"Oh, Henry"

By Jerry Zezima

The Stamford Advocate

Over the years in my humble and frequently fur-flown household, I have been surrounded by women: one wife, two daughters and various animals. The pet population has included a dog, four cats, two frogs, approximately 147 goldfish, half a dozen hamsters and too many gerbils to count because, face it, gerbils can’t do math.

Of these many fine, furry and finny friends, only one (to my knowledge) has been a guy. His name was Henry, one of our quartet of felines, son of Kitty, brother of Bernice, no relation to Ramona. He thought Lizzie, the dog, was his mother.

Henry was a mama’s boy because he loved Lizzie and loved my wife, Sue, even more. He liked his real mother, Kitty, but he had little use for me, his surrogate daddy and the only other male in the house, perhaps because he saw me as competition for female affection but more likely because I would get rid of the scores of eviscerated creatures (birds, rabbits, mice, squirrels, practically everything but the mailman) he left at the back door or, worse, wanted to bring inside.

Henry was a paradox: He was the most ruthlessly efficient killer I have ever known (not that I hang around with murderers, in case the police are reading this), but he also was the biggest wimp in the world.

And he was, indeed, big. I conservatively estimate he weighed 200 pounds, give or take 180. He was like a small mountain lion.

Most of it was fur. His rich black and white coat was so long that sometimes you couldn’t see his feet, which were armed with razor-sharp claws that left a scar on my left wrist from the time Sue and I attempted to put flea powder on him. It worked because I haven’t had fleas since.

I’d say Henry was a Maine Coon except he wasn’t from Maine and raccoons were about the only fellow beasts he didn’t count among his trophies. As a result, our yard -- and, by extension, the entire neighborhood -- was devoid of vermin. Not including me.

On the other hand (or, rather, paw), Henry was afraid of his own considerable shadow. We had him for 12 years, but just about every time he saw me or any other human besides Sue, he would cower and run away. I always treated him well. I fed him, I brushed him, I tried to do the male bonding thing.

“It’s just you and me, Henry,” I would say.

“Meow!” he’d shriek. Then he would make a beeline upstairs.

That was another thing about Henry: He sounded like Frankie Valli.

“What’s the matter, Henry,” I would ask, “is your underwear too tight?”

“Meow!”

Then again, he purred with love for Sue. He followed her around so much I was tempted to get a restraining order against him. If I fed Henry, he’d eat only a little bit and wait for Sue to give him more.

“He wants me to feed him,” Sue would explain.

“Suppose you weren’t around for a few days,” I’d respond. “What’s he going to do, go on a hunger strike?”

Between his critter diet and his regular cat food, Henry looked like he missed very few meals.

One thing he did miss, however, was Lizzie. They were inseparable. Henry loved to sleep right next to Lizzie, often with his head on her hind leg. He even took on the canine characteristic of giving the paw whenever he wanted something.

Henry hadn’t been the same since Lizzie passed away last year.

Now he’s gone, too. The house is a little quieter and, considering his size, a lot emptier. Sue misses him terribly. So do I. And although he wasn’t a typical guy, a man’s man with whom I could bond and goof off and do paw bumps and watch sports on TV, I have to say that, all things considered, Henry was the cat’s meow.

Copyright 2011 by Jerry Zezima

"Cool in the Shades"

By Jerry Zezima

The Stamford Advocate

I have never been mistaken for Jack Nicholson, the eternally cool Hollywood legend who wears sunglasses everywhere -- even, I bet, in the bathroom -- but I can imagine starring in this dramatic scene with my wife, Sue.

Me (yelling from the bathroom): “Hon, we’re out of toilet paper!”

Sue: “There’s a new roll on the vanity.”

Me: “I can’t see it.”

Sue: “You’re hopeless. And that’s the truth.”

Me: “You can’t handle the truth!”

Sue: “The roll’s right in front of you. Take off your sunglasses.”

Me (after removing shades): “Got it. Thanks.”

Still, I felt like Jack recently when I went shopping for a new pair of shades. I wanted to look cool for the upcoming summer season, something I couldn’t do in my previous sunglasses, which were old, scratched and misshapen. Then again, it could have been my head.

So I drove to a nearby mall and walked up to a kiosk store called the Sunglass Hut, where I was greeted by a very nice sales associate named Nicollette.

“May I help you?” she asked pleasantly.

“Yes,” I replied. “I want to look cool. You know, like Jack Nicholson.”

Possibly because she was about 20 years old, Nicollette didn’t know Jack. But she did know sunglasses. “What do you want them for?” she asked.

“This may sound crazy,” I replied, “but I want them to keep the sun out of my eyes.”

