Cue Ball

Cue ball: (n) the ball a player strikes with the cue, as distinguished from the other balls on the table.

I insisted it was not fair.

Every time I played pool with my friends—Eight Ball—I did a great job clearing the balls on the table.

That is, until I got down to the cue ball and the eight ball.

Then it was time to put the eight ball away, naming the pocket where I planned to place it, thus closing the game with a slam-dunk.

Here was my problem.

Every time I got to that stage, I either hit the eight ball and it would go into a pocket I did not name, or more often, the cue ball followed the eight ball into the pocket, thus making me a loser.

I argued.

After all, I completed 90% of the task of winning the game. How could I lose the 90% over a 10% mistake?

It was unrighteous.

It was a plot.

It was un-American.

My friends didn’t care. “The rules say…”

That’s how they began every discussion, declaring me a loser.

I got to the point that I hated the cue ball. I feared it. Once I began fearing it, I was afraid to strike it with my stick.

Of course, if you can’t strike the cue ball with your stick, you won’t have a very good break at the beginning of the game. So I stopped wanting to have the first break—which certainly robbed me of an advantage. So I sat around, hoping someone would miss a shot since I had passed on breaking the balls.

All at once, a game I had been very efficient at playing I now despised.

All because of the cue ball.

That damned cue ball that followed the eight ball into the pocket.

Or the eight ball which refused to go to where I declared its home to be.

At no time did it occur to me that I could practice and become better. Why would you want to practice something that was unfair?

So I pouted.

After a while, when I went with my friends to play pool, I just sat and watched.

Soon I wouldn’t go along if they were going to play pool.

They, on the other hand, could never guarantee that pool wouldn’t crop up in the evening’s activities. So I started staying home.

I soon became a recluse. Nobody wanted to be around me.

Since I wasn’t going to be around people, I stopped bathing, didn’t shave and only occasionally brushed my teeth. My breath was repugnant, even to my own mouth.

Pretty soon people were praying for me instead of visiting me.

I went into a mental hospital and was diagnosed with a personality disorder.

I had to stay in my room, though, because the recreational area had a pool table and it sent me into a fit of rage.

I tried to overdose on aspirin but failed miserably.

You see? This is what can happen when you are viciously attacked by a cue ball.

Epilogue

By the way, everything I shared after the word “un-American” was completely made up—seeking your sympathy.

funny wisdom on words that begin with a C

 

Cue

Cue: (v) anything said or done, on or off stage, that is followed by a specific line or action

The cues are off.

Somebody has stolen the script of human behavior and has messed with the stage directions so that we, the actors, do not know when and how to respond.

It’s subtle.

There was a time when someone in pain would cue empathy.

There was certainly a season when belligerence would cue disfavor instead of a bizarre outburst of admiration.

Do you remember a time when sitting by a fire would cue some intimacy or even singing without us feeling phony?

I’m telling you—the cues are off.

We used to rely on romance to cue sex.

Now we appear to hope that a well-planned calendar of sex will initiate romance.

A discussion of women’s rights used to cue men to consider the misogyny that still existed in them. Now such a conversation just makes guys get quiet—pretending to give a shit.

The cues are off.

There are fewer and fewer prayers of thanksgiving because there are too many prayers for victims of tragedy.

There is less holding of doors for others.

It’s become inexplicably important for us to enter first.

Free-flowing conversation among friends has turned into a chess match as we carefully pick our words so as not to offend or come across unenlightened.

Where is the cue that welcomed humility instead of the stiffness of foolish pride?

The cues are off.

Therefore the play acted out every day doesn’t seem to make sense. It fails to develop a plotline which leads to a story which gives us hope that the conflict in our second act can be resolved by the denouement. (Sometimes we even fail to get the cue to look up the word “denouement,” but instead, decide that the writer is too fancy.)

What are the cues?

How do we know how to be human beings on the stage unless we’re prompted to provide our best performance?

funny wisdom on words that begin with a C

 

Cuddle

Cuddle: (v) to lie close and snug; nestle.

Among the great myths floating down to us mortals from Mount Olympus is the assertion that women “like to cuddle” just as much or more than actually having sex.

This particular fable is favored by men so they don’t have to worry about the female orgasm and can spend about two-and-a-half minutes with their arm around their girlfriend and then roll over and go to sleep.

