Big Country

lot going on today. Took my blood test today. I'm got my prostate check. That's what I'm doing. But I'm not getting the finger in the ass. I went to the urologist the other day and pee a lot. You know, I'm pining too much. I don't like how much im peing. And I'm not one to get the test too often. And i know I've been lax about that. I shouldn't be that way at my age, but just I've been lax like everything in my life. I'm a last minute guy,

which is stupid with your health. But anyhow, I went to the eurologists the other day thinking, okay, they're gonna stick to the you know, finger in my butt and check the press. And I get to this place and the doctor's a female. I go, wait a minute, hold it to female other female eurologists? Do they for men? Do they do they put their finger in your ass? I don't think I want this. I'm not a finger in the ass guy. I'm not even a knuckle in the ass guy. So when you go in there to check,

I've had it done a couple of times. But these are men, doctors in Beverly Hills. I tell you, one guy, what's my doctor, Doctor Trabulus? What a name rhymes with fabulous? Doctor Trabulus was doing it, and as he did it, I don't know what we got on the subject of I was dating a lot of girls. I was in La on TV and he asked me about Actually I think it corresponded his finger in my butt corresponded with him asking me you get any action. It was the

worst timing for that question. But you know, anyway, she didn't do that, the female doctor. She just said, it doesn't really tell much with a finger, you know, So let's get a blood test and see what that says. So I'm waiting for that test. I took it today. We'll see you in the next day or two. What that means. Feel fine, feel great, but you know, you never know. But I promise to be more proactive moving forward with my health. You got to it's just, you know,

too many people around me are dropping. It's just scary, you know, scary. Anyway, let's talk about what's happening out there, and this show will end with a family story, which you guys tend to enjoy, particularly with regard to some of the pictures I've posted on the podcast of cess page from back in the forties and fifties, showing my father and my relatives and grandparents and Rosalie. And we'll

get to that at the end. But I want to ask this question, I how many articles do I have to read and how many pictures do I have to see? Once a year, every year, I gotta see pictures of Reese Witherspoon and her lookalike Doughter. They love saying this, they love talking about how much they look alike. I'm sick of it. The kid's cute, Reese Witherspoon's a door.

But we get it. But every year there's stories everywhere because Rene wishes her daughter a happy birthday, or the daughter wishes the mother happy birthday or Merry Christmas on Instagram, and you know, the lazy press turns it into a story, and it's always about Reese Witherspoon stills feels and looks youthful at forty nine or forty eight or forty seven, same story every year. Can we move on, please? It's annoying,

it really is. I don't like to hear this. I could never imagine working at a newspaper or a magazine right and actually telling your editor, hey, here's a feel good story. Reese Witherspoon turned a year older and she still looks like a daughter. Wow, yeah she does. You know, give me two hundred words on that. Make sure a fifty of those words are spent describing what they're wearing, even though anybody looking at the picture can see what they're wearing. But I can't stand the way stories are

padded in newspapers or magazines. You know, they'll never say the person's name, if they can say the such and such star of you know, like if they're doing a de Niro story, you know, the Irish The star of the Irishman was wearing brown corduroy is like, Okay, who cares what he's wearing. It's not a beat shot, it's not a bikini in Sardinia we're talking about. I'm from

a different world. I used to love well. Sometimes I used to dread heading into the afternoon meeting with all the editors at the New York Daily News, because that's when you have to let the desk editors and the guys there to ex but to expect story wise when it comes to deadline, and if there was anything really good that ought to maybe be moved out of the gospep column and get preferential treatment on page three or

five or even the front cover, that's where it was discussed. Otherwise, you tell the right people what you're working on, and they know what to expect. The only time it sucked was when whether there was some days that just nothing was really happening, didn't have anything meaty. It was like two two thirty three o'clock, two hours till deadline. We need four or five stories, you know, twelve hundred words.

That's when I'd have to pick up the phone and call as many plugged in people as I knew, and I knew everybody back then. Sometimes I forget d the drama that happened in our office. My god, But back in the day, New York City had tons of bicycle messengers, bike messengers right racing across the city, speeding through midtown traffic. A lot of these guys would even to save time.

The would ride up alongside a bus or a truck and they with one hand hold on to the wheel well or you know, a window something, and they'd let the bus or the truck move them and they wouldn't have to peddle for a while. They'd get a break. They used to call that skitching. And these messengers were typically wiry guys, you know, very hyperactive kind of dudes

with knee peds and elbow pads. Not all of them were helmets either, But when someone had to get me a roll of film or a document, court papers, whatever, bike messengers were the fastest way to get your shit. And I'll tell you one time I was I was in the city before I had the job. I was with my girlfriend soon to be wife at the time, and I'm driving my Gray RX seven. I love that car, and I'm pulling over to the right side of the road to it's the parkinged meter, and I wasn't used

to driving in the city too much, you know. I would go in there for weekends. And I flung up on the driver's side door, and a bike messenger like you see in the movies, he hit the brakes really hard, but it was too late, and he crashed into my door and he flew over the handleballs and nothing happened. Cursed me out. I said, what the fuck are you doing solo? You know, we both did a whole New York little curse dance. He got back on his bike and left, and I, you know, went on my day.

