Don’t you just hate GRAY areas?  I do.  I want things to be concrete , black and white, absolute. Especially when it comes to my health.

Well, we all know that, more times than not, that just isn’t the case.

My father and my paternal grandfather both died from heart attacks. They both had high blood pressure, and they both had elevated resting pulse rates. So, I have been very diligent about my heart health, and my wonderful Dr. Kristin Gildersleeve watches over me and always gives me great medical care and sound advice.

However, According to some medical site that I discovered on the internet, in order to get my pulse rate target numbers for my daily half-hour cardio workout, I should take my age and subtract it from 220. Then multiply the difference by 0.60 to get my minimum desired heart rate, and multiply it by 0.80 to get my maximum desired heart rate.

Well, I’m 57 years old. So 220 – 57 = 163.  163 x .60 = 97.8 and 163 x .80 = 130.4

Therefore, according to this formula, minimum heart rate while doing my cardio work is 98. 

98?

Hell! Farting and thinking hard gets my pulse up to 98! How much of workout is that?

So, rather than follow the stupid, concrete, one-size-fits-all solution,  I try to keep my pulse between 120 and 140 for thirty minutes, just like Kristin told me to do way back when. (And, for those of you who are worried about my family heart history, my resting pulse rate is 62, and my blood pressure taken in Kristin’s office two weeks ago was 114/68.)

***

Remember when carafes used to be called coffee pots? I do. I guess that the change came about when the price of coffee soared a few years back. I mean, who the hell wants to pour liquid gold into something called a “pot”? “Carafe” sounds so much more classy, doesn’t it?

Anyway, I really hate Mr. Coffee carafes.

Seriously. I really do.

You’d think that a company that makes its money from people who LOVE coffee could design a container that wouldn’t spill all over hell and creation whenever you try to pour the coffee into a cup.

EVERY SINGLE TIME that I try to pour coffee from a Mr. Coffee carafe, no matter how slowly and carefully I do it, I end up making a puddle of the hot liquid on the counter or the kitchen floor.  I’ve resigned myself to only pouring coffee when I am directly over the kitchen sink.

Am I the only one that this happens to?

It’s aggravating.

***

Do people REALLY think that those pictures of sunrises, mountains, dolphins and tigers on the scatter rugs that you see at flea markets and Dollar Stores are beautiful?

REALLY?

Don’t you think that those electric blues and mustard yellows are just a bit much? If they’re beautiful, they’re beautiful in the same way that Elvis-On-Velvet paintings are beautiful…Get my drift?

***

Remember when guys used to have belt buckles with their names on them? I never had one, and I never wanted one, but a lot of people did have them and Iiked them. And, apparently, there are a lot of folks who still like them. (You know – Wal-Mart shoppers who adorn their living rooms with Elvis-On-Velvet paintings, think that Sarah Palin is a political genius, and really believe that Bristol Palin can dance.) However, there are some folks who just shouldn’t wear such buckles.

Case in point?

I saw an old codger walking down the street here in Palmetto, Florida yesterday.  He was trudging along the sidewalk in his plaid, short sleeve sports shirt, his polished, white tennis shoes, and his dark, neatly pressed dress pants that were being held up by a belt that had a buckle with his name it.  Right there, in plain sight on a public thoroughfare, emblazoned in two-inch, shiny steel letters resting midway between his navel and his crotch was what I assumed (and HOPED) was his name - DICK.

It was either his name, or else he was an aging gigolo who was advertizing his services.

As I passed him, I could help but think that all that was missing on the buckle was an arrow pointing downward.

***

Does it bug anybody else when they hear the word “often” pronounced with the “t” – “ofTen.” Sorry, the proper pronunciation is “offen.” The T is silent.

***

Don’t you just hate smoke alarms? I do. They make me feel so stupid.

I know. I know. They’re supposed to be lifesavers and all of that, but I hate it when the little bastards start screaming bloody murder when I burn something in the kitchen and I can’t shut them off!

Mary Ellen and I were skiing the other weekend in Vermont, and we booked a room in a hotel on the mountain.  At lunchtime, I was starving, and we had brought some venison hot dogs that were given to us by one of our hunter sons. (Sorry, all of you vegans out there, but they are delicious!)

Anyhow, whenever I cook, I always turn the stove burners on high to get the task done in a hurry, especially when I’m hungry. This lunchtime was no exception. I cranked the burner on high and threw the meat into the pan. Not three minutes later, the smoke alarm went off with its ear-piercing, chest-thumping, other-worldly screech.  And, to be perfectly honest with you, there was only a moderate smoke plume in the room! Nothing to get all hot and bothered about, by any means! But Sweet Jesus! The way the damned thing was carrying on, you’d think I was burning Norwegian wood furniture in the middle of the living room!

I opened the door that led out to the deck hoping that the folks in and around the pool that was just thirty feet away wouldn’t hear it and look over in my direction, embarrassing the bejesus out of me.

I then planted a kitchen chair directly under the offending little bastard disk that was hanging from the ceiling, and I began waving towels around in a vain attempt to disperse the really paltry little excuse of a smoke cloud.

When the infernal machine finally stopped its ridiculous caterwauling, I again looked out the open door leading to the deck and the pool beyond.  Nobody was looking in my direction. Nobody noticed.

The perfect crime!

So, just as I was beginning to feel that things under control,  the front door to the apartment suddenly burst open and in charged the Calvary! A man dressed in blue maintenance overalls rushed into the apartment armed with a fire extinguisher that was cocked and ready.  “What’s going on?” he shouted as he ran into the middle of the room, his frantic eyes darting about in all directions. “Everybody all right? Just remain calm! Just stay calm!”

Jesus Christ, I thought as I climbed down from the chair, Barney Fife is alive and well and living in Killington, Vermont!

I looked out the deck door now and all of those folks who had ignored The Smoke Alarm From Hell were peering into my room with bemused expressions on their faces and eyes as big as quarters, thanks to the boisterous antics of this Keystone Cop.

“Relax, Mortimer,” I soothed. “Nothing to get excited about.”

“What’s going on here?” he demanded, the blood still pumping through his temples like Amazonian flood waters.

“It’s just my husband’s cooking,” Mary Ellen said, unable to resist a dig at my culinary abilities.

“Cooking?” Barney repeated, obviously greatly disappointed that he hadn’t rushed into a blazing inferno where people were running around screaming with their flesh on fire and throwing themselves off the deck and into the pool in utter panic.

“Lunch,” I stated flatly. “Hot dogs.”

“Hot dogs?” he asked, deflated and uncocking the trigger of his trusty fire extinguisher.

“Uh-huh,” I answered. “Want one?”

“No,” he replied with shoulders slumping, barely able to hide his disappointment.

“Really?” I asked.  “They’re good! Venison.”

He looked at me like I had two heads. Then he simply shook his head and said quietly, “No. No hot dogs. Thanks.”

Then he trudged dejectedly to the front door. As he exited into the hallway with his extinguisher dragging dejectedly behind him, he turned and looked back at me. Wagging a warning finger in my direction, he warned, “Be careful!”

I saluted and reassured him that I would.

When he had closed the door behind him, Mary Ellen and I sat down and ate our hot dogs.

Delicious.

The next day, we had hot dogs left over, so I cooked up a couple for lunch one again…this time I boiled them. Not nearly as good, but a LOT less eventful.