Dick Summer Connection

Whadda ya think ? Real life situation: A friend of mine cheated on his wife with a beautiful young girl. He lied and he broke his wedding vows. She never lied. She never broke any vows. She never led him on. She never tried to get him to leave his wife. All she ever said about it to him was, “Whatever you want.” She was a virgin in her mid twenties. She just never wanted to go to bed with anybody till him. And she never had sex with anybody else. Ever.

Question: Even if he really loves the girl, which he does, he’s a dirty dog.  But how about her ? She really loves him. Is she guilty too ? If so, why ? I’m really interested in your thoughts. Please either add a comment at the bottom of this “Quickie,” or drop a note to dick@dicksummer.com

Thanks. Dick Summer

I’m sitting here in my big, comfortable, black leather poppa chair, and on the left arm of the chair is a note that says, don’t forget the top two most downloaded stories from the good night podcasts of the last four years…because it’s Fourth Anniversary time. And thanks to Proud Podcast Participant Betsy Kemp for reminding me. How can I forget our anniversary? Time to turn to the teachings of Big Louie, his own bad self, the Chief Mustard Cutter of the Louie-Louie Generation for consolation. He says, “Don’t worry about forgetting things. That happens. People get older. They get larger. They start to smell bad. That’s why they need their own space.”

 Anyway, the second most downloaded “personal experience” Good Night story from the past four years is an upset. This was the number one story for each of the first three years. Number two this year is about disguising myself, and giving my Lady Wonder Wench a big returning home kiss at the airport…AND SHE DIDN’T RECOGNIZE ME. After all these years…just a little mustache and she didn’t know who I was. The whole shameful story is in the current podcast.

 Looking back on it, given the current state of panic at our major airports, I guess I was lucky I didn’t get arrested for that one. There is some promise that calmer times are coming according to some recent surveys. I just saw one that said in some states, many people are returning to traditional values. I think that means beer.

 Ok, the pulse pounding excitement is over. Here’s the new champ. The number one most downloaded personal experience story from our first four years of the Good Night podcasts. It was about….such a time in the lives of my Lady Wonder Wench and me. She had just come home from the hospital…still wearing a medieval torture device called a halo. And our brown fuzzy chair was really the only place she could get to sleep. You sent lots of emails when you found out she’d had an accident. Some of you even sent cards and a couple of teddy bears. That was pretty warm of you. Thanks again. The story is called Underwear or Lingerie. And it’s in the current podcast.

 I was thinking maybe I should write a book for my fellow Louie-Louie Generation guys called “How to appear nonchalant while shopping for lingerie.” But I’ve got to figure it out for myself first.

 That’s it for the top four personal experience stories of the first four years of the Goodnight podcasts. I’d like to thank the Stitcher app for making Goodnight available on mobile devices. And thanks to CBS Radio’s www.Chataboutit.com   for adding it to their wonderful website.

 Next time, the top four downloads from the personal audio cds over the first four years.

 Let me wrap it up with my choice of one of the best quotes from Big Louie, his own bad self over these last four years. I remember he said once, “Courage isn’t always beating your chest and hollering I’m number one. Sometimes it’s just a small voice in your head at the end of the day that says, “I’ll try again tomorrow.” That’s hard. But Louie-Louie Generation folks have been through plenty. One more day…we can do. But if you need help, remember…therapy is expensive…snapping bubble wrap is cheap. You choose.

I’m sitting here in my big, comfortable, black leather poppa chair, and I was just about to tell you about what four out of the five voices in my head have been saying about you, when I got an Email from Proud Podcast Participant Betsy Kemp. It says:

 “Hi Dick, Just wanted to wish you a Happy 4th Anniversary for your podcast! Glad you and LWW have a nice swing to enjoy the summer evenings.”  I don’t know if I just never saw them before, but I really like how all the podcasts are listed and easy to listen to, with a summary of what they’re about.  Maybe this is what you spoke of recently that Dave did.  

 So I did it again. I forgot our anniversary. As the Witch Doctor always said…”ooh ee ah ah ting tang walla walla bing bang. More to the point I guess is the wisdom dripping from the words of Big Louie, the Chief Mustard Cutter of the Louie-Louie Generation. Louie says, “You worry too much about forgetting things. If you’re in a restaurant and you forget your glasses, and your arms are too short to read the menu, you can always just order from the menu of the people sitting at the next table” Big Louie is such a comfort.

