Computers are nothing but pure evil

The more I use them, the more I am convinced computers are vile entities designed to make me crazy.

I suspect I am not alone in my assessment of the ‘marvels’ of technology.
Many movies have been made about computers running rampant and destroying humanity. I say we are almost there.
The electronic beasts have effectively taken over the world and are in control of everything from traffic lights to international banking.
They were supposed to make life easier, but as my home computer proved this week, that’s like saying alcohol makes people wittier.
My computer had been acting up for some time and the other day it gave the electronic version of a death gurgle and shut down.
My computer at work is in good shape, but it still drives me crazy because, after all, it is a still a computer.
Then there is the perennial problem of the electronic terrors crashing without warning. One minute you are merrily working away, your fingers happily caressing the mouse and then - BAM – you are left staring at an error message.
I think I know why quirky little things happen when using the infernal machines: computers are evil.
More than once I have wished I could bring a computer to life just so I could have the pleasure of killing it.
“Hi, I’m your computer. I have just come to life.”
“Really, that’s great.”
Ka-boom.
“Reboot that.”
Acting as a buffer between feeble-minded computer users – I’m not mentioning any names here - and the technologically bloated machines are the tech experts, who are sometimes referred to as geeks.
I, of course, would never call them that and have a deep and heart-felt respect for their astounding ability to communicate with said machine, and to correct whatever digital crisis the device may be enduring.
I really mean that. I am not just saying it because there’s a chance the company tech will read this and take offence to being called a geek.
Because if he were to take offence to the comment (which I am not making) the next time I go scampering to him for help, he might just stick his fingers in his ears and go, “La-la-la-la-la” until I went away.
Or worse, he might put his hands over his eyes and say, “Where’d the tech go? Where is he? He’s all gone.”
When it comes to fixing computers I am lost after re-booting, which is the first thing I do no matter the problem.
Smoke and flames could be pouring from the hard drive and my first course of action would be to reboot. If rebooting doesn’t work, I might try hitting it on the side like the Fonz would have done. I would like to add that never works on computers or anything else for that matter.
I would then think bad thoughts about the computer before running to our most beloved in-house computer tech who is not unlike a knight in shinning armour waiting to battle the evil, glitch-breathing dragon that has dared attack one of his flock.
One time I explained the problem, but he was too busy to tend to the matter immediately, so he rattled off some possible solution and asked if I knew how to do it.
I said I didn’t have to know how to do it. That’s what he was for.
He corrected the problem in about four seconds.
“The least you could do was make it look difficult so I could salvage some shred of self worth. Maybe spend a whole minute fixing it or something, I mean, c’mon will ya. Every body is watching.”
Maybe I’ll just sit back and wait for this whole computer “fad” to end.
I have a feeling it’s going to be a long wait.