But those days don't happen, and now there's laws, suits, there's cops involved it all. It used to be like, you're okay, I'm okay, good, okay, it was my fault. You're right, Oh, I'll take care because we were both busy people had shit to do. But these bike messengers depended on tips a lot, you know, and they did really well, especially on shitty days like it was raining really hard or even snowing. Sometimes just too hot and

too humid to be outdoors. And there was this one day where a messenger I hadn't seen before, because we got to know them. Came into my office and to hand me something. I was about to run to a meeting, so I told Michael to handle it. And I got back to my desk ten minutes later, and I see my day book is gone. Now, back before there were iPhones that had all your contacts in there, people actually had rollo deses on their desk or you know. I used the leather Barrend notebook that had the names of

the biggest people in New York and LA. I mean everybody. They on me Campbell's cell phone, like I had everybody and whoever this guy was, and he was never caught. He hit the mother load my book. He hit the mother load. Not sure what he could do with those numbers except Prank called him. I don't know, but he got them all. I had to start from the scratch. It was awful. It's a lot different than going up and getting your shit back from the cloud. Back then,

you just start over. Anyhow, how embarrassing to have to write that yearly non story about Reese Witherspoon looks as young as your daughter. Okay, I think much of today's show, especially at the top, it's going to be about these these these bullshit type stories. Okay, So in addition to Reese Witherspoon, I also see a photograph of the singer Meghan Trainer. Remember it's all about that bass that show is proud of herself on being you know, the girl

that wasn't skinny, she wasn't a size too. Meghan Tray was proud to be a size whatever, twelve. I don't know what she was. But the song all about that bass meant it's all about women having a big ass, big hips that bass, and you know, girls, a lot of women latched onto it, just like they latched on to listen. They loved hearing a girls saying who talked about, Hey, I'm big and I don't care. Good Good for you guys,

I understand. But so in addition to the reason with this one, I see this Megan Trainer pitch and she dropped a shit ton of weight. Remember Megan Trainer was also the girl, the married singer. I figure she married, but they got his and her toilets. Remember, because they said they don't mind if they both take a shit in front of each other, they don't mind they walking

on each other. So they thought for their their anniversary they'd buy a his and her shitter where you're both like facing the other way, like your backs are kind of together, but you're next to each other. I cannot imagine a scenario unless me and my girl were taken hostage or whatever, fought in front of a let alone. Shit, I mean, taking a leak doesn't bother me. Better dump. No, there's somethings people shouldn't see or smell it. Just stop it. I remember back when I won all that junk from

the presenting an Emmy one of the gifts. There was so many like we can't getaways at this hotel and this spa, and I took advantage of a couple of those. One I liked was down There's a place in Santa Monica on the beach, a great hotel called Shutters. Shutters on the beach. You might know of it. It's a great place in Santa Monica, right on the water. I took the when I was dating Michelle Brandah. We went there, but we weren't we just had started dating. We were like,

you know, honeymoon phase. Right. We get to the hotel, great beautiful, that's great restaurant. The beach is right there, and we settle in, dropped the luggage, and I got an a bathroom, but number two not number one. So I put the TV on high, because you got to do that first, because guys sound differently than girls do behind closed doors. Except the doors that shutters. They're not doors that close. They're doors that have slats on them, so

you can hear and smell whatever goes on in that bathroom. Okay, that's not the way you want to begin to relationship. But yet we still made it to two years, so I guess I wasn't that much of a caveman in there. Speaking of caveman, how ugly is Benny Blanco and what is Selena Gomez trying to prove? Obviously, you can't have a man that you think is prettier than you are beautiful. I've already said there's a midget in her line, there's a dwarf in her family, and Benny Blanco's is the

same thing. There's chromagnum in his family, nanderthal in his family. Look at the picture. And then I saw him have an interview where he actually said that you know he's went through he's dressing nice thing. Going to all these events. They'll probably be at the met Ball in May, and he said to either Seth Myers or Jimmy Fallon, you know, I've actually become hot to some people. And he was giggling, but he kind of felt like he's now hot to

some degree. I understand the guy's a brilliant music producer. I don't know enough about his talents to say that, but I heard he is just like Scott Storch. Is not a good looking guy and developed such a cocaine addiction and pain pill addiction. But Scott Storch was like a wizard with the way he can create beats and make those beats at a piano or an organ. I mean just he made some of the greatest beats in

hip hop. You can imagine, not another guy, but everybody, every girl banged him, Paris Hill, they all, they all wanted a piece him. I don't know what it is, just because he's talented. But this this Benny Blanco horrible looking, horrible like circus level, and Solana comes, She's happy. I can't you know, I'm off on a tangent. But Megan Trader right, okay, Megan fan his and her shitters, Okay, Megan Tranda is really thin now in this picture, alarmingly thin.

