A few days ago I was driving home from the library, and there was a woman walking a dog through our neighborhood. Nothing unusual about that… and I instinctively gave her a friendly wave as I went past; it’s how we do things here in suburbia. However, the tale takes a very dark turn from there.
When I got home Toney noticed the woman walking past our house, and casually mentioned that it was our neighbor, “Mrs. Half-Shirt.” What?! I don’t even know what she looks like, but can’t stand her. She’s my faceless nemesis. And I’d just smiled and waved at her?!
Man, this information wrecked the rest of my day. I wanted to go over there, knock on their door, and rescind my wave: “Yeah, listen… When I waved at you a few minutes ago, it was all a big misunderstanding. I’d never knowingly wave at you, on account of the cuntiness, so I’d like to take it back.”
But I just walked around the house and stewed about it, instead. It was greatly upsetting: my own personal ‘Nam. I have the kind of wounds you can’t see.
Several weeks ago Toney and I were driving somewhere on a Saturday morning, and went past one of the roughly 5000 soccer fields in this area. It was filled with young kids, and their parents seated in camping chairs, watching.
Toney said, “I kind of miss those days. I loved being out there on a crisp fall morning, with a good cup of coffee…”
That’s her instant memory of the soccer days. And to demonstrate how two people can have a completely different view of the exact same thing… I looked over there, saw all those kids chasing balls in packs, and thought one thing: gnats.
At those soccer games (matches?), it seems like all I did was wave gnats away, and bitch. Instantly that’s what popped into my mind. There was no crisp autumn morning, or freshly brewed coffee… Just tiny bugs in my face and ears, and sometimes landing on my eyeballs. Hey, whatever.
A few days ago I received a call on my cell phone, from a number I didn’t recognize. I frowned, and hit the IGNORE button. Later, I listened to the voice message. It was a recording, urging me to buy stuff at eBay. WTS? I’d been robo-called by eBay? It’s weird. Is this kind of thing starting to happen now? I’m usually the last to know. Do you receive cell phone calls like this? I don’t care for it, not one tiny bit.
I need to go to work, now. But before I wrap it up… I want to remind you about our Amazon links again. Please don’t forget to pass through one of them (like this one), before doing your holiday shopping. It costs you nothing extra, but I’ll receive a small portion of whatever you spend. It’s an easy way to support the Surf Report!
Every year I hope to have a bigger Amazon December than the year before. And right now… we’re $60 down. So, please don’t forget to pass through our links. It’s just a couple of extra clicks, but it helps me immensely.
Thank you very much.
And now I’ll leave you with a questionable Question. A few days ago I asked if there was anything from your life that you’d like to unsee. That went pretty well, so let’s expand it today, to the rest of the senses.
In the comments section, please tell us about the things you wish you could:
unhear
unfeel
unsmell
untaste
Does anything jump to your mind for any of those? If so, please share it with us below.
And I’ll see you guys again tomorrow.
Have a great day!
Now playing in the bunker
Treat yourself at Amazon: US and Canada
No comments?
At least one.
I sometimes receive calls from a foghorn.
Does anyone else get those.
The phone rings.
I answer it.
“Hello.” I say
“HOOOOOOOOOOOOOONNNNK!” says the foghorn.
Yep, fuckers! You just won a cruise or some such boolshit! I hang up pretty quickly so I’ve never figured out what they’re selling.
Oh, I thought it would have been a message along the lines of “I say, I said I say, boy, this here chicken feed is mighty, I say mighty tasty!”
Fab.U.Lous.
I get the foghorn/oil tanker call as well. Now that I know it comes from Washington state, I hit the ignore button.
If you’re from Washington State, leave a message, I’ll call you back.
Unless you’re a foghorn.
Or an oil tanker.
I keep getting one, when I answer, some obnoxiously LOUD voice booms “KRACO 8-TRACK STEREOOOOOOOO…….WOW….WOW…..WOW !!!!!! “
Untaste: Vitamin K. I had to take that in liquid form when I was having my tonsils out in 1974.
