Ad Hudler's Blog, page 38

Run For Your Life: Part 1

The low point of my manhood occurred in the summer of 1986, in a bar in a squatty strip mall in Port Charlotte, Florida. It was called The Rheinlander Haus, run by a black Jamaican man named Eno who wore a burgundy tuxedo every night. A musician named Wayne, in a toupee and understated black tux, played Brat-Pack oldies at the white-Formica organ bar, and a cocktail waitress who looked and dressed like a sex-kitten Pocahontas served up drinks. My friends and I liked the place because it was c...

Yummm

My daughter's visiting for fall break from college, and she brings this tasty college-dorm-food-inspired recipe with her: FATTY TOAST.

That's what she and her friend call it: Take a piece of overly processed American white bread, toast it, slather with butter or margarine, then sprinkle with cigar and cinnamon.

Funny thing, said my wife: We used to call it "cinnamon toast."

Someone, call National Geographic ...

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A sunset ritual performed by one of the natives of Coconut Drive ...
This native had been hunched over a table for hours, feverishly typing gibberish into a laptop ... and then, when the sun started setting in the west, he picked up these two ceremonial rings and started performing the dance.

Twitter Twits

Says Ad: "Tweeting is like farting ... little expulsions of empty, meaningless air."

Says his fiction-writer friend, Nancy: "Yeah, and how many people really want to smell it?"

What's wrong with Chinese fortune cookies these days?

My fellow author friend, Gonzalo Barr, writes to me:


"...Chinese fortune cookies have become less substantive over the years.When I was a child, you could expect to read a proper fortune, like, "Your future is bright." Then fortune cookies leaned toward the metaphorical, like -- After winter comes spring. Well, that's nice, but what does that have to do with me? But now, now -- fortune cookies are way past enigmatic. They border on the tautological. I'm still waiting for the one that reads -- ...

Something I miss from childhood

Saturday morning cartoons ... back in the day when the only time you could watch cartoons was from 7 a.m. to noon on that one day of the week. I would get up before my parents and turn on the TV and sit there, cross-legged on the floor with a bowl of Cap'n Crunch With Crunchberries in my lap. Mom tried to get us to eat Heartland granola, but, alas, the Cap'n always won out.

I remember Josie and the Pussycats. The Bugs Bunny and Roadrunner Hour. Superfriends. (Batman, Aqua Man, etc.) And all th...

Scam of the Century

We were visiting our daughter in Ohio when we walked into a Build-A-Bear store. I'd never been in one. I thought it would be fun: Pick out a nose, and eye colors, and body shape, and color of fur, etc., and custom-build our very own teddy bear.

But then I learned that Build-a-Bear isn't Build-a-Bear at all. Actually, it should be called "Stuff-a-Bear." All you do is pick out an already-made carcass and then stand in a very-long line for the machine that blows stuffing into the aforementioned c...

Curiosity from the Medicine Chest

Look how the manufacturer strapped these two bottles together.
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Don't you think it looks like the space shuttle riding atop the 747 for transport?

A secret about guys ...

I've been watching this for years, and I've finally reached a conclusion about men and spitting. They only spit when they're feeling territorial. Men spit when they feel threatened by some other dude whom they feel is bigger, meaner and/or cooler. This does not include men who are chewing tobacco; chewing tobacco actually requires spitting. You read it here first.

My stinky clothes

Since I'm bald and wear wrap-around Oakleys and boots and drive a white fleet truck (the same exact F-150 that just about every city and county and construction company buys by the thousands), people frequently mistake me for someone who labors for a living. Now, writing IS a labor, of course, but I regret to inform you that I cannot fix your car or pour cement or re-plumb your house.

I also cannot fix your front-loading washing machine ... and SEVERAL of you have asked me what to do about the...