This is Day Four of my bout with strept throat. I am taking strong antibiotics, anti-inflammatory drugs, decongestants, and whiskey but recovery is freaking slow. I feel like I have two flaming golf balls in my throat.
I am a reclusive monk when I’m sick. Not a bad habit, actually.
That was a joke. Monk. Habit. Oh forget it. From my bleary-eyed perspective it was funny.
I have only recently come to terms with being a “blogger.” While I undoubtedly “blog” I have always considered myself a writer. But I’ve kind of given up. OK. I’m a blogger.
Since I started blogging, I have pretty much cut back on most other forms of entertainment. TV – no. Books – much less. Magazines – maybe in an airplane.
I also used to love to work on my geneaology. But the last thing I want to do now to relax is spend more time on a computer.
I actually have a fascinating family history. My grandmother’s family was among the orginal Dutch settlers in what is now New York. One relative was named Storm because he was born during a ferocious storm at sea. Another relative was nicknamed The Indian Slayer because he killed 99 Indians to avenge an ambush that wiped out his family. Not sure how I feel about that. I wasn’t there.
I also had a line of vaudeville performers in the family. One danced on roller skates. One charmed snakes. That’s kind of like being working in sales, right? Shirley Temple was one of my direct relatives.
My vaudeville heritage still manifests itself in me in many ways. Ok, here is something you didn’t know about me. I was a carney. A carnival worker.
There is this huge amusement park in Ohio called Cedar Point. I worked there two summers and my first summer I was a weight guesser. Damn good one too. If you do anything 10 hours a day, six days a week you get good at it. It’s that Malcom Gladwell “Blink” sort of thing.
Here is the greatest achievement of my life. One time I guessed a woman’s weight, age, birth month, home town and name. You might ask how? Or perhaps you’ve stopped reading by now. Like me.
Any way, I called upon my finely-honed spidey senses to easily guess her weight, age and birth month but she still wanted that Cedar Point coffee mug. So I said, OK, I’ll guess your hometown. “My hometawn!” she said … with an obvious Pittsburgh accent and indeed … that was her home town.
But wait, I said. I’ll guess your name. By now I had a crowd of more than 200 people watching this performance, She handed over another dollar. Well back in the early 1980s there was a fashion trend where you had a little initial in the bottom-right corner of your over-sized eyeglasses. She had a “B.” It is a little-known fact that every middle-aged woman from Pittsburgh in that era was named Mary, Betty or Viola. So Betty I guessed … and Betty it was. The crowd went wild.
A weight guessing legend was born that day.
Any way, I find it interesting to learn about your roots. My grandfather, a plumber, could never understand why I liked family history. “Why study dead people? Look to the future.”
My grandfather was awesome. So was his brother, Leo who was my hero. Never finished high school. Worked with Einstein. Has a comet named after him too.
What will be named after me? The Mark Schaefer Home for Wayward Bloggers. Or writers as the case may be. Maybe they’ll name that weight-guessing stand after me in Ohio. Hell, that story deserves a plaque of some kind!
OK, I am starting to fade. Now comes the big decision, do I push “publish” on this post? Nawwwww ……
