Jim Hagarty

You know you’re getting old when the language you’ve lived your life with – and made your living by – changes before your eyes and you know there’s not a thing you can do about it.

Take the word caregiver, for example, which has begun to make its way into everyday talk. People used to be parents, babysitters, guardians. Pretty soon, they’ll all be caregivers.

No more Mom and Dad. It’ll be primary caregiver, secondary caregiver, etc. All of which begs the questions: Are the recipients of a caregiver’s care to be known as caretakers? Will kids soon be overheard taunting, “My caregiver is bigger than your caregiver?” Or, “Your caregiver wears army boots?”

We’ve discovered a polite way to describe the unusual habits of strange people. Today, a man enjoys an alternative lifestyle. Years ago, he was a “nut.”

What’s the opposite of quality time? Inferior time? If your time is lacking in quality, what can be done to improve it?

All time ever does, and since time began it’s been doing it very well, is pass. It’s never gotten better or worse at it.

In my life, I’ve had good times and bad times. If a quality time comes along, I may not be able to handle it.

Factories I’ve worked in have quality-control inspectors. Will we some day see quality-time inspectors? How was my weekend? Well, I had a couple of quality hours Saturday afternoon but the evening time was definitely substandard.

Popular nowadays are job descriptions. This is mine: I come to work. I work. I go home from work. On the list of things included as falling within my area of responsibility: everything I haven’t been able to get out of and nobody else wants to do.

Brainstorm. People get together in a group and at some sort of signal, their brains all begin to, well, storm. Gales blow from their ears, rain pours from their mouths and lightning flashes in their eyes.

This is supposed to be a beneficial experience. I had a brainstorm once and I don’t want any more.

People used to talk to other people about ideas, projects or goals. Now they network. What I wonder is what happens to the network in the event of a brainstorm? Does it go off the air?

I don’t even want to discuss the words feedback, interface, consensus. Input bugs me. As a newspaper editor, I recently got a press release from an organization welcoming “ideas and input” and I wondered, what is the difference between the two?

Feedback sounds like what my cats give me when their stomachs are upset.

Witness how polite we’ve become. Today, a man is an underachiever. He used to be a lazy, good-for-nothing bum. Another man has a personality disorder. He used to be a dirty rat. A third man is cost conscious. He used to be a miser, skinflint, tightwad – you choose.

A boy is socially maladjusted. He used to be a brat. Another kid displays aggressive tendencies. At one time, he was a bully.

Today, news reports talk about the amount of disposable income a person has. Sounds rather callous. “Well, we got this $50 left over,” says Mom. “What say we burn it?”

Used to be, all your income was disposable. If you couldn’t figure out ways to get rid of it, lots of people were happy to help you do the job.

I don’t know any more. Dumps are landfill sites. Farmers are becoming agriculturalists. Teachers are educators. Reporters are “the media.” More than one money is monies.

Oh well. At least I don’t have to worry about getting old. I’ll undergo the aging process instead. Some day, a piece in the paper will describe me as being 80 years “young.”

And I’ll never die. Instead, the hospital will list my untimely expiration as just another negative patient outcome.

©1987 Jim Hagarty

I wish I was in Dixie. Away, Away. Seriously.

I am tired of Ontario, Canada, and all of its rules. I want to be a citizen of the State of Georgia where yesterday, lawmakers passed a law which would allow a fine young man like myself to carry a gun into bars and churches.

I cannot tell you the number of times over the years when a gun was just the thing I needed in a bar. It would have settled so many serious disputes, such as whether the greatest hockey player in history was Gordie Howe or Wayne Gretzky (it was Gordie Howe) and whether John Deere tractors are better than any other tractor on the market (they are) as well as the age-old battle between Chevy and Ford.

A gun would have also helped in the many situations where a tablemate and I were trying to decide who had the better claim to the pretty young woman at the bar (I always did).

In fact, I provide as evidence the true story of the country music star in the 1940s who was sitting in a bar with another country music star and that star’s girlfriend. Star Number One asked Star Number Two to meet him in the hallway where he fished a gun out of his boot, pointed it at him and said, “She’s mine from now on.”

And guess what? She was.

But, while handy, a gun in a bar would not be my first use of the new law passed in one of the houses of government on Tuesday in Georgia. Not by a long shot.

Where I would use it most and would need it the most is in church. Because in church I am surrounded by self-admitted sinners of every description.

I am getting tired of being defenceless in the face of the violence that could be unleashed at any moment by one or more of the thieves, adulterers, liars and other such ne’er-do-wells in the pews around me.

Also, how often have I been offended by the message being preached by the misguided minister of God at the lectern and would love to be able to stand up, draw my weapon and order him to change his tune, especially when some of these Ten Commandments are cramping my style, as they usually are.

Also, the Georgia law would let me carry my gun into my school if I was a teacher and I used to be one. Oh how my discipline record would have been improved if I had been packing heat. I thinking cheating on exams would have been greatly reduced.

As well, in Georgia, I could carry my gun into government buildings.

“Really?” I would say to the clerk, gun drawn. “You want me to pay how much to license my cat?”

Sadly, however, I would still be prohibited from taking my gun into courthouses and prisons and I really don’t know why. Why should the prisoners on Death Row not be able to be armed? Why shouldn’t I be able to argue my cases in front of a judge based on more than just evidence and logic?

So, while enlightened, the Georgia law will leave some areas still in the dark.

However, the best thing about all these gun laws is that they do not apply to gun shows and National Rifle Association conventions where guns are strictly prohibited as well they should be.

Come on.

Let’s not give up on common sense people!

©2014 Jim Hagarty

In countries overseas where I have travelled, it is not uncommon to be approached by children begging for money. In my country Canada, of course, that doesn’t happen.

BING BONG!

“Yes.”

“You wanna buy some chocolate-covered almonds?”

“What’s the money for?”

“My school.”

“Yes, but, what exactly at your school is it going towards?”

“Oh. Ah, I dunno. A trip somewhere.”

“OK. I’ll take two boxes.”

BING BONG!

“Yes.”

“Would you like to sponsor me in a read-a-thon?”

“How much?”

“I’m supposed to read 10 books. Most people are giving me $5.”

“What’s the money for?”

“My school.”

“But, what exactly at your school?”

“I dunno. It’s just for the school.”

“OK – Put me down for $5.”

BING BONG!

“Yes.”

“Hi. Would you like to buy a chocolate bar?”

“What’s it for?”

“School.”

“Yes, but, for what at school?”

“I dunno.”

“You don’t have any idea?”

“I think it’s for a trip.”

“OK. Give me a bar.”

BING BONG!

“Yes.”

“Would like to buy a bag of potato chips?”

“For your school?”

“No. For my soccer team.”

“Is your soccer team going on a trip?”

“I dunno.”

“OK. Give me a bag.”

BING BONG!

“Hi. Have you heard the good news about God?”

“Yes I have.”

SLAM!

BING BONG!

“Hi. Would you to buy some flowers?”

“What for?”

“To support youth employment.”

“How is my buying flowers going to help youth employment?”

“Ah …”

“No!”

BING BONG!

“No!”

BING BONG!

“No!”

BING BONG!

“No!”

The good news is, my meetings of Curmudgeons Anonymous are going nicely. Next week, I get to tell my story. Now if I can just get through Halloween without chasing anybody down the street, I just might make it.

©1994 Jim Hagarty

Despite what many might feel is strong evidence to the contrary, there appears to me to be an orderliness to the universe that indicates things are indeed unfolding as they should. Something that keeps the stars up there and the oceans down here. Some great planning department in the sky that co-ordinates our comings and goings.

Some celestial Director of Human Resources, for example, who found Eugene Moos a job as undersecretary of agriculture in the United States. And encouraged Howard Buffett to open up his own food company in Illinois.

Pshaw, you say. People’s occupations don’t have anything to do whatsoever with their names. Jobs are jobs and names are names and there’s no link between them. It is all just decided by random selection.

Oh ya?

How many examples would it take to convince you otherwise? Two? Three?

Would you change your mind if I told you about Dr. Ernie Doktor, who owns a veterinary clinic in Alberta? Or if I mentioned Laura and Susan Homer who are real estate agents in Ontario?

Now that I think about it, names are coming to me like a flood.

Billy Potash is an organic farmer in British Columbia. Heather Apple is president of the Canadian Heritage Seed Project, a group dedicated to preserving rare fruit trees. Pat Hayes was hired as a parliamentary secretary to Ontario’s minister of agriculture.

What do I have to do to make a believer out of you?

Do I have to tell you about Gord Surgeoner, an Ontario doctor? Or John Pasteur, a cattle rancher in Alberta? Or Father Ray Masse, a Catholic priest in Ontario?

Maybe you’re one of those real skeptics who knows there is no such thing as Fate or an overall Plan.

So, it wouldn’t do much good to tell you about Florida sex researcher Dr. Carol Darling. Or Lydia Basil,who’s compiling a Quebec vegetable dictionary. Or Ontario Cattlemen’s Association member Dick Heard.

I don’t know. I guess it’s a tough sell. Did Milan Panic become prime minister of Yugoslavia by accident? Why didn’t Dr. Chu go into psychiatry instead of becoming a renowned dentist?

It’s complicated, that’s for sure. You hear about a ball coach whose last name is Wyn or a U.S. potato-virus researcher who goes by the name of Stephen Poe and you wonder.

But then, you read that the plastic surgeon who has invented a way of lengthening the penis goes by the name of Dr. Robert Stubbs and you start to question yourself. Maybe there is no connection between your name and what you’ll end up doing in life.

On the other hand, if you’re name is Bill Dozer you might check out a course in road construction.

Or Rich Guy? My suggestion for you might be to forget computer processing and get straight into law, banking, politics or better yet: hockey.

©1993 Jim Hagarty

So how do you spend your days now, Jim, I am sometimes asked by people who are trying to find something by which to explain my encroaching and increasingly perceptible insanity.

Well, you know, I reply.

The Hagartys are a one-car family, the first one-vehicle family since the Clampetts rode their infamous truck into Beverly Hills. Also the Flinstones had only one car.

So our little buggy is on the road a lot.

Take a recent Wednesday, for example, and Wednesdays are the worst.

At 9 a.m. I drove my wife to work and came home.

At 10 a.m. I drove my son to school and came home.

At 11 a.m. I drove my daughter to school and came home.

At 3 p.m. I drove my daughter to the dance studio and came home.

At 4 p.m. I drove my son to work and came home.

At 4.45 p.m. I picked up my daughter at the dance studio and came home.

At 5 p.m. I picked up my wife at work and came home.

At 8 p.m. I picked up my son at work and came home.

Eight trips on one not untypical Wednesday.

I have no figures for this, but there are a lot of taxis in my city of Stratford and my guess is there is at least one cabbie who didn’t have eight fares on the recent winter Wednesday I refer to.

One mid-morning a while back, I picked up my wife at work.

“Where to?” I asked in a monotone. “Hospital?” Yes, she was headed to a meeting at the hospital.

Later, I realized, all I had left out of that conversation was the Ma’am as in, “Where to, Ma’am?”

Other than that, since my retirement, I have nothing to do and it takes me all day to do it.

©2015 Jim Hagarty

How old does a male human being have to be before he can finally escape the demeaning title of “boy?”

Apparently, no age group is safe.

Even old guys who belong to exclusive groups are derisively labelled as members of old boys’ clubs and apparently there’s no worse group to join than that.

And those of us who were raised on farms are forevermore known as country boys.

Men who drive pickup trucks and love country music are known far and wide as good old boys.

And every time a middle-age Toronto executive says something corny in a meeting, somebody is sure to follow to up, with: “You can take the boy out of the country but you can’t take the country out of the boy.” Chuckle, chuckle.

Of course, when dear old Dad drives in the lane on his new all-terrain vehicle, Mom looks cynically out the kitchen window and remarks: “The bigger the boys, the bigger their toys.”

Why are grown men who play baseball for a living still called the boys of summer? Even by female sportswriters in Toronto?

When men get together with other men for a night on the town,why are they out with the boys and not out with the men?

When a man smirks, why is it a boyish grin, never a mannish one?

If a man looks after herds of cattle for a living, why is he a cowboy instead of a cowman? Why are men and women who offer themselves as sex objects called boytoys? And why is a nation which ships male soldiers to do battle sending its boys off to war?

Why is a woman who gets along great with a group of men just one of the boys? Why is her male companion her boyfriend?

Why are policemen called the boys in blue? Why are male orchestra members known as the boys in the band? Why are The Beach Boys still The Beach Boys when they’re all 40-something?

Could it be that in all these cases the word “boys”, as it is used when referring to men, is used as an indication of affection and not derision? Like other words we use.

Take the word “girls”, for example.

Both words denote youth and vigour and energy and spirit. But both words are on the endangered list while today’s self-empowered language cops are out on patrol, listening to our every utterance, waiting for our tongues to betray us as enemies of The New Order.

All I can say is boy, oh boy. There is time enough for most of us males to be a man. Too little time to be an actual boy.

The language police, whether boys or girls in blue, can come and arrest this good old country boy any time they want.

©1990 Jim Hagarty

Once again, You Asked Us has compiled a short list of answers to often-asked questions regarding another complicated issue.

This time, we tackle Canada’s proposed new federal Goods and Services Tax, scheduled to go into effect next year. The following information will help you understand the tax, in all its complexity.

Question: Is their any escape from the tax?
Answer: Yes, but the only sensible way out will be to not spend any money. The good news is, you will be able to do this in about two years’ time because by then, you won’t have any money left to spend. For those who can’t wait that long, there is another way out but keep in mind funerals will also be taxed.

Question: Will the nine per cent tax rate ever be lowered?
Answer: Please. Serious questions only.

Question: What will the money raised by the new tax be used for?
Answer: It will be used for the salaries and offices of the extra people hired by the government to collect the tax and for literature telling us what a great new thing the tax is. Most of the rest of the money will be used to pay for studies on how the tax is working out. Copies of the study results showing how the tax is working out just fine will be available for sale, but will be taxed. Any funds still leftover will be given to lobby groups to protest the tax on Parliament Hill.

Question: Is it true some people will receive rebates to help cushion the effect of the tax?
Answer: Yes, but the $100 Goods and Services Tax rebate won’t arrive until about 10 months after a successful application is made. Applicants will be required to take blood and lie-detector tests, fill out two dozen, 20-page forms, beg like a dog, humiliate themselves in front at least 10 civil servants and hand over their first-born child. The rebate will then be taxed when the applicant rushes out to spend it on Goods and Services.

Question: Is it true cars will be cheaper under the new tax system?
Answer: Yes it is true. Cars on average will cost about $2.49 less to buy. And about $502.49 more to drive.

Question: What will the government committee now studying the tax be likely to conclude about it?
Answer: In brief, the committee report will say: The committee finds that the new tax is indeed, a new tax and that it will replace the old tax and that this will affect everybody and that some people won’t like it and others will and what the heck we may as well go along with it anyway because we already told everybody we would.

Question: Will rich people be adversely affected by the new tax?
Answer: One more joke question out of you and I’m walking out of this column.

Question: Could the new tax lead to a return to the old barter system as people try to avoid paying taxes by taking payment for goods and services in other goods and services?
Answer: If you’ll come over to my house and paint my front porch for me, I won’t charge you for the answer to this question.

Question: If Canadians don’t like the tax, can’t we change things through the ballot box at the next election?
Answer: Okay, that does it. I warned you about silly questions. Sorry, but you’ll just have to figure out this tax thing for yourself if that’s the way you’re going to be.

©1989 Jim Hagarty

I have a new lawn.
Actually, my new lawn has me.
It is obvious that what is planted in my yards is Grass From Hell.
It just keeps growing, growing, growing.
Growing.
Someday they’ll find me lying in it, face down, mower still running, rake clenched in one hand.
It will already be growing over me.
It’s my own fault.
All I’ve wanted for the past two years is a nice lawn.
I think I told someone I’d do anything to have one.
Maybe I told the wrong person.
The landscapers came and planted it Aug. 10.
“It’ll be up in five days and you’ll be cutting it till your blue in the face by the end of August,” one of them said.
“Yeah,” I chuckled. “Sure I will.”
I turned blue in the face long ago.
I haven’t had time to look in a mirror to see what colour my face is now.
I cut the grass 19 days after it was planted.
Then the landscapers came back and fertilized it.
In the last 16 days, I’ve cut it nine times.
I cut it twice Wednesday.
The cutting and raking took four hours.
Then Friday night, I cut it again.
Woke up Saturday and looked out my window.
The grass had grown so much overnight I could hardly see the lawnmower tracks.
Cut it again.
Also Monday.
And Wednesday.
And Friday.
And Monday.
And now it’s Friday and I’m cutting it as you’re reading this.
I would have cut it Wednesday but it was too wet. I can hear it growing outside my bedroom window at night.
I makes an eerie sound.
As if it’s breathing.
But soon I won’t hear it any more.
Because I’m just going to leave the lawnmower running all the time.
That’ll save the bother of starting it so often.
So far, I’ve raked up eight green garbage bags full of grass clippings.
Dragged them out to the curb for pick up.
Monday night, somebody came by and picked up two of them.
Took them home.
If he likes my grass so much, maybe he’ll buy my house.
It’s a nice place.
Well built.
New roof.
Great lawns.
Price is right.
Includes free lawnmower.
Gas can.
Rake.
And a promise he’ll never see me again.

©1988 Jim Hagarty

You’re nobody nowadays if you don’t belong to a movement with “ist” on the end of it.

In 1989, in my country Canada, you can be a pacifist, a conservationist, an activist, a feminist, an environmentalist, a unionist, an animal rightist, a pro- or an anti-abortionist, a (death penalty) abolitionist (or retentionist), a separatist, a moralist, a leftist, a humanist, a multiculturalist, an isolationist, a communist, a socialist, an atheist, a federalist or an economic nationalist.

You can be a combination or two or more of these things.

You could be a sports enthusiast, an artist or an agriculturalist.

But you might also be, unfortunately, a racist, a white supremacist, a materialist, a sexist, a chauvinist, an egotist or a bigamist. Even a political opportunist. Or a perfectionist.

Hopefully, a realist.

One way or another in this day and age, if you want proof that you do, in fact, exist, you better find yourself an ism to attach yourself to.

If none of the above categories appeals to you there are also the following special-interest groups which you can join and whose cause you can advance. They are less well known, it’s true, but they too are making their way into the public eye. They just need a little more exposure. That’s what I’m here for.

Try to imagine yourself as a:

1. Couch potatoist – an advocate for the rights of sofaholics, campaigning for an end to the ridicule they suffer, especially at the hands of newspaper reporters, standup comedians and toymakers;

2. Bugs Bunnyist – a fighter for the right to watch the original, uncut versions of the Warner Brothers cartoon classics, before all the bonks to the head and whammos to the backside were edited out for the sensitive children of the ’80s;

3. Inactivist – promoting the doing of absolutely nothing for periods of up to an hour, even longer;

4. Lack of exercisist – dedicated to getting nighttime joggers dressed in dark clothing off the streets and to having annoying Richard Simmons commercials banned from TV;

5. Lighten upist – fighting to restore fun to the lives of all the other “ists” who are taking the whole thing way too seriously;

6. Less educationist – dedicated to the concept that ignorance is bliss and what you don’t know can’t hurt you and to the goal of enjoying life more by being informed less;

7. Imperfectionist – calling for a reduction in the amount of quality time people spend and a general lowering of the pressures to do things really well;

8. Total unknownist – striving to lead an unpublicized life, completely unnoticed by the media;

9. Averagist – in search of second place;

10. Gone fishinist – committed to spending many free hours in pursuits which hold no socially redeeming value and which are guaranteed to bring no improvement to the lives of anyone, not even to your own.

I recommend any of the above groups, though I don’t actually belong to any of them myself. I don’t need to.

I’m a journalist.

And a columnist.

(Hopefully a humourist).

©1989 Jim Hagarty

Everyone in our household spends their free time on their laptops these days and hardly anyone watches TV any more.

Except me.

And I am hooked on a show out of England called Doc Martin. I think it is my favourite show of all time.

Unfortunately, this is its last season I believe. They only run their series for three or four seasons over there. This is Doc Martin’s fourth season and the actor who plays the main character had to be talked into doing one more year so this will be it. (Update 2020: I was wrong. The series has just been renewed for its tenth season.)

Doc Martin is along the lines of two other favourite series of mine from the ’90s – Ballykissangel from Ireland and Monarch of the Glen from Scotland.

The shows from the British Isles use a whole different approach than American series. The characters are more fully developed, there is no reliance on snappy retorts and one-liners and pathos and laughter combine in rapid succession sometimes.

Best of all, there are no gun battles, car chases or bombs going off.

Someday I would like to visit the town in England that is the setting for Doc Martin.

The doctor who is at the centre of this show is a real crabapple, so much so, in fact, that he seems to be missing so many of the basic emotions that motivate the rest of us. And he has the social skills of a porcupine.

I like him just the way he is.

If curmudgeons gave out an annual award, he’d win it every year. And yet, there is something endearing about him. And he’s one hell of a doctor.

In the show is on Vision TV in Canada and PBS in the United States.

©2012 Jim Hagarty