Nicollette patiently explained that some people wear sunglasses only for certain activities, such as driving. “If you want to wear them to the beach, don’t get Guccis,” Nicollette suggested.

“Why?” I inquired.

“You don’t want sand to scratch them,” Nicollette answered. “They’re $300.”

I gulped. Then I tried on a less expensive pair. “They’re Pradas,” Nicollette said.

“How much?”

“Two hundred and ninety dollars.”

The devil wears Prada, so I thanked Nicollette and went around the corner to the NYS Collection kiosk, where Dan, a baby boomer who has heard of Jack Nicholson, told me that the sunglasses average $15 a pair.

“Will they make me look cool?” I asked.

“I think we can find a pair that will do the trick,” said Dan, adding: “I haven’t looked cool in 20 years.”

Of course, he wasn’t wearing sunglasses, but he has three pairs, all of which, he said, are fashionable.

“And inexpensive,” said Dan, who used to work at the Sunglass Hut. “They’re made of polycarbon, which is the same material in Guccis and Pradas. You’re not paying for the name.”

“Cool,” I said.

As I reached for a pair, my arm hit a box that tumbled to the floor, spilling a stash of stylish shades.

“They’re also very durable,” Dan commented as he picked them up.

“So if I fall, my face might break but my sunglasses won’t?” I wondered.

“Right,” said Dan, adding that most guys buy sunglasses primarily to look cool. “One young guy was here recently with his girlfriend,” he recalled. “Apparently he was paying too much attention to other women when he was trying on sunglasses. I guess he thought he was cool. He and his girlfriend got into a big fight and left. They came back the next day and the same thing happened, but I sold him a pair of shades before another fight started.”

Though Sue wasn’t with me, I didn’t pay attention to any other women as I tried on several pairs of sunglasses. One pair, with bright yellow reflective lenses, made me look like a giant bug in one of those 1950s sci-fi movies.

Then Dan showed me wraparounds, one with a blue tint, the other gray. I was coolness personified.

“They’re you,” Dan said after I chose the grays.

At home, I showed Sue my new shades. Her one-word reaction: “Cool.”

Just like Jack Nicholson. Now all I have to do is remember not to wear them in the bathroom.

Copyright 2011 by Jerry Zezima

"Stupid Crook Tricks: Global Dumbing"

By Jerry Zezima

The Stamford Advocate

Time now for another exciting episode of Stupid Crook Tricks, the hard-hitting series that presents actual cases of bumbling incompetence by some of the most inept criminal masterminds in America.

All of these stories are true. The names have been eliminated to protect the dumb, de-dumb-dumb, dumb, de-dumb-dumb-duuuumb.

Today, we here at CSI (Criminal Stupidity Investigations) go overseas to track down crooks whose idiocy knows no boundaries.

We begin in Italy with some legal advice for prospective criminals: When in Rome, don’t do as this Roman did. Hunger got the best of a convicted drug trafficker who had eluded Italian police by hiding out in Belgium. He was nabbed when he came back home for a plate of his wife’s lasagna. Acting on a tip, as well as the aroma of simmering tomato sauce, cops burst into the house at lunchtime and arrested the dumb diner, who was definitely out to lunch.

Another lesson for crooks to chew on: Never sleep on the job. That’s what happened in Malaysia, where a bungling burglar broke into an empty house and pocketed several hundred dollars in cash before taking a nap. He woke up the next morning when the homeowner returned and called police. The drowsy dope went from being under a rest to under arrest.

The last tip for international idiots: Always go to the bathroom before leaving the house. That’s what a bank robber in Denmark failed to do prior to hiding in a bank vault. He got locked in and had to wait until the bank opened the next morning to get out. Meanwhile, he had to answer the call of nature, so he relieved himself in a box before escaping with jewelry and $500,000 in cash. Cops got the whiz kid’s DNA and later arrested him. Needless to say, it wasn’t a safe deposit.

These three cases are overwhelming evidence of global dumbing. As a proud American, however, I can say with utter confidence that crooks in the United States still lead the world in stupidity.

Exhibit A: The guy who robbed a convenience store in South Carolina, got in his truck and started going the wrong way. The truck broke down, so the genius hailed a cab and asked the driver to take him to a town that the driver had never heard of. When they came upon the store that had just been robbed, the crook told the cabbie to ask a cop for directions. The cop recognized the idiotic passenger from a surveillance tape and arrested him. For once a man asked for directions and look what happened.

Exhibit B: The moronic motorist in Ohio who led police on a high-speed chase before abandoning his car and jumping a fence -- directly into a prison yard. It was a women’s prison, so he had to be transferred to a men’s facility. At least he didn’t need to ask for directions.

