When youre 47 years old, you sometimes hear a small voice inside you that says: Just because youve reached middle age, that doesnt mean you shouldnt take on new challenges and seek new adventures. You get only one ride on this crazy carousel we call life, and by golly you should make the most of it.
This is the voice of Satan.
I know this because recently, on a mountain in Idaho, I listened to this voice, and as a result my body feels as though it has been used as a trampoline by the Budweiser Clydesdales.
I am currently on an all-painkiller diet. Ill have a black coffee and 250 Advil tablets is a typical breakfast order for me these days.
This is because I went snowboarding.
For those of you who, for whatever reason, such as a will to live, do not participate in downhill winter sports, I should explain that snowboarding is an activity that is popular with people who do not feel that regular skiing is lethal enough.
These are of course young people, fearless people, people with 100 percent synthetic bodies who can hurtle down a mountainside at 50 miles per hour and knock down mature trees with their faces and then spring to their feet and go, Cool.
People like my son. He wanted to try snowboarding, and I thought it would be good to learn with him, because we can no longer ski together.
We have a fundamental difference in technique: He skis via the Downhill Method, in which you ski down the hill; whereas I ski via the Breath-Catching Method, in which you stand sideways on the hill, looking as athletic as possible without actually moving muscles (this could cause you to start sliding down the hill).
If anybody asks if youre OK, you say, Im just catching my breath! in a tone of voice that suggests that at any moment youre going to swoop rapidly down the slope; whereas in fact youre planning to stay right where you are, rigid as a statue, until the spring thaw.
At night, when the Downhillers have all gone home, we Breath-Catchers will still be up there, clinging to the mountainside, chewing on our parkas for sustenance.
So I thought Id take a stab at snowboarding, which is quite different from skiing.
In skiing, you wear a total of two skis, or approximately one per foot, so you can sort of maintain your balance by moving your feet, plus you have poles that you can stab people with if they make fun of you at close range.
Whereas with snowboarding, all you get is one board, which is shaped like a giant tongue depressor and manufactured by the Institute of Extremely Slippery Things. Both of your feet are strapped firmly to this board, so that if you start to fall, you cant stick a foot out and catch yourself. You crash to the ground like a tree and lie there while skiers swoop past and deliberately spray snow on you.
Skiers hate snowboarders. Its a generational thing. Skiers are (and here I am generalizing) middle-aged Republicans wearing designer space suits; snowboarders are defiant young rebels wearing deliberately drab clothing that is baggy enough to cover the snowboarder plus a major appliance. Skiers like to glide down the slopes in a series of graceful arcs; snowboarders like to attack the mountain, slashing, spinning, tumbling, going backward, blasting through snowdrifts, leaping off cliffs, getting their noses pierced in midair, etc.
Skiers view snowboarders as a menace; snowboarders view skiers as Elmer Fudd.
I took my snowboarding lesson in a small group led by a friend of mine named Brad Pearson, who also once talked me into jumping from a tall tree while attached only to a thin rope.
Brad took us up on a slope that offered ideal snow conditions for the novice whos going to fall a lot: Approximately seven flakes of powder on top of an 18-foot-thick base of reinforced concrete.
You could not dent this snow with a jackhammer. (I later learned, however, that you COULD dent it with the back of your head.)
We learned snowboarding via a two step method:
STEP ONE: Watching Brad do something.
STEP TWO: Trying to do it ourselves.
I was pretty good at Step One. The problem with Step Two was that you had to stand up on your snowboard, which turns out to be a violation of at least five important laws of physics.
Id struggle to my feet, and Id be wavering there and then the Physics Police would drop a huge chunk of gravity on me, and WHAM my body would hit the concrete snow, sometimes bouncing as much as a foot.
Keep your knees bent! Brad would yell, helpfully.
Have you noticed that whatever sport youre trying to learn, some earnest person is always telling you to keep your knees bent? As if THAT would solve anything. I wanted to shout back, FORGET MY KNEES! DO SOMETHING ABOUT THESE GRAVITY CHUNKS!
Needless to say my son had no trouble at all. None. In minutes he was cruising happily down the mountain; you could actually see his clothing getting baggier. I, on the other hand, spent most of my time lying on my back, groaning, while space-suited Republicans swooped past and sprayed snow on me.
If I hadnt gotten out of there, theyd have completely covered me; I now realize that the small hills you see on ski slopes are formed around the bodies of 47-year-olds who tried to learn snowboarding.
So I think, when my body heals, Ill go back to skiing. Maybe sometime youll see me out on the slopes, catching my breath. Please throw me some food.
Q: What do the letters D.N.A. stand for?
A: National Dyslexics Association.
Dain bramaged.
Where theres a will…theres a relative.
Q: How do you know that Calista Flockhart (Ally McBeal) doesnt exist?
A: Because the camera adds 10 pounds!
1. Ask them if they are Satan worshippers.2.Be considerate, rearrange their altar so it will look neat.3.Blow out their altar candle if it is still day light. (No need to waste a good candle!)4.Pick up their gems for a closer look.5.Sharpen their dull black-handled knife.6.Witness to them about the true religion.7.Untie the knots in their cord.8.Take hold of their jewelry for a closer look.9.Play card games with their Tarot cards.10.Ask them if they are Satan worshippers.
Before I married my wife, a husband once said, it was nothing but wine, women, and song.
Now that Im her husband, its beer, mama, and TV.
A lecturer teaching medicine was tutoring a class on Observation. He took out a jar of yellow-colored liquid. This, he explained, is urine. To be a doctor, you have to be observant to color, smell, sight, and taste.
After saying this, he dipped his finger into the jar and put it into his mouth. His class watched on in amazement, most, in disgust. But being the good students that they were, the jar was passed, and one by one, they dipped one finger into the jar and then put it into their mouth.
After the last student was done, the lecturer shook his head. If any of you had been observant, you would have noticed that I put my 2nd finger into the jar and my 3rd finger into my mouth.
There were 4 sardars in Mumbai. They decided to start a business. They had a lot of discussions on the type of business and finally decided to start a hotel. They selected the best of locations and cooks and built the hotel. The hotel was inaugrated and was awaiting its first customer. The sardars waited and waited but
nobody turned up. The story was the same the next day. A week passed but nobody turned up.
WHY ? -Bcoz there was a sign at the entrance Visitors not allowed
After the failure of their hotel they decided to start an auto garage. They bought the best of car servicing equipments and soon started the garage. The 4 sardars waited that day for the first car to arrive butno car entered their garage.
WHY ? Bcoz their garage was on the first floor.
After this failure they decided to fall back on the good old taxi driving. They bought a new Premier Padmini running on CNG and began to look for passengers. They drew past Church Gate but nobody hailed their taxi. They went to Nariman point yet nobody hailed their taxi. They drove to Chatrapati Shivaji Terminus, even there nobody hailed their taxi. In desperation they kept on driving all around Mumbai but alas no one hailed their taxi.
WHY ? Bcoz all the four sardars were sitting in the taxi.
All the 4 sardars were very disgusted with their naseeb an decided to push their taxi into the sea at Marine Lines. They started pushing their taxi. They pushed the whole day and were very exhausted but the taxi did not move even an inch. They decided to rest for the night and start the next day. The next day the story repeated itself. The taxi just wouldnt move. They pushed for a whole week but the taxi wouldnt budge.
WHY ? Bcos two sardarjis were pushing from front and two from behind.
From Mark Russels recent special–
Did you know, that just a few years ago, C. Everett Koop was a
3-pack a day man? Thats a lot of condoms!