Copyright 2017 Darren Handschuh

A stunt skater I am not

I know, and you are right, it was a dumb idea.
I also know I will have to narrow that down a little as I have more dumb ideas than a politician (if that's possible).
The dumb idea in question was from a few years back when I took my kids to a local skateboard park.
No, I did not jump on a skateboard after a 30-year absence and hurt myself - that would be really dumb.
Instead, I threw on my in-line skates and hurt myself.
While the kids were rolling along doing all sorts of neat little tricks, I was calmly skating my way around the outer perimeter of the skateboard park.
I watched as they went up the quarter pipe and down and around and thought, “That doesn't look so hard.”
I have been ice skating since I was about five years old, so I feel quite comfortable on in-line skates, and this is where the dumb idea began to form.
Slowly, I skated closer and closer to the quarter pipe, while my brain lied to me and told me I could do it.
“C'mon, you played hockey for years. You are a master on skates. What's the difference between ice or cement?” challenged that little red, horned guy on my shoulder.
“How tough can it be for a super jock like yourself. You can do it. Go for it stud.”
The white guy with the halo on the other shoulder was trying to offer a cautionary word or two, but the red guy was making such a convincing argument.
“C'mon big man, you can do it. Go up, go down, it will be great. People will be amazed at your skating ability, especially for such an old guy.”
By now I was feeling pretty darned good about my skating prowess and even in my late 30s I knew I possessed the skills of a life-long stunt skater.
“I can do it,” I thought.
The plan was to start slow. I would just go part-way up the ramp, turn and come back down.
No problem, I can do it.
Once I completed the little warm up stunt, I would graduate to more challenging moves and before you know it, I will be the oldest guy in the X Games.
I can do it.
Apparently I couldn't do it. In fact, I could not even come close to doing it. In fact, I only made it less than two feet up the ramp when I realized I should have listened to the little white dude with the halo, who was now sitting back with a rather smug look on his face.
I quickly learned the difference between skating on a nice flat sheet of ice, and in-line skating up a sloped ramp.
My leading skate hit the bottom of the half-pipe and decided it would be best to go north while the rear in-line skate went east sending my stunt south.
I also learned I do not bounce like I used to. Instead of bouncing off the ground, getting up and going again like I did as a young lad, I landed with a thump that held absolutely no bounce at all.
I didn't even slide or anything, just - WHAM – and down I was.
I got up and tried to look cool, which wasn't too hard because people (much younger people) were falling around the place all the time.
The truly hard part was not showing how much pain I was in. I had a bruise on my hip that covered roughly 48 per cent of my body.
That will happen when you thud rather than bounce.
The pain in my hip could have been a lot worse had I not used my wrist, elbow and shoulder to break the fall. Fortunately the fall was all that was broken that day.

Copyright 2015, Darren Handschuh

I'm not going to be stumped by this challenge

I have a new nemesis.
It is not an evil villain type of nemsis or even a human nemesis: it is a tree stump nemesis.
When we bought our home 15 years ago it had five crab apple trees, which, in my opinion, are the most worthless trees in the world because you can't eat the fruit. I guess you an make jam out of it, but who wants to?
And those millions of tiny little apples mean the tree has to be sprayed as if it were a real fruit tree, which is a pain in the posterior.
It also pains me to spend good money on something as worthless as a crap, er, I mean crab tree.
So within the first year, three of the infernal wooded growths fell to the chainsaw, but the other two I left in.
I spent years pruning the one in the backyard to grow along our fence line so it will block out the school that is directly behind my house and I am happy to say I succeeded quite well.
It is still a stupid crab tree, but at least it serves a purpose.
Sitting in the front yard of my humble home was another crab apple tree. True, it looked beautiful when in full bloom, but that only last a couple weeks and then it is just a useless, growing lawn ornament.
I left it in for all these years because my kids and their friends liked to clumb on it and who am I to deny a youngster the age-old thrill of climbing a tree.
However, the kids are older now and have no interest in climbing the tree, so I finally had the chance to convert it into firewood.
That left a stump in the yard from what was once a 30-year-old apple tree.
No problem, I have pulled many stumps in the past. Growing up, my parents had two acres with lots of trees and I can remember spending the better part of a summer digging out five poplar trees that were at least 50 years old.
That meant they had massive roots, so I spent hours digging with a shovel and chopping with an axe. Digging, chopping, digging, chopping...
My dad always warned me to wear leather boots for such work, but one day (when he was not home) I decided running shoes would do just fine. I took a mighty swing with the axe only to have it bounce off the root and sink into my foot.
I froze and waited for the pain. I waited...and waited but no pain came. I pulled out the axe and realized the blade had gone perfectly between my toes and embedded into the sole of my shoe.
After that, I always wore my work boots.
Anyway, the stump I am dealing with now is just as evil, with roots the size of an elephants leg. Well, maybe not quite that big, but those are some very large roots.
Junior needed gas money (what teen doesn't) so I traded him some money for a bit of time hacking away at the stump.
He quickly learned digging out a stump sucks.
He worked hard on it for a couple of hours, but the stump would not even wobble let alone fall over.
It is good for a young lad to do some old-fashioned physical labour and it is even better for dad to let him do it.
Having earned his gas money, he vacated the job mumbling something about a chainsaw and couple sticks of dynamite, which meant it was once again my turn to tackle the  stump from hell.
A lot of hacking, digging and the occasional bad word has gone into removing this stump, but so far it refuses to release its grip on Mother Earth.
But I am stubborn and will not stop until the stump and its evil root system are vanquished.
It is me or the stump and the yard ain't big enough for both of us.

