Tag Archives: directions

Assemble

Assemble: (v) to fit together the separate component partsdictionary with letter A

When I was a young father walking through a toy store with my offspring, I had one peculiar horror that lay deep within my heart, constantly plaguing me with apprehension.

It was not the fact that my children were going to beg for toys; this is their God-given right. This terror was not based upon my unwillingness to turn them down and tell them the status of our budget or that their birthday was near and they should wait; that was my God-given right.

What scared me into beads of sweat was the possibility that one of my children would pick up a reasonably priced toy, well within budget, but displayed on the front of the box would be the three most dastardly words ever printed:

“Some assembly required.”

For the record, for all time and even for those folks who think I might be teachable–I am a klutz at putting things together.

There are occasions when changing the roll of toilet paper requires some reflection, space and maybe even a bit of consternation and prayer.

I can read directions, but I can never locate A on the object, where it’s supposed to meet up with B, thus making me unable to move on to C.

  • I have tried reading the directions slowly.
  • I have had someone read them to me, trying to comprehend them from a distance.

It doesn’t make any difference.

Whenever I see a set of directions, what I view is an upset of directions.

I have disappointed my children as they watched their father fumble with pieces. Matter of fact, one day, with a particularly notorious bicycle, which touted that it was “only seven pieces,” I took so long that my son fell asleep on the couch.

And you want to know the worst part? I always eventually have to turn it over to someone else.

I do not even achieve the satisfaction, at the end of my arduous effort, of standing back and pointing to the object of my frustration and proclaiming victory. Someone mercifully steps in and takes the pain from my fevered grasp and relieves my agony.

Some people are good at one thing and some at another.

Yes. if I were ever stranded on a desert isle, my greatest problem would not be maintaining my calm or industriously finding materials to provide me shelter.

I would just have no freaking idea … how to turn it into a hut.

 

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Agnew, Spiro

Words from Dic(tionary)

dictionary with letter AAgnew, Spiro (1918-96): U.S. politician, he served as Richard Nixon’s vice president from 1969-73 but was forced to resign because of corruption charges against him that stemmed from his time as governor of Maryland 1967-69.

Most of the people around me who are under the age of forty have never perched themselves in an outhouse.

I have.

And the funny thing about an outhouse is that even though it is set apart from the regular home and requires that someone go down “the path less taken,” you always know when you’re near one. Matter of fact, rarely do you even have to ask for directions–unless you have nasal congestion.

It stinks.

And you know you’ve stayed in one too long when you cease to find it repulsive.

So when I see the name Spiro Agnew, that’s what I think about. As we look back, using the great hindsight of history, it is absolutely amazing that no one noticed what an outhouse the Nixon Administration, considering all the turds that surrounded it.

It just stunk.

They were arrogant, they were self-righteous, they were filled with the notion of their own mission and goodness, and it was ridiculous to connote that the man who selected the team was any different from his worst members.

Spiro Agnew always had the look on his face–as if he had swallowed a parakeet and you had just walked in the room and caught him. Yet he had no intention of divulging his action.

I guess that’s what the phrase, “by their fruits you shall know them” actually means. It’s not so much that we need to judge people–we just need to be intelligent enough to “take a whiff.”