Exhibit C: This one stands for Connecticut, my home state, which has no shortage of stupid crooks, like the guy in Old Saybrook who burglarized three condos and then called the cops to report that his getaway car had been stolen. When the police pulled up, they saw the felonious fool with a pillowcase full of loot and arrested him.

Then there was the pothead in Farmington who called 911 to ask how much trouble he could get into for growing a marijuana plant. He soon found out. Maybe his case will be tried in a high court.

Finally, there was the idiot in New Canaan who called police to report that his car had been rear-ended by some other dummies who had allegedly robbed him of his marijuana. And the governor wants to decriminalize small amounts of the stuff.

I don’t know if that’s a good idea, but I do know this: When it comes to stupid crooks, it’s a small world after all.

Copyright 2011 by Jerry Zezima

"The Loan Arranger"

By Jerry Zezima

The Stamford Advocate

Ever since my wife and I were rejected for a home refinancing loan by our bank, which actually owns the house but kindly allows us to pay the mortgage, I have been wondering what we did wrong. The answer, I now realize, is that I didn’t rob the bank.

On the advice of my attorney, who is in jail, I will say for the record that I would never resort to bank robbery. And our loan officer, Joe, who has been in the banking business for almost 30 years, is so ethical and honest that I call him the Loan Arranger. He’s not a masked man, but he is a straight shooter. And a good guy.

“Times are tough,” Joe said when I went back to case the joint -- sorry, I mean to pay the mortgage. “And people are frustrated.”

A classic example, Joe recalled, was the guy who had been put through the wringer by the underwriters, who kept asking him for pay stubs, insurance forms, bank statements, everything but his birth certificate.

“Nothing he provided was good enough to get his refinancing application approved, so they kept asking for more,” Joe said. “The guy got so angry that when the underwriters demanded to see where he kept his money, he took a picture of a stainless steel box with an arrow pointing to it. He said, ‘The money is in the box.’ I was hysterical. But the underwriters weren’t amused. They said, ‘Open the box and give us pictures of George Washington.’ The guy didn’t get the loan.”

It’s stuff like this, Joe said, that causes people to try to outwit underwriters -- not a very difficult task, he and I agreed, because they seem pretty witless.

“They’re stupid. They have no common sense,” said Joe, who remembered the guy who pooled his resources by hiding his pool.

“He had a built-in swimming pool that he didn’t have a certificate of occupancy for,” Joe said. “The guy took the ladders out of his pool, put plywood over the whole thing, threw dirt and grass seed over it and roped it off. He told the appraiser not to walk on that area because it was freshly seeded. The appraiser never suspected and the guy was approved. He got away with it.”

Then there was the guy who got approved by not having an open-door policy.

“He had converted the garage to a living space that he didn’t have a certificate of occupancy for,” Joe recalled. “He took the facade off the front of the house and put two garage doors up. They didn’t work, so you couldn’t open them, but the appraiser didn’t know because he never checked. Most appraisers don’t bother to go into the garage. This guy got away with it, too.”

So did the guy who used pull to get approved.

“He had a huge deck on the back of his house that he didn’t have a permit for,” Joe said. “He also had a huge tree by the deck, so he devised a pulley system on the tree to pull up the appraiser, who went along with it. The appraiser took pictures of the back of the house from above that never showed the deck.”

Of course, some plans backfire, which is what happened to a guy who tried to doctor his W2 form but put down the wrong address for a company he said he worked for but didn’t.

“He wasn’t that sharp,” said Joe, adding that he would never go along with such chicanery. “My reputation is involved,” he said.

Still, Joe said, banks have been robbing people for so long that some people have decided to use pens and ingenuity instead of guns and bravado to rob banks.

“It’ll keep happening,” Joe promised. “You can bank on it.”

Copyright 2011 by Jerry Zezima

"Jest What the Doctor Ordered"

By Jerry Zezima

The Stamford Advocate

You have to have the patience of a saint to deal with a devil of a patient.

That’s what I learned recently when I went to the hospital for a ureteroscopy, a surgical procedure taken from the Greek words “ureter” (an extremely sensitive area of the lower anatomy) and “oscopy” (invaded by a scope the length of a boa constrictor).

The intention was to blast to smithereens a kidney stone that, because it appeared to be composed of concrete and asphalt, was barely dented by shock waves in a less invasive but unsuccessful procedure a few weeks earlier.

Despite the persistent fear that I would wake up as the lead singer for the Vienna Boys’ Choir, I was in a pretty jaunty mood as I sat in the pre-op unit with my wife, Sue, who was at my side to provide comfort, support and, if necessary, information about my living will.

