My Parasailing Adventure

So there I was, just minding my own business. 

Angie and Kristin had decided that they wanted to go parasailing and asked if I wanted to tag along. After I carefully considered the fact that I am terrified of heights, can’t swim and am allergic to sharks, I declined. Then Angie, (the cute little thing) said, “Well you can at least go watch”. So I thought about it and “watching” did seem a safer alternative to “doing” so I agreed. 

As it turns out, you can pay a smaller fee and just ride on the boat while the others parasail. I like boats and decided that a peaceful boat ride in the Atlantic while watching my loved ones dangle from a kite 200 ft in the air might be kinda cool.

We strapped on our life vests and waited in the designated area. Now the boats don’t come in and get you because that would be WAY too easy. You have to climb aboard this big inflatable thingy with handles on it. (Those become important very soon). After you are aboard the inflatable, you are told that your group will be gently towed by a Jet Ski out to the awaiting boat for the rest of your journey.

I stupidly assumed that the dude driving said Jet Ski, had the same understanding of the word “gently” as did I. As it turns out, not so much.

He climbed on his “Water Rocket of Doom”, yelled “Ye-Haw!” and floored it out into the open sea.

Now I’m still siting still watching him disappear over the pounding waves blissfully unaware that the rope that attached his Jet Ski to the pool toy I was straddling was rapidly uncoiling.

HOLY MOTHER OF SPONGE BOB!! I’m FLYING! AND NOT ON PURPOSE!!

When the slack came out of that rope, my ears touched the back of my feet and I was being drug through the ocean like a broken fishing lure on the bottom of the ocean at around 267 miles per hour. When I opened my mouth to protest, I was immediately slapped upside the face with a refreshing mountain of sea water.

Then it got bad.

We would crash through a wave and I would face plant directly into the back of Kristin only to be immediately hurled backwards and upwards once more.

To the casual observer, I must have looked like a drunken overweight cowboy trying to ride a 2,000-pound epileptic bull while performing my version of the “wobble” dance.

We finally began to slow down a little so I actually managed to put my shorts back on and regain my seat. Off in the distance I clearly heard another “YE-HAW” so this time I grabbed 2 of those handles and held on for dear life.

This didn’t help A-TALL

Now I had BOTH hands on the raft and NEITHER on my shorts and I was flying midair behind the thing like one of those banners they pull behind the planes. I could faintly hear both Angie and Kristin cheerfully yelling “Yippee!” during my flight.

You get the picture.

After what seemed like an eternity, we finally reached the boat and stopped.

I did my best Jesus impression, and sprinted across the top of the water and pole-vaulted directly into the arms of the Captain. He finally made me let go and told us to go sit in the front of the boat.

I’m not paying any attention to Kristin or Angie while they are getting suited up for the parasail. At this point I have settled into the seat and am busy looking back towards the beach to see if any of my body parts are still there. I’m looking forward to watching Kristin and Angie parasail while I rest comfortably on the boat while waiting for my heart rate to come back down to normal levels.

At this point, one of the crew calls me over and asks me to step into this little racing harness thingy and proceeds to latch it around my waist. I’ve never been in the ocean on a boat so I must say I was impressed by the complexity of the safety equipment they make you wear just to ride on the boat. I mean it’s not like I’m parasailing or anything. I’m just there as an observer. I’m just there to watch and enjoy the boat ride.

Suddenly, I made an alarming observation. This little seat belt thingy he just strapped me into looked curiously like the ones that Angie and Kristin were wearing. Then another strange thing occurred to me. My seat belt thingy was also attached to the parasail just like Angie and Kristin’s.

Clearly a mistake had been made.

When I turned around to tell the dude that I wasn’t parasailing and was just there to watch, he was gone! I looked left, not there. I looked right, not there. That’s odd. He was just right here. Oh, there he is.

200 FREAKIN FEET BELOW ME!

I was parasailing!

Just as I realized what had happened, I heard my daughter let loose with a blood curdling scream that only teenage girls are capable of making.
As I turned to her to see what was wrong, I noticed that her mouth was closed and she was staring amusedly at me. Turns out it wasn’t her voice I heard. It was mine!

