Categories
Family

The Gospel of Dalton: Be nice

In what we all agree is one of cinema’s finest moments, bar bouncer Dalton, in the critically acclaimed film “Road House,” instructs his team of bouncers to “Be nice.” If you are unfamiliar with this movie or this scene, you can pretty much turn on cable any time and find it. That and “Shawshank Redemption.”

But Dalton’s point rings true: Be nice. And good readers, I implore you today: Be nice. I have experienced some non niceties recently, and I think we can all be better.

So a few ways you can, like Dalton says, be nice:

  • If you drive a truck or an SUV, you are not, by definition, a compact car. So please, in a parking garage, don’t try and wedge yourself into a spot designated for a compact car. Oftentimes, you take up two spaces, which is not nice. Other times, you park about three inches from my driver’s side door, which means I have to climb through the passenger’s side car to get in. Add to that I was wearing a suit at the time, and while I will grant you the visual is worth a chuckle, it’s not nice.
  • If you are at the grocery store and have an overflowing shopping cart and a guy behind you has just a jug of milk, let him go ahead of you. Especially if he looks remarkably like me.
  • Speaking of the grocery store, you know those plastic bags they put your stuff in? Yeah, you can hang on to those, and then, when you are walking your dog, you can use said bags to pick up your dog’s mess from other people’s yard. Or you can be extra fancy like me and get a little thing that clips to your leash that carries bags just for that purpose. The little container is even shaped like a bone.
  • People are often criticized for failure to use turn signals. However, equally egregious is assuming that a turn signal is an automatic pass to begin merging over into a lane. You know what’s nice? When you make sure the other driver actually sees you and lets you in, rather than just barging into the lane nearly causing a collision.
  • That crying baby in public? No, it’s not pleasant to listen to. But you know who it’s most unpleasant for? The parents trying to soothe it. That said, parents — it’s nice to maybe take said unhappy camper outside for a little jaunt. Goodness knows I have taken plenty of walks out of events in order to soothe a crying baby, and that includes quite a few meals at restaurants, as well as my sister’s wedding.
  • I love sports, especially college football. One aspect of sports I have never loved is the trash talking, in particular to strangers in public. We’re a Bama family, so we have had our share of success over the last few years. That said, hey, awesome job by the Clemson Tigers, and a well deserved national championship win. But you know what’s not nice? Walking up to my son, while he is wearing a Bama shirt, and pointing to your Clemson shirt and saying, “Yeah, we rolled you! HAHAHAHAHA!” That’s not an indictment of Clemson fans. I know there are plenty of obnoxious Bama fans, too. Every fanbase has them. And they should all be nice as well. And really no grown-up should ever talk trash to a kid. You’re a grown man, and I don’t care how many beers you’ve had.
  • I am legally required to include returning shopping carts in this column.

So there you go, America. A few simple measures you can take to just be nice. Dalton thanks you for your service.

Mike Gibbons was born and raised in Aiken, S.C. A graduate of the University of Alabama, he now lives in Mt. Pleasant. You can e-mail him at scmgibbons@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @StandardMike.

 

Categories
Uncategorized

Fast break

You know that great feeling of karma when you see someone driving down the road breaking the law and then suddenly a police officer appears?

Yeah, glad I could provide that great feeling to a couple of motorists the other day.

My wife and son and I were traveling down a back highway recently. We travel a lot of back highways, and usually traffic is fairly light. I don’t speed for the most part, but I also don’t like traveling 10 miles under the speed limit for long periods of time.

On this day, we found ourselves the sixth car in a line of cars going about 45 miles per hour. We were at the rear of the pack, so I was going to have to wait for the cars in front of me to pass. And they apparently had little motivation to do that. Eventually, two cars turned off. Then one finally passed. Then another. I was now in prime position to pass.

As we approached a long stretch of road. I took my opportunity and passed the car. And just as I got back into the proper lane, along came a state trooper.

“He got you,” my wife said.

“Yep,” I said.

He immediately hit his brakes and turned around. Fantastic.

About five seconds later, here came the blue lights.

