Author: Pat Cashman

I showed up for an afternoon meeting a few weeks ago and immediately apologized. “Sorry I’m late,” I told the other five people sitting around the table. I was 25 minutes late for the 1:30 meeting. I tried to blame Siri.
“No problem,” said the guy who had called the meeting. “It’s actually a 2 o’clock meeting—we just told YOU that it was a 1:30 meeting.” That hurt—but that’s the way it is. I am the late Pat Cashman.

I was born almost three weeks past my due date, and have been trying to catch up ever since. My mom said, “Frankly, by the time you finally showed up, your dad and I had pretty much lost interest. We had a really nice name all picked out for you, but forgot what was by the time you were finally born.”(What a lucky break for me—I found out later the name was Tiffany.)

I was so late in fact, that by the time of my birth I had sideburns.
I began crawling within weeks, was walking at six months, starting skipping at ten months—and then went back to crawling until I started school—late, naturally.

A college psychology professor of mine once spoke about the tendency some people have of always being late. I did not hear the first part of his lecture of course, but by the time I arrived he was saying: “For some, it may be rebellion against authority. If a figure in charge demands that one arrive at a specific time, then being late is a way of demonstrating defiance and independence. “
Yea, that must be it. I love showing up at the Cineplex, paying up to ten bucks—and then missing the first ten minutes of the movie—because I’m a rebel.

In fact, it is likely that serial tardiness has to do with other things—like poor planning, disorganization and an inability to tell time. I never plan to be late. In fact, I am late because I don’t plan.
Indeed, I don’t plan on traffic being backed up, even though it always is. I don’t plan on finding no place to park, even though it always happens. I also don’t plan on running out of gas, getting a flat tire, waiting for a train to pass or a hundred other possibilities. Not a planner, I.

The great baseball player, Stan Musial, was once quoted as saying, “If you’re not 15 minutes early, you’re late.” Pretty good remark, I guess—but baseball players are pretty well regimented in timeliness. In fact, a contemporary of Musial’s was a pitcher named Early Wynn. Now there was a guy was born to be punctual.
Being late is not a funny thing. It leads to stress, can give someone a bad reputation—and keeps you off most Tupperware party invitation lists. (A plus, actually.)

A friend of mine says he has a psychological aversion to sitting even one extra minute in a doctor’s waiting room. So to deal with it, he works at arriving to his appointments at least
ten minutes early—and then uses the time productively. “I now spend the extra minutes worrying about what maladies the doctor will discover,” he says. “By the time of my actual appointment, I’m ready for any possible combination of bad news. It’s great!”

I think for some of us habitual last-minute types it all comes down to poor time estimation. For example, I’ll think I can get from West Seattle to Bellingham in twenty minutes, even though there is no evidence that it has ever been done except by rocket.

So I now will no longer assume how fast I can get somewhere by car. I will think in terms of a horse-drawn carriage—and figure time more accurately.

Many of us also tend to pack too many additional commitments into our schedules—sometimes making us unable to manage any of them. So I am now simply going to set up a 10 am meeting—and nothing else. I’ll no longer also try to squeeze in stops at a doughnut shop, an Arco, a pet store, a florist, an oil change—and a back-waxing.

On the other hand, we who often ‘miss the boat’ can take some solace in the words of a woman named Arlene Lang: “Just being alive should make you late for everything. In case you’ve never noticed, the dead are always on time.” Right on, sister!
Still, I will always be angry at the Sumerian civilization—thousands of years ago—for inventing the mechanism of time keeping itself. Cave people had no such constraints. “Hey, Trog! I will meet you when the sun is straight overhead.” Easy peasy.
Meanwhile, I will work hard at this, albeit belatedly—no longer leaving people in the lurch, no longer burning the toast, no longer returning library books, overdue.

Better wrap this up. This column is four hours past deadline.

Nuts!

After the old man ordered him to get out of the house and land a job, my brother Sean headed down to a nearby grocery store—found the manager—and asked him, “Hey, you guys ain’t got no jobs down here, do ya?”

It wasn’t just his use of a double negative that kept him from being hired that day.

