COWBOY UP!

It wasn't long ago when the only pharmacutical products advertised on television were for dandruff, 'roids and bad breath. Roids, of all things on TV. Have you noticed a change in what's being advertised?

Now everyone gets to know and thing/worry about what they might have, all courtesy of television. I'm at the top of the worry list. Nail fungus commercials now has me checking my toenails with every clipping looking for tell tale signs that there might be a fungus among us.

The guy commercials have to be the worse. If I get up more than once in the night to use the toilet I start thinking my prostrate is enlarged. I always thought that bigger was better. I ask myself, why not an enlarged prostrate? It can't be all that bad. Maybe I can order up medication to increase its size. Haven't seen any ads that attest to doing that, at least not yet.

And this losing the hair thing that is always on television. There's a medication to take that supposed to stop hair from falling out off the top of your head. The way I look at it is less hair means less stuff to take care of. Those guys who have gone bald at young age and then started shaving their whole head? That's the way to go. No fuss. No muss. Think of all the money they're saving by shaving their own heads. A good hair cut is 20 bucks every 4 weeks. These guys are saving at least $240 a year which could be used for buying lottery tickets or for upgrading a coach airplane ticket to business class. That said, I think I have enough hair to last the rest of my life. Bob does not need to save $240 and he will not be shaving his head anytime soon.

Not long ago I started hearing this thing called ED being advertised as something men need to look out for. Were those the initials of some mean woman who was carrying the plague that men had to steer clear of? Evelyn Doodingee? I don't pay a lot of attention to commercials so it took a while for what the meaning of ED was. It means something doesn't work. Pills make it work. If that isn't a hell of a note. Pills.

Do you think that our forefathers had issues with ED? Hell no, the old lady would say, "Bud, you cowboy up, ya hear! And iffen you don't I'm a gonna cut your ears off!!" Maybe that's the trouble with people today . . . too much woosing out and not enough of the cowboy up stuff. If everyone would cowboy up and toughen up a lot of drug companies would go out of business.

Being a bunch of woosies is maybe why the good old USA has not won a war since 1946. Think about it. We're good at starting a fight but I'll be damned if we can finish one. USA? Time to COWBOY UP!

I now get mail from companies trying to sell hearing aids. How do they know if I have a hearing loss? Or does a hearing loss go with the age? Do the people at the hearing aid companies sit behind a desk with a list of people born during this year and that year and say, okay, let's send all this crap mail to those people born in this year. And they do. Crap mail, now there's another topic to write about.

I have a hearing loss. Not a complete loss of hearing. Part of my hearing loss is definitely selective hearing. Translated, I only hear what I want to hear. It's a man thing.

The other part of my hearing loss is real. A hearing test in my 20's revealed a 40% loss in one ear. Scar tissue in my ear caused by a childhood ear infection left unmedicated (Bob, Cowboy UP, now - your ear infection is all in your head!). Simply put, my parents didn't have the money to haul my sick butt to a doctor.

Additional hearing loss was caused by a combination of being around the jet engines of B-52's, front row rock concerts (Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jefferson Airplane, to name a few) not to mention loud music played in the home (as evidenced by no less than three sets of four foot tall stereo speakers having their woofers being blown out) coupled with a penance for exercising my right to bear arms and shoot the damn things without ear protection.

Candace sometimes has issues with her ears being plugged but it's cool when that happens. The corner drug store sells these cone like things. You stick one end in your ear, light the other and VIOLA! the pressure is relieved. What's cool about this is that I get to light the end of the cone.

I get to pretend that I'm in NASA Mission Control. The rocket is on the launch pad and ready for firing. I light the match and count down: Five, four, three, two, one . . . Houston, we have ignition! Candace doesn't think this is funny.

What will the next cure be that is advertised on TV? Maybe they'll invent one pill to cure everything or at least prevent you from getting everything. ED, hair loss, 'roids, dandruff, clogged arteries, hip replacement, hangovers, you name it, one pill would take care of it. Wouldn't that be great? I just know that pill is going to happen one day.

I want to be around to buy that pill. Eating, drinking and being merry would be so much more fun.

The picture? I was going to say that it was a picture of me surfing in Hawaii but you'd know better than that, wouldn't you?

It's pot roast with vegetables tonight at our house. I think of this food as a touch of the old midwest, the Mother Land, where men were men and out of necessity, so were the women. In those days everyone had to cowboy up.

Have a great Sunday. And don't forget when the going gets tough, the tough cowboy up! Yeee HAW!