I had not seen him in some time, but always enjoy catching up with him whenever he stops in Buzzy’s Country Store.
He got a beer and sat down at the counter as he usually does and we began chit chatting about what he has been up to in his retirement. He has relocated from the area but comes back home frequently to visit his family and grandkids.
He told me a story about his granddaughter working for some rich old guy who owns a Mc-mansion with lots of land. When the rich guy received an offer of a couple million dollars to sell his place, he decided to do so and informed the granddaughter of his plans. The old guy told her that he wanted to give her a heads up so she could start looking for another job.
A couple weeks later, after the granddaughter fretted about her future employment, the old guy came back to her and told her that his family had objected so much to his selling the property that he had changed his mind and would be keeping the place. The granddaughter of course was greatly relieved at the news. My visitor noted that he too was relieved because it sounded like the granddaughter might be wanting to come work for and live with him. “I love her,” he said, “but I sure don’t want her working for me much less living with me.”
I laughed along with him and commented on the two country music songs with that same selling scenario and how the land owners in both of them had come to the same conclusion NOT to sell. My visitor wasn’t familiar with the tunes but said he would track them down. (The one video (Dirt Cheap) I have discussed previously here on the Buzzyblog and the second one I have included below.)
My visitor got another beer and began kibitzing with some other folks there at the counter. He is the classic bar room kinda guy who can entertain and tell a funny story that isn’t too long or too boring. You know the type of guy I am talking about – one who has been everywhere, done everything, has the life scars to show for it but can still laugh and joke about it.
Somewhere along the line, I waited on another customer buying some bait and after completing that transaction sat back down to talk some more with my visitor. He had just grabbed another beer and returned to his seat at the counter when he said to me “Hey, I got a funny story for you. My granddaughter….” He then proceeded to re-tell me the same story that he had just told me a couple of minutes previously.
I started to interject that he had already told me this story but he was on a roll and I didn’t want to appear rude by interrupting him. Too, like most bar tenders, I am used to hearing stories repeated repeatedly. (Was that redundant? Well, so be it.) Bottom line, there is some correlation with number of drinks/beers consumed and the number of times a given story gets repeated.
But overall, and later as I rode home and thought about the exchange, it made me a little sad to see and hear my friend not remembering telling me something that he had just told me. That fog rolling in can be a little scary you know? P.S. Forgive me if I told you that already.
Ok, don’t want to leave you on such a down note like that, so check out a couple cartoons I came upon recently. This first one is a little offensive. Offensive to country stores being used as a political prop!
And back to the subject of old farts in a bar:
