Some Of The Things That Make Me Happy

It seems that many conversations I have been in directly or indirectly (because I’m nosy) always revolves around tragedy. There is rarely a time in a coffee shop, on an airplane or happy hour meeting that doesn’t, in some facet, involve someone dying or loss of an eye. Just the other day two ladies were talking about their friend’s mother who had a rash and two weeks later she died. With the same breath, they were talking about shoes. I can’t tell if other people’s tragedy brings comfort or misery really does love company. To me, I work hard at surrounding myself with positives because there seems to be a lot of wet blankets in the world. Here are some of the things that put a smile on my face.

Golden Retrievers are my favorite. I had one when I was a kid. His name was Guy which came from the Sesame Street character “Guy Smiley“, because as a puppy he was the one out of the litter that had a perma-grin. These dogs live a care free life of just being happy. Not really known for their intelligence they go through life rolling in stuff, shedding, napping, drinking from the water bowl then laying their wet mouths on your lap, and being goofy. Above all they just love people which makes them the easiest going animal on the planet. If there is truth to reincarnation, I wouldn’t mind being a retriever. Shit, I practically have the same traits now.

Stormy nights always scared the ba-Jesus out of me as a kid, no thanks to the movie Poltergeist. Today I find them very relaxing. It’s a good reason to unplug the TV and the computer, turn on a reading lamp and just listen to storm approach. At times I may open the garage and watch the show from the safety of my folding chair. Lucky for me, there hasn’t been any real dangerous storms here in a while. If there are, you know I’m going to be the asshole on the news that was found 200 miles away in someone’s tree. I never heed the warnings.

I’m an addicted runner but my addiction doesn’t make me a good one. I have been running most of my life but I just am not meant to be one. That’s why I turn to “Runner’s World” magazine for inspiration. The motivational stories keep me on track to get up, put my running shoes on and head out into the vast darkness every morning. Even though I still come lumbering in, snorting and huffing, side stitched and limping, I still did it. Plus the review of shoes is usually right on.

I know this sounds strange but I am a big fan of foreign vintage advertisements. I consider them more art than anything else and if I could find a print of this above, I would so hang that in the kitchen. Can you imagine a time when this would make you want to buy pork?

One of my new favorite pass times is cruising YouTube for old commercials of yester-year. I’m saving this for a full post later but it also is on the list that makes me happy. More over, I really dig McDonald commercials from ’86-’88. I believe I may have consumed more cheeseburgers during that time but I feel the real reason is that advertisements back then focused on stories rather than the product. Just take a look at this. Until the end, I didn’t know if this was for Trapper Keepers or hight-tops.

Tiki themed anything really floats my board, man. One day I am going to have a basement that will look just like this. I can picture drinking blue martinis and listening to Link Ray on the turntable while outside it’s a whopping 20 degrees. It’s a great reflection of my life; where ever you are, you can always be somewhere else.

Well, that was a pretty pointless post but I had to get some happy thoughts churning. Meetings and sad sacks get to me after a while and just writing about this stuff has already made the day a little better. You guys should try this. I swear it works.