I pulled off to the side of the road and could feel the laughter as the other car went by me (at 45 mph).bluelights

I rolled down my window and pulled my license out of my wallet as my wife retrieved the registration from the glove box. As the trooper approach, I stuck my head out the window and screamed, “I PAY YOUR SALARY!!! ALSO, AREN’T THEIR MURDERS TO BE SOLVED!?!?!?”

Ha! A little bad citizen humor there. I passed on those chestnuts for multiple reasons, but the main one being that, yeah, he had caught me speeding.

As he approached, I leaned out the window and said, “You got me. I was speeding. I know.” I handed him my license, and explained to him that I had been behind that car (along with a bunch of other cars) for about 20 miles, and finally had an opportunity to pass. I told him when he passed me I had was beginning my deceleration but that, yes, in fact, I was speeding at that time.

“I’ve got no reason to think you’re lying,” he said, taking my information.

About two minutes later he came back to my car. “I’ve issued you a written warning. Have a good day, sir.”

No. YOU have a good day, sir. In fact, have a GREAT day, new best friend!

We headed on down the road, and then this thought occurred to me: I needed to find that car and let them know that they no longer got to delight in my comeuppance, because I just got a warning. To do that, I would have to drive probably 90, something that was not going to happen because (a) I shouldn’t be driving that fast and (b) my wife became the ultimate speed monitor in the car every time we hit 56 mph.

At one point, we had this exchange:

ME: So is it like I have a learner’s permit now and you’re the driving instructor?

MY WIFE: I’m not the one who got pulled over for speeding.

ME: You and I have the exact same number of speeding tickets today: zero.

OUR SON: But you got a warning for speeding.

ME: Stay out of this.

I never did find the slow car so that I could let them know about my warning victory, although I did monitor every gas station we passed, just in case. Granted, had I found the car stopped somewhere, I am pretty sure I would not have gone and said anything to them. For one thing, I don’t think my new driving instructor would have allowed it.

Mike Gibbons was born and raised in Aiken, S.C. A graduate of the University of Alabama, he now lives in Mt. Pleasant. You can e-mail him at scmgibbons@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @StandardMike.

 

Categories
Adventures Family

Burn, baby, burn

The last really bad sunburn I got was about five years ago. Well, prior to last week.

The one five years ago was a doozy, and my entire family got scorched at the beach.

Now, you’d think, “Hey, Mike – isn’t sunscreen something that, you know, every single person on the planet knows you should take to the beach, especially if your family is comprised of fair skinned people who will turn the color of a fire hydrant if exposed to direct sunlight for about five minutes?”

The answer is yes. And we did have sunscreen. Lots of it. And applied it frequently throughout the day. And apparently we would have been just as protected had we just rubbed some of the seawater on us.

On that day, we learned that sunscreen goes bad. This was a reliable brand we had used for years, but apparently this bottle was kaput.

So we are pretty diligent about keeping our sunscreen fresh. Every year, we restock our sunscreen supply, and we have been sunburn free since then. Until last week.

Hey, fun fact – it doesn’t matter how effective your sunscreen is if you don’t use it.

This was my fault and my fault alone, and I accept full responsibility. And now I will give you the reasons why it was not my fault and blame other factors, thereby shirking any and all responsibility.

My son and I were going to meet my dad and some folks about three hours away to tromp in the woods looking for critters.

I had set all of our stuff out the night before, as we were going to have to get up early to leave. But I was doing this at night. And it was cold. So sunscreen didn’t come onto my radar. My wife had gone to bed when I was getting stuff ready, so I think we can all agree she shares some blame in this. Yes? Hello? Anyone?

The next morning, we left before the sun came up. And it was still cold. And my wife had not woken up yet, so I think we can all agree she shares more blame in this. Yes? Hello? Anyone?

When the sun began to rise, I realized that I had forgotten something. No, not the sunscreen. My sunglasses. I hate being without sunglasses when I am driving, but we were too far down the road at this point. Power through it, I figured.

We arrived at our destination and I realized I had forgotten another item. No, not sunscreen. Ball caps. When I’m going to be out in the sun, I always try to wear a cap, as does my son. He was half asleep when I put him the car, but I still think we can all agree he shares blame in this. Yes? Hello? Anyone?

I dug through my trunk and found a baseball cap in there for him to wear. I would just try to change my position throughout the day, avoiding too much sun on one spot at a time, which dermatologists will tell you is probably one of the dumber ways to avoid a sunburn.