 So, just a little late, in honor of our fourth anniversary, we’ll continue with our annoying habit of re-playing the real time story parts…the stuff that was going on in my life…from the most downloaded podcasts of the past four years, in the current podcast.  Since it’s the fourth anniversary, we’ll play the top four from our internet counter… numbers 4 and 3 this time, and numbers 2 and 1 next time, on the podcast. The number 4 most downloaded story was called “The Princess and the Frog.”

 I was thinking that it’s hard to find an opening line that would get you a kiss from a pretty girl, let alone an invitation to her bedroom. But if you believe what the princess told her mom about kissing that frog…Mr. Froggy came up with a winner. And from what I’m told by some single scenes women,  “ribbit” would be a distinct improvement over some of the opening lines they’ve heard.

 The third most downloaded mostly true personal life story from the counter is called “Mano a Mouse-o.” It’s about a middle of the night battle with a Mickey Mouse with Michael Jordan moves. He didn’t beat me. But I didn’t beat him either till I resorted to weapons of mouse destruction. I really had no choice if I wanted get my Lady Wonder Wench down from her perch on top of her dresser. But, I really did feel kind of sorry for that little guy. It’s in the current podcast.

The two most downloaded personal life stories from the past two years will be coming up next time. 

Dick’s Details Quiz – All the answers are in the current podcast.

1-    What should American working girls be sure to do with the window shades in their bedrooms ?

2-    How do we know that goldfish are afraid of the dark ?

3-    What can some sexy honey do for your hangover ?

Dick’s Details. They take your mind off your mind.

 Next time…the top two personal experience stories from the last four years of the Good Night podcasts. And I’ll tell you one thing… there’s a big upset involved.  One of your number one picks really floored me. I guess my brain cells are finally down to manageable size.

I’m sitting here in my big, comfortable, black leather, pappa chair in my living room, and let me tell you, it’s a LOT more comfortable than sitting in my branch office…which is where I spent the day. Let me explain in case the IRS is listening. I work out of my home office. My entire company…consisting of me, and my Lady Wonder Wench is based in my basement.

 But like most Louie-Louie Generation guys, I am somewhat maturity challenged. And when I was a kid growing up in Brooklyn, I used to love climbing the tree that grows there. I guess you could call me a tree hugger. But it’s ok. Because according to  Big Louie, his own bad self, the Chief Mustard Cutter of the Louie-Louie Generation  “It’s ok to hug a tree you love, just as long as the loving doesn’t go any further than just one quick hug. Anything more than that one quick hug, and you should go see a shrink to get to the root of your problems. “

 And I still do like climbing trees, although these days I usually use a ladder to help. And that’s why I was sitting in my branch office, in my back yard today. I think it’s a dog wood tree, although I’m not sure. But I certainly learned something nasty about its bark today.

 Today’s job was to amputate a couple of its branches that have begun to whack the electric and telephone lines that come into the house. And I must confess, it wasn’t easy. The branches were kind of high up, but the height wasn’t the problem. It was the bark. For some reason, hordes of small, six legged soldiers, with red eyes and fangs, and claws have decided to live in the bark. So I guess you could say this dogwood’s bark was worse than its height. Sorry. Sometimes I can’t help myself.

 After all those years on the radio, I figure I have a license to carry a concealed pun. And that’s important. Because our son Eric lives just outside Washington D.C. and when we visit, we love to swap pun shots, and they have strict pun laws in Washington D.C. Carrying a pun without a license in D.C. is a capitol offence.

Dick’s Details Quiz. All answers are in the current podcast.

1- If you transplanted the Great Wall of China to the U.S., what would you have to do a half hour after you were finished ?

2- Where did the phone company get the idea of printing “Yellow Pages.”

3- What did Foyodor Vassilet and his wife do that should get him an endorsement contract with Wheaties ?

Dick’s Details. They take your mind off your mind.

 A little housekeeping here. My thanks to the Stitcher app, and CBS Radio’s Chatabout.com  for carrying the podcast. And a very big thanks to Harry Sandler, the former drummer of the very successful 60’s Boston rock group Orpheus for including a very generous bio of me on the Music Museum of New England web site. If you’d like to know more about the huge contribution that Boston area musicians made to American rock, check out www dot mmone dot org. It’s a terrific work in progress.

 I told you a little while ago that Louie-Louie guys are a bit maturity challenged. That’s not meant as a negative comment. It’s one of the reasons we are the bedmates of choice for super models, porn stars, and Catherine Zeta Jones impersonators. They like our boyish charm. They like the fact that we treat women with love, lust and respect. They like the fact that we wear our baseball hats facing front. And they like the fact that some of us, have paid off our nice cars and personal airplanes.