Copyright 2015, Darren Handschuh

It's not all about the money

The problem with people who have lots of money is they don't understand what it's like to not have lots of money.
Or to even not have enough money.
A recent trip to Mexico showed how great the contrast between haves and have nots are. In one area of the town we spent five days in, there was a vast landscape of shacks, barely running cars, dust and garbage.
Numerous homes were atop an old landfill site and many of the homes were made out of whatever material could be found.
And these were not druggies or alcoholic bums, but hard-working people who were trying to survive on a whopping $40US a week.
A few kilometres away, sat a strip of posh resorts. Pools, hottubs and condos with the same square footage or more as my entire house stretched for kilometres. BMWs, Mercedes and Cadillacs graced the parking lot, while the 'slums' were full of dented and rusted out cars that were as peace meal as the houses.
Having too much money has never been a problem I have had to face, but it is one I wouldn't mind trying on for size.
For a few years after we wed, my wife and I were so broke we could barely afford air, but we saved and worked hard to arrive at the humble abode we now call home.
During those broke years, I was covering an event as a photographer for the newspaper I worked for that featured a wealth-management specialist.
That is someone who tells people how to best take care of their money. Considering I did not have any money at the time, I did not pay too much attention to what he was saying.
That is until he said, “And with the extra money you have left over from each pay cheque, you can invest it in...”
Extra money?
What the hell is that?
What is this mythical thing called extra money of which he speaks?
At the time, we were 'foolishly' spending all our money on silly stuff like rent and food and we certainly did not have any 'extra money' lying around we could invest in something.
But to people in the audience with an abundance of money, it all made perfect sense.
I personally know a few people who are doing quite well financially. Some of whom made a lot of money in legal, yet somewhat unscrupulous manners, but that is for another time.
The common thread they all shared was they had no concept of what not being able to afford something was like.
This one guy and I were talking and I mentioned my truck needed some work.
His response, “Well just take it in to get fixed. Problem solved.”
He could not wrap his money-laden brain around the thought that, at the moment, I could not afford to have the work done.
He was baffled at the notion.
The conversation drifted in another direction and it wasn't long before he was telling me about his new boat, vacation plans and all the skiing they did last winter.
Years of working in newspaper has provided me with a career that I have come to regard as a job I have done for a very long time.
Coupled with a marginally acceptable wage and it was a way to pay the bills – most of them anyway.
The rich people I have met over the years – and I have met a few very rich people – cared about one thing and one thing only: money.
It was their god, it was their desire, it was their sole purpose for living.
They were not very nice people, at least not to us little people and I found some of the poorest people I have met were the most inviting, welcoming and generous with what little they had.
For someone who lusts, loves and covets money, they will never have enough. But for someone who loves people, life and giving you will always have enough.

Copyright 2015, Darren Handschuh

Hola from the real Mexico, where many lives were changed

Turning off the rugged, pothole-filled paved road, a caravan of vehicles made its way along a dirt road through the barrio of a coastal Mexican town.

