Thursday, December 28, 2017

"For Cold Times' Sake"

By Jerry Zezima
Stamford Advocate
On Jan. 11, 1954, a date which will live in infancy, I made my grand entrance into the world while a blizzard raged outside the maternity ward at Stamford Hospital in Connecticut. I have been perpetrating snow jobs ever since.

So you might think that I like winter. Actually, of the four seasons, my favorite is Frankie Valli.

I forget the names of the other three guys, but seasonally speaking, winter comes behind spring, summer, fall, parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme.

(Thank you, Simon and Garfunkel.)

Winter is the worst season not because of sleet, which God obviously created when He had a sinus infection, or even the windchill factor, which sadistic meteorologists devised to make us feel even more miserable.

No, winter leaves me cold because, simply, it’s too complicated.

Take gloves and car keys. You should because if you don’t take gloves, your fingers will freeze, making it impossible to hold your car keys. And if you don’t take them, the rest of you will freeze because you won’t be able to get into your car and will have to trudge through a sheet of sleet (see above) that is whipping horizontally into your nostrils and will soon turn you, gloves or no gloves, into a human Popsicle.

The question is: Where do you put this stuff?

Here’s where it is complicated. You might put your car keys in the front pocket of your pants (it’s a good idea to wear them, too), but then you’d have to lift up the bottom of your parka (ditto) to fish the keys out of your pocket, which you can’t do unless you first take off your gloves.

This, I am sure, is why keyless cars were invented, probably during the winter in a place where sleet is common.

Then there is your wallet, which you will have to fish out of your back pocket — after again taking off your gloves and lifting up the bottom of your parka — to pay by credit card or, naturally, cold cash to put gas in your car so you can drive to work.

So you figure you will outfox winter by putting everything — car keys, wallet, gloves, ski hat, scarf, employee ID card, lip balm, hand moisturizer, flask of brandy — in the pockets of your parka so you won’t have to lift it up to fish out any of those items from your pants.

Or you’ll buy a tote bag in which to put all that stuff.

The problem is that if you go to the cafeteria, you’ll remember that your wallet is at your desk, in either your parka or your tote bag, and not in the back pocket of your pants, where it should be.

Then there’s footwear, which might normally consist of dress shoes or, if you’re casual, a pair of sneakers. In winter, you have to wear boots and carry a shopping bag in which to put your shoes or sneakers so you can change into them when you get to the office. When the workday is over, you have to put your boots back on and head out to the car, where it dawns on you that you left your tote bag under your desk.

One possible solution is to bring a suitcase to work so you can stuff it with everything, including summer clothes because the heat in the office is likely to be cranked up so high that it feels like a sauna.

Speaking of which, it is not a good idea to wear only a towel unless you want to be escorted out of the building and into the arctic air, where you will, without gloves, pants and parka, freeze to death.

So until spring springs, weather winter as best you can. And don’t forget that flask of brandy.

Copyright 2017 by Jerry Zezima

Friday, December 15, 2017

"The Zezimas' 2017 Christmas Letter"

By Jerry Zezima
Stamford Advocate
Since I am in the holiday spirit (and, having just consumed a mug of hot toddy, a glass of eggnog and a nip of cheer, the holiday spirits are in me), I have once again decided to follow in that great tradition of boring everyone silly by writing a Christmas letter.

That is why I am pleased as punch (which I also drank) to present the following chronicle of the Zezima family, which includes Jerry, the patriarch; Sue, the matriarch; Katie and Lauren, the daughtersiarch; Dave and Guillaume, the sons-in-lawiarch; and Chloe, Lilly and Xavier, the grandchildreniarch.

Dear friends:

It sure has been an exciting 2017 for the Zezimas!

The year got off to a rocky start when Jerry had a kidney stone. He is sorry to have to number them like the Super Bowl, but it was Kidney Stone VI. Mercifully, this, too, did pass.

Also on the medical front, Jerry took a CPR class in which the instructor used him as a dummy. The other class members couldn’t tell the difference.

To keep in good physical condition, Jerry won a one-day gym membership. He didn’t exercise very strenuously, proving to be the biggest dumbbell there, but afterward he went to an adjacent bar and did 12-ounce curls.

Continuing to show his commitment to a healthy lifestyle, Jerry attended a Wine Stomp Party at a vineyard and, re-creating a famous “I Love Lucy” episode, climbed into a vat of grapes and stomped them with his bare feet. To ensure the health of the vineyard’s customers, the grapes were thrown away.

Jerry may not have made his own wine, but he and Chloe did make their own ice cream. They went to a shop where the owner, impressed by Chloe’s natural ability to pour in the ingredients but not by Jerry’s pathetic incompetence at measuring them, allowed the dynamic duo to make a batch of honey-cinnamon. It was delicious, prompting the owner to tell Chloe, “Now you can say you taught your grandfather how to make ice cream.”

Jerry, Sue and Lauren took Chloe and Lilly on their first visit to the zoo, where humans were the wildest creatures and Jerry, an acknowledged oldster, was carded by a flirtatious young woman while buying beer for the adults in the group. He roared louder than the lions.

One of the proudest moments of the year occurred when Chloe graduated, magna cum little, from preschool. She had a prominent role in the ceremony, which was attended by Jerry, Sue, Lauren, Guillaume and Lilly, and was tops in her class. Afterward, everyone had milk and cookies. Yale or Harvard couldn’t have done better.

A milestone was reached when Lilly celebrated her first birthday. Big sister Chloe, who’s 4, helped her blow out the candle on her cupcake and, as their little friends applauded, helped her eat the cupcake, too. Talk about sisterly love!

And there was an addition to the family: Xavier, Katie and Dave’s beautiful boy, made his grand entrance into the world. Sue and Jerry, aka Nini and Poppie, went on a road trip to meet him and Jerry quickly learned that changing diapers on a boy is a lot different from changing them on a girl. That’s because boys have an apparatus that is not unlike a water cannon or, considering the oscillation, an in-ground sprinkler system. It was a geyser on a geezer.

But Jerry didn’t mind because he got to do some male bonding. On a subsequent visit, Jerry introduced Xavier to the Three Stooges, making him giggle uncontrollably by doing Shemp imitations. The women, naturally, were thrilled.

Xavier met cousins Chloe and Lilly on a visit to Nini and Poppie’s house. The three adorable children had a ball, laughing, playing and, not surprisingly, proving to be more mature than Poppie.

We hope your year has been fun-filled, too.

Merry Christmas with love and laughter from the Zezimas.

Copyright 2017 by Jerry Zezima