Of course a kid can be forgiven for awkwardness in job-seeking skills—but the truth is it really never gets easier the older we get. It may be why so few 90-year olds are being hired as video game developers. After all, there are few more nerve-rattling, sweat-inducing, heart palpitating ordeals in life than seeking employment.
That’s why this week’s column is being offered: It presents job interviewing tips to anyone trying to get hired: Whether it be at Amazon—or in the Amazon; interviewing at the International Harvester Company—or the International House of Pancakes; trying to get hired at Albertsons—or by Albert’s son.

Here are ten tips that may not get you hired, but may help you from being arrested.

1. Appropriate attire: Unless you are applying to be a lifeguard, it’s best not to show up in swimwear. Men should dress to look professional. This means no ball cap unless you’re applying to be a Seattle Mariner. Women should also dress in business attire, with a dress length in a neutral area somewhere between the hips and the ankles—and a neckline that doesn’t plunge below the clavicle. But regardless of gender—short-shorts, a tank top and flip-flops—are generally not considered suitable. Unless the potential employer specifically requests them.

2. Be on time: Showing up, say, Thursday afternoon—when your appointment was scheduled for Wednesday morning—is bad form and shows poor time management skills.

3. Do not walk in with a beverage in your hand: Arriving while slugging back a coffee—especially a coffee nudge—sends a message to the interviewer. And not a great one. It’s also smart not be clipping your toe-nails, eating a hard-boiled egg, delousing your hair—or gargling. True, there is one known example where a person using a nose-hair trimmer did land a job—but it is rare. Especially surprising since he was using the nose-hair trimmer on the interviewer.

4. Do some research on the company: When the interviewer asks you, “Do you
know what our business is here at Crate and Barrel?”—some basic preparation might make you able to say something better than “I figure you sell crates and barrels, right?”(That particular company seems to sell neither, by the way.)

5. Don’t exaggerate or fabricate things on your resume’: “It says here that you
are the former chairman of Microsoft.” This forces you to admit, “Well, that’s not exactly right. It wasn’t Microsoft. I was actually the farmer chairman of Mike Rowe’s Sauce—a barbecue product. You should try it. It’s pretty damn good!”

6. Always maintain eye contact with the interviewer: Don’t start staring at his or her nose, even if it closely resembles a two-car garage.

7. Do not talk too much: Avoid telling the interviewer your entire life story. “I was born breach. Yet the obstetrician told my parents I was the most beautiful infant ever. I’ve seen the photos. Darned if the doctor wasn’t right! Take a look for yourself.” Also avoid bringing up your ex-wife, your gun collection—or your foot fetish.

8, Ask questions to the interviewer, but ask the right ones:
Inappropriate questions include:
“Have you always had that weird twitch thing going on with your mouth?”
“Does this company seem to notice when office supplies turn up missing?”
“Who do you think God is?”
And, “Have you ever killed a guy?”

9.Don’t badmouth previous employers: My old boss is a shark-nosed, swivel-eared, block-headed idiot! And he calls ME a name-caller!?”
And finally,

10. Turn off your phone: Don’t take or make calls during the job interview unless
it’s an emergency —like a call from your bookie. Believe it or not, some job interviewers find it disrespectful when applicants are texting, checking football scores—or playing “Angry Birds.” So turn off your phone and drop it into your briefcase or purse prior to walking in. Especially if you use the musical ring-tone: “Take This Job and Shove It.”

Many years ago, my pop decided to take my brothers and me to a big, organized Easter egg hunt. Colored eggs had been hidden all over a city park in our small town—including one gold egg. The kid that found it was to receive a fabulous prize—perhaps candy for life. Plus a gift certificate for unlimited orthodontia.
The huge throng of kids, including my brothers and me, were lined up on various starting lines. Everyone was staggered several feet apart so that the littlest kids would get a head start over bigger ones. That meant the youngest kids—say, under a foot high—were placed in front, while the older kids—say, those with beards and tattoos—were placed in the back.

But when the starting whistle was blown, the big kids ferociously bounded past the tiny ones—like sharks elbowing their way through a school of minnows. (If sharks had elbows, the preceding simile would have been brilliant.)

The scene was straight out of “Lord of the Flies.” Kids were crying, rolling, screaming, kicking, wailing and punching—in perfect imitation of their parents.
Finally, in the midst of the throbbing throng, a kid who looked old enough to be working in a liquor store emerged with the gold egg. His was the only face among the hundreds who was smiling.