For several of us, it was the first time we had ever been to Mexico, let alone deep into a neighbourhood of shacks, small rundown travel trailers and peace-meal homes built from whatever material could be found.
The homes sit atop an old landfill and pieces of plastic, glass and other materials poke through the light-brown dessert sand.
By North American standards, it looks like a slum, but for the people living in the barrio of Puerto Penasco (Rocky Point) it is home and not an uncommon neighbourhood. With a wage of mere $40 a week, it can be a challenge to provide even that.
While only a few kilometers from a pristine collection of resorts, condos and towering luxury buildings, the barrio might as well have been on a different planet, the contrast is so stunning.
As we pulled up to one particular shack, we were warmly greeted my Meetay, Jasmine and Charlie. Charlie is not his given name, but because of the difficulty our Canadian tongues would have in pronouncing his real name, he told everyone to just call him Charlie. So we did.
I thought our mission was to change the life of this Mexican family, but when it was over it would be my life and the outlook I have that would be changed.
Charlie and his family were typical of so many in the area. Honest, caring people who were doing their best to scratch out a living in an economy where wages were dollars a day and a litre of gas cost the same as Canada. Alcohol is cheap, milk is not.
We piled out of rented cars into the hot Mexican sun and immediately got to work building a ‘house’ for this warm and genuine family.
The house, by North American standards, was really not much to look at. A rectangle box with two doors, two windows and a tiny bathroom area, it measured 220 square feet – roughly the same size and the garage of my Okanagan home.
Dozens of wheelbarrows of concrete were mixed by hand to make the floor and foundation. The family was hooked up to electricity only a few months ago. Water was from a small pipe sticking out of the ground with a garden hose attached to it. There were no cement mixers, just wheelbarrows, shovels and large hoes with holes in them to mix the cement.
Prior to our arrival, the building material was dropped off at Charlie’s home. Someone had to stay at the home at all times to watch over the pressboard, bags of cement and two-by-fours. Charlie assured they would be safe.
“It’s OK, I have my 45,” he said not referring to a handgun caliber, but to his dog, whose name was 45.
First the forms were made to contain the cement mixture before everyone grabbed a shovel or hoe and began the laborious task of mixing the concrete.