And she also got a boot drop that was last month or two months ago. Story and uh, the picture doesn't even look like her, that's how thin she is. And the person who wrote this article is acting like it's a shock that she lost so much weight, like, what did she do? What do you think she did? Do you think she actually hit the gym? You think she lifted weights? Any and all actresses and plenty of actors, actors who have terrible allergies to heavy weights. They have

forsaken the gym from Manjaro or Ozempik. That's what they're doing. Bet the house on it. There's no reason to wonder how they went about getting thinner. Those days are over. There's no wondering anymore. Even Channing Tatum, who, by the way, we have so many videos in our phones of Rosalie after a wine. Now she has one wine and she's done. Sometimes she makes the man to read the while she's cooking. Why she does it, we don't know. If she does it on empty stomach, she's done. She gets what she

calls ossified on one drink. And she loves Channing Tatum. She loves guys who can dance. And there's about four videos in my phone and Joey's phone and her phone of Joey saying to how do you pronounce that actor's name you like? And when she's drunk, she can't remember Tanning Chatham, Right, Tanny Chatham, Try again, ma, And as she's thinking, we're throwing that name is like Carol Channing huh, and we're just naming the other names that sound kind

of adjacent to Channing Chanky, shit, Tanning Tanning Chatham. Then she's positive Channing Tatham, No, you're wrong again. Oh it's so crazy. So Channing Tatum apparently gained forty pounds for a roll. I don't know what movie he was where he appeared any different than he normally looks. I don't know what that is. But there's a before and an after picture of him. In the after he looks great, you know, Rip City. The guy's got a great body. But the before picture he's like, I'll never play a

fat role again. And I'm looking at the before picture that he calls fat, and I want to I wish that picture were my after picture. I mean, for him, it's a fact pick I get it. For most of us, fifty to sixty year old fathers. It's as close as we're gonna get to a Greek guy his before picture. I'll take it now. You think Channing Tatum or Tanning Chatham just jogged and Ate Paleo. No, he takes the shot too when needed, Are you kidding me? When needed?

Hollywood suddenly getting thin like Megan Trainer or Rebel Wilson, Tracy Morgan, Tom Segura, Kelly Clarkson, Adele Lizzo, Sharon Osmoe Oprah, countless others. These diabetes drugs for them would be like if steroids were suddenly legal. For athletes, it'd be like Mark Wigarre, Sammy Sosa and Barry Bonds and Jose Kints go all over again. Every athlete in the world would take them to get an edge like they had back then.

For athletes, it's about strength and muscle repairs. For Hollywood, it's all about squeezing into his size two or being considered for a Marble movie. You know, Rachel's who's playing snow White, and because of her mouth, it's gonna be shit, and it's getting shit reviews and it's just not gonna be a big hit. She's back pedaling somewhat, but she's an asshole, anti Trump, also anti Disney, anti man. You know what she said, she's got a not in the snow white, they made it look like a child in

snow white. But other pictures, not what she's doing, blowing her jaws, moving a mile a minute, but just regular pictures. She is a really beautiful girl. I'm telling you. I know she looks like a kid, forget that she's not a kid, but she's a beautiful girl. Have you seen a chest on her? It's like they it's like they're making themselves look like young boys, even galaic at doll. I'll get her in a second. What the all she is now is an action star. She's not a good actress.

She's beautiful, but they only use her in these roles where she can throw a couple of high kicks and beat up men like the Rock and Ryan Reynolds. They just they're just filling niches with these people. They're not they're not getting people who've studied and are tremendous actresses and actors who can do comedy, drama, dance, sing that those days are over. They just they're just plugging people in for certain Roles just I don't know. I watched

TCM too much. I just I like the where it used to be, where people actually studied to know everything there was about being a Hollywood star. Now it doesn't matter you make a Marvel movie, you'd go for life. Like I said, Ggado, I've been thinking I saw her in a film recently. It was a caper called Red Notice. Because I've seen everything on Netflix. Like I said, I can't where she outsmarts the rock and Ryan Reynolds, who

I got to omit. He's funny in this movie. But the more and more I see him, especially after the whole Blake, Blively and Baldoni lawsuit, Ryan Reynolds appears more and more to come off as a caddie queer. He reminds me of a homocentral who's married and the wife doesn't know, or maybe she does know. But it's a good it's a good union, it's a good business partnership.

