I was driving in KC rush hour traffic today, and I saw this old lady, like 70 or 80 or 60 or some shit old, with an oxygen feed running to her nose while she was puffing on a funky, steam roller looking breathable medicine machine pipe ventilation device. She was driving, with a handicap sticker in the window, and had a 7 year old in the car. Looked like the little baby above, but like many decades older. Seriously? I love old people as much as the rest of you all, but, damn. I am all about highway medication, but this is even past what I feel is aceptable. My standards are low. What is this world coming to. I was going to take a picture, but I didn't want the old lady to flip out and have a heart attack, or call the cops on me, cause that would always be bad.
On a similar note, well, at least in a round-about-way, well not really, cause you know why the hell I even noticed that old lady,
"James also revealed he and his teammates smoked marijuana one night after getting access to a hotel room in Akron." Only one? You knew you were in the NBA when you were 16. Only one?
As you may know, I currently live with my grandparents, who have both now crossed the elderly line and started in on their victory laps.
ReplyDeleteI love them dearly and I am terrified to be in a car with them. I've been here almost a year now, and from intensive observation, my sense of being old is that it is like never not being sort of drunk.
My grandparents do all the things I try to avoid when I want not to seem drunk, like weaving around on the road, asking the same questions over and over, and loudly declaiming unfounded opinions about politics and entertainment.
They totally shouldn't drive, but nobody's gonna do all the things they need done for them, and SOMEBODY has to buy MORE MAYONNAISE EVERY DAY and I'm aware that I'm rambling. These are my cool liberal academic grandparents, too, which proves that this can and will happen to every one of us to some extent eventually.
My short term solution is to move back to Winston Salem and listen to loud music and drink liquor in my own place until I am sane again. Long term? Fucked if I know. It seems disrespectful, to me, to suggest that they curtail their (thus-far) harmless daily grocery store trips and occasional jaunts around the immediate southeast to visit their children and surviving friends. But goddamn does it worry me when they're on the road.
i think it is a failure of our society that we allow the elderly to become isolated and desperate enough to risk driving around on their own. you are a good man, ian. you should definitely confiscate their keys if you can.
ReplyDeletei haven't checked the cooler in a while, but i'm pretty sure that my grandma is still drinking wine coolers on roadtrips to casinos. if she knew about the pinilis cocktail, she'd probably be drinking that instead.
ReplyDeleteIsn't the Pinilis Cocktail like a Three-Mile Island Iced Tea, but with Pepsi added? (Three-Mile Island Iced Tea = 1 part Everclear, 2 parts water, Lipton powdered iced tea mix to taste.) Or is it more like a Suicide that's half vodka? I can't remember, but a sip of one made me blind for a couple hours. I think it made me actually fall asleep watching Legend. Either way, there were enough preservatives in it that I still look 22.
ReplyDeletethe key was to use a large taco bell cup for basing measurements....probably a quarter cup of countrytime lemonade powder mix, shit ton of the blue labeled smirnoff vodka, and enough pepsi to make it look dark.
ReplyDeletealso very important to use a knife stolen from the cafeteria to stir.
i've only recently been able to start drinking pepsi again.
oof. my room smelled like that for at least a month after i moved in.
ReplyDeleterecipes for delicious drinks:
The Shampoovy:
one pbr.
one shot vanilla (or hazelnut) flavor syrup.
chug.
The Frosted Gnome:
one cup kombucha, steamed via stem wand.
topped with whipped cream and a dusting of salt.
chug.
The Richard Dean Anderson (a combination of The MacGuyver and The Stargate)
The Stargate:
clear liquor with a circle of dark rum poured around the edge.
The MacGuyver: a drink garnished with paperclips attatched to a nine volt battery, shocking you as you sip.