Gravel and cement were first mixed dry before water was added and the whole thing was mixed yet again. When the last wheelbarrow was dumped, we turned our attention to framing the walls that would be put up the next day.
As the work progressed, neighbourhood children came over, shy at first, but by the end of the build they were running up to some of the foreigners they had bonded with, wanting piggyback rides or to sit in the sand with them and stack small pieces of cut wood in a game they had just made up. The children were a delight and irresistible to hang out with. Besides, it was also a good excuse to take a break from mixing cement, or later, swinging a hammer for a few minutes. Who could deny someone a chance to interact with a small child with huge brown eyes and an even bigger smile. These beautiful children would remember the people who played games with them and gave them their time long after the memory of the builders had faded.
A few venders showed up as well to ply their wares, but they were not aggressive like the ones in the Old Port market who do whatever they could to entice you into their shop.
“Amigo, you buy. You come look. We make deal.” were oft heard phrases in the market crammed with vendors, restaurants, taxis and more vendors all clambering to get the attention of the gringos. If you were white, you were assumed to have money.
Because we were there during the off season, there were not too many white folk to be found so the ones who were there were besieged by vendors. After a short while, I must admit it became very irritating to be constantly declining offers to purchase something, as you would no sooner decline an offer from one when another would attempt to get your attention. The sidewalks salesmen were relentless and almost overwhelming with their omnipresent sales pitch. Nothing had a price tag and everything was negotiable.
In contrast, the sellers at the build site sat patiently near the side of the road and waited for us to come to them - which we did at the end of each working day. Bartering is a given in Mexico, but most of us could not bring ourselves to haggle too much knowing these people were barely surviving and the few greenbacks we gave them would feed their family while our wallets would barely notice the absence of a few pieces of paper.
The first day’s work done, it was time to head back to base camp for a meal and time together before going to bed. We would be up before the sun to get as much work done as we could before the afternoon heat bore down on our winterized Canadian bodies.
Day two saw the walls go up, a roof put on and the first layer of stucco (a mixture of sifted sand and cement) as the swarm of pasty-white Canucks labored shoulder to shoulder with Charlie, his family and neighbours. When the first walls went up and the shape of a building began to form the volunteer work crew was re-energized, as real progress could be seen. Once the walls were secured, the roof was added and sheets of Tolko pressboard covered the entire structure.
Tar paper and chicken wire was then added to the exterior before it was back to the wheelbarrows and more hand-mixing cement and sifted sand for the first layer of stucco.
Day three had ther final coat of stucco added, windows and doors installed and finishing touches to the structure that would more than double their living area.
Through it all, Meetay could not stop smiling, a joy that infected the 20 people who travelled from the Great White North to help 1 Mission build yet another home for a deserving family. The heat of the day was barely noticed as we closed in on completion of the home and the excitement of making such a huge difference. The look of pride carried by Charlie was not lost on any of us.
A faith-based organization, 1 Mission builds 75 homes a year for the people of the barrio – for free. All that is required from those receiving the home is to put in 200 volunteer hours helping their neighbours. 1 Mission has been operating in Rocky Point for several years and have built some 300 homes; a feat that has not gone unnoticed among the barrio community who treat 1 Mission and its workers with respect.
As the last nail was driven into the door frame, you could not help but feel a sense of accomplishment, an inner joy for helping out such a deserving family and a humbling feeling of just how blessed we in Canada are to live in such a rich and luxurious nation.
For the first time in her life, 12-year-old Jasmine would have her own bedroom. Charlie and Meetay would take the other room and their former house would be their kitchen and common area. As a brief ceremony was held at the end of the build, Meetay and Jasmine could not hold back their tears and several of the builders also found themselves filled with emotion.
It was wonderful and fulfilling to spend time with ‘real’ Mexicans. To see the ‘real’ Mexico and not just some sanitized Americanized version of the nation that so many people visit, but few really experience.
These were just regular, everyday people, and we were blessed to be able to share a short portion of their lives. The unpaved roads, roaming dogs, blowing dust and sheer poverty in which so many Mexicans live was so far from anything I have ever seen in Canada, it takes a few days to process.
In this Mexico, there are no swimming pools, no waiters catering to your every whim, no maids cleaning your room while you lounge at the beach with a tequila, and I loved every minute of it.
We spent five days in Mexico, three building the home and two at a resort only a few kilometers away. By far, spending time with Charlie and his family was the more enjoyable of the two. It does the soul good to help others, there is a joy that cannot be found poolside as you sweat in the midday sun and rinse dust from your teeth or nurse a finger that got in the way of a swinging hammer.
I would highly recommend it. There is reward in giving of yourself to help others. The time at the resort is reduced to a few photographs and souvenirs, but the house built memories that will last a lifetime. The resort offers a few days of luxury, the home offers a family a life-changing blessing – both Charlie’s family and my own.
While my family and I chose to support a Christian-based group, there are many agencies working in communities throughout Mexico that could use some free labour. So perhaps the next time you go south, considering skipping a couple days of a king-size bed, big screen TV and room service to experience the real Mexico and to get more than just a tan. By helping out you will get a sense of satisfaction, lifelong memories and the knowledge that you made a difference in the life of someone not as blessed as you. You will not regret it.

Rodent running amok at work

There has been an unwanted guest running around the office the past few days.
It's small, it's a grayish-brown colour and it is freaking people out.
It is easy to tell when Mickey's cousin makes an appearance – just follow the screams.
ﾒThat was gross. It ran right over my foot,” said a female staff member after an up-close-and-personal encounter of the vermin kind.
ﾒWell, think of how scared the mouse was when it saw you,” was my soothing reply, but oddly enough she did not find it very comforting.
After all, a mouse is a tiny little creature that must see us humans as scary giants.
While the office is hardly infested with mice – a single mouse does not an invasion make – it is still creeping people out, so steps are underway to take care of the problem.
I suggested they bring in the Critter Assault Tactical Squad – CATS – to take care of the situation. There are a couple feral cats living in the alley behind the building that could dispatch of a rascally rodent in no time. All we would have to do is herd the cats into the building and let them do their thing.
Of course herding cats is slightly easier than raising a teenage daughter, but the cats won't burst in to tears every 30 seconds.
The other suggestion to get rid of the rodent was to arm a few select staffers with BB guns. My sons each have BB handguns and I could strut around like Wyatt Earp and hunt down the varmints like an old west bounty hunter.
While that would likely be the most entertaining way (for me anyway) to get rid of the beast, I suspect PETDLR (People for the Ethical Treatment of Dirty Little Rodents) would get their knickers in a knot and I anticipate a more traditional method will be used, such as people running around with hammers and hockey sticks.
I am kidding of course, all we need are hockey sticks.
Wait, I'm kidding again.
Although I am not privy to the inner workings of the rodent-elimination project, I suspect traps will be strategically placed to dispatch the rodent from this earth.
The Interweb is a gold mine of mouse-killing information with dozens of sites explaining the finer points of exterminating the little blighters.
Oddly enough, cheese is not recommended as the trap food of choice. It would seem all those childhood cartoons I watched lied about a mouse's penchant for hardened yellow dairy products.
The food of choice to catch the furry menace is peanut butter because it sticks to whatever you put it on, such as the trigger mechanism of the death machine known as a mouse trap.
There are also a bevy of elaborate mouse-killing methods available on the Net, but the spring-loaded trap of doom is still the cheapest tried and true method.
How many rodents have been sent to mouse Valhalla by the little piece of wood with a spring and metal attachments we will never know.
There are, of course, humane traps. This is where you catch the mouse alive, take it outside to release it and then you run like mad to try and get back into the building before the mouse does.
Someone even came up with a water bucket trap. This where you set up an elaborate string system over a bucket half filled with water.
The mouse will venture onto the string in an effort to reach the bait before falling into the water where it will drown – that is after spending who knows how long trying its best to stay alive.
Sounds kinda cruel to me. I much prefer the quick and painless of the good, old-fashioned spring-loaded dealer of mouse death.
You can try, but I doubt you can actually build a better mouse trap.

Copywrite 2014 Darren Handschuh

The path not taken...

Lately, I have been spending some time reflecting on the paths I took that brought me to where I am today.
I am not sitting alone in the dark, obsessing about my past (my psychiatrist said that is a bad thing), but on occasion I will pick a certain topic and re-visit decisions made years ago.
Some of the decisions I made were quite good – marrying my wife was one of the smartest things I have ever done. I wonder if she can make the same claim – somehow I doubt it.
The dumbest decision I have ever made was to smoke cigarettes. What the hell was I thinking?
Smelling bad, spending hard-earned money and damaging my health apparently was a cool thing to do at that age. Ah, the stupidity of youth never ceases to amaze.
With the half a century mark less than a year away, my latest reflections have been on the career choices I have made and if I could go back 30 years I would smack myself upside the head to knock some sense into my cranial region.
I really had no specific drive or direction in my younger years. The only thing I was even remotely passionate about was riding motorcycles, but there were not a lot of career options in that area.
In high school, we were told to avoid any sort of trades. There were so many carpenters, welders, electricians and plumbers out there they could not buy a job.
Nowadays, trades are like a workplace Nirvana with workers being snapped up faster than an expense cheque in the Senate.
After high school, I wandered aimlessly through life for a while, wondering what the heck I was going to do next.
I spent a couple years working in a sawmill pulling lumber off of what was called the planer chain.
Basically you spent eight hours a day stacking wood onto a big, green cart. When the cart was full, you pushed it into a pick up area where a forklift driver grabbed the pile of lumber. You then pushed the cart back to the planer chain and resumed filling it with wood again – and again and again and again...
I quickly realized I had found the true definition of boredom.
I became engaged and after enduring yet another short-term lay off, I knew I wanted a lot more out of life than piling little pieces of trees day in and day out so I looked for a more interesting job option.
I met a guy who was a newspaper photographer and he had all sorts of fun at his job, so I spent a couple years in college before embarking on my own newspaper adventure.
Over the years I have been a photographer, reporter, editor, columnist, coffee maker and have done pretty much everything but have a paper route.
I must admit, at times my new career was a lot of fun. It was great to always be going out and doing things, meeting people, taking in different events. Unlike the sawmill where you knew what you would be doing every single day, each day in the newsroom was different from the last.
But the newspaper industry has taken a few knocks lately and despite having some fun on the job even after all these years, I am thinking a different career might have been a better move.
Like gangster, or politician – oops my bad, that is basically the same thing.
I would say I should have followed my youthful dreams, but I did not really have any.
But if I could go back to the mid '80s and give myself one piece of advice it would be this: stay at the sawmill, make good money and invest every penny you can in Microsoft stock.
By now, I would be the ruler of my own island in the Caribbean.
Sigh, the path not taken...

copyright 2014, Darren Handschuh  

Junior learns a life lesson

It's fun to watch one of your children have a life realization.
I got to enjoy one of those when Junior was talking about his menial part-time, after-school job.
But before we get to that moment, a little history is required.
My parents owned a nursery when I was growing up and that meant I was called upon to help out – a lot.
Being the first-born son I had responsibilities the eldest son was expected to meet. Basically, it was my job to help shoulder the load of running a business while my dad still worked full time.
Weekends and after school meant putting in some time on the end of a shovel, a rake, pruning shears or simply moving potted plants around. In general it was doing your best to make sure none of the stock died.
Oddly enough, people did not want to buy a dead tree – go figure.
I must admit, I was not always thrilled with the arrangement, but I sure did enjoy the income.
I was the only kid in Grade 8 with a job, but without that job I would not have been able to afford dirtbikes (which I loved), or cars (which I loved) or fancy rims for the car (which I loved) or a stereo so loud it would make your ears bleed (which I really loved.)
Yes, there were many benefits to working in the nursery. Of course, the downside was I had to work in a nursery.
And really, what teen actually wants to work.
I knew a guy who went off on me one day about all the stuff I had. At the time, I had a car and two dirtbikes, and he was envious of the cool toys in my possession.
After listening to him rant for a minute, I became somewhat agitated and pointed out that I worked hard for all my stuff and while he was sleeping in until noon on weekends, I was up and doing manual labour for several hours already.
He then looked at me with all sincerity and said, “But, I don't like to work.”
He believed if he did not like to work, he should not have to.
"Who the hell does?” was my exasperated reply. For some reason he felt he should have as much as I did without having to work for it.
Sounds like a prime candidate for the Senate if you ask me.
Anyway, because Junior wanted a car, ski pass, brand-name clothes and all sorts of things, he needed and a job and after sending out applications he would lament about how 'cool' it would be to have a job at your fingertips like I did when I was a teen.
Eventually Junior did get a job, a manual labour job and after one particularly boring day under the hot summer sun, he came home and proclaimed, “Manual labour sucks.”
This is that life lesson moment I was speaking of earlier.
I must admit, I pounced on that statement like a lion on a three-legged gazelle.
"Oh reeeeeaaalllly. So you mean it would not be cool to have a manual-labour job at your fingertips. It would not be cool to come home after school everyday and put in a few hours of work. Hmmm, interesting, because I recall you saying on several occasions how cool that would be.”
For one of the few times in his life, Junior had nothing to say.
But to his credit, he has stuck with his manual labour gig and purchased a car of his own.
He then was introduced the world of insurance, repairs and the ridiculously high price of gas.
He also learned how important an education is and the better educated he is the farther away from manual labour he will be.

copyright 2014, Darren Handschuh