Shut up and dance!

Hayter article for May 10, 2020

“The Agony of Murder Hornets… and Toenails.”

            One morning last week, I yelled for Kay to get her buns in the bedroom so I could show her something very important. Immediately, she hurried on her way. After 48 years of marriage, I have taught Kay not to expect, which is good because she didn’t appear the least bit disappointed in my genius.

            What I did was pull the top sheet tight over my feet with my toes sticking straight up. Then I moved my feet back and forth like windshield wipers. Who hasn’t done that? But -- and here’s the beauty of it -- the sheet fibers began making a raspy noise as they rubbed against my sharp and pointy toenails. I told Kay that after about 30 minutes, the top of my toenails would be smooth as a mousepad.

            Kay said something that actually caught me off guard. She said, “That reminds me of a song.‘Daddy, cut your toenails, ‘cuz you’re ripping the sheets.’” Before she could head back to her makeup mirror, I said, “Where did that come from?” I thought I knew all the stupid songs of my youth. Kay told me that her mom used to sing it.

            When I asked Kay to sing the toenail song, she had to think a minute to come up with the tune. What is bizarre is the fact that the rock group “Walk the Moon” stole the tune for their hit song “Shutup and Dance with Me” from the sheet ripping song.  Instead of “…oh, oh, oh, shut up and dance with me!” Kay sang, -- “Daddy cut your toenails, oh, oh, oh, ‘cuz you’re rip-rip-ripping the sheets!” -- Before we married, that girl was never that animated.

            Okay, raise your hand if you want to keep talking about toenails. Anybody? Okay, time to ramble.

      ✿Speaking of Mother's Day, I’ll bet Elsie Hayter got fewer flowers on gift-giving occasions than any other lower-middle-class mom in the country. We were a rather practical family. If you couldn’t eat it, use it, or play with it, we thought it not worth buying. With that rationale, Mom seldom got anything womanly as a gift.

            No one knew what kind of clothing to buy her, dad least of all. -- “A cowgirl dress? I thought it was a bathrobe.”  -- “Regardless, Dad was a great husband. The husband doesn’t have to get his wife something for Mother’s Day, Dad always did. He even gave us an extra allowance so we could ger her something. The apple fell a good distance from the tree because I never got Kay anything for Mothers’ Day. Let’s face it, we’ve never had kids. If there was a “Wife’s Day” I’d be all over that thing. At our church, the ladies always get a flower for Mother’s Day, and I never tell on Kay when she accepts one. Considering what that girl has to put up with, I figure God isn’t holding it against me.  

            ✿Have you heard about the Asian Murder Hornets? Well, you don’t want to. These things are scary. They’re about two inches long and look vicious as all get out. While they can kill a human, they prefer honeybees. I mean they eat honey bees, and then steal their nests and eat all the wax and honey. ‘]

            Two of the murder hornets have recently been found in Washington State. The only way the honeybees have devised to combat the murder hornets is to pile on top of a single hornet and stay there until their body-heat kills it. The process has only been replicated in an empty mayonnaise jar. Unfortunately, there were about 200 hundred honeybee carcasses at the bottom of the jar laying around with the dead hornet.  

            A contributor to Kay’s High School blog said it all when he wrote, “What is this murder hornet panic all about, and how much toilet paper will it take to kill it?” -- While that was a pretty good joke, there is no humor to be found in the discovery of these murder monsters.

            ✿While Kay and I were walking in the backyard yesterday, I asked her to identify the bird that was making a strange chirping noise. She told me to go inside and get her phone because she has an app that can identify a bird from its song.  

            That is just so flabbergasting! Mark my words, in time your cell phone will be able to tell you why your baby is crying. Without the use of a lie detector, a cop will be able to ask a suspect a question and immediately know if he’s lying. (I imagine they can already do that.) A psychologist will be able to say, “No, there’s nothing wrong with your marriage. You’re just upset at the Texan’s draft.” 

            Has this piece not been a wealth of information? If you run into Kay during the week, please don’t ask her how she puts up with me. She’s running out of answers for that.

            By the way, I searched for the lyrics to the toenail song and found out that it’s “Daddy cut your toenails.’ It’s  “Baby cut your toenails” I couldn’t find the lyrics, but for 99 cents, I could download the song. I have always refused to pay over a dime for a toenail song, so I’ll just have to live with the mystery.

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