Afterwards, the proud father of the gold egg-finder told my dad: “Egg hunts are good training for life, you know.”
“How so?” Dad said.

The guy hitched his pants a bit and said, “To succeed in life, you’ve got to outmaneuver
the competition, be tough—and never settle for second best.”

It also helps to have a little insider information—because it was later discovered that
the kid’s dad had been among the committee of parents in charge of hiding the eggs in
the first place.

The resulting scandal was the biggest in our small town since—during a mayoral debate—a candidate sneaked a whoopee cushion onto his opponent’s chair. The candidate defended his actions saying he had gotten tired of his opponent’s constant mudslinging—and had decided to go “toot for tat.”

Eventually, my parents decided that we kids could have just as much fun if we staged an egg hunt in our own yard. Plus, our house sat next to a forest, so there were plenty of hiding places, bushes and cranny-laden stumps nearby.

Our folks would hide a bunch of colored eggs—behind an arborvitae, under a rock or nestled into the lawn—and then cut us loose to find them. The lawn was a particularly perilous place though, since the neighbor’s dog regularly used our yard to do his business. So before actually picking up an egg, it was important to “trust and verify.”
Nobody ever kept a careful accounting of just how many eggs had been hidden in
the yard—so one or two wouldn’t be discovered until the hottest days of August, when we’d run over them with the lawn mower.

The smell would be familiar to anyone with a brimstone collection.

But the Easter I remember best was the one when Dad announced he had a big surprise. We had all returned from church, eaten a breakfast and then were ushered outdoors. There on the lawn was a small cage—and inside were two, long-eared, pink-eyed white bunnies.

“You kids have been wanting a pet,” Dad said. “I thought it’d be nice if you had two
of them.”

Actually, we were hoping for just one dog—but this was a start.
Dad opened the cage door carefully, reached in and pulled out the two rabbits. He sat them on the lawn. Their little noses twitched the way rabbit noses tend to do. Their cute little pink eyes blinked sweetly. Their little rabbit tails wiggled eagerly.

My brothers and I were enthralled. We started tossing around names: “Let’s call
them ‘Twinkie and Blinkie!” I suggested. Another brother offered “Hippy and Hoppy.”
I think even “Eddie and Jack Rabbit” were mentioned.
But “Butch and Sundance ” might have been better, because suddenly, as if shot from a double-barreled cannon—our pets of perhaps two minutes—escaped into the forest.
They were gone for good, despite days of searching.
Now that—better than any egg hunt—is real training for life.

I still remember the moment of the great breakthrough. My son, perhaps five years old, raced into the living room wearing a grin so wide it could have spanned two –and-a-half time zones.

“I can do it!” He announced triumphantly. “I can whistle! Listen, Dad.” He puckered up and let it blow. Sure enough, a distinct whistling noise—not unlike a factory-second teapot—was coming out of his mouth. Euphonious. Sonorous. Symphonious. And other words that sound like an illness.
It had all begun several weeks earlier when he had heard me idly whistling while I was changing the brake pads on my car. OK, that is not true. I do not know how to change brake pads. I’m not even sure what a brake pad is. Let me rewrite that:

It had all begun several weeks earlier when he had d heard me idly whistling while I was
performing brain surgery. That’s when my son became determined to learn how to whistle too. I showed him some moves—but whistling is not something you can pick up casually. It takes practice. Like brain surgery.
I saw an article recently lamenting how old-fashioned and obsolete whistling has become. In fact, practically no one these days—according to the report—whistles anymore. Except for referees. And they tend to do it out of anger, not joy—and only with the help of portable devices hanging around their necks.
But is it true? Is whistling becoming the Dodo bird of body noises?
Well, not entirely. My brother still whistles frequently. At night, after he’s fallen asleep—and mostly through his nose.

When I was a kid, I was constantly digging out my parents’ old collection of music records—and noticed that lots of old songs showcased whistling. It was the hip-hop of the times.

Guys like Bing Crosby seemed to do a lot of it—in between crooning of course. Crosby was the music idol of his time, and so girls swooned mostly over his singing. The whistling thing was sort of an ‘add-on’—like getting a free oil change with the purchase of a Kia.

