Month: March 2019

Answered Prayers for the Short… for a Price…

I know that people are probably tired of me complaining about being short.

Tough.

“Quit using that as an excuse for being a failure!“

“There’s nothing you can do about it, so complaining about it doesn’t do any good!“

“Don’t focus on the negative, focus on the positive!” (like what… short-people clothes cost the same as regular-people clothes, and Chili’s doesn’t offer an under-average discount on Wednesday nights…)

Besides, there actually is something that can be done about it.

There is a procedure that can be done to increase a human’s height. I am a short human. I would like my height increased. This procedure can add approximately 3″ to a human’s height.

I’m currently 5′ 7″. The average height of a white adult male in the United States is 5′ 9.5″. With the addition of 3″, I would be 5′ 10″. I would be above average. I would be above average in some way for the first time in my life. I want this.

Here are the issues:

  1. The procedure costs about $85,000
  2. The procedure can be done for less (around $16,000)if you can spend a few months in Russia to have it done.
  3. The procedure involved the breaking of leg bones, stretching the bones apart, and letting everything grow back together while stretched. It is a very slow and very painful process.
  4. There is an extensive and painful physical-therapy heavy recovery period.
  5. The whole thing (barring complications and with having to pretty much completely relearn how to walk) could take up to a year or more, so that’s a year without a job or income.

Still… sooo worth it. I would sign-up to do this tomorrow… if I had the money and a job waiting for me after I was all healed-up and tall (actually, more like average, but that works). Giving up a year of my life to feel normal would be priceless… but the price tag is too high. Since insurance doesn’t cover this, who exactly can afford to have this procedure done? I bet a Fortune 500 CEO could afford to have this procedure done. Of course, the average height of a Fortune 500 CEO is close to six-feet tall. These people don’t need to be taller. They are already tall and confident and make enough money to afford the surgery which they do not need.

Meanwhile, here in Smallsville, Shorty McShort Butt doesn’t make enough to afford elevator shoes. It’s like a classic Catch-22. I might have to try stuffing newspaper in my shoes to appear taller so I can get a really good-paying job so I can save up to have the surgery… when I’m 65 and my bones don’t heal anymore…

Are there any millionaires looking to adopt a 49-year-man who is in desperate need of a surgery?

Oh – WAIT! THE POWERBALL IS UP TO $750,000,000 – but if I have the money, I’ll probably no longer need the height. And if I don’t have the money, I need the height.  Everything would just be so much easier had I been born with better DNA…

The Slow, Stinky Death of My Fortress of Solitude…

I have written about my bathroom basement before… back when I used to actually put pictures in my posts via Photobucket because they weren’t out to screw me. The downstairs basement was very special to me.

Every man needs a retreat, a Bat Cave, a Fortress of Solitude, some place just to get away from everyone and everything… and that place needs to be in his house (or “on my property” as the rich and famous would say). The downstairs bathroom is that place for me.

I don’t have a man cave. My garage is not a place I like to spend time. The tree house retreat of my future hasn’t been built yet (because I haven’t won the PowerBall yet). So, the downstairs bathroom is my place to escape.

I get ready for work in the downstairs bathroom. This is where I shower. This is where I shave. This is where I brush my teeth. This is where I sit and think about all of the mistakes I’ve made. This is where I ask God, “Why?” This is my place. Except when it’s not…

Our house is a place that tends to be a gathering place for family. When my family visits, they stay at our house. When the wife’s family visits, they tend to stay at our house. It makes sense for family to stay with us since they are visiting us… I guess. The holidays seem to be a time when our house is constantly invaded (my wife doesn’t like when I use that word… because it’s usually her family that blesses us with their presence) blessed with the visits of family. Even if the family isn’t staying in our house, all of the meals tend to be at our house. Our house isn’t tiny, but when full of family, it doesn’t seem very big. I really don’t like being around a lot of people. I feel claustrophobic. It’s times like the holidays when my retreat in the basement comes in super handy. However, a recent trend has developed at my house. I think this trend has existed for longer than I am aware, but my eyes… and nose… just recently discovered it.

We have two bathrooms upstairs in our house. These are the bathrooms closest to all of the action when family abounds. They are close to the living room, the kitchen, the bedrooms, and the dining room. The downstairs bathroom is close to nothing. The two upstairs bathrooms are in constant use when family is around. Someone almost always seems to be going into or coming out of one of the bathrooms. What I recently noticed is, every once in awhile, one of the male family members disappears. At first, I thought they were maybe getting some fresh air outside or something. I really didn’t think much of it at all.

And then I saw one of them…

It was a nephew or a brother-in-law or someone like that… my memory is slightly foggy… probably PSTD. I had reached my limit of family togetherness and need a take-five. I descended the stairs to the basement and was headed for my retreat when I saw him. He was walking away from the general direction of the downstairs bathroom. I looked at him questioningly, and he got a little smirk on his face.

“Don’t worry,” he said, “I sprayed.”

???!!!???

I hurried past him to my retreat… my Fortress of Solitude… when the smell hit me. The deodorizer I keep in the downstairs bathroom is “Warm Flannel” scent. I have no idea what in the hell “Warm Flannel” is supposed to smell like, but this scent sounds manly enough to be the scent of choice in the downstairs bathroom. What I was smelling at that moment was not “Warm Flannel.” What I was smelling was “Warm Flannel” that had taken an extended vacation in some dude’s colon. The smell was not pleasant, nor was it “warm” in any way.

I was destroyed.

Memories of passing various male family members (Daddy?!?) in the basement on my way to a five-minute break came rushing back. The glances at the floor as they passed me. The half-smiles and smirks and moments of eye-contact avoidance. I thought that maybe they had just been looking around the basement, but I now know what they had been doing.

THEY WERE POOPING!

At the earliest available moment, I pulled the wife aside and quietly exclaimed, “Did you know that all of the guys are using my bathroom to poop?”

“First of all, how do you know that,” she replied. “Second, it’s not your bathroom? And third, better down in the basement than right by the dining room.”

“I know it because I smelled it, it is my bathroom, and the women are pooping up here and it doesn’t stink up the dining room,” I whispered. “The guys can poop up here too.”

Mid-eye-roll, the wife said, “It’s not your bathroom, how many times do I have to tell you that women don’t poop, and it’s not a big deal, so don’t turn this into something it’s not!”

“You do realize that when you smell something,” I continued rapidly, “tiny particles of what you are smelling actually land on receptors in your nose. That’s how smell works! It’s not just air or something, it’s tiny particles… of POOP!”

“Knock it off,” said the wife. “That’s gross and you’re being ridiculous.”

“MY TOOTHBRUSH IS IN THAT ROOM,” I shot back, to which the wife just turned and walked away.

The walk-away was the last we discussed it. There have been numerous family visits since the incident, and I now notice that the male trips to stink up the downstairs bathroom are quite common. We go through a lot of toilet paper and “Warm Flannel” deodorizer during these visits.

I don’t say anything.

I just let the resentment build.

Someday, I will visit the homes of these villainous poopers, and I will save-up a “special delivery” for each and every one of them. For now, I just bide my time… and my toothbrush finds a new home during family visits…