Around noon, my dad turned to me and said, “You’re getting a little red there. Did you not bring a hat? Or sunscreen?” “No, dad,” I said, suddenly becoming 11 again.

One of the other people in our group had some sunscreen, which I applied liberally, although I knew this was pretty much akin to taping an aspirin to your head after several hours of a headache.

I sprayed my son down as well, although I was pleased that the hat had done him some good. His neck and his right ear had not fared so well. Clearly, he was not rotating himself as well as I was, or his left ear could have bore the brunt of some of it.

So here we are a day after, and my face and neck feel like they’re 8,000 degrees. My son’s neck and right ear are fried, but the aloe seems to be abating that.

I will remember this incident and make sure it doesn’t happen again. And if I do stumble, I think we can all agree others share some blame in this. Yes? Hello? Anyone?

Mike Gibbons was born and raised in Aiken, S.C. A graduate of the University of Alabama, he now lives in Mt. Pleasant. You can e-mail him at scmgibbons@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @StandardMike.

 

Categories
Family Home improvement

Nailing the ‘industrial, rustic, farmhouse, you know’ look

My wife and I have begun decorating our house. The most surprising part of this is not that we have lived in the house for more than two years and haven’t started decorating until now.

That part is explainable. We rented it for the first two years. We didn’t do a whole lot of hard-core decorating, because it was not our house. No sense in putting your stamp on something you may be moving out of.

But then we bought the house from the previous owner. The surprising part is that my wife and I are decorating it. Or, to be more specific, the “I” part. There is really no reason for her to include me in this, as I have the decorating sense of a color blind capuchin monkey.

In fairness to my wife, she is doing the heavy lifting. We’ve already painted, put in new flooring, and changed out numerous light fixtures. My wife asked me for my input on these things much in the way she asked for me for input when we were picking our dishes before we got married. She asked for my opinion, kind of how you ask for a child’s take on dinner. It’s not to find out what the child likes. It’s to find out what they are going to have a temper tantrum over, and you can therefore eliminate that one.

This was the absolute right choice, as I am terrible at picking out these things, and I completely defer to her on what is the best choice in these matters. If she picks out 100 options, I probably can’t tell the difference in 99 of them. She just wants to make sure we don’t end up with the one choice that I am going to harp on for decades.

So on a recent Saturday morning, my wife asked, “So you wanna go look for stuff for the house?” I was a bit taken aback, as I assumed that I would be in my usual (and understandable) role, which would be to have her narrow down the finalists, and I would say, “Hmm. Whatever you like.”

But, hey, why not be a part of the process for a change. We headed to the store and my wife told me what she was looking for. She wants our house to have what she has described as “industrial, rustic, farmhouse, you know…” I’m going to just go with her on this, as everything has turned out great so far.

We strolled the aisles of the store for about two hours. She had a few priorities she wanted to address, the first being a basket of sorts to hang on the wall by our front door where mail could be placed, rather than having it just plopped on our dining room table. Fun fact: big box craft stores carry 43 billion types of rustic baskets that can hold mail.

After we hit the 18th aisle and my wife found her 19th basket that would just be perfect, I decided that I would offer up an opinion. “Hey, see that one in your hand?” I said. “That’s the one. It’s perfect.” Pretty sure that my wife started regretting inviting me at that point.

But she is a smart one. That’s when she assigned me my job. Decorate the backyard. She has known for a while that I had a vision for our backyard, and it involves a rather eclectic vision that includes wanting lots and lots of colorful, tin animals on our backyard fence. Yeah, I know. We’re weird.

I set off on my own, and found three new members of my now-growing fence club. By the time I was done shopping for my colorful critters, I can only assume my wife subbed out the baskets another 25 or so times. She settled on one, and I have to say, it’s a fine addition to our home’s personality.

Over the next many weekends, we will continue to shop for things to keep changing our house into our home. I know my wife will add the little things that give us the “industrial, rustic, farmhouse, you know” vibe we’re looking for. I just hope I can find some more tin animals for my fence.

Mike Gibbons was born and raised in Aiken, S.C. A graduate of the University of Alabama, he now lives in Mt. Pleasant. You can e-mail him at scmgibbons@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @StandardMike.