“Are you diabetic?” asked Janice, a nursing assistant.

“No,” I replied. “I’m Italian.”

Janice laughed.

“It gets worse,” Sue promised.

Sure enough, when Janice asked if she could take my blood pressure on my left arm, I said, “Either arm is fine. I have it narrowed down to two. Good thing I’m not an octopus or we’d have to do this underwater.”

“Is he always like this?” Janice asked Sue.

“Yes,” Sue responded. “I just ignore him.”

I helpfully pointed out that I hadn’t even been given drugs.

“If I gave you Sodium Pentothal, you’d be gabbing up a storm,” Janice said.

“Please,” Sue begged, “not that.”

“Do I have a pulse?” I asked Janice.

“Yes,” she said. “It’s 64. And your oxygen level is 100 percent.”

“I never got 100 on any test in school,” I said.

“You just aced oxygen saturation,” Janice replied.

“Too bad the oxygen isn’t going to my brain,” I noted.

Sue nodded.

Mary, a nurse, came in to continue the prep work.

“Turn toward me,” she said.

“I’m taking a turn for the nurse,” I told Sue.

Mary looked at Sue and said, “You’re his daughter, right?” Sue chuckled. Mary smiled and said to me, “I’m giving it right back to you.”

She was just what the doctor ordered: nice, funny and very good at her job.

Then the doctor (or one of them) came in.

“I’m Dr. David Paul, your anesthesiologist,” he said.

“What’s up, doc?” I asked in my best Bugs Bunny voice.

“I’m going to knock you out,” he said.

I thought Sue, Mary and Janice would kiss him.

After a brief discussion about allergies (“I’m only allergic to myself,” I said), the doctor left and Brian, a nurse anesthetist, came in.

“Do you have any questions?” he asked.

“Yes,” I responded. “Will you be giving me domestic beer or an import?”

“You’ll be getting craft beer,” Brian said. “It’s the best-quality brew.” He should know because a friend of his owns a brewery. “By the way,” Brian added reassuringly, “I won’t be having any during the operation. I’ll wait until tonight.”

“Cheers!” I said as Brian left. Then my urologist, Dr. Albert Kim, who would be performing the procedure, came in.

“Are you behaving?” he asked.

“Of course not,” I replied.

“Good,” he said with a smile. “See you in surgery.”

The operation was a success. I’m grateful to Kim and everyone at John T. Mather Memorial Hospital in Port Jefferson, N.Y., for taking such good care of me.

The next day, Louise called from the hospital to ask how I was feeling.

“Couldn’t be better,” I said. “It’s been a rocky road, but the stone is gone.”

“Did she get the joke?” Sue asked after I hung up.

“I think so,” I answered.

“Next time you have surgery,” Sue said, “they should take the rocks out of your head.”

Copyright 2011 by Jerry Zezima

"Seals of Approval"

By Jerry Zezima

The Stamford Advocate

Unlike a lot of seals, who have managed to gain steady employment in circuses and aquariums, I have never tried to balance a beach ball on my nose. Considering the prominence of my proboscis, nobody could tell the difference.

But I once was a seal trainer for a day at Atlantis Marine World in Riverhead, N.Y. I even have a framed certificate and a photo of me being kissed by a 465-pound sea lion named Herbie.

I figured this valuable experience would come in handy when my wife, Sue, and I went on a seal walk recently with our favorite naturalist, Dr. Artie Kopelman.

A couple of years ago, Kopelman led me, Sue and about 80 other people on a whale watch off Montauk, N.Y. Everyone but Kopelman, the captain and yours truly got violently ill. Sue was green for three days. Even the whales must have been sick because none showed up.

There was little chance of a repeat on the seal walk because we would be on terra firma, not the open ocean. (The ocean, by the way, is open until 9 p.m. on Thursdays.)

Lacking seal blubber, which made me want to blubber when I realized how cold it was, I was bundled in four layers of clothing to ward off the 30-degree temperature, 20-mph wind gusts and 20-degree windchill, conditions that are positively balmy for seals. Then again, I’m positively balmy myself, so I was prepared to perambulate with a pack of pinniped pals.

So were 40 or so fellow seal walkers who huddled in Cupsogue Beach County Park in Westhampton, N.Y., and were warmly welcomed, figuratively speaking, by Kopelman, a college professor and president of the Coastal Research and Education Society of Long Island (cresli.org).

Before we set out on our walk, Kopelman warned, “Never get in the water with a seal.”

That’s because -- if you don’t freeze to death first -- seals will eat you. Or try to balance you on their noses.

Peg Hart is living (fortunately) proof. “I was bitten by an elephant seal,” said Hart, a naturalist who specializes in birds (she was, after all, talking to a birdbrain) but also works with marine mammals.

“It happened in San Francisco,” Hart recalled. “The seal had to be restrained so its blood could be drawn.”

Instead, the seal drew Hart’s blood. “It was a fluke,” she said, rolling up her sleeve to reveal a long scar.

“Looks more like it was a tooth,” I said.

Hart left her seal in San Francisco. Now she’s back East and going on seal walks with Kopelman.

Curiously, seals don’t like to walk, preferring to take mass transit by swimming together, which made the seal walk a misnomer.

The two dozen harbor seals we saw were about 150 yards away, lounging on the beach but not, as far as I could see, reading romance novels.

I did get a better view of them when I looked through Kopelman’s telescope. One of the bigger ones turned on its side and waved a flipper at me. I waved back.

“I can see some of my regulars,” said Kopelman, noting that a few of the seals return to the beach every year from Canada, where they have summer homes. On the water, of course.

Despite the difficult conditions, it was a fascinating experience. Kopelman, who has been leading such groups for more than 20 years, had great insight not only about marine mammals but terrestrial ones, too.

“A couple of weeks ago, this kid showed up in shorts, with no gloves and no hat,” Kopelman said. “He must have eaten dumb flakes for breakfast. Then there was the woman who asked, ‘Do seals have bones?’ And some people want to know where the bathroom is. I always say, ‘It’s at home.’ Thanks to humans, these seal walks can be a real adventure.”

Copyright 2011 by Jerry Zezima

"The Stripper"

By Jerry Zezima

The Stamford Advocate

Don’t tell my wife, but lately I’ve been frequenting a strip joint. It’ll sound even kinkier when she finds out that the joint is a dental center, the stripper is an orthodontist named Michael and his best customer is a patient who happens to be me.

To avoid further confusion, as well as a raid by the police, I should mention that the young man in question, Dr. Michael Sheinis, always wears his white lab coat when I visit him in the Dental Care Center at Stony Brook University on Long Island, N.Y. But he does strip my teeth, which I guess makes me the strippee.

It also makes my pearly whites easier to move into the desired position now that I am wearing invisible braces. I need them because two of my teeth, one on the top and the other on the bottom, have shifted. Since I can’t shift for myself, I have been going to Stony Brook to get things straightened out.

For a year and a half, I had a short strip (there’s that word again!) of metal braces in the upper right part of my mouth. The braces moved back the teeth in the buccal segment so the lateral incisor could be rotated to its original position.

After the construction project was dismantled by Sheinis, a nice and talented resident at Stony Brook, I was ready for my invisible braces, known by the brand name Invisalign.

But first, the good doctor had to put cement in my mouth. Not blocks, which would have been appropriate because I’m a blockhead, but small attachments on a few of my teeth so the clear plastic braces can be snapped into place. At mealtime, I can pop out the upper and lower trays, stuff my face, brush my teeth and put the braces back in. No one can see them. Only my orthodontist knows for sure.

“I won’t tell anyone,” promised Sheinis, who used a composite gun to apply the attachments. It looks like a cross between a caulker (“No, I didn’t get it at Home Depot,” Sheinis said) and the phaser Capt. Kirk used on “Star Trek” (“Going where lots of other orthodontists have gone before,” the doctor added).

On a recent visit, Sheinis announced, “I have to do a little stripping.”

“Keep your shirt on, doc,” I urged.

“Not me,” he replied reassuringly. “Your teeth. I have to strip some of the bottom ones so the invisible braces can move them more easily.”

To do so, Sheinis used interproximal strips, which are essentially pieces of sandpaper floss. The idea was to slenderize the aforementioned teeth so the crooked one on the bottom could be pushed back into line with the others.

The stripping was done over three visits. “It keeps the shape of your teeth, but it narrows them a bit,” explained Sheinis, 27, who had braces -- metal, not invisible -- when he was 10.

“My dad’s an orthodontist,” he said. “He put every appliance in my mouth. I even had the headgear with the strap that comes out of your face. I had the lip bumper, too.”

The only good part, Sheinis said, was that he got to pick which color elastic bands were used on his braces. “I always chose colors to match my favorite sports teams,” the native Floridian said, referring to the Miami Dolphins (aqua and orange) and the Miami Heat (red and black).

Today, his teeth are perfectly straight, which will make him look good in his wedding pictures (he’s engaged to be married later this year). “The braces worked,” he said, noting that mine will, too.

“By the end of the year, you’ll have a dazzling smile,” Sheinis said. “And no more stripping. I’m sure your wife will be happy to hear that.”

Copyright 2011 by Jerry Zezima