Anyway, I actually survived the parasail and as they lowered us back to the deck of the boat, I was amazed! That was actually pretty cool! I had accidentally conquered a fear and didn’t die! I held my head up like a brand new man. There was nothing I couldn’t do. For this one moment in time, I was the king of the world!

My moment of joy came to a crashing halt when I realized that Bubba and his Jet Ski of Doom was parked off the port bow waiting to take us back to land.

YE-HAW!! 

The Missing Car

Angie and I had just returned from our trip to Chicago. Our plane had just landed in Charlotte and we were exhausted, tired, wore out, and hungry.

The airport (all 47 acres of it) was flippin PACKED with people scurrying about like a pack of rabid caffeine- fueled chipmunks fighting for the last nut on the oak tree.

We (Angie) fought our way through the heaving throng of zombie-eyed travelers and headed for food. We found a Chili’s nestled in a remote and secluded (only 7,212 people) area of the airport and sat down to eat.  The food was good, the beer was cold, the trip was over and I hadn’t soiled a single pair of underwear on the plane. All was right with the world. Until…………………..

We cleaned off our table, paid for our meal and struck off toward the parking garage to find our car.

(Remember the last part of that sentence. It becomes important shortly.)

Now I don’t know how many of you have seen the parking garage at Charlotte Douglass International Airport, but it is flippin H-U-G-E!!  I took the liberty of looking up the size so that I may share it with you.

(It becomes important shortly.)

Here is the size of this freaking thing; it has 5 or 6 parking decks. Each deck contains around 250,000-square-feet of parking spaces. There are 2 garages that each contain the same amount of square feet per level and have the same amount of levels. They look exactly the same and are side by side. I read that the garages have a combined capacity of over 30,000 cars!!

Defiantly NOT the kind of place that you want to forget where you parked! Thankfully, my wife was smart enough to write down exactly what deck, level and which garage we parked in.

“Whew!” I said to my wife. “I sure am glad you were smart enough to write down exactly what deck, level and which garage we parked in. Cause I would HATE to lose our vehicle this ocean of cars!”

(Her bottom lip started quivering)

(My left eye started twitching)

As it turns out, Angie (the cute little thing) did in fact write down the exact location of our car when we parked it, but left the paper that she wrote in on,……wait for it………..IN THE CAR!!.

My eye started twitching, my ears turned red and an entire plethora of verbal not-niceness began to form in my aching head. I choked back the symphony of butt-chewy words that almost fell out of my mouth, smiled and said, “That’s OK dear, we’ll find it.”

(My eye was still twitching however)

We then proceeded to strike out on our latest adventure.

We made it through the first 2 levels without incident (other than me peeing on a Volvo) and STILL aint even seen any type of resemblance of our car.

I was holding the key fob over my head and playing “wipeout” on the button trying to make the horn honk to no avail.  By the middle of the third level Angie got tired, took off her shoes, bounced them off of the windshield of a BMW and slowed her pace. I decided to be a gentleman and let Angie take a break so I told her, (and I quote) “Wait right here”.

I then peed on a Volkswagen, apologized to the woman sitting in the Volkswagen, and struck out alone to finish searching the level while Angie waited (and I quote)” right here”.

After spending what seemed like an hour in my lonely unproductive search of the vast wasteland of (not my freakin car), I decided to return to my wife.

At least she would be easy to find because she would be waiting (and I quote) “right there”.

Guess what………..

I spent the next horrified 20 minutes of my life running around a 250,000 square foot parking garage like an epileptic crack addict in an all-night drug store trying to find my wife who must have been clubbed like a baby seal by an escaped ax murdering, ice-cream truck robbing, squirrel molesting lunatic because she would NEVER,… not be… (and I quote)…….. “right there”.

I started running in a dead sprint to find the cops (hard to pee on a car in a dead sprint) to get them to help me find Angie and the chainsaw wielding kidnapper that must have kidnapped her and made here leave where she was supposed to be “right there”.

