"Mission: Implausible"

By Jerry Zezima

TOP SECRET

To: Tom Cruise

From: Jerry Zezima

Re: “Mission: Implausible”

Dear Mr. Cruise:

I am a dashing, heroic and admittedly aging spy cleverly disguised as a syndicated newspaper columnist whose work is highly suspect. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to let me star in the next installment of your fabulously successful film series.

My qualifications are impeccable — or maybe, more fittingly, they’re impossible — because I recently went on a dangerous and sometimes embarrassing mission at the International Spy Museum in Washington, D.C.

I can’t say I sneaked into the museum, which a professional spy would have done, but I did have a ticket, so they let me in. Accompanying me were my wife, our two daughters, one of our sons-in-law and our five grandchildren, all of whom, if my information is correct, were better spies than I was.

Nonetheless, I wasn’t captured by a foreign power and imprisoned in a dingy jail cell, only to escape using my wits, or at least half of them, and save the world from evil.

But I did have a good time.

Don’t tell anyone, as you are sworn to secrecy, but in order to begin my mission, I was given a new identity.

My name was Drew Smith. I was from Athens (Greece, not Georgia), my occupation was as an artist, despite the fact that I can’t even draw a good salary, and my code name was Rattler. The comparison to a poisonous snake was insulting, but I’ve been called worse.

Still, it was especially dangerous because I would be — you guessed it — unarmed.

I also, unofficially, gave myself the code name 0072, because that’s my age. I didn’t walk up to other visitors and identify myself by saying, “Zezima, Jerry Zezima,” but I did ask someone on staff if the museum served martinis — shaken, not stirred.

I’m surprised I wasn’t thrown out.

My adventure began when I went to the first of several touchscreens I would have to navigate and signed in as Rattler. Then I got these instructions:

“We believe a cybercriminal has their base of operations in Moscow. YOUR MISSION: Determine the location of their secret headquarters. Continue to your next Undercover Mission stop.”

At my next stop, I had to identify myself again (spies can never be too careful, I guess) and got these further instructions:

“You’ve received a secret message from headquarters. Assignment: Crack the coded message to figure out the next steps for your mission.”

It turned out that I wasn’t too smart — I was more like Maxwell Smart, the bumbling Agent 86 on the 1960s TV spy spoof “Get Smart” — so I needed help. Here’s what I got: “Ops cracked the message for you. Your mission is a go!”

I went to the Gadget Lab to design the right tool for the job. I picked a lock pick kit, which I’m glad I didn’t have to say five times fast.

“Good work!” it said on the screen.

From there I went to the Disguise Screen, where I chose a photo of myself with a trench coat and a fedora, and then to the Briefing Station to assume my cover on a Stealth Mission, which entailed crawling through an overhead vent while my grandchildren, giggling behind me, played Follow the Geezer.

I somehow made it through the Operational Zone in Moscow even though I blew most of the questions about security threats.

At the end, I got this message: “Intel received. Nice work, agent. This is the key piece of intel that we were looking for. We will take it from here.”

I had completed my mission. Now I am a certified secret agent.

Your assignment, Mr. Cruise, is to cast me in your next “Mission” movie. My new code name: Poppie. It’s what my grandchildren call me.

Copyright 2026 by Jerry Zezima

"Mr. Coffee"

By Jerry Zezima

As a man who dozes off at the drop of a hat, even though I don’t wear one, I find it hard to wake up and smell the coffee.

The problem is that I can’t smell the coffee until I wake up. And I can’t wake up until I have coffee.

If that weren’t bad enough, my wife, Sue, won’t get out of bed in the morning until I wake up and make the coffee.

It’s the only thing I do better than she does. That’s especially true now that we have a new coffeemaker.

This one is a high-tech machine that comes with an instruction manual that must have been written by NASA.

The first thing I noticed was that the coffeemaker holds 14 cups, which created yet another conundrum because our old machine held 12 cups. This meant I would have to figure out how many scoops to use to make a full pot.

The challenge was daunting because I have the mathematical aptitude of a spider monkey.

I could divulge how many scoops I use to make 10 cups, which I do during the week, or 12 cups, which I make on weekends, but nobody could ever duplicate the quality of my coffee because I am like an Italian grandmother (I had two of them) who doesn’t go by recipe measurements as much as an instinctive touch that guarantees full flavor.

Then there’s the coffee itself. Sue buys a high-end brand that’s expensive but worth the price to wake up and smell it.

Still, I have always considered coffee a stupid drink. It’s made from beans that are grown on mountains, brought down by donkeys and smashed to bits before being run through with boiling water.

I prefer sensible drinks, like beer and wine, which I have made myself.

I once home-brewed Jerry’s Nasty Ale, which went down smooth and came back up the same way.

I also made Zezima Merlot after I picked grapes at a vineyard, brought them home, stomped on them in the bathtub like Lucille Ball on “I Love Lucy,” bottled the juice and let it ferment for two weeks. The winemaker said it tasted like nail polish remover.

But since I need caffeine to perform important tasks like feeding myself, I rely on coffee to start my day.

And to start Sue’s day, which is why I had to learn to use our new coffeemaker. It replaced our old coffeemaker, which was starting to leak.

Speaking of which, coffee can make you leak like Niagara Falls.

It can also make you smarter. According to Dr. Adam B. Rosenbluth, a columnist for AARP Bulletin (“All the News That’s Tough to Read Without Your Glasses”), coffee “seems to improve some kinds of brain activity. One brain-imaging study found that coffee enhanced connectivity in the memory and decision-making areas.”

I could have used a cup of java because my brain activity was short-circuited by the new coffeemaker’s instructions, which included these unnerving words: “Warning: Risk of Fire or Electric Shock.”

Then I noticed that there were 22 “Important Safeguards” and 14 “Features and Benefits.”

It was a far cry from the old metal coffee pot that Sue and I had when our two daughters were toddlers. Not only didn’t it come with instructions, but it was their favorite toy.

One of our daughters, now an adult with two daughters of her own, bought the same coffeemaker that Sue and I did. When I asked her how many extra scoops I’d need for a full 14-cup carafe, she said, “One. It’s not complicated, Dad.”

The next morning, I woke up and made the coffee.

“This is really good,” Sue said after taking a sip. “You got the hang of the new machine.”

“Thanks,” I replied. “I’m glad you don’t have grounds for complaint.”

Copyright 2026 by Jerry Zezima

 

"Window Puns Are a Real Pane"

By Jerry Zezima

If it weren’t for Venetian blinds, it would be curtains for me. It also would be valances, drapes, shutters and other coverings for windows that I haven’t washed in two years, which is why my wife, Sue, has been throwing shades at me.

We recently got new blinds in the family room because the old ones, which came with the house when we bought it in 1998, were getting increasingly difficult to open, forcing me to use all my strength, which at this point is practically nonexistent, to pull the cord on each side of the blinds every morning and let the sunshine in.

Except when it was cloudy.

The only good part of the daily battle was that it was tough to see just how dirty the windows are.

Not anymore. The new blinds let the grime shine in.

While Sue isn’t happy about it, and often shoots me looks that are even dirtier than the windows, she loves the new blinds.

“They make the room seem larger,” she said.

“Great,” I replied. “Now we’ll probably have to pay more in property taxes.”

“Nonsense,” said Robert Montalvo, an independent contractor who had come over to install our new blinds. “This means you can sell your house for a lot more money.”

Robert should know because he has been in the window treatment installation business for 30 years.

“Those blinds,” he said, referring to the old ones, which he had dismantled, “look to be 30 years old. I’ve done a lot of work in this area, so I might have installed them.”

“Now you’re taking them down,” I pointed out. “And you’re giving us a window into your life.”

“Please,” Robert said, “I’ve heard all the window jokes.”

“Like no pane, no gain?” I guessed.

“Yes,” he said.

“How about the blinds leading the blinds?” I inquired.

“I hear that one every day,” Robert said. “One customer told me jokes for four hours.”

“I bet he was a pain in the glass,” I said.

“I couldn’t wait to get out of there,” he said.

“You must have felt like jumping out the window,” I noted.

“One time,” Robert said, “I was working in a school and an announcement came over the loudspeaker: ‘The blind guy is here.’ The principal said, ‘Somebody go help him.’ Fortunately, the kids weren’t there to hear it.”

“Do you wash windows at home?” I inquired.

“Not at all,” Robert replied.

“What does your wife say?” I asked.

“I married a girl like my mom,” he said. “When she’s doing things around the house, I have a list of things to do. Washing windows isn’t one of them.”

“What kind of window coverings do you have?” I wondered.

“We have shutters on the high windows and silhouettes on the regular windows,” Robert said.

I asked him if customers complain about a national window chain that seems to advertise 24 hours a day and bugs people so relentlessly, with texts, emails, postcards and phone calls, that you feel like inviting a salesman over just so you can throw him out the window.

“All the time,” Robert said. “And they’re not cheap. I had a friend who kept at me to buy them. He’s not my friend anymore.”

“Our windows may be dirty, but at least they look better now,” I said.

“You picked great blinds,” Robert said as he gave us a demonstration. “Your old blinds had vertical slats. The new ones have horizontal slats. You don’t have to pull cords and chains. You just raise them from the bottom. Or you can gently pull them down. And you turn the wand to open and close them.”

Sue beamed and said, “I love them! Next I’m going to replace the blinds in the dining room.”

“When you come back,” I told Robert, “we’ll tell more window jokes.”

“Sounds good,” he said.

“But let’s not do it for four hours,” I said. “Even I would shutter to think about it.”

Copyright 2026 by Jerry Zezima

"Don't Take Snow for an Answer"

By Jerry Zezima

Because I am a geezer with a heart condition, I’m not ashamed to admit that when it comes to shoveling snow, I am also a wuss, which stands for “wait until spring starts.”

To compound matters, I was born during a blizzard and have been perpetrating snow jobs ever since.

So in anticipation of a recent storm, my wife, Sue, a cardiac patient herself, hired someone to shovel our driveway.

The forecast had called for “wind-driven snow,” as opposed to “car-driven snow,” which is caused by idiots who don’t clear their vehicles after a storm and then drive in front of you so all their snow blows onto your windshield and forces you to plunge into a snowbank.

Snowbanks are open until 4 p.m., after which you have to go to a snow ATM.

Sorry, I have brain freeze, which afflicts me even in the summer.

At any rate, the prediction of snow caused us to panic because our previous snowplow guy moved to Texas, the Lone Flake State, where one snowflake falls and paralyzes traffic for three days.

Not only that, but since the “real-feel” temperature outside our house rivaled the climate of Neptune (the planet, not the town in New Jersey), the snow wasn’t expected to melt until approximately the Fourth of July.

I could just imagine myself keeling over in the driveway, shovel in hand, and being found frozen to death the next morning like Jack Nicholson’s character in “The Shining,” except my movie would be called “The Snowing.”

That’s why Sue, bless her heart, which has stents, arranged for Benedetto Costanzo, the owner of Three Village Power Washing of Setauket, New York, to plow our driveway and shovel our walks.

As longtime customers (Sue called the day before), we knew we would get excellent service.

It was a dark and stormy night, but after the snow stopped falling and had piled up to a depth of about half a foot, Benedetto and his assistant, Matthew DiGennaro, came over in a truck with a plow on the front.

Matthew hopped out and started shoveling around the two cars parked vertically on one side of the driveway.

Benedetto drove up to one of the two garage doors, lowered the plow and put the truck in reverse, the first step in removing the crusty accumulation from the rest of the driveway.

As Benedetto kept on trucking, Matthew shoveled the front walk and a path leading around to the side of the house.

Then they dropped rock salt and sand so I wouldn’t slip on a patch of ice, become airborne, go head over heels and land on my keister, a pathetic performance that would have disqualified me from the Winter Olympics.

“You saved my life,” I told the guys when they were finished.

“We’re happy to help,” said Benedetto, who’s 55 but looks younger.

“I like shoveling snow, but I’m not supposed to,” said Sue.

“I hate shoveling snow, but I’m not supposed to, either,” I chimed in.

“That’s why I do it,” said Matthew, who’s 24 but doesn’t look a day over 23.

When I asked Matthew if he spells his name with one T or two, he said, “Two, like the apostle.”

“You made the snow miraculously disappear,” I said.

“I salt the earth,” Matthew told me.

“I’ll take that as gospel,” I said.

After a blizzard of more silly remarks, such as telling Benedetto that his age matches the speed limit, which nobody obeys even during a snowstorm, he said, “You could work for me. I’ll take you out on estimates. You can entertain the customers.”

“Sounds good,” I said. “Then you can say you hired a real flake.”

Copyright 2026 by Jerry Zezima

"Canine Clothing Conspiracy"

By Jerry Zezima

I wouldn’t be barking up the wrong clothes tree to say that my younger daughter’s dog has a better wardrobe than I do.

So do both of my barber’s dogs.

It’s enough to make a grown human howl.

I became aware of this canine clothing conspiracy about a year ago when my daughter and her family adopted Opal, a sweet, smart and sassy Chihuahua pup whose only outfit was her birthday suit.

That soon changed with the purchase (by my daughter, not the dog) of the first item in an extensive ensemble of fashion-forward finery.

Opal’s wardrobe, which fills a small trunk, includes outfits for the holidays. This past year for Halloween, she was decked out as a Target shopping cart.

She also has outfits for Thanksgiving, Christmas and the Fourth of July. A Valentine’s Day getup may be in there, too. I don’t know if Opal has one for Arbor Day, but since dogs have a fondness for trees, if you know what I mean, it would be appropriate.

And her wardrobe doesn’t stop there. Sweaters, coats, shirts, skirts, hats and other garments make Opal a doggy doyenne who could win the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show if it were sponsored by Vogue or Cosmopolitan.

I have no idea how much my daughter has shelled out to keep Opal in the style to which she has become accustomed, but it has been well worth the expenditure. I say that as a proud grandfather. And also because it’s not my money.

But Opal is not the only canine whose mommy has kept her precious pooches in the lap dog of luxury.

Maria, my barber, has bedecked her 14-year-old Maltese twins, Louie and Chanel, in clothes ranging from holiday outfits to special ensembles.

Louie, for example, has a fighter pilot jacket, complete with goggles, which makes him look like Snoopy, of “Peanuts” fame, ready to do battle with the Red Baron.

Chanel has a pink tutu, which makes her look like an en pointer getting ready to star in “Sleeping Beauty.” After all, she’s a beauty who, as a senior dog, sleeps much of the time.

“He doesn’t mind getting dressed up, but she’s not crazy about it,” said Maria, who named Louie after Louis Vuitton, the international fashion house, and Chanel after Coco Chanel, the French fashion designer.

Then there’s me.

I must have been named after Jerry in the “Tom and Jerry” cartoons. Neither Tom (a cat) nor Jerry (a mouse) wears clothes.

What I wear most of the time are two outfits: T-shirts and shorts in spring and summer and sweatshirts and sweatpants in fall and winter.

I will not blame my wife, Sue, who buys my clothes because I refuse to accompany her to the store and shop till I drop.

My idea of hell is to be stuck in the fitting room while other men and their wives wait for me to emerge in an outfit that shows off either flabby flanks or a bony bottom. Or both.

Sue has excellent taste, but she knows that I consider jeans and a button-down shirt to be formal attire.

To me, plaid flannel pajamas are de rigueur, a French phrase meaning: “You look like a dweeb.”

That’s why — unlike Opal, Louie and Chanel — I don’t have special holiday outfits. I have never gone trick-or-treating dressed as a Target shopping cart. I don’t have a fighter pilot jacket and goggles. And I certainly don’t own a tutu.

That’s also why I will never win the title at Westminster, even if it was sponsored by GQ, which in my case would stand for Geezers’ Quarterly.

When it comes to fashion, I’ve gone to the dogs.

Copyright 2026 by Jerry Zezima