I remember having several records featuring someone named “Whistling Jack” Smith—who did nothing but that. Even with his limited range, “Whistling Jack” had some hits. You can find him on You Tube.
(Another artist of the time—“Scratching” Larry Muldoon”—had a skin condition and never sold a single disc.)
I also remember a novelty artist of the 1960’s—an older woman named “Mrs. Miller”—who sang covers of popular songs in a spectacularly horrible soprano voice. Yet, in the middle of the song, she switched to a high-pitched whistling solo that was surprisingly solid. The odd—and very strident—performances brought her a measure of fame. Although she was not popular with dogs.

But whistling is not so big in popular music anymore. The only whistling Justin Beiber does is on his way to the bank.

I remember a handyman who used to do work at our house when I was a youngster.
His name was ‘Windy.’ No one ever had to explain how he got his nickname, for the fellow rarely stopped talking. Except to whistle.
He’d replace a drippy water faucet—while whistling a merry tune. Then, he’d rewire a faulty light switch—and still be whistling. Next, he’d turn his attention to a plugged toilet—and keep on whistling. It all seemed to suggest that ‘Windy’ was a man who was very happy with his life. Or slightly off his rocker.
Speaking of that, I remember a movie from long ago called “M.” It starred Peter Lorre as a creepy child murderer—who whistled. He was definitely way off his rocker. After seeing that scary film, it seemed reasonable to be suspicious of anyone who whistled.

Even Whistler’s Mother looks a little off-kilter.

And yet, there were those cute dwarves in “Snow White” who whistled while they worked. Even ‘Grumpy’ went along with the program.

Whether everyday whistling will ever come back into vogue is unknown. (Whether the word ‘vogue’ will ever come back into vogue is another unknown.)

Maybe people are so deeply into i-pods, i-phones and karaoke these days they can find no time or interest in the solitary joys of expelling air through pursed lips anymore.

Still, there is hope.

Every year there is an international whistling competition—a showcase for people who can blow artfully from their lips, tongues and teeth. Like other athletic competitions, there is great drama in watching a brash newcomer—a sort of whistling whirling dervish—come out of nowhere to take the crown.
Perhaps the Babe Ruth of whistlers is a genial fellow named Christopher Ullman. He’s a four-time national and international champ.

Wouldn’t a presidential candidate who did nothing but whistle be refreshing right about now?
Words are not always to be believed. But you can always trust a whistle.

A well-known local personality wrote a book of his memoirs a few years ago. He was an acquaintance of mine, and I delighted in watching him promote his tome with much fanfare, loads of publicity and a bunch of local TV and radio appearances. I was thrilled when I received my copy.

Then I read it.

From nearly the first page came a torrent of misspellings, grammatical missteps and messed up punctuation. The book contained more slips than a lingerie company; more errors than a blindfolded shortstop; more boo boo’s than a ghost convention. (I attended analogy school for a semester.)
When the author of the book finally asked me, “What’d you think?”—I decided to be brutally honest. “It was absolutely terrific,” I stated boldly.
He replied quickly, “You didn’t notice all the mistakes?”
“What mistakes? “ I asked with typical candor.
“Oh, come on,” he said. “You had to notice that there are more slips than a lingerie company; more errors than a—“I cut him off. “Yes, “I admitted. “I did notice one or two.”
He said, “Well, throw that first edition away. I hired a real proofreader this time, so there’s a new version coming out in a couple of weeks—error free.” At least in book publishing, sometimes life does offer do-overs.
But writing a column—such as this one—does not generally afford the same redemption. A faux pas in newspaper print or on-line will live on—uncorrected, unfixed, unforgiven.

Oh sure, the publisher can offer the readers a follow-up apology: “The editors and staff of this paper are sorry that our columnist made a blunder in his writing last week. We are as embarrassed and appalled as you are. In the future, we will try to hire smarter columnists.”
Yes, thanks to more than one reader, I have been made aware of a goof I served up in last week’s column—made especially embarrassing, because I knew better.

In the shameful column, I referred to the great American explorers Meriwether Lewis and William Clark—as Meriwether Lewis and James Clark. (My first three drafts were even worse, variously calling the man Dick, Roy—and Petula Clark.)