As I skidded towards the elevator that takes you down to where the phones are I saw a woman casually leaning half asleep on a suitcase. “Thank God” I thought. Maybe this woman has a cell phone I can use to call in the national guard or maybe she could point me toward the switch for the bat signal, or……wait just a damn minute………it can’t be……………IT WAS ANGIE!!

She was just standing there half asleep, leaning against a parking bumper with drool starting form on the corner of her mouth, totally oblivious to the horrific slasher film i had just envisioned in my mind.

She was resting comfortably.

She got pissed at me for waking her up and said something to that effect. So I turned around, (peed on Angie’s foot) and got in the elevator to go check the next level.

When the elevator reached the next level, I stepped off and waited on Angie to do the same. I turned around just in time to see the doors close and whisk Angie away to God knows where. She had dropped something and had bent over to pick it up.

I’ll just let that one slide.

After a few minutes, she magically reappeared and we were off again.

We finally found the flippin car and headed for the house.

On the way home Angie decided that this night simply had not lived up to her idea of an adventurous evening, so she decided to make a wrong turn and drive the wrong way directly into  oncoming traffic on the interstate.

By this time, I was entirely too tired to give any more damns.  I just peed on myself a little bit and turned the radio up.

The End.

If I hadn’t met Angie, I wouldn’t have had anything to write about. She is truly my inspiration. Never a dull moment.

The Widow and the Hired Hand

A rancher died and left everything to his wife. She was a very good-looking woman and determined to keep the ranch, but she knew very little about ranching, so she decided to place an ad in the newspaper for a ranch hand.

Two cowboys applied for the job. One was gay and the other a drunk. She thought long and hard about it, and when no one else applied she decided to hire the gay guy, figuring it would be safer to have him around the house than the drunk.

He proved to be a hard worker who put in long hours every day and knew a lot about ranching.

For weeks, the two of them worked, and the ranch was doing very well. Then one day, the rancher’s widow said to the hired hand, “You have done a really good job, and the ranch looks great. You should go into town and “kick up your heels.” The hired hand readily agreed and went into town one Saturday night.

One o’clock came, however, and he still hadn’t returned.

Two o’clock and no hired hand.

Finally he came home and snuck into the house at around two-thirty. Upon entering the room, he found the widow sitting by the fireplace with a glass of wine, waiting for him.

She quietly called him over to him in a low voice …………….

“Unbutton my blouse and take it off,” she said.

Trembling, he did as she directed.

“Now take off my boots.”

Nervously, he did as she asked, ever so slowly..

“Now take off my socks.”

He removed each gently and placed them neatly by her boots.

“Now take off my skirt.”

He slowly unbuttoned it, constantly watching her eyes in the fire light.

“Now take off my bra..”

Again, with trembling hands, he did as he was told, and dropped it to the floor.

Then she looked deeply into his eyes and said,

“If I ever catch you wearing my clothes again, you’re fired!”

I have a lot to learn about golf!

I played my second round of golf ever yesterday and actually shot Par on 2 holes! Of course I shot like quintuple bogies on all the others, but I am proud of those two Pars! Accidental or not!

I’m brand new to the game of golf and have a lot to learn. For instance, on the very first hole there was a strange contraption that was mounted to a post and labeled “Ball Washer”. 

This confused me a bit.

I just figured it was some strange ritual that was required to play the game correctly, and not wanting to look like a complete idiot in front of everybody I decided to participate. After falling off the post and almost breaking my neck for the third time, my son finally took pity on me and decided to explain the real purpose of this contraption. Turns out, I was doing it WAY wrong! Who’d a thunk it? Now, for some reason, I’m not allowed to play there anymore.

Lost again,

As an Honor Guard bagpiper, I play many gigs for other people. Recently I was asked by a funeral director to play at a graveside service for a homeless man. He had no family or friends, so the service was to be at a county cemetery in the back country. As I was not familiar with the backwoods, I got lost and, being a typical man, I didn’t stop for directions.

I finally arrived an hour late and saw the funeral guy had evidently gone and the hearse was nowhere in sight. There were only the diggers and crew left and they were eating lunch.

I felt badly and apologized to the men for being late. I went to the side of the grave and looked down and the vault lid was already in place. I didn’t know what else to do, so I started to play.

The workers put down their lunches and began to gather around. I played out my heart and soul for this man with no family and friends. I played like I’ve never played before for this homeless man.

And as I played ‘Amazing Grace,’ the workers began to weep. They wept, I wept, we all wept together. When I finished I packed up my bagpipes and started for my car. Though my head hung low, my heart was full.

As I opened the door to my car, I heard one of the workers say, “I never seen nothin’ like that before and I’ve been putting in septic tanks for twenty years.”

Apparently, I’m still lost…

 

The Bible Code

A new pastor was visiting in the homes of his parishioners. At one house it seemed obvious that someone was at home, but no answer came to his repeated knocks at the door. Therefore, he took out a business card that he had printed “Revelation 3:20”  on the back of it for just such an occasion, and stuck it in the door.

When the offering was processed the following Sunday, he found that his card had been returned.

Added to it was this cryptic message, “Genesis 3:10.” Reaching for his Bible to check out the citation, he broke up in gales of laughter. Revelation 3:20 begins “Behold, I stand at the door and knock.” Genesis 3:10 reads, “I heard your voice in the garden and I was afraid for I was naked.”

 

How to keep kids off drugs

Two young guys appear in court after being arrested for smoking dope.

The judge says, “You seem like nice young men, and I’d like to give you a second chance instead of jail time. I want you to go out this weekend and try to convince others of the evils of drug use. I’ll see you back in court Monday.”

On Monday, the judge asks the first guy, “How did you do over the weekend?”

“Well, your honor, I persuaded 17 people to give up drugs forever.”

“Seventeen people? That’s wonderful. How did you do it? “

“I used a diagram, your honor. I drew two circles like this: O o. Then I told them that the big circle is your brain before drugs and the small circle is your brain after drugs.”

“That’s admirable,” says the judge. Then he turns to the second guy. “And how did you do?”

“Well, your honor, I persuaded 156 people to give up drugs forever.”

“Wow!” says the judge. “156 people! How did you manage to do that?”

“Well, I used a similar diagram,” the guy says. “I drew two circles like this: o O. Then I pointed to the first little circle and said, ‘This is your butt before prison……… .'”

Multiple Flatulations

An old woman goes to the doctor and says, “I have this problem with frequent gas. Fortunately, the farts never smell and are always silent. As a matter of fact, I’ve farted at least 10 times since I’ve been here, and I bet you didn’t even notice!”

The doctor says, “I see. Take these pills and come back next week.”

The next week the old lady returns. “Doctor,” she says, “I don’t know what the hell you gave me, but now my silent farts stink like the dickens.”

The doctor says, “Good! Now that we’ve cleared up your sinuses, let’s work on your hearing.”

Too drunk to poop.

A man spent the whole day drinking at the local bar. After guzzling at least 20 beers, he decided he needed to use the bathroom and stumbled through the door. He was in there for a long while and every so often would scream to the top of us lungs, “SWEET ANGEL OF DEATH! KILL ME NOW!!!”.

A frustrated barmaid reluctantly went into the bathroom to check on him.

“Sir, what are you yelling about? You’re scaring the customers.”

“Every time I try to flush this toilet something keeps biting my balls!”

“Sir, please get off the mop bucket.”

 

Steamy Breakfast

An old couple celebrates their 50th wedding anniversary in their home.

“Just think,” the old man says, “we were sitting here at this same breakfast table, naked as jaybirds, 50 years ago.”

“Well,” the old woman snickers, “what do you say — should we get naked?”

The two immediately strip to the buff and sit back down at the table. “You know, honey,” the little old woman says slyly, “My breasts burn for you now as they did 50 years ago.”

“I’m not surprised,” replies the old man. “One’s in your coffee and the other is in your oatmeal!”