A MAN OF MEANS BY ANY MEANS

Some people, and I’m one of those people that tripped, teetered, tottered, lurched, and fallen into waywardness as I’ve journeyed through life’s storms. Now that doesn’t mean I’m a bad man or a man of egregious evil intentions just because I occasionally used rare and unconventional knowledge to squeeze me through some very tight and incommodious situations.

Since I’ve become a real old codger, plumb worn out my britches gallivanting here, there, most everywhere, I’ve had to give up all that rigmarole (wink, wink). I must admit though, there were times when I could hoodwink almost anybody, even the slightest skullduggery did wonders for my ego. But not everything turns out in a copacetic, hunky-dory, and gratifying manner. When things went sideways, helter-skelter, took a really bad turn, I’d jump into my jalopy, put the pedal to the metal and just drive off leaving a trail of smoke and mirrors belching out of the exhaust.

Quite often, it’s best to put a kibosh on everything, I mean bejeebers and flibberty-jibbet, jumping out of the frying pan into another hullabaloo could wind up being threatening to one’s health. I’ve seldom been bamboozled but I have been flabbergasted with some of the outcomes of my risky actions and we aren’t talking a slight brouhaha either. Sometimes I’ve been mired down, a little discombobulated but that was when I had a mind to lollygag and not take things too seriously. When I was a young ripper-snapper, somewhat of a smart aleck, my carefree life often took a catawampus direction, but I may have been a nincompoop at the time. The smart thing to do was probably skedaddle, hit the road Jack and don’t come back before all the shenanigans broke loose but being flummoxed and stuck in my craw like a hunk of pumpernickel, just plain stubborn, I’d pop my cork and fizzle into confusion. Other instances, like a garden full of carrots and one flowery periwinkle, I was securely rooted and could not escape my unscrupulous decisions. And, when all seemed lost, feeling sorry for myself, I’d just grab a hold of my thingamajig. What’s that you ask? Well…when you’re confuzzled, in one kerfuffle after another, the world appearing to be full of perpetual poppycock, it’s good to get a hand on things, don’t you think?

Some of what I’ve said so far is completely bogus, utter balderdash and up to my neck pure baloney, and yet, if you’re an old fuddy-duddy like myself - I mean thunderation – there is a mote of truth in my words. But I’m sure most everyone has had a major skewwiff and if there hadn’t been a railing, they would have been dastardly derailed or tarred and feathered and ran out of town on a rail. I wouldn’t call myself a flim-flam man, con man or any whatchamacallit but when one is caught up in a concoction of tiny fibs, I’ve sometimes grabbed onto any doohickey of false security until I was gobsmacked and brought back to my senses. Being puzzled and slightly disoriented, needing an immediate sense of fulfillment I’ve often had to grab a hold of my thingamabob. What’s that you ask? If you have to ask, then you’re most likely a woman.

But as I look back at my cavalier, devil may care, staggering down the middle of the road attitude I’ve enjoyed the camaraderie of many a knucklehead and wishy-washy individual. Fiddlesticks, let’s face it, anybody with a bottle in a brown-bag caught my attention and some of those destitute, down-behind-a-dumpster souls were a lot more interesting than the bleeding-hearts that were constantly caterwauling over their tiniest misfortunes – I mean a chipped fingernail or an overdone T-bone steak, is hardly anything to get upset about. But let’s get back to some tomfoolery, bodacious, fiddle-dee-dee, willy-nilly, off the wall misinformation. Why hell, I may be a decrepit, persnickety, fill my “Depends” at any given moment, wrinkly, saggy-assed old bastard but egad – I have a twinkle in my eye that won’t go out until the day I die. Now I may have had the audacity to write this load of tripe but you my friend are a numb-skull for reading this overly exaggerated tale…cheers, eh!