Over the years, a variety of people have told me that when you sneeze, you are as near to death as you will ever get while alive. Some have even insisted that we are, in fact, dead for that instant when we sneeze because our heart and all vital functions cease.
Of
course, this is a persistent old wives' tale.
The
nearest we ever get to death and momentarily cease all life functions is actually
in that instant when we think we've lost our smartphone.
—Mitchell Hegman
Life is more interesting when you misread things. While shopping with Desiree at one of our local grocery stores, I walked by a produce display featuring fresh herbs and spices. A package label caught my eye as I whisked by. “Wow,” I thought to myself. “That’s a cool thing!”
According
to the label, the package contained Organic Poetry Blend, herbs and spices.
I
stopped after a couple more steps. Wait.
What is poetry blend?
I
walked back to investigate.
Posted
is a photograph of the package in question.
—Mitchell Hegman
Over the weekend, a 58-year-old man drowned after falling off a jet-ski in Hauser Lake, a couple of miles from my lakeshore property. The man, his wife, and their dog were on the jet-ski when it tipped over and spilled them into the water. Neither rider was wearing a life preserver.
I
was down at the lake near the same time the drowning occurred. At that time,
the lake was what I call “stupid busy.'” There were at least two dozen
watercraft (a mix of boats and jet-skis) pinballing and bucking about amid huge
waves produced by wakeboarding boats.
“I
wouldn’t even put my boat out in that mess if you paid me to,” I told a couple
of lakeshore neighbors as we sat in some shade, watching from the shore. “At
this rate, somebody is going to get killed out there.”
I’m
not sure if the heavy waves and the 'stupid busy' atmosphere played a part in
the drowning, but the shore is the only place for me when everyone comes out to
play on the weekends.
—Mitchell Hegman
When I first Googled “independence day” using lowercase first letters, I ended up with this as a first hit: Independence Day is a blockbuster movie from 1996 starring Will Smith.
When
I Googled “Independence Day'” using capital first letters, I ended up with
this: Independence Day (colloquially the Fourth of July) is a federal holiday
in the United States commemorating the Declaration of Independence, which was
ratified by the Second Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, establishing the
United States of America.
Now,
the internet has corrected itself and properly displays “ratifying the
Declaration of Independence” no matter how I enter the Google query.
Thank
you, internet.
Happy
Independence Day, America!
—Mitchell Hegman
I tend to adopt bastardized or altered forms of words or phrases when they please me, for whatever reason. In my years immediately after high school, I worked with a gentleman who substituted the word “squirrel” for “girl.” Before long, he and I started singing “go away, little squirrel.” That has stuck with me to this day.
Another
one that stuck is a new way to pronounce “binoculars.” This one came from a
little kid who had his own version: “by-nock-lee-urs.” Well, that's now
permanently with me, too.
Desiree
often uses the phrase “blah, blah, blah,” but she says it in this fashion: “ba-la,
ba-la, ba-la.” A sort of musical version. I like it!
—Mitchell Hegman
Eilleen Regina Edwards has sold more than 85 million albums and is one of the top-selling female artists in country music history. Don't recognize that name? Try this: Shania Twain. Shania, like so many other entertainers, became famous using a stage name. Some used a single moniker like Sting or Prince, while others ventured into different territory, such as Engelbert Humperdinck.
If
you want to be a porn star, some suggest using the name of your first pet as
your first name and the name of the street you grew up on as your surname.
Using this trick, my name would be Sandalwood Groschell.
Not
bad, but it's not really my style. I prefer something with a bit more
resonance.
Here
is my new stage name: Mitchell M. Mitchell.
What's
your name?"
—Mitchell Hegman
—Mitchell
Hegman
