I'm Just Saying

I may have been inadvertently crowned Queen of Stinkbugs by The New Yorker Magazine a year of so ago (still, unbelievably, one of their most read articles), but that doesn’t mean I welcome the little boogers as they make their annual pilgrimage into my house.

D’you know what an American asked me last week when I drove her to the airport?” said my taxi driver as we negotiated our way out of the snarl of West London traffic en route to Heathrow.

Inwardly cringing, as we Yanks have a bit of a reputation, I replied, “Haven’t a clue.”

Twice within the last month, someone has made this comment to me:

“You’re probably a Tall White.”

How do you respond to an accurate, if not disconcerting, summation of your physical characteristics? ‘Thank you for noticing?’ ‘I can’t help being born this way?’ ‘Kinda early to be drinking, isn’t it?’

When my friend, Jessica, asked if I could help a well known animal rescue and sanctuary, I was all about it.

“What do they want me to do, a benefit, or something?” I asked. “Public appearance? Book signing? Put the word out on Facebook?”

Fresh from my folder titled ‘Hey, get off my lawn!’ comes this little ditty.

Each year around this time I headline a stand-up comedy concert to benefit Big Oaks Rescue Farm in Greenwood, SC. This year the chosen venue was the historic Abbeville Opera House, and what a privilege it was to stand upon that stage.

One of these days I might just put up a cot inside my local Greek eatery as I tend to spend far more time there than in my own kitchen. And if you’d ever tasted my, what some people might refer to as, cooking, you’d understand why.

That doesn’t look good,” said Paul, happening upon me icing my leg at the kitchen table, after I’d smacked and twisted it while unloading hay out of the truck into the barn.

(In case you didn’t know, if you’ve ever wondered why trailer hitches were invented, it’s so that you can locate your shin in the dark.)

“Does it hurt?”