It provides little solace to know that typos and flubs happen all the time—even in time-honored and highly popular writings.

A famous example is Daniel Dafoe’s Robinson Crusoe, wherein the hero is said to have had taken off all his clothes, then had swum out to a shipwreck, and then gone “to the bread room and filled my pockets with biscuit.” Since Crusoe was nude, it’s hard to figure out where such pockets might have been located. Perhaps he was both man—and marsupial.

In one of the Harry Potter books, critics point out that two of the main characters are said to be in “a corner of the room”—even though the room was earlier described as “circular.” Still, it seems somewhat picky to quibble about stories where magic wands and flying on sticks is considered normal.

Even Shakespeare apparently screwed up a bit. (I’m talking about William Shakespeare, not James.)

In one famous scene, Hamlet and his dad meet up at precisely midnight. They talk for just a moment or two—and then Dad says he has to leave because the sun is coming up. Time does fly, it seems—especially on the stage.

Speaking of time, there is a clock striking the hour in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar—a play set in Ancient Rome, well before mechanical timepieces were around. Shakespeare probably figured, “Nobody will notice. Besides, this is a play. And who can hear a sundial?”
By the way, did I mention that the first edition of my friend’s mistake-riddled memoir (referred to earlier) is actually selling for very high prices on e-bay right now? Apparently it’s akin to the way certain postage stamps with upside-down images or misprints suddenly become quite valuable because of their rarity.

So if you do have a copy of last week’s erroneous column, hang on to it. It could make you wealthy. You can thank me later.

Meanwhile, from now on, I promise these columns will always uphold the highest standards—including every small detal.
You may count on it.

If you think you’ve never seen a presidential campaign as nasty as this one, you must not be old enough to have voted in the election of 1800.

While today’s republican candidates discuss building border walls, who is the toughest—and the size of their hands, it is not the first time presidential runs have devolved into cage matches. Jumping ugly is as American as America. And that’s been true from the start.

Thomas Jefferson and John Adams were pals and colleagues. They had worked together in the 2nd Continental Congress. They were among the founding fathers of our country. They both liked teriyaki.

In 1796, Adams was elected president—but under the rules of the time, Jefferson as the runner-up, became vice-president. Things seemed hunky-dory—until the election of 1800 came along. That’s when Jefferson decided he would be a better president than the guy he was serving under.

And that’s when Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, hired another writer to pen the following: “John Adams is a hideous hermaphroditical character which has neither the force and firmness of a man, nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman.” Top that, Trump.

Jefferson won the election gong away. Once in office, he brought in explorers Meriwether Lewis and James Clark and told them, “I want you two to go west and discover the towns of Lewiston and Clarkston.”

They did as requested—and also discovered that on one side of the Columbia River, it was OK to pump your own gas. But not on the other.

In 1828, Adams son—John Quincy—announced that his rival, Andrew Jackson, was “too uneducated to be president.”(‘Uneducated’ was John Quincy’s way of saying ‘stupid.’)

Then, J.Q. Adams really got into the mud trough. He hurled all kinds of insults at Jackson’s previously married wife, calling her “prone to open and notorious lewdness.”

Jackson shot back that Adams had sold his wife’s maid as a concubine to the czar of Russia. Jackson also said that Adams used public money to bring lots of gambling equipment into the White House. Adams might have shot back: “You want to bet?”

Jackson won the election—and moved his “open and lewd” wife in to the White House with him.

You might think that Abraham Lincoln—of all people—would be above the fray. Wrong.

He made fun of his rival, Stephen Douglas’s 5 foot 4 inch height. “He is 5 foot nothing in height—and about the same in diameter.”
 Douglas meanwhile called Lincoln a “horrid-looking wretch, sooty and scoundrelly.” He also called Lincoln “hatchet face.” Lincoln must have thought, “I always thought I had more of a pick-axe face. And ‘scoundrelly’ is a word?”

When James Blaine ran against Grover Cleveland in 1884, he made hay with the rumor that Cleveland had fathered a child out of wedlock. Everywhere Cleveland went, there were chants of “Hey, Ma! Where’s my pa?”

Meanwhile, Blaine was dogged with reports that he had some shady dealings with the railroad. Chants of “Hey, Blaine! Where’s my train?” didn’t catch on.

Nonetheless, Blaine was narrowly defeated. Some say he was railroaded.

More recent presidential contests have all had their moments of grisliness. But it should come as no surprise that most all campaigns seem to head for the gutter. After all, the rules of politics are learned early.

In high school, election campaigns can get further down in the dirt than an army of ground hogs. Candidates for student body president are generally wasting their time promising longer recesses and better school lunch food. In my day, it was far more important to get personal—especially about other candidates’ names.

In my grade, Harry Hinds never had a chance. Neither did excellent candidates with the unfortunate last names of Butts, Fink and Stenkamp (Stinky).

I ran briefly for school treasurer, figuring the name Cashman would be a natural vote getter. But then the opposing posters started showing up changing “Pat Cashman” to “Fat Trashcan”—and worse. I was clobbered.

So whatever happens in the ongoing race for U.S. president, it is best to assume that you’ve seen nothing yet. Candidates will continue to make all kinds of unfounded claims—and disparage their opponents whenever possible. After all, it seems to work.

Most of the time.

In my campaign for 8th grade class president, I pointed out that my opponent—Carl McCool—had been caught cheating on his math final. “Is this the kind of person you want leading your class?” I asked.

The results of the election were clear: Yes, they did. McCool was elected in a landslide.

The snitch was turned away.

While watching a new episode of “Better Call Saul” the other night, I recognized a guest actor immediately. Why wouldn’t I? I once gave him a ride to the airport.

More on that later in this column. (In TV news they call this a “tease.”)
Meanwhile, it seems that everybody can lay claim to some brush with celebrity.

My brother insists he’s met several U.S. presidents—among them, Reagan and Clinton. Of course, he doesn’t have any photographic proof of those encounters—but he does have a snapshot where he appears to be eating a hot dog with Calvin Coolidge.
My mother used to regale me with stories of how she used to play tennis with the singer
Andy Williams growing up in Chicago. “He even sang to me one time,” she’d say swooningly. For some reason my dad didn’t much care for the guy.

A catholic friend told me he once got an audience with the Pope. I always wondered about that. I mean, what is an audience with the Pope? An audience could include countless other people, right? By that definition I’ve had “audiences” with every major star and world figure you can think of—all while sitting in a La-Z-Boy using my TV remote.

I once traveled to Chicago to shoot some TV promos with Oprah Winfrey. She was very nice and accommodating—especially for such a big star. But we never kept in touch after that.

There are now TV ads for Weight Watchers featuring Oprah—where she states boldly:
“I love bread!” It is not clear whether she is talking about the baked product made from bleached flour—or the popular 70’s band, “Bread.” Assuming it is the former, she curiously does not offer an opinon on scones, English muffins or bagels.

However if she is referring to the band, I was hoping she would comment on “Bread’s”
woefully poor grammar in songs such as “Baby, Ima Want You”, “It Don’t Matter to Me”—and a lyric from their song called “Diary” where they sing, “I found your diary underneath a tree…and started reading about me.”

True, the word “myself” wouldn’t have rhymed as well with “tree”—but why couldn’t the diary just as easily been discovered on a “shelf?” Or been delivered by an “elf?”

I apologize for the digression.

Early in her Hollywood career, Sally Field was part of a movie shot near my hometown. I don’t remember how it happened, but my dad arranged for me to get into a photo with her. I protested wildly—embarrassed to be the dweeb, even though I clearly was.

I still have the photo somewhere locked in a dusty drawer. It’s a blurry Polaroid, but sure enough, there I am with the two-time Oscar winner—looking like the twitchy, insecure and geeky-looking wretch I was. Sally drew upon her already burgeoning acting skills to look tolerant. As for me, I waited for a trap door to open.
If only it had.

Now about that actor I took to the airport.

Ed Begley, Jr. had come to Seattle to take part in the town’s annual Seafair celebration. Begley’s dad—surprisingly named Ed Begley, Sr.—once won an Academy award. But now, Ed, Jr. was the big deal. He was one of the stars of a hugely popular show in the 1980’s called “St. Elsewhere.”

The show had to do with a teaching hospital in Boston—and Begley’s character was named Dr. Victor Ehrlich. I know that information because I just looked it up. I have never seen the show.

Begley shook some hands, took a few pictures—and then it was time for him to head to the airport for his return to home in L.A.. But his limo never showed up. So someone asked me if I would mind driving him to the airport. I did not.

While driving Begley to the airport I tossed in some small talk. I told him how much I loved his work on “St. Elsewhere”—and how it was among my favorite TV shows.

I laid it on thicker than double cheese at Papa John’s.
Finally, Begley asked me what my favorite storyline was.
I faked an answer.
He finally said, “You’ve never seen the show, have you?”
There was a long quiet.
Then we arrived at the airport.
“Thanks for the ride,” said Begley. He got out, grabbed his luggage and departed.
And now, even though it’s readily available on You Tube, I’ve never seen the show.
But I must say that Begley is terrific on it.

Superman has biceps the size of grapefruit. Me? Kiwis.

Hercules had back muscles as hard as steel. Me? Similar to Jell-O pudding—when
it’s been in the back of the refrigerator for a month, and is mostly just skin.

Tarzan could wrestle an alligator and a lion—simultaneously. Me? Well, maybe. But they would have to be newborns.

When I was a kid, I remember buying a Karate instruction book—thinking I could learn the skills by reading about them. All I got from the book were paper cuts.

The world has changed, but bullies still abound. Yet, nowadays, on one downtown city block near my home, I recently saw no fewer than three different self-defense businesses. One offers a course on Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu; another is for Taekwondo and Kung fu; and yet another teaches Judo and kickboxing.

All have signs in their windows proclaiming: “Bully Proof Your Kid!” That sounds fine—unless bullies also take the same courses.

A tough in my neighborhood used to chase me after school nearly everyday. He would sometimes catch up and pound me. I finally decided that I should start walking home from school with a kid tougher than me. Failing that, I settled for a kid slower than me.

On the back pages of the comic books I read as a kid were advertisements for the most alluring items any boy could hope for. It was all available by mail order: whoopee cushions,
fake dog poo, pocket spy telescopes and joke gum.

Also advertised: joy buzzers, air-powered hover crafts, stink bombs, hot pepper candy and super-hearing devices. I knew a kid who bought a super-hearing device so he could hear his whoopee cushion better.
For teenage boys, the prospect of owning X-ray glasses that could look through girls’
clothes or bathing suits was just too good to be true—and an incredible bargain at only
$1.98!
But nestled among the ads for Sea Monkeys, spy sunglasses and live turtles was perhaps the most tantalizing promise of all—especially for pencil-necks like my pals and me. A man named Charles Atlas proclaimed that a kid could have super muscles, bull-like shoulders and a powerful chest in 7 days. It sounded great—even if it would take an entire week.

I didn’t really notice the smaller print which revealed that Mr. Atlas only promised that a person could start getting “results you can feel” within 7 days. In that vague description anything might be the “results”—from starting to feel sore—to a heat rash.

Still, the ad was intriguing. There was a picture of the mighty Charles Atlas, wearing only a pair of leopard-skin trunks. This was years before PETA existed. Today, those trunks would be corduroy.

The rest of the ad was presented in comic book style. It showed a skinny guy and his girlfriend sitting under an umbrella on the ocean beach. Suddenly, a big bully runs by kicking sand into people’s faces.

When the skinny guy calls the bully on it, he is grabbed and threatened: “Listen here, shrimp,” the bully says, “I’d smash your face…only you’re so skinny you might dry up and blow away.” Never mind that the bully’s remark didn’t make any sort of sense. But, after all, he was a bully, not a logician. He was used to letting his fists do the talking.

As soon as the big lug is out of earshot, the skinny guy declares to his girlfriend: “I’ll show that big bully some day!” But then—get this—his girlfriend says: “Oh, don’t let it bother you, LITTLE boy.” Ouch! That must have hurt more than ten of a bully’s knuckle sandwiches.

But after sending away for the Charles Atlas “Dynamic-Tension” Bodybuilding and Fitness Course, everything changed. In the final panel of the ad, the skinny guy—no longer skinny—is back on the beach again (at least seven days later)—and this time, he punches the big bully right in the chops, while his girlfriend just beams.
Yes, the skinny, geeky guy had now become a muscular, thick-necked stud. Maybe that
worked for him in the short term—but you have to wonder if may have unwittingly blown his future chances of becoming a software billionaire.

Yet, despite the appeal of having big muscles, my friends and I never sent away for the Atlas course. Sure, the idea of being built like Charles Atlas would have been cool, but we already had our money earmarked for other purposes.

And as soon as our X-ray glasses arrived in the mail, we headed straight for the beach.

“One man scorned and covered with scars still strove with his last of courage to reach the unreachable stars; and the world will be better for this.”
—Miguel de Cervantes

Some years ago (my kids figure it was the 1930’s) I hosted a morning radio show. It required getting up very early, driving downtown in the darkest hours of the night—and then pretending to be wide awake and chipper. In truth, most mornings, I wanted to be thrown—wide-awake—into a chipper.

But my radio experience was a distinct privilege—especially in the world of talk radio—where guests and callers always enriched the conversation with amazing stories. Maybe not true stories, but good ones.
One morning, while other serious-minded radio talk hosts were discussing world affairs, domestic policy and city politics, I brought up a different topic question: “Where’d you get that scar?”

The phones lit up like a crowd at Hempfest.

“I fell down a flight of stairs and landed face-first onto the prongs of a garden rake,” said one caller. I thanked the caller and then read a live commercial for a gardening nursery.

“When I was a kid,” said another person, “I was fooling around with my new puppy when he suddenly clamped his jaws onto my nose like a metal clamp. My nose must have looked like a Snausage.” Twenty-five years later, the caller said, his nose still has the scar tissue of a prizefighter. One who usually loses.

Other callers told stories of childhood skateboard mishaps, neighbor kids throwing rocks into faces—and in one amazing tale, slipping on a kitchen floor—and landing headlong onto a red-hot waffle iron. (Perhaps it is why breakfast can be the most dangerous meal of the day.)

Flawless skin, head to toe, is nice to look at. But bodies with scars are far more interesting. My brother Mike has had so many knee surgeries that his legs look like railroad route maps. Yet, he unembarrassedly wears shorts all the time.

Kris Kristofferson said he got some scars from playing baseball and football—but now his wrinkles are starting to hide them.

Kristofferson was a Rhodes scholar—so that must mean that people with scars got them because they’re so smart, right? Not the case with me.

I have a fairly long scar running from the top of my left rib cage to down south about five or six inches. It’s hard to see the scar these days, especially when I’m wearing an overcoat.

It would be a delight to report that my scar came from a wound received from rescuing
a little old lady from a knife-wielding maniac.

Or from an enemy bayonet in armed combat.

Even being slightly gored from a bull-running incident at Pamplona would be vastly superior to the real way I was punctured.

It happened like this: Two friends and I—in our late teen years—had loads of free time on our hands since we were not busy doing charitable work or attending Mensa meetings.

One guy, Eric, had just acquired a used car. Today, he remembers it as maybe an Oldsmobile Rocket 88—a big, heavy car as long a football field.

For reasons that perhaps only a teenage boy can explain, we thought it would be fun for two of us to sit in the parked car—while the third person—me— would crouch in front of the car just below the front grill. Then—to simulate a person being hit by a car—I would suddenly rise up, fling myself onto the hood of the car, and roll around goofily. If that’s not the stupidest gambit ever, it must certainly be in the top five.

What I did not notice in those moments before my performance, was the extremely sharp-pointed hood ornament on the Oldsmobile—shaped like a jet airplane—so when I lurched up and thrust myself onto the car hood, I also impaled myself.

Somehow I pulled myself free and ran to my house. I rushed into a bathroom, applied a big band-aid, and tried to stay conscious. I should have gone to the hospital, but was so embarrassed by the pure stupidity of it all, that I kept it a secret from my parents.

Years later, I finally told my mom. She said, “I’m not surprised. You did a lot of dumb stuff.”

It is often said that it’s the scars in life that define our individual character—that we don’t learn from successes, but from failures—and the scars that come with them.

But whether the scars are on the inside—or out—few of us can get through an entire lifetime without at least one or two. And if you don’t have one by now, you need to go out and get one.
So find yourself an Oldsmobile Rocket 88 with a wicked hood ornament.
Get a scar.

Stretch marks don’t count.