Older than dirt

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

By Galloping Grandma

In case you care, I am continuing my journey into Old Ladyland. I will be having a birthday soon and officially will be turning older than dirt.

Actually, I suppose that depends on how old the dirt is where you are — it seems to vary from place to place — around here it seems pretty old. After all, if it has dinosaur parts in it, it’s got to be old.

But anyway, the point is, if I were a monument, they would be having parades to celebrate my oldness.

Nobody wants to look old anymore. I think it is now illegal to look like you’re over 30. Plastic surgery is the answer for a lot of people who think that the ravages of time can be sucked, pounded and blasted away.

If I had a facelift, it would have to be one where they grab your scalp and pull you up from your feet, like a sock.

Back in my hometown of Corn Cob, Iowa, La Wanda Vogelheim finally noticed that she was wrinkling faster than a cheap suit and decided to stem the tide of approaching disaster.

She really liked the puffy lips that all the actresses had, and she felt that her skin was beginning to look like it could stand a repaving job, so she went down to Des Moines and got a laser peel, a lip injection and a lot of other stuff.
As luck would have it, she was allergic to everything and she turned a bright blotchy red. Her lips looked like two hot dog buns floating in ketchup.

She was in hiding for weeks. She still looks odd, but then she always looked odd.
No matter what you do, there comes that terrible day when you get in the car, adjust the rearview mirror and looking up, you see your mother’s face.

No, she’s not in the back seat — it’s you. My only hope is that I will live to see the day when this will happen to my children. It will serve them right and make all this getting old worthwhile.

On a slightly different subject, I see that they have invented a new device for airport security.
It is an X-ray machine that can see right through your clothes, revealing any hidden weapons or bomb-making equipment. Unfortunately, it also reveals a lot of stuff best left unseen, like your shape.

But, really, this is nothing new. When I was in school, we had the same thing. We just called it Mr. Fingle’s eighth grade boys’ shop class.

On warm spring days, they would hang out the windows and try to guess what the girls’ underwear looked like. They could always spot falsies and padded bras.
They didn’t miss a thing. Teachers were exempt from scrutiny because no one cared what their underwear looked like.

I defy any X-ray machine to outdo these boys; they were masters of their craft and before their time.

A note from home: You may remember Margaret, the Krutch family bulldog who likes to eat things.

In my last column, she ate a pink frosted cupcake containing a diamond ring, a Valentine surprise.

Now I hear she ate Hortense, the family turtle, probably thinking she was a cookie or a dog treat. Once again, people were pounding on Margaret and screaming, “Spit it out!” She was so upset that she tossed Hortense up and out.
The turtle had a cracked shell and a headache, but was OK. Poor Margaret had been told she was a bad dog so often that she sat around all sad and hunched over and droop-eyed ... oh, wait: bulldogs look like that anyway, so maybe not.

It is a known fact that if you tell someone he is a bad dog often enough he will believe you and make you sorry you ever brought the subject up. PJH
PERMALINK:
Older than dirt | Planet JH News Article: Galloping Grandma

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