Meanwhile, the young lady is supposed to be completely satisfied having her face stuck into the hairy armpit of a gentleman friend, who really only desires to stop panting so he can go to sleep.

Let me give you a clue:

A woman who has had an excited sexual experience and orgasmed also wants to roll over and recover from the experience.

A woman who did nothing but permit the pleasure of her mate may wish to settle for a squeeze, a hug and a hair stroke and call it a day, but any member of the human race who has sex and achieves orgasm is not that interested in confirming it or enhancing it by being a cuddle bug.

I know there are people who will disagree and there are women who insist that they “just love to cuddle.”

(Actually, some men voice this as well, but we won’t get into it.)

When human sexuality is done correctly and a little bit of surface sweat breaks out all over the body and the toes tingle at the highest point of arousal and breathing is heavy, the natural conclusion to celebrate the experience is to bless one another with a great night’s sleep.

funny wisdom on words that begin with a C

 

Cud

Cud: (n) the portion of food that a ruminant returns from the first stomach to the mouth to chew a second time.

I am susceptible.

I don’t like to admit it.

Often, it’s why I refuse to watch medical shows or even programs of itinerant travelers who share experiences of strange lands, animals and diseases.

I buy in too easily.

Such a thing happened to me short years ago. In my ongoing pursuit to remove the mythology of my obesity and supposedly create the human-flesh-muddle that I’m meant to be, I listened to a young, slender woman (my first mistake) expound upon the importance of chewing your food at least twenty times before swallowing.

She explained that this not only made digestion easier, but also that chewing at for such an extended period of time caused us to eat less, and therefore promoted weight loss.

In that moment–in my flurry of passion and with her apt representation– she was able to convince me to try. She closed off her discourse by highlighting that animals like the cow chew their cud over and over again until it is just a mushy mess of drippy liquid, which they then gulp.

Surviving her vivid description, I sat down to my dinner that night and decided to pursue my own cud chewing.

I quickly realized that my normal number of chews for consumption was four or five.

I was still comfortable with eight chews.

At twelve I had to take my mind to a faraway place to keep insanity from ensuing.

When I finally reached twenty and tried to swallow, nothing happened. (All the little gushy, mushy pieces had already snuck down my throat to the stomach to the awaiting stomach).

Yet faithful pilgrim that I am, I continued this practice for an entire meal.

It was exhausting—so tiring it was that at the end of the feast, I found myself needing energy—starved.

 

funny wisdom on words that begin with a C

 

Cucumber

Cucumber: (n) a long, green-skinned fruit with watery flesh, usually eaten raw in salads

There are times I feel that the only thing I have available to show off is my ignorance. It is rather annoying.

Because sometimes I don’t know I’m ignorant.

The world is filled with so much information that it is completely impossible to be up to date on everything, leaving one and all with a spotty perspective.

One day I was at a luncheon with four dear women, and the waiter asked the ladies if they wanted cucumber on their salads.

On cue, they all giggled vigorously.

I joined them, not knowing what I was laughing about. (I hate it when I do that, because then people assume I’m in on the joke, and for the next terrifying minutes I have to listen carefully for context clues in the conversation, to try and figure out what has brought about the hilarity.)

These women were very tricky. They actually began to carry on a conversation about cucumbers that was so mystical and laced with code that I was unable to ascertain any true insight.

They started to discuss the smell. This brought on more comic relief. (At least I had the sense to stop laughing and just listen.)

One girl said she enjoyed the texture, which made everybody burst into rolls of levity.

One of the young ladies asked if anybody else had a preference with the size. Did they like their cucumbers short and round, or long and lean? There was not much discussion or disagreement on this one. Short and round won the day.

It became really frustrating to me when the salads arrived and as they nipped and chewed at their cucumbers, they looked at one another and moaned.

I realized they must be playing with me, but there was no hint of deception from any of them. They seemed to be lost in their world of cucumbers, without me knowing how to get to their location.

Wanting to join in, and chomping on my salad, I remarked, “I like cucumbers, too.”

My comment won the laughter fest of the day—although I felt it was directed more in the realm of humiliation than appreciation.

 

 

funny wisdom on words that begin with a C

 

Cuckoo Clock

Cuckoo clock: (n) a wall or shelf clock, often carved and decorated, that announces the hours by a sound like the call of the cuckoo

For a very brief season, I had some money.

I did not earn it. The finance was acquired through an inheritance.

It was annoying.

Money is like a parakeet you invite into your house and no matter how hard you try to shut out the sound of the tweeting, it abides.

No matter how much I attempted to envision my money as having a station at the bank, I kept trying to bring it home for the holidays.

Yes.

I wanted to spend it.

I especially wanted to buy things I would not normally buy, but would show others that in buying them, I expressed my opulence.

In everyday English, I wanted my money to brag for me.

On some days, I sat in my small office and thought about items I could purchase that would make me seem prosperous, worldly and well-traveled.

On one such occasion, a cuckoo clock came to mind.

I had always been enamored with them. The idea of a mechanism telling time while also having a little bird pop out of a door on the hour, singing a song to let me know that sixty minutes had passed, enchanted me. How adorable.

I became obsessed.

I quickly found out that they were expensive. But hell—wasn’t that the point?

I learned that the best ones came from Germany, so I suddenly became very patriotic and decided to “buy American.”

I found the best American-made cuckoo clock that was available to be purchased by a mortal such as myself.

It arrived, I opened it up, it looked beautiful, I read the instructions, had others read them with me, so we could all come to a consensus on how to get our cuckoo clock to cuckoo.

After all this was done, we hung it on the wall.

It never worked right. Not even once.

Oh, it would cuckoo—but it would cuckoo like it was cuckoo.

You know what I mean?

It was a clock that had a whim. Apparently, it disregarded the importance of time, and the bird came out to do its show whenever the clock felt like it should.

It still looked beautiful, but if people visited for more than an hour, they became aware that I had purchased a clock with a wacko bird.

 

funny wisdom on words that begin with a C

 

Cubit

Cubit: (n) an ancient linear unit based on the length of the forearm

Scouring my mind, I do believe the only time I’ve ever heard or read the word “cubit” is in the Book of Genesis and the story of Noah.

In this tale, God tells Mr. Noah to build an ark and “cubit” is one of the measurements to determine how big it’s going to be.

Once I discovered that a cubit is really about eighteen inches, I was able to go through the text of the narrative and ascertain how immense this boat was purposed to be.

Although it was a quite formidable structure, it probably was not large enough to hold all the animals of the world, even if they came two by two.

Now, I did not doubt the value of the story—trusting that what I read was inspired and I should go ahead and follow through on it.

But I would not hold to the veracity of every detail.

I have friends who would not associate with anyone if they found out that person did not believe that the Bible was the whole Word of God—inerrant and infallible.

I have other acquaintances who would doubt my sanity if I held fast to the Noah story as related by Moses in the book.

But one of the ways I know that every person, in his or her own mind, has found some interpretation that pleases them about the Great Flood is that we no longer use the word “cubit.”

Actually, eighteen inches would be a very handy length to place into our lexicon.

But it got associated with the story of an ark built by a man who believed the world was about to be flooded and it was his job to save a skeleton crew.

funny wisdom on words that begin with a C

 

Cubicle

Cubicle: (n) a small space or compartment partitioned off.

 Being twenty-nine years old, my attitude was a mixture of intolerance, gratitude, arrogance, confusion and overly pumped.

Arriving at the small college that had ridiculously allowed me to come in and teach a couple of courses,

I was introduced to everyone in the office—and given a cubicle.

I have never been a great fan of cubicles because I, for one, find it a little difficult to concentrate on what I’m doing when I’m hearing the whispering voices of people around me who are trying to be sensitive to everyone else in the room because we’re all stuffed together like bargain-brand sausage.

I didn’t like my cubicle.

It wasn’t just small—it was forbidding. It offered just enough space for my things, without me, or me without my things.

I could not land on a compromise.

One day, during my break from being uncomfortable, I walked around the hallways and found a door that read, “Storage.” I opened it. It smelled like dirty socks. But there was only an old Coke machine and three broken chairs in it, and the good news—it was at least five times bigger than my cubicle.

So I launched my plan…in stages:

  1. “That storage closet down there really smells bad. Can I help by cleaning it out?” (No one objected.)
  2. “Would anybody mind if I swept and mopped that storage closet?” (There were a couple of people who were curious about what I was up to but didn’t say anything for fear that I might ask for volunteers.)

After mopping, I put a desk inside which I had found in another storage room.

  1. “Turns out I found an old desk that I put in that storage room. Would anybody mind if I worked in there? Even though it does smell like gym shorts on their second week…” (A whole room full of grimaces from the cubicles. No one was interested in sniffing the shorts.)

I brought in some things from home, and in no time at all, I had a little office. Would you believe, it was two weeks before anyone stopped in to see what I had done. It was the dean. He poked his nose in, looked around, then glanced at me, and said:

“Nice work. Good office.”

One by one, my cubicle prisoners came down and eyed my pavilion. They were jealous, yet at the same time, realized they probably would not have done the same thing.

So the lesson is, if you find yourself stuck in a cubicle and you’re not happy, walk down the hall until you smell something you can work with.

funny wisdom on words that begin with a C

 

Cubbyhole

Cubbyhole: (n) a small, snug place

 Maybe we shouldn’t teach our children to play hide-and-seek.

Attempting to be invisible could deter the better mental health of our race. I know it’s just a game.

But I become very concerned when someone I know is looking for a cubbyhole–pretending it’s a niche.

That’s what these folks tell me: “I’m looking for my niche, where I’ll be comfortable and able to be who I am without intimidation or fear.”

Of course, there is no place free of intimidation or fear.

There really isn’t a locale where you can totally “be yourself.”

Therefore, setting off on a mystical journey may be what causes folks to become permanently frustrated or barren of communication skills.

The minute we look for cubbyholes, we’re trying to hide something.

Why are we hiding things?

There is always a danger of being arrogant. Normally, this is taken care of by people trimming back our egos through critique.

There is also the possibility of being loud-mouthed and wrong. But as you well know, truth eventually sheds a light and exposes all dirty crevices.

But through erroneous determination, we can find a cubbyhole and wrap some secret in a napkin, tucking it away and believing it will never bother us again.

Unfortunately, the shadow of defeat continues to nag, even when we have actually won.

Hide-and-seek is a dangerous game.

Because in real life, when we hide, people stop seeking us.

funny wisdom on words that begin with a C

 

Cuban Missile Crisis

Cuban Missile Crisis: (n) A confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union in 1962 over the presence of missile sites in Cuba;

I was two months from my eleventh birthday when I was informed that the world was about to blow up. I didn’t know much about what was happening on the planet.

My life was simple.

I was climbing in the bathtub every night, looking down at my pubic area for any signs of hair, since a rumor had spread that one of the guys in our class had some.

This was the most important thing to me.

But all of a sudden, my attention was temporarily nabbed by the news that those bad people over there on the other side of the world were trying to kill us good people over here—by blowing us up with bombs which seemed to be a lot more explosive than I could even imagine.

I was very angry.

Matter of fact, over dinner I expressed my rage by explaining that it was completely unfair for a bunch of old people to destroy my life just because they couldn’t get along with each other

The problem was that there were now missiles in Cuba.

I didn’t know anything about Cuba. When I heard the word “Cuba” the first thing that popped into my mind were cube steaks, which were some hybrid of hamburger and sirloin. So the way I remembered the word was to think of “Cuba Steaks.”

Therefore, people in “Cuba Steaks” were planning to fire bombs at us that turned our bodies into dust through fire.

I was not going to get to live long enough to kiss a girl or do any more hair-raising.

That’s what it meant to me.

And honestly, as I think back on it, having studied it, heard renditions of the story and considered the insanity of the times, my ten, nearly eleven-year-old objections seem quite suitable.

It would be wonderful to tell you that the Cuban Missile Crisis is a thing of the past. But now we have a whole new generation of leaders who apparently cannot remember what it was like to be terrified, living in a world of “duck and cover.”

Now they are trying to reintroduce these weapons into everyday thought.

If I had a poison in my cupboard and I knew it would kill someone if they drank it, the only sane solution would be to remove the poison from my cupboard, not expect everybody to remember that it’s lethal.

Perhaps we should all pray that logic will win the day and we will grow so weary of thinking about being destroyed that we’ll finally put the poison away for good—those weapons that snuff out all life.

 

funny wisdom on words that begin with a C