 Another thing they like about us, is that we are stylish lovers. We’re not over anxious. We don’t remove our sox by violently shaking our feet. On the other hand, when the moment seems right, we don’t hang up our trousers and insert shoe trees in our shoes either. We don’t feel used if a partner seems to lose interest after only four hours of love making. We don’t get distracted if she is wearing the wrong day of the week underwear. Louie-Louie Generation guys are gentlemen, We know that women need more enticement than lighting a cigar and ordering out for a pizza. We tie up, or blindfold pets first. 

 And Louie-Louie Generation ladies are magical midnight madonnas. They know how to love, they know how to laugh, they know how to cook, and how to care, and they try not to cry. They don’t carry baggage with them. They carry their life experiences…and they share them with us. They never use words like fiasco, catastrophe, botch, tragedy, or law suit.

 All this takes time. Some of the Pimple People who strive for Louie-Louie Generation membership will make it. Big Louie has advice for them too. He says, “If your partner can’t stop mummer-ing your name you’re probably a good lover. If she can’t remember your name…you’re probably not so good.”

 There’s a story in the Night Connections personal audio cd about a Pimple Person guy who has just had an experience that could… if he deals with it the right way… make him a genuine candidate for Louie-Louie Generation hood. It’s called The Tiny Dancer. She was just a little lady…just going about her life…but she gave the guy such a whack on the head…just her reflection…I wonder what she would have said if she noticed him watching. I wonder if she might have noticed the expression on his face…and said, “Hi…I miss you too.” The Tiny Dancer is from the Night Connections personal audio cd. If you like it you can just keep the podcast. Or if you want a fresh copy, you can just download it from the icon on the home page.

So…almost all day, I was sitting out there in my branch office, happily sawing away…loading my puns for this puncast…and it felt good. And physical. I like that. I’m still coming back from an operation, so I don’t have all my energy back. But it’s better than it was just a couple of weeks ago. I think my pulse rate must have been down around a four.

And I was sawing, and sawing…and thinking that trees must have been our first cheer leaders…with all that rooting that they do. And the branch I was working on started to groan. Then it slowly broke, and went crashing to the ground. And the tree shuddered a little. And all of a sudden, I had to put my puns away. Because I’ve always been a tree hugger…ever since I was a kid in Brooklyn. All of a sudden, this wasn’t my branch office. It was a living creature. It gives my Lady Wonder Wench and me shade in the summer. Squirrels play hide and seek in it. We sometimes put Christmas lights on it. It’s probably about my age. I found a heart and two names carved in it…lovers from a long time ago. They’re probably about my age now too.

 I guess the tree and I both have to get our energy back. I’m rooting for both of us. Because it would be a shame if it couldn’t turn my world all red and gold again this October.

I’m resting here in my big, comfortable black leather poppa chair in my living room, after an exhausting day of starring in one of the leading reality shows on the government run Godless Communist Chinese Television Network. Loosely translated, the show is called, “Tune In And Laugh At American Guys.” It consists entirely of satellite shots that zoom in on guys like me putting together 3 person porch swing sets imported from China.

It’s the kind of swing that Kevin Costner and Susan Sarandon were sitting on at the end of the movie Bull Durham…except that it’s a three seater. Why is it a three seater ? They’re trying to mess up American morale by threatening to send Commie Commissar chaperones to screw up our romantic summer evenings on a porch swing. 

I told you before about my adventures assembling a Godless Communist Chinese made outdoor barbecue. The one that had some of the parts made in Burma…where they don’t like us too much either. So the instructions included statements like “Should to insert bolt forcefully with included hammer without regard to puncture in finger from doing so. Ha Ha.” But this time the Godless Communist producers of the show, like Godless producers everywhere, demonstrated their whole hearted dedication to doing things on the cheap, by simply not including instructions. That’s why, if anyone has an extra Chinese bolt, I’d like to swap you for a couple of Chinese nuts. See, Chinese bolts won’t screw into American nuts.

 And you know the kind of job that takes two guys…not because there’s a lot of weight involved, but you’ve got something too floppy to handle both ends yourself ? Or you think you can’t, until your wife smiles, and says, “Why don’t you call our neighbor Randy and ask him to help.” Not going to happen if you’re me. Stand back woman. I don’t need any help. I can do this…so I’ve got both ends of the half assembled floppy seat, and I’m just about to insert bolt forcefully with included hammer…and something that feels suspiciously like that Chinese bolt made in Burma falls on my foot, and bounces away…and it’s the last one in the box, and I’m standing in tall grass…at the top of a hill.