I swear to God, because he's always funny with those asides, he does or looks to the left or right, or breaks the fourth wall and speaks directly to the camera right. You know, I've seen him in a few things recently, and I can tell whether it's Red Notice or The Adam Project or Deadpool, that he writes his own shit. Whoever the screenwriters are in these movies, they give him

the script that he makes changes. That doesn't happen much too. Actors, four actors he has to because there cannot be three or four separate screenwriters. Who's who's perfectly captured his language and unique sense of humor? That's they know? Why is that important? Why does that matter? It really doesn't accept it. If you think about it, you can kind of put two and two together to better understand the kind of

person he is. Because, as we know, Blake Lively has bragged that Ryan wrote the entire Rooftop Flirty Sexy scene where Blake and Baldoni first meet in that movie. It ends with us, right, And when you watch that scene, it's called that ends with rough right. Yeah, I've actually forgotten the name of the film because it's all about the lawsuit. But yeah, I'm pretty sure it ends with us. But you watch that scene and you hear that, the

jokes and the dialogue, it's pure Ryan Reynolds. And on top of that, if you remember back on SNL's fiftieth anniversary show. There was that moment in the beginning where Amy Poehler and Tina Fay come out and they're looking across the audience trying to spot the famous people sitting down, and they go, hey, there's Ryan Reynolds. Hey, Ryan, how's it going right in the fit of the lawsuit conversation? And Ryan stands up all smiles and Blake Lively looking

very glamorous to his left. She's beautiful, but you know, I can't like her as much over all as bullshit, But anyhow, she is a beautiful woman, even though she changed her face like everybody else has done in this town. But Ryan says nervously, everything's great. Why what have you heard? Haha? Audience laughs awkwardly. Now the story is that wasn't the way that bit was supposed to go. Nobody was supposed to find us out. But what happened was the guy who's held up the cute cards for SNL and Seth

Myers and he even did Carson Daily Show. This guy's been at this job for like thirty or forty years, Wally Ferriston. They call them Wally cute cards. He was being interviewed for some reason by some people in the Australian press, and they asked about that moment. They were obviously fishing to get some information on Ryan and Blake and just They asked about that moment when Amy and Tina and Ryan made that comment, and uh, you know,

was it tense? How did ago that night? You know, with everything in the press, And Wily innocently said, oh, that wasn't what was originally written, so I have to change the hue card. Yeah.

scripts generally. That's something that happens when you're into someone, and I think she was into him in that scene and during that film, and I think Ryan Reynolds got jealous with the way she was getting along with this co star. And I'll always believe this whole lawsuit thing Blake was pushed by Ryan Reynolds to go through with it because of his own insecurity because I don't know, possibly being gay. Maybe I don't know, may have gotten

him jealous. Anyhow, long tangent back to Megan Trainer follow me here looking real Finn she is. Last month or so, she was excited to get new boobs, like I said, And I think she had complained because after having two young sons back to back, her boobs had gotten deflated. A lot of women talk about this, I understand, and she needed something to make herself feel better. Good for her. I always say, if you don't like when you see

in the mirror, change it. By the way, speaking the mirrors, the urologist has me stand Oh, I didn't tell you this. She was a very hands on doctor, and by that I mean she wanted to do, you know, none investigating. She wanted to look at my package. And I'm not really I don't get funny around doctors, even if female. Whether it's a nurse or a doctor, I don't care.

I'm where I'm supposed to be have at it, so I dropped my pants obviously, you know, whenever you're nervous, the guy shoots back into your body a look like a turtle hat. That happens, you know, But I didn't care, and it didn't even shoot back that far. So I was feeling pretty good. And she's feeling around me, and she goes, have you felt different lately? And again just grubbing the my thing and my bulls. I'm looking for

her nis and I don't. She finally were in front of a full length mirror and I'm watching her handle me like a substape, and she goes, oh, I see a little hearing your belly button. I said, what she says, you have a little hernia your belly button. I said, I've never seen that, but I never look at my body. She goes, you need to. You gotta inspect your buddy.

And I looked at my belly button for the first time, and I don't know since I'm thirty eight, and I see the right side of my belly buttons got a little bump belly button HERNIAU phunu. But yeah, she worked me over and they asked me to write a review of how Well do you Feel at north Shore blah blah blah, and I said, I like the way Angelica Kaslowski handled me, and I mean handled me. She has very warm hands and a great disposition. Hope she reads that.

So Meghan Trader, good for he wants to feel better, get yourself some boobs. Great. But if I were Meghan Trader, I would have gotten that nose fixed before anything. Take a look at the picture of her kneeling down, very thin, and she's making the heart sign with her fingers. You know, the heart with your thumbs and index fingers, or if you're really obnoxious, all four fingers up top and the two thