PATRICK MCVAY

WRITER

My Musings

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Stop Driving While Texting!

One thing that drives me nuts is when people are texting just fine and then, suddenly, they decide to pull out their car. It's like, wait a minute! You're texting. Don't you think you should be more focused?

No one will feel worse than you if you hurt someone because you weren't focused on your texting. It may seem like you're safe and in control, but all it takes is a split second of turning your attention to steering and braking for autocorrect to change your message from "I love u" to "I loathe u." And because you continue to be distracted by driving, you don't even realize that you've done this, wounding your friend or your mom or that person you've been admiring on Tinder. 

It can wait. You can drive when you're done texting. 


  541 Hits

The Knickerman

Someone should stage a dramatic reading of a play about one man's struggle to outfit himself with excellent and colorful golf knickers, which he believes is the only thing that stands between him and golf greatness.

Confounded by supply-chain and color-scheme issues, he tries but fails to outfit himself appropriately, which he tells his wife of some twenty years is the only reason he hasn't been able to join the tour. They live on a golf course because back in the day he convinced his then-fiancée, who knew less about golf that you do, that he was destined to be a touring pro, and she wanted to believe him because it sounded really awesome to be the wife of a guy who spends 100% of his time living out of suitcases and never seeing the kids.

Over time the woman comes to see that her husband has delusions of grandeur, since they live on the fairway of a short par 5 hole and she is able to spy him whack at the ball 8 or 9 times before it reaches the green. She hacks into his account at the country club they spend way too much money to be members of and sees that he possesses a 30+ handicap at the age of forty, and confronts him about it. "Of course, I have a 30+ handicap!" he hollers. "I don't have proper golf gear."

At her wits' end, she pulls out her mom's old Singer sewing machine and fashions the loudest, most ridiculous golf knickers she can conceive of, made of red fabric embroidered with little golf clubs and balls and bags, which she presents to him for his birthday, mostly as a joke. But he doesn't take it as a joke, donning the gear and heading straight for the first hole, where, as the lights dim all around except for a spotlight on him, a voice from the ether call his name to tee off at the US Open.

Question: should I first seek out a membership at a private golf club for the purposes of "research"?

  495 Hits

A Pox On Your Portland Monkey

We're supposed to believe that these two things are entirely unrelated.  

  502 Hits

La Chapelle

La-Chapelle-Barbershop They Take Walk-Ins You Know

I don't usually get my haircut in Roslindale, but the godforsaken hellacious virus from another world (slight exaggeration) has made mincemeat out of my routine, and now I'll go anywhere and do anything.

"We need you to fly to Iran and get a few Americans holed up at the Canadian Embassy out of the country."

I'll do it!

No, wait, that was just me recalling the moving "Argo," which I happened watch just a few days ago. Always love to revisit styles from previous periods, like the early '80s, when I knew as much about fashion as I do now. Apparently, there were mustaches, and eyeglasses were oversized.

OK, so I need a haircut, and one day I'm driving through Rozzy village, which is totally normal for me, and then I encounter a sign that includes the words "Barber." Cut to two days later. I have to get my scooter's safety inspection done, so I figure I zip over to J and D Cycles in Hyde Park, which it turns out passes right by Rozzy Village if you believe Google Maps, which of course I do, despite my strong preference not to.

Have you ever heard the song by Barber Shop by Tom Waits? Also, I am blogging about a random haircut I got because – what, there isn't anything more important happening in the world to blog about?

But I digress. So, I go into the shop and realize that this place doesn't specialize in my brand of graying, thinning, British Isles hair, nor my British Isles mother tongue. And with the cost at $8 more than I'm used to paying, I get up to leave. But then a barber comes over and tells me he is available, and now I'm stuck getting a relatively expensive haircut from a man who can't possibly know how to cut hair like mine.

Of course, I'm wrong. Armed with an array of weapons that would make the Russian army look ill-prepared for battle and a few mumbled words of instruction from me, the barber clips and cuts and sculpts to perfection, adding a handful of foamy mousse to the top of my hair. I'm pretty sure the barber didn't cut the top short enough, until I live with my new head for a day and determine the length is spot on.

Didn't get the barber's name, but very likely to visit that shop again.

  519 Hits

 

 

J'Biden Era Haikuage

 

People's Arms. That's right!

200 million shots

In 100 days

 

We are good people

But we still have far to go

Repair. Restore. Heal.

 

There's nothing new here

The Affordable Care Act

We're restoring it 

 

America's Day

Democracy is fragile

The world is watching 

 

Strategy is based

On Science, not politics

Truth, not denial

 

 

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