"Baby, It's Cold Inside"

By Jerry Zezima

Whenever it’s hot, I’m cold. And whenever it’s cold, I’m hot.

I know it’s not cool to say this, but the cold fact is that I am not hot enough to be a magazine model or cool enough to be a movie star.

The real problem is that I am a geezer for whom no temperature — inside or outside — can make me feel comfortable.

That’s especially true now that my wife, Sue, and I have a new air conditioner. The powerful unit is in the family room, which feels like a meat locker when the AC is on and a sauna when it’s off.

We need the air conditioner because we recently had what sadistic meteorologists call a “heat dome,” which sent temperatures soaring into the high 90s, but with the “heat index,” another measurement of misery, the “real feel” was in the triple digits.

What this means, mathematically speaking, is that when it’s 102 outside and 42 inside, the average temperature is 72 degrees.

Now you know why I can’t be trusted to do our taxes.

The opposite is true in winter, which features what TV weather forecasters love to call the “windchill,” yet another cruel meteorological term that explains why, if you take even one step outside, arctic blasts will freeze you like a Mrs. Paul’s fish stick.

But back to the AC, which in my case stands for “arthritic codger,” an old guy whose blood has thinned to the point that even a two-degree change in temperature can make him shiver like a nudist in a blizzard or sweat like a broken fire hydrant.

The hefty appliance is in a wall sleeve behind the chair where I sit to watch TV, drink beer and eat popcorn, some of which invariably falls under the cushion, only to be found by Sue, who will get hot under the collar, even if she isn’t wearing one.

The main issue, aside from the fact that I can’t hear the TV when the AC is on, is that permafrost forms on the back of my neck and can’t be melted without the aid of a blowtorch.

The safer option is to get up without pulling every muscle in my body (the chair is sunken like a shallow grave, where I will end up anyway) and turn off the air conditioner.

This, of course, defeats the purpose of having one.

We had central air installed upstairs a few years ago and it works except when it doesn’t. It’s an energy-saving system that goes on and off, the latter being when I wake up because it’s too hot.

My idea of saving energy is to get a good night’s sleep.

Anyway, we couldn’t have central air downstairs because of some technical gibberish involving the misalignment of air ducts. This meant, to use layman’s terms, that we couldn’t get our ducts in a row.

Plus, the cost would have been greater than the gross national product of Finland.

So we bought a new downstairs air conditioner to replace the old one, which was even louder and may have had mold, dirt and a colony of bats inside of it.

With the exception of making the family room feel like a hockey rink, the new unit does a decent job of cooling off the rest of the downstairs.

But this doesn’t solve the problem of why I can’t get comfortable no matter where I am. Neither, it appears, can anyone else my age.

That includes Sue, who sometimes wears shorts and a sweatshirt.

How can it be warm enough to bare your legs but cold enough to completely cover your arms and upper body?

Heat rises, doesn’t it?

The only good thing about the whole temperature dilemma is that I don’t have to change my seasonal wardrobe. I just leave all my clothes out and dress accordingly.

Then I’ll sit in front of the air conditioner — in a parka, gloves and a ski hat — and chill out.

Copyright 2026 by Jerry Zezima

"Water Bottles Everywhere"

By Jerry Zezima

It’s a good thing 70 percent of Earth’s surface is covered by water (the other 30 percent is covered by asphalt and bird droppings) because otherwise I don’t know how I would ever fill my new water bottle.

Thanks to my younger daughter, who gifted me with the 40-ounce stainless steel container, in a beautiful metallic blue, I have officially become the last person in the United States to have a water bottle.

That includes children, some of whom, like my grandkids, aren’t appreciably larger than their water bottles.

It also includes my younger daughter, who has a whole collection of water bottles in many different designs and colors and for all occasions, including holidays.

I am grateful for my water bottle because I have a history of kidney stones and need to stay well-hydrated so I don’t develop more of the agonizing calcium deposits, most of which have not followed the old proverb “This, too, shall pass” and had to be blasted to powder by death rays from outer space.

On the other hand, I am a geezer who is going from bladder to worse. Faithfully drinking from my water bottle will make me seem like Old Faithful and cause me to run to the bathroom so often that I could qualify for the National Senior Games in track and field.

I’d be going for the gold, if you know what I mean.

My wife, Sue, has two water bottles and drinks so much water that she may soon sprout gills. Nonetheless, she told me, “If you drink too much water, it washes out your electrolytes.”

According to the Cleveland Clinic, “Electrolytes are substances that have a positive or negative electrical charge when dissolved in water.”

Great, now I can be electrocuted for trying to keep hydrated. At least it would be quicker than drowning. And less painful than kidney stones.

The U.S. government, which is all wet anyway, says the human body is typically composed of 60 percent water but that the figure can rise to 75 percent, depending on factors such as age, gender and, I would guess, water bottles.

My bottle will help me keep good muscle tone. When filled with water, and considering it is made of metal, it weighs about as much as a barbell, an exercise in irony since it would be lifted by a dumbbell.

Alexa Castrova, the extremely nice manager of the gym where I go to drink water, told me that almost all of the establishment’s members have bottles when they are on treadmills, stationary bikes or elliptical machines.

A quick scan of the sweaty exercisers, done as I was holding my water bottle, confirmed this.

“I try to drink four 40-ounce bottles of water a day,” Alexa said.

“That’s 160 ounces of water,” I said, doing the math in my waterlogged brain.

“That’s right,” she said. “If you see my water bottle, I won’t be far behind.”

Alexa also said that there are even 60-ounce water bottles on the market.

“They’re so big that they don’t fit in cup holders,” she said. “That’s why you can get 3D printed cup holders for cars. Everyone’s cup size is getting customized.”

“I’ve heard of drinking and driving, but this is ridiculous,” I said.

I also pointed out that medical science used to say that people should drink eight glasses of water a day.

“Now it’s considered too much,” I said. “You don’t know what to believe anymore. I guess the findings didn’t hold water.”

When I got home, Sue told me to wash out my water bottle.

“With what?” I asked.

“Water,” she said.

“There’s water in it now,” I countered.

“Dump it and wash out the bottle,” Sue said.

“It’s bad enough that it comes with an instruction manual. But this,” I said, taking one final sip, “is the last straw.”

Copyright 2026 by Jerry Zezima

"Grin and Print It"

By Jerry Zezima

A young orthodontist with what I hope is good eyesight recently said I have a Hollywood smile. I didn’t want to press my luck by asking if he meant I should star in a horror movie.

So I was greatly relieved when I saw that the new retainers he made for me don’t have fangs.

I went to the Stony Brook University School of Dental Medicine earlier this year for my annual followup, which was actually my biennial followup because I forgot to go last year, and saw Dr. Eric Zhang, who said my retainers were holding up nicely.

I held them up.

“Nice,” he said.

In the intervening five months, however, the retainers began to erode. A hole developed in the lower one and there was a crack in the upper one.

It was fitting since a hole and a crack are what I have in my head.

So I went back to Stony Brook and saw Dr. Robert Zhou, a second-year resident from San Francisco.

“Did you leave your heart there?” I asked him.

“Yes,” he replied.

“You should see a cardiologist,” I said. “Did you leave your teeth in San Francisco?”

Dr. Zhou’s smile — also of the Hollywood variety — provided the answer.

“Do you have retainers?” I wondered.

“No,” the doctor answered. “But I did have Invisalign in high school. It was a cool experience.”

I had Invisalign — also called invisible braces because you can’t see them when they are on your teeth — when I started as a patient at the dental school. Eventually they came off (the braces, not my teeth) and I got retainers, which keep my pearly whites straight while I am sleeping and, of course, dreaming of being a movie star.

“For your new retainers, you won’t have to make an impression,” Dr. Zhou said.

“I always make an impression,” I told him. “Sometimes it’s not so good.”

He meant that I wouldn’t have to go through the same routine I did when my old retainers were made. It entailed sitting in a chair while narrow, U-shaped trays were filled with alginate — a gooey substance a lot like spackle, only not as tasty — and pressed over my teeth.

The impressions were then molded, heated and made into clear plastic retainers.

“This time,” Dr. Zhou said, “your retainers will be made with a 3-D printer.”

He gave me a pair of cool sunglasses — not for a celebrity look but to keep me from spitting in my own eyes. Then he waved a wand over my upper and lower teeth.

“Is the wand magic?” I asked.

“In a way,” Dr. Zhou said. “But it won’t make you disappear.”

“Some people wouldn’t mind if I did,” I said.

The wand made a digital scan of my teeth that would be sent to a 3-D printer to create hard dental models.

“A suck-down machine will be used make your new retainers,” explained Dr. Zhou, who said I could pick them up at my next appointment a week later.

When I arrived, I went in a back room and saw the small device, in which plastic is sucked down on models to make retainers that are cut out, trimmed and washed.

“Here they are,” Dr. Zhou said, handing me the new retainers.

I had a tough time getting them over my top and bottom teeth, but eventually they snapped on. I had an even tougher time getting them off.

“I have a hook you can use,” the doctor suggested.

“I’d feel like a trout,” I said.

Finally, I reached in the back of my mouth and, with a fingernail, lifted them out.

“They will loosen up,” Dr. Zhou promised. “And you will keep your Hollywood smile.”

“Brad Pitt will be jealous,” I said. “I guess I made a good impression after all.”

Copyright 2026 by Jerry Zezima

"In the Swim"

By Jerry Zezima

If Sports Illustrated ever does a male version of its famous Swimsuit Issue, I could be on the cover for two very good reasons:

1) I just got a stylish new swimsuit, which impressed a lifeguard at the pool where I took my granddaughters for a swim.

2) It’s not a Speedo.

You can add my wife and our younger daughter to the other eight billion people on Earth who wouldn’t want to see me in a Speedo.

That’s why they went to the store, the one place I hate more than the beach, and bought the snazzy trunks for me.

They’re red and white with an array of ocean creatures and symbols: lobsters, tunas, octopuses, seashells, shrimp, crabs, sailor’s knots, ship’s bells, captain’s wheels and compasses.

The only nautical images that aren’t on my new bathing suit are — yo ho ho — bottles of rum.

I don’t need them to drive pool club members and beachgoers to drink.

It’s exactly what would happen if I wore a Speedo, which has less material than a Kleenex facial tissue and can barely keep the average man out of legal trouble.

On the positive side, a pair on the wrong guy could even repel sharks.

My new trunks are comfortably loose-fitting with a drawstring to hold them up and legs that reach almost to my knees.

For a man of my age (old), I look pretty good in them, just as Martha Stewart looked pretty good for a woman of her age (even older) when she was on the cover of the 2023 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue.

If memory serves (I’d like it to serve me a margarita), Martha was photographed at both the beach and the pool.

The last time I went to the beach was several years ago, when I was dive-bombed by a flighty flock of foul feathered fiends.

It was a case of boy meets gull. Things took a turn for the worse when several terns voiced their displeasure at my faded old swim trunks. Two of them collided in midair and fell, stunned, to the ground.

Birdbrains.

Aerial bombardment, plus the fact that sand can be found for weeks in your bathing suit and various parts of your anatomy, plus the additional fact that the vast majority of people in skimpy swimwear are younger and better-looking than I am, plus the final fact that I have no interest in feeling like a broiled halibut, is why I don’t go to the beach anymore.

I prefer the pool, where at least I am not humiliated by either sadistic seabirds or other old guys who actually do wear Speedos (the guys, not the birds).

It’s why I wear sunglasses.

It’s also why I don’t want to be one of those guys.

My granddaughters seemed grateful when I took them to the pool recently. They liked my new bathing suit but otherwise didn’t pay much attention to it. They preferred to float in the deep end and frolic in the shallow end, where they did some impressive handstands.

I tried to do a handstand, but it lasted for approximately four seconds. And I got water up my nose.

When I asked if I should try to touch bottom at the deep end, which is 11 feet, one of the girls said, “No, Poppie! I don’t think your heart can take it.”

But it did my heart good when Ava, a wonderfully pleasant lifeguard, said she liked my new bathing suit.

“It’s nice,” she said.

“What’s the best way to break it in?” I wondered.

“Do a cannonball,” Ava suggested.

“I don’t want to get water up my nose,” I said. “Do you have any further advice for a geezer like me?”

Ava smiled and said, “Don’t wear a Speedo.”

I’m sure Sports Illustrated would agree.

Copyright 2026 by Jerry Zezima

"A Star Isn't Born"

By Jerry Zezima

Now that I have seen Steven Spielberg’s “Disclosure Day,” a space alien thriller that’s out of this world, I am making this my own disclosure day:

I could have been the star of the movie.

And not necessarily as a space alien.

I was sure I’d be heading to Hollywood when I read about a casting call for Spielberg’s new film, the title of which had not been disclosed that day, although the plot was rumored to be about the U.S. government’s coverup of close encounters (get it, Steven?) with extraterrestrials (ditto).

The call, which was held last year at a theater about half an hour from my house on Long Island, New York, was for extras who would be portraying wrestling fans.

I didn’t have to grapple with the decision to apply because the WWE is headquartered in my hometown of Stamford, Connecticut, and I would undoubtedly be seen by Spielberg as the lord of the ring, even though that’s an entirely different film franchise.

I sent an email to the casting company with personal information such as name, age, height and weight, along with my photo, which itself should have qualified me to be cast as a man from Mars.

About a week later, I received an email confirming receipt of my application and information about the date and time of the casting call.

I showed up on the appointed day at 6 o’clock in the morning and walked into the theater. I didn’t see Spielberg, who might have been in the temple of doom (get it again, Steven?), but I did see a production person.

“Where are you from?” she asked.

“Neptune,” I replied.

“New Jersey?” she wondered.

“The planet,” I told her. “I’m perfect for this movie.”

She looked at me like I had just beamed down from outer space. Then she instructed me to go up the street to where the aspiring extras were waiting to be signed in.

I got in a long line with a guy who said he had tried out for a TV commercial but wasn’t chosen.

“That’s small-time stuff,” I said. “This is Spielberg. It’s our ticket to fame and fortune.”

My ticket was abruptly canceled when I got to the head of the line and was told by an officious individual that the company didn’t have my information and I couldn’t be cast as an extra, a wrestler, a space alien or — I was sure the legendary director would make this happen — the star of the movie.

It was, I figured, Spielberg’s loss. I drove back home, Hollywood dreams shattered. I regretted that I didn’t meet the man himself so I could ask him probing cinematic questions like:

How come the streets in night scenes are always wet?

If he made “E.T.” today, would the creature be unable to phone home because the kids were busy playing games on their devices?

And why did he make the biggest goof of his career in “Lincoln” by purposely misrepresenting the 13th Amendment votes by representatives from Connecticut, my home state?

Needless to say, but I’ll say it anyway, I wasn’t inclined to like “Disclosure Day” when my wife and I saw it recently.

Not to give anything away, but the first scene was the one in the wrestling arena. It was over in about two minutes, so my screen time, if I had any at all, would not have been long enough to establish me as a Hollywood heartthrob. Or, more likely, a heartburn.

But the movie was fantastic. The real stars, especially Emily Blunt, were brilliant. And the direction was, of course, masterful.

I forgive you, Steven. But please know that when you are casting your next film, I’m available. I can see it now: “Connecticut Jones and the Kingdom of the Empty Skull.”

All right, Mr. Spielberg, I’m ready for my closeup.

Copyright 2026 by Jerry Zezima