A brave American patriot readies for battle

Last Sunday, as I was sitting on the couch debating myself on whether it would be better to take a nap on the far end of the sectional or nearer to where I was already working up a sweat trying to go to sleep, She-Who-Must-Not-Be-Made-Mad and her two Mini-Mimis (our granddaughters) walked in.

“Why don’t you keep the lawn trimmed like our neighbor?” she asked.

“He does have some nice stickers,” I said.

She gazed out the window longingly at our neighbors yard.

“I wish you were committed enough to do that,” SWMNBMM said with a sigh.

It was a good sigh, too. I mean I actually thought about getting up and go giving the tumbleweeds and stickers a drink. I raised my hand to assure her I was committed ... and then sanity reigned me in.

“Dummy,” I told myself with my hand still in the air. “She’s trying to push your buttons! If you say something, you’re gonna have to do something. Are you up for that?”

“I’m sorry, dear,” I said. “I am unable to do anything at this point due to Texas culture and safety concerns.”

She looked at me ...

I looked back ...

The Mini-Mimis put their hands on their hips.

I did, too ...

“What are you rambling on about?” SWMNBMM asked while crossing her arms across her chest.

Pointing my finger in the air and tucking my hand into waistband of my shorts (I had a pull-over shirt on so I couldn’t employ my Napoleon stance).

“Well, that’s all fine and dandy,” I said. “But before I undertake this lawn manicure procedure, you should be aware that this fine abode that you wish to send me outside of sits on property that has been proven to grow the finest stickers this side of that side. And, furthermore, are you aware that the mercury in the thermometer has been elevating at quite a rapid pace. I’m fairly certain that our neighbor is going to fall out from exhaustion at any moment.

“What kind of emergency responder would I be if I went outside and tuckered myself all out just when our neighbor needs me most?”

“I’m not sure I could live with the guilt that would take root in the deepest parts of my heart if something happened and I wasn’t in perfect emergency responder shape,” I added.

“You’re in shape?” she asked with a stunned face.

I assured her I was. In fact, I had been exercising quite vigorously before she rudely interrupted me. I mean, round is a shape and I was looking to flatten out one side at a time by lying on them and sawing several hundred logs.

Exercise, I feel, is all about at how you look at it.

“You need to get passionate about something,” she said.

“Why can’t you be like that guy you were telling me up in Minnesota. That you felt so passionate about the war in Ukraine that he decided to do whatever he could.”

“You should be like that, she smiled.

Ummm ... I think she missed the part of the story in which I told her the guy in Minnesota was so passionate about helping Ukraine that he gave away his newspaper and then went to the Ukrainian embassy to enlist in their army.

“I am not going to war with Russia,” I said. “You know I still have some serious PTSD from having to shine all those brass bells when I was in the navy.”

“But,” I said, again using my best heroic stance. “I do respect the guy for doing it ... and I respect your desire for me to be more passionate about worldly affairs. So, I hereby declare war on the Swedish bikini modeling team. As we (myself and the Swedes) are opposed to the use of weapons, I’m afraid I will have to endure hours of brutal hand-to-hand combat.”

“I’m warning you, though. If one of them step on my ingrown toe, I’ll wind up a prisoner of war. Just know, I am a brave American patriot doing my duty.” I said, adding a salute at the end.

SWMNBMM smiled and went to the tool drawer and took out a pair of cotton work gloves, and began putting them on.

“Fine,” she said sweetly. “If you don’t want to mow the grass, you watch the girls and I’ll do it.”
I’m not going to lie, watching those Mini-Mimis is terrifying. They can tear up a steel ball with a rubber hammer ... and they never stop talking!

I’m only telling you this whole ordeal because well, it helps take my mind off of the heat as I push this mower around and around and around the planet in hopes of finding a blade of grass to cut.

The things I do just to make my wife happy. If I don’t get that “Husband of the Year” award this year, I’m gonna be so mad ...

Tommy Wells is the editor of the McGregor Mirror. Everything in this column is true, except for the parts that are made up, exaggerated or just plain lies.