Be entertained by the simplest things in life

One can be entertained by the simplest of things, costing nothing by just observing people around you.

For instance, check these happenings out while a four-yearold boy was visiting our home. Barb and I kept asking the lad what he would like to do: feeding fish in the neighborhood’s pond, playing Frisbee in the basement or playing with the special Hess trucks in my closet. Each time his answer was, “boring!”

He then decided to build a tower out of the seven pillows in our family room, placing them on our couch. Now, I know I am a bit of a tease but so is he, so he deserved my actions. When he had a stack of three pillows, he would turn his back to me to reach another pillow, at which time I surreptitiously knocked the top pillow off the stack before he could look back at me. This happened several times.

Finally, he looked at me with a stern face and said, “DON’T MOVE A MUSCLE!”

I asked him where that command originated from and he readily told me he learned it from his older brother. I immediately threw my arms in the air and before he reached the next pillow, another pillow would tumble off the top of the stack and up would fly my arms just before he turned to face me. We both grew tired of this so eventually ended our efforts.

Another time, he was trying to operate something mechanical in nature and after several tries, on two occasions he said, “This thing is malfunctioning.”

We thought he was doing very well in expanding his vocabulary until he said, “What does malfunctioning mean?”

I feel that laughing is physically good for you as well as good for the soul. In a recent “Fishwrapper” article, it said that we laugh on average 13 times a day. I can prove this wrong. If you have a friend that can set you on your heels laughing (like I do), you can laugh at least 13 times in an hour.

The pricier things could include movie theater tickets in the neighborhood of $12 each. One could easily spend more than that amount just for refreshments at the theater. You could spend over $100 for two tickets (among the cheapest seats) at a Philadelphia Phillies ballgame, including parking and eats. Those costs pale in relation to a four day bus trip to Kentucky and back to see a replica of Noah’s ark and various places of interest along the way. Museums and a tremendous amount of sightseeing are not my favorite things to do because I don’t remember much about what I have seen and if there are nice items to purchase, I either can’t or don’t want to afford the purchases.

Let’s face it, I love to stay at home and putter or read and write. Now I have a problem! My wife, Barb, wants to take the bus trip to Kentucky. I could try to talk her out of it but she has a totally unfair advantage. I just found out she has the funds saved up for the trip. That’s “small potatoes” compared to her bigger advantage. She has people praying that I will change my mind. Not fair! I know that she seriously wants to go and I am NOT overruling God.

Hoping to be in Kentucky in October, Lord willing!