 Dick’s Details Quiz – all answers are in the current podcast.

1- What does the expression, “sleep tight” have to do with Jack Daniels ?

2- What does flying an airplane upside down do for you ?

3- How do we know that the smart guys in the white lab coats don’t have wives or girlfriends

Dick’s Details. They take your mind off your mind.

 People usually think pilots are good mechanics. That’s not necessarily true. I’m a pilot. But my mechanical shortcomings are the reason I got to star in “Tune In And Laugh At American Guys.” The FAA has a rule about pilots fixing their own airplanes. It’s very short. It says, “Don’t.” Because they know that most of us only know stuff like pull the wheel back and the houses down there get smaller. Push the wheel forward and the houses down there get bigger. Pull the wheel back too far, and hold it too long, and the houses down there get bigger very fast. Any time you want your plane fixed, a government licensed mechanic has to do it. He works on your plane for a while, and he calls you and says, I think it should be ok now. Why not come down to the airport and fly around for a while. I’ll keep an eye open for you. It’s marginally better than the cable companies…”We’ll have a repair man in your vicinity between February 24^th and the All Star Game. Will somebody be home ?”

 Actually, most people don’t know very much about pilots at all. There aren’t very many of us. And most of us don’t fly air liners or fighter jets. We’re just ordinary guys who love to fly…usually in our little one, two, four or six seat airplanes. Ordinary guys. With ordinary lives. Just people…with ordinary people problems. There’s a personal audio cd about that. It’s called Love Comes When You Least Expect It. It’s about two pilots and a woman. There’s a few minutes of the story in the current podcast.

 She was beautiful…that woman…and smart…and more mysterious than any woman that pilot ever met. And she took over his life…it seems like without even trying. That kind of thing happens at little airports. It happens. It happened. If you like that part of the story, you can just keep the podcast. Or if you want a fresh copy…or you’d like to know the rest of the story, just go to the home page, and down load it from the Love Comes When You Least Expect It icon.

 I guess most American guys have appeared on that Godless Communist grim reality show…trying to put stuff like my swing set together. And most of us have inserted that bolt forcefully with included hammer without regard to puncture in finger from doing so. Ha Ha. But I was just thinking about the guys who make this stuff. Not the Godless Communist big guy producers. The ordinary guys…guys like you and me.

 Besides the swing set in my back yard, and the barbecue grill on my back deck, some ordinary Chinese guy made the little Christmas tree lights that I string on my tree every year. Chances are, he doesn’t really know what Christmas is. Or why little lights have anything to do with it. He’s just showing up for work every day…putting in his ten or twelve hours…sticking those little bulbs in those tiny sockets.

 His fingers must hurt by the time he leaves the factory, and on the way home, he breathes that dirty air that we all saw during the Olympics. I wonder if he knows how it feels to toss some hamburger on that grill…and have a bunch of friends over on a Fourth of July…celebrating freedom by…drinking beer…and laughing and telling corny jokes…and watching the fireworks at night. The Chinese guy’s neighbor probably made those fireworks…but the Fourth of July, and that idea of freedom…that’s something he’s probably not going to understand.

 I was thinking about that Chinese guy, working his fanny off to make the bolt that’s sitting somewhere in the tall grass in the back of my home. And I started thinking about what Big Louie, his own bad self, the Chief Mustard Cutter of the Louie-Louie Generation always says…”Watch out, because Non Judgement Day is coming.”

 So…little ordinary Chinese guy who made the bolt I lost…maybe you’d like to know that my Lady Wonder Wench and I got to rock gently back and forth…watching the fire flies one night on the swing set you made. And she likes her burgers almost raw…I like mine medium…and that barbecue grill you made sizzles them just right. If you lived around here, I’d be glad to flip one for you too…I know where I can get some Chinese Kirin beer…and there’s plenty of room in the cooler for yours. American guys like to share stuff like that.

 And I hope you someday get to walk into a room full of the scent of a real Christmas tree, and see the lights you made, and listen to Jingle Bells, and Silent Night, and hear the little kids laughing and tearing the pretty paper off their presents. I know the guy down the block from you probably made the paper…and the toy inside. Thanks for that.

 Maybe you don’t know it, but while you’re tuned in and laughing at us American guys trying to put the stuff you made together, there’s something you should understand. We know it was your other buddy across the street from you, who made the fireworks that help us celebrate our freedom. And…from one ordinary guy to another… hang in there…maybe some day…I hope we’ll get to share that too.