. They totally had a roller coaster.
That was the name of the business that provided the rides. It was David.
But Peggy, you were telling a story about your dad's retirement, right?

Yes. And so it was at Papa's.
And he didn't know it, but I had arranged ahead of time for you guys to come over. after dinner and entertain and you sang

some really nice music and he really did enjoy it. There's a picture floating around the internet somewhere of that.

Well it's somebody, it's in one of your books and somebody.

Oh yeah.

Oh I probably have it. I guess just scanned it and put it on the internet but yeah you can find that out there.

Yeah.

You weren't dressed up. I mean you had your street clothes on as I recall.

And

but they loved you. Yeah, you were a brother.
Oh there you go.

And nobody exploded in front of us. So it was a big night for us.
Got out with no casualties. I think dad gave you $10 when you

said

we were not extravagant people.

And you looked at it and you said,

that's all right, Dad.

We're okay. This one's on the house.

$2.50 a piece. $2.50 a piece.
Yeah, this is on the house.

You could have in those days, yeah, you could have gotten a hamburger. You could have gotten a hamburger

or a milkshake. Well, you know.
And you turned it down. You couldn't be bought.

No, you couldn't be bought.

I can't believe. Look, we've been on here over an hour.
Yeah, yeah, we should probably let you go. I know you got it.
You know, you're impossible to get a hold of anymore. I know.

I'm always at a meal or getting ready for the meal or on my way to the meal. I can't believe you guys don't weigh 400 pounds.
All you do is eat over there. It's just a movable feast.

Well, we go to dinner at 4 o'clock. We eat at 4 o'clock, and I'll tell you why.

We sleep later than we used to, so we eat brunch, and then we eat dinner. We only eat two meals a day.

That's why we don't weigh 400 pounds. But they're three hours apiece.

I know.

Because

evenings are busy. There are a lot of activities going on in the evenings.
There are games, you know,

shuffleboard and pool and all kinds of card games and table games.

That's the main event, you know.

I just, I mean, it's just, I'm just saying in passing, from my perspective, it's very strange to be at this point in life and getting grief from you my whole life for never calling or not calling enough.

Because you always used to, I'd call you at home and you were always there.

And now I call you and you can never, you just never pick pick up you know you're just always always in the middle of something

because i turn my phone off when i go into the dining room and you know if you're playing cards or another game rummy cube or pinocho or whatever it's rude to have a conversation i could say hi mike i'll call you back later

that's why texting is good to set up a call time

i'm going to call you at 3 30 mom chuck shut that down text in advance if you want to talk to my mother

But listen who's talking,

like the times I've called you. Or drop my dad a note on his Acer.

Head right on.

He's not faithful about opening it. I think he probably would be a little more responsive on another computer.
All right. Well, good luck with your next

masseuse, massage, whatever's going to be happening, and all the electronics being run into your hip.

Okay. Yeah.
Excellent. That's tomorrow.
Chuck, wake up, buddy. I'm awake, man.
I'm just waiting for you to say goodbye. That's all.
All right. Goodbye.

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