Semen
You can hear semen? Naw…. You can probably just hear it coming.
I chose the untaste category
Just made an $80 purchase from Amazon this morning via the good ol’ WVSR link. Wish it could’ve been more!
I throw everyone the middle finger. I figure it’s easier to say “sorry” to the few people that I like, rather than be in Jeff’s predicament.
Most of the things I’d like to unhear also line up with the things that I don’t understand. Like Jimmy Buffet. Parrot Heads? WTF? Why is this man popular?
Sammy Hagar
Had a swig of my wife’s breast milk a few years ago. I’d like to undo that “experience”. It tasted like pecans. My be why infants puke so much.
There is one girl’s vaginal odor I’d like to un-smell. What a boner-killer that was!
Biff, that had to be a classic vagina full of bad decisions.
My recollections of when the boys were playing soccer here in The OC? Two words: soccer moms.
My ex wife fits all the un words.
Unsmell: The fart-clouds of the lactose intolerant.
I missed the ‘unsee’ posting so will comment on that. A few years back a friend I were looking for something to do and decided to check out the gaypride parade (my first and last) in Vancouver. A group of men in their 70’s from a nudist colony went strolling by and I will never get that image from my head. The girl in front of us was hysterically screaming – that part was funny. I should have known better.
About the best I can do for ‘unsmell’ is the forgotten bag of liquefied vegetables in the fridge crisper drawer.
RIP Dave Brubeck; I need to go listen to some Unsquare Dance or Blue Rondo a la Turk.
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Untaste:
The Chinese “white” liquor called Bai Jio, pronounced “bye joe”. Tastes like paint thinner.
I would love to unsmell funky monkeys from my days as a labor nurse. Trich has a very distinctive “plate-of-tuna-left-out-in-the-summer-sun” smell. My unheard is also from those days. I would love to unheard a 4th degree tear (ripping flesh does make a noise) and also the “kerchunk” sound of the scissors when the doctors would cut an episiotomy.
that last one made me cringe.
Me too. When I would see the doctor pick up the scissors, I would clench. If I could have put my fingers in my ears without upsetting.g the patients, I would have done that.
m……your comment made me think of what I’d like to unhear and unsee.
While going to school for medical assistant back in the 80’s, we had the option of going to watch an autopsy at the coroner’s in Pittsburgh. Unsee: the sight of a hollowed out body of some poor soul. Unhear: the sound of the saw cutting the skull and the suction sound created when removing the cut piece.
It has always stuck with me and always will. Horrible.
We never got to see an autopsy, and I was glad. It wad bad enough disecting dead cats and fetal pigs.
unhear – the sound of a cat getting run over the second time in 5 minutes (i was on my way to pull the body out of the road)
unfeel – cold jail cell floor
unsmell – dead body in cincinnati in August (3 weeks dead in the apartment)
untaste – earwax
And unsee? The belly dancers I”m seeing now? Lotsa dance, lotsa belly
Untaste….Moldy stuff. Grapes, strawberries, shredded cheese. Had a burrito somewhere in Texas recently that had moldy cheese in it. Hate that taste!!
Unhear…”License, registration and proof of insurance”.
Unfeel….hangovers
Unsmell…Reading, Ohio.
I work in an ER. Last week we had a guy with so many bedsores he stuck to the sheets from all of the wounds weeping. The EMS guys said “worse cast I have seen in 28 years of doing this”
When we were doing CPR (hands steadily slipping off from the oozing flesh) they uncovered the legs to try to find a vein to put a line in. His heels had rotted off, and in their place were maggots and rotting skin. The smell hit me and I damn near threw up on the poor bastard we were trying to save…he didn’t make it.
Believe it or not, NOT the worse I have ever seen.
Holy crap. Damn obamacare!
I heard it’s W’s fault.
Damn. That’s horrific.
Untaste the taste of gasoline from when I was about 12. siphoning from my dads tractor for my motorcycle.
