The Dad
is on the move again, people. I would have warned those in the states between Ohio and Texas, but he left without much notification, barreling
through the Polar Vortex, daring Mother Nature to try and stop him while he
made the 16 ½ hour journey only stopping for food and gas. This time he’s
headed to the Texas panhandle to live with my sister and I needed to give her the benefit of my experience with her new roommate. There
is a very particular process for the care and feeding of the Redneck Man.
When
tackling a project of this scope, there are categories of likes and dislikes
that are surprisingly specific for a man who will literally take a bite of
anything you place in his hand and has been known to wear the same pair of pants for seven days.
SMELL- He can smell bacon cooking 26 miles away, but cannot smell himself at any point in the say, regardless of level of ripeness. You need Febreze. Lots of it. When you think you've bought more than you should, buy more. When it gets to the point that people are pointing and laughing at your buggy in The Wal-Mart, buy two more bottles, just in case. Her GoFundMe website should be up later this week. I am not kidding. Fortunately, he has no problem with anyone spraying his chair and, truly, being sprayed himself, unless the scent is Green Apple or Watermelon.
FURNITURE
– He comes complete with the largest recliner manufactured in America today, a
La-Z-Boy. It will smell, regardless of
covering. His Old Man Smell will
penetrate leather, y’all. He also comes
with a power wheelchair, a very fancy reading lamp, a TV and a special chair
for Lulu, his Boston Terrier, to sleep in.
I informed the sainted Shontyl that she needs to decide where the chair will be located
as that room will then become his bedroom as he sleeps in his recliner and only
in his recliner. Just like his European forefathers, when he plants his chair (instead of a flag) that is where he shall reside, henceforth and forevermore.
KITCHEN
IMPLEMENTS – He will require a coffee pot; he doesn’t care if it’s fancy or
not. It simply must be able to brew his
Folger’s Country Roast every morning. He
will also require a cast iron skillet. It
must be larger than the one you already have.
Regardless of the size of your skillet, it will be too small. One roughly the size and shape of Oklahoma should suffice.
FOOD –
Fortunately, he will eat anything you put in front of him unless it is spinach,
salmon or hummus, which he pronounces as ‘hoo-muss’ and truly believes that is
a foodstuff that I invented in my efforts to be fancy. He will require an extensive amount of red
meat or pork, which is plentiful in Texas. He prefers his steak rare. Really rare. And I quote, "Just cut the horns off and knock the 'moo' out."
TOWN – He prefers a place that is almost not a town. Somewhere small enough to where people often say, "Is that a real place?" The boonies is where he wants to be. He truly loves it when there is an end to a town and then several miles of nothing before the
next town starts. He disliked the Bay
Area of California because “town never stopped.” He was over-joyed to hear that there is just
the one main street in Vega, on which sits my sister’s house, a Dairy Queen, a library and
a truck stop. There is a Baptist Church
across the street from the Dairy Queen.
Odds are he will not venture there unless they have a potluck on Easter
Sunday and even then he'd prefer a to-go plate.
DOCTOR
– He requires a doctor for his myriad ailments and prescriptions. Fortunately, there is a VA Medical Center in Amarillo,
less than 30 minutes down the road. I
may need to give them a heads-up that he’s coming. They need to prepare. I informed my sister that she would need to
go with him to his first appointment to meet his Primary Care Team and let them
know he is an unashamed liar who will only occasionally follow his Dr’s orders
because, and I quote, “what do they know?”
FAMILY
–He doesn’t want to see everybody every day, but he wants you close by. He doesn’t want to go anywhere with you, but
he wants to be invited. He doesn’t want
to babysit, but he wants to see the great granddaughters; he now has two. He is happiest in the boonies with kids and
dogs and the occasional cow.
It’s
going to be interesting to see how this goes.
When he lived with me, it was like Frasier. Living with my
sister will be more like if Uncle Jesse from The Dukes of Hazzard moved in with...well, the closest I can come up with would be Katie Otto from American Housewife.
I promise to keep you informed after gathering the pertinent info from my Saturday calls with Shontyl and the Sunday calls with The Dad.
Somebody should throw up a prayer, or two. Seriously.
