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Echoes from the

Loafers’ Club Meeting

I’m going to see a different audiologist.

What’s wrong with your current audiologist?

He keeps telling me I need a heron egg.

Driving by Bruce’s drive

I have a wonderful neighbor named Bruce. Deep thoughts occur as I drive past his drive. I bobbed and weaved my way through a crowd at a county fair to get to my parked car, which had become an Easy-Bake Oven. It wasn’t frying eggs on a flat rock hot, but it was sizzling. The temperature was 87, but it was humid, which made it feel hotter than the hinges of Hades. I can hear a resident of Yuma, Arizona, saying, “Oh, so you think 87 degrees is hot. That’s so cute.”

I attended the funeral of a legendary domino-playing lady, Lois Bushlack, where I was served a fine funeral fare — scalloped potatoes and ham (I call them “funeral potatoes,” a title often given to potato casseroles involving cheese, cornflakes or crushed potato chips), coleslaw, dill pickles and dessert bars. I call them funeral potatoes because they’re often served at funerals. For that, I am most thankful. Lois and the late Donna Ferguson played the pipped tiles with gusto, each accusing the other of cheating. As a boy, I was told that the one who complained the most about cheating was typically the biggest cheater. Lois and Donna held themselves to a higher code of ethics than a Supreme Court Justice. Neither cheated nor thought the other had.

A family elder used to dismiss another by saying, “I wouldn’t give him the time of day.” Someone asked me the time. I’m rarely asked for that. I gave him the time of the day. Why not? I’d found a cart with good wheels and pushed it merrily from store aisle to aisle, working conscientiously on the shopping list my wife had entrusted to my care. Everything was copacetic until I ran over a squirrel. It rattled my cart. I looked for a pancaked squirrel. There was none. What I had hit was an ink pen.

I’ve learned

Hands down, the best time for anything is 6:30.

Don’t blame a clown for acting like a clown if you keep going to the circus.

Hors d’oeuvres prove we have no willpower.

I petted a porcupine in Alberta. Always pet a porcupine with the grain.

I never complain about the long lines to a men’s restroom.

I’m glad that I knew Ryan “Juner” Johnson, who used spoonerisms on stage to tell the tale of Rindercella, who lived with her mugly other and her two sad bisters. The storal of the mory is this: If you ever go to a bancy fall and want to have a pransom hince loll in fove with you, don’t forget to slop your dripper.

Bad jokes department

Two conspiracy theorists walk into a bar. You can’t tell me that’s a coincidence.

How do you catch a squirrel? Climb a tree and act like a nut.

Do they use seahorses in water polo?

Nature notes

“I know a chickadee and a killdeer call out their names. Do any other birds?” Some bird names are imitations of their songs/calls, yet there isn’t a single bird species named chirp. Some onomatopoetic names are the phoebe, peewee, towhee, cuckoo, jay, bobwhite, kiskadee, willet, curlew, whip-poor-will, chuck-will’s-widow, hoopoe, kittiwake and chachalaca. A crow might be imitative of the bird’s cry.

“What’s an easy way to tell a raven from a crow?” Check the range maps. The much larger common ravens can be distinguished from American crows by their massive bills; by their tails, which come to a V (like the V in raven) behind them; and by their croak compared to a crow’s caw.

“Do monarch caterpillars use dogbane as a host plant? Dogbane’s name refers to its supposed toxicity to dogs. The perennial plant’s strong fibers have made it prized for cordage and threads. Young dogbane plants are often mistaken for milkweed. Injured dogbane oozes a white sticky sap with the consistency of latex paint. It’s native to Minnesota and was once thought to be a larval food for monarch butterflies, but research has shown that while female monarchs occasionally lay eggs on this species, their offspring will not mature on it. Dogbane grows 5 feet tall and blooms in white flowers in June-August. I enjoy seeing the iridescent dogbane beetles on dogbane. The gold, blue, green, yellow and red insects are stunners.

Meeting adjourned

“Never admire quietly. If I admire something about someone, I tell them. We humans are so fragile. It’s important we give people their flowers while they are still here.”—Chimamanda Adichie.