Yes. Especially the hydrocarbon belches that followed for the next couple of days.
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Untaste: Chewing up a multi vitamin gel cap on a bet…
unhear- my accountants sour depiction of what i really owed on my tax bill
unfeel- the panic attack that soon followed my accountants sour depiction of what i really owed on my tax bill
unsmell- the valerian root i found myself taking for insomnia after hearing my accountants sour depiction of what i really owed on my tax bill
untaste- a kiss i once had, post bar-hop, with a complete stranger who’d obviously fresh vomited outside the taxi
Oh, I forgot an unfeel. I would love to underlie waking up from a cesarean after the doctor forgot to leave orders for pain medicine.
That “underlie” should be unfeel. Damn autocorrect.
(Sam Kinison voice) OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!
You’re a doctor. Someone’s just been cut from sugar to shit and you “forget” pain medicine?! Someone whose body has been growing a fucking watermelon?! Oh, hell no!
I’d like to unfeel that abscessed tooth I let go for too long. Hey, it only hurt when I was gnawing away on an excellent tasting turkey leg. (Note to self: stay away from gristle!) Then, while at work THREE WEEKS LATER!!! I noticed a small lump at my jawline. Sure enough, the small lump that wasn’t noticeable at 8 am had swollen my face to Elephant Man proportions at 4. Meh. I just titled my hat to cover most of my face, then set out in the 100+ degree weather to go home.
The ER was a bitch, though. I didn’t have to wait long at all–that wasn’t the problem. The problem was the “morphine” that the “doctor” gave me. Okay, I didn’t want to feel like the popular description they always paint morphine with, but I would’ve liked it to at least have lasted for more than a fucking hour. Once I was finished with the MRI, it was hurting even worse. Oh, and don’t get me started on that fucking Oxycontin. The ones I got must’ve been made in some basement bathtub in China, because I have no idea how Rush Limbaugh nor anyone else can get hooked on something that doesn’t even work! Hell, I’ve taken Somas from (probably) a basement bathtub lab somewhere in India, and they worked so well, I forgot I had hands!
Lesson: Morphine and Oxycontin are not as great as Bela Lugosi and Rush Limbaugh would have us believe.
I know exactly what you mean. I recently had 2 periodontal surgeries one week apart, on Fridays. 1/2 of my mouth each time. I was given 10 Vicodin following each procedure, so I was looking forward to a couple of wonderfully wasted weekends. You know…like old times. But noooooo. Only once–on the second Saturday morning, when I took it first thing, before eating, did I get even mildly buzzed. What a damned disappointment!!!
In hindsight, perhaps I should have mixed in a little bit of Vodka.
1. NEVER take prescription drugs without alcohol.
2. NEVER operate power tools without beer.
3. NEVER knock the beer over while moving the power tool..
Yes, you should have. For my last dental surgery I had 1) residual knockout shit; 2) Vicodin; 3) horse pills of Motrin; 4) single malt whisky. It was a pleasant evening.
On a side not, it’s sad that I have a regular oral surgeon but not a regular dentist. Maybe the latter would prevent the former.
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True dat
I worked in the labor unit where I had my baby, and anesthesiologists forget to sign pain orders all the time. Right after my surgery a trauma came in to the ER, and I was forgotten. I reminded him about it probably 113 times after I got back from maternity leave.
I mentioned before I don’t watch TV but I’m home alone for a week or so…so. I mostly have on the MLB channel but surf now and then so I’d really, really like to unhear stool softener commercials.
I wish I could unread a few of the above…
Unhear? Bluegrass.
Really? I love bluegrass Alison Meshes has the voice of an angel.
That would be Alison Krauss. Autocorrect is driving me nuts.
Alison meshes is a jew hating cunt.
Alison kraus gives me a chub.
Hey Ohio and regional folk. I’ll be moving to Cleveland (don’t judge) in about 10 days.
Let’s fuck some shit up.
Un see? Tstorm licking the cloaca of an iguana at the winking lizard.
I wish I could unsee that last line!