A Bad Day In Paradise
D.V. Aldrich
There are two things I hate in life - war and Elvis Presley look-alikes; other, less serious, problems seem to fall into one of those gray areas, very much like the boredom I’m experiencing right now. I was banished from my bedroom tonight for reasons I don’t understand, and I’ve already spent my inheritance dialing 1-900-PSYCHIC. So, unless I want to play with my wife’s collection of Barbie dolls or harass the cat again, I need to find something else to occupy my time. Perhaps the best thing for me to do is to take a few minutes an reflect on what got me into this mess in the first place.
Last evening my wife and I stopped at a cafe, alongside the Gulf of Mexico, trying to kill about an hour before, hopefully, enjoying a beautiful sunset off one of Florida’s beaches. “Will that be all?” the waiter questioned us in snippy tones after we had ordered only shrimp cocktails and a couple of beers. Speaking politically correct, I’m not financially challenged, but I thought the price of a shrimp cocktail was exorbitant. “Let’s see, six dozen live shrimp for $6.00 at a bait shop vs. one dozen dead shrimp for $8.00 at this restaurant, there’s something wrong with this picture,” I complained to my wife. “We are paying for the atmosphere and the cooking of the shrimp,” she cordially offered. “Okay, I’ll buy that,” I responded, then observed the tattooed biker chick sitting to my left, the cigarette butts on the floor, and our waiter’s look of anger when I requested he bring us the urn since we were obviously paying for the shrimp’s cremation rites.
Well, that was yesterday, and today would be a new day. “Let’s go back over to the beach this morning and grab a few rays,” I suggested to my wife, hoping to make up for the hissy fit I’d thrown last night. “Sounds good to me,” she replied, and we were off to the beach.
We always have a great time at the beach, except for one thing - quarters needed for the stupid parking meters; I never have enough, and today was no exception. Even though I had robbed $3.00 worth of quarters out of my daughter’s lunch money, I don’t think the sun’s rays ever penetrated the sun blocker we were using before we ran out of quarters. Deciding the meter maid probably wouldn’t believe our claim of diplomatic immunity, we packed up our beach supplies and headed home.
“The toll road is bumper to bumper today,” my wife commented after we had been sitting in traffic form some time. While patiently awaiting our turn to donate our share of money to the governor’s swimming pool fund, my only two thoughts were I hoped my license tags wouldn’t expire and prayed my bladder wouldn’t burst before finding relief in my bathroom at home.
Having no change, I offered the tolltaker the sum of my weekly allowance to which he tersely responded, “Do you have anything smaller than a $20.00 bill?” “I have a $15.00 bill from our veterinarian,” I came back with a smirky grin on my face. You know, I’m pretty sure the tolltaker signaled me I was ‘number one’ on his list of favorite people. How kind, I’ll have to send him a Christmas card this year.
After checking my tires and my wife’s yelling out the window, “You’re gonna get arrested for indecent exposure!”, we stopped by the supermarket on our way home.
“Paper or plastic?” the zit-faced bag boy asked. Having stood in the check-out line long enough to determine the cashier’s name tag would still read Anna spelled backwards and hungry enough to enjoy possum noodle soup, I boldly stated, “Forget the paper or plastic crap! Bring us a can opener; we’re going to eat right here!” I really wish I hadn’t made such a rude remark. I just know my wife is not going to cook for a week, and you can bet Anna, the cashier, will make confetti out of my check cashing card the next time I’m in her check-out line.
Okay, so we finally made it home, and I immediately opened the mail. “Look, honey, you’ve won ten million dollars in the magazine sweepstakes,” I joked and tossed Ed McMahon’s personalized, heart gripping letter to her. I have a message for Ed’s cronies should they ever bring a ten million dollar check into my neighborhood, “May the force be with you, the entire police force, that is.”
In hopes of getting my wife in a better mood, I spent the entire afternoon replacing some broken wall tiles in our bathroom, which turned out to be a disaster. I admit there was no excuse for my not warning my wife I had dripped some glue on the toilet seat before she sat down.
I was still alive by nightfall and thought the best thing for me to do was to join my wife in watching a little television. Since there was no dinner served at our house tonight, which I’m hoping is only a temporary problem, I grabbed a few snacks and caught up with her in the living room.
I flipped on the TV and surfed through all the stations, finding only sex and violence on nearly all the programs. “Let’s cut to the chase and cut down on our viewing time,” I suggested, and we began watching the national news.
I’ve noticed my wife goes into some sort of trance whenever Peter Jennings is on television. I wonder if he ever glued his wife to the toilet seat? Anyway, Mr. Goodlooks took a break and I heard the Hollywood reporter say, “More nude photos of Madonna to be released soon.” For whatever reason, I suddenly remembered I hadn’t fed the dog.
“Here we go again,” I thought when I noticed three cans of dog food costs about the same as one hamburger at the fast food joint. You don’t suppose? No, they wouldn’t do that, would they?
Bed time finally arrived, and my last thoughts before retiring for the night were maybe I’m too old fashioned, and maybe I just need to get with the plan. “I can fix that,” I said to myself, thinking I’m not over the hill yet.
I splashed on my best designer fragrance, Old Spice, and, “yo, ho, ho” I jumped into bed. I snuggled up next to my wife and softly whispered into her ear, “Honey, I think you’re so bitchin’. Wanna tread back over to the beach tomorrow and knock the heads off a couple of brewskis?”
As you’ve probably guessed, we won’t be going to the beach tomorrow. I’m going to be spending my time shopping for a convertible sofa. This couch I’m now forced to sleep on leaves a lot to be desired, which is the exact same phrasing my wife uses when describing my attitude since I found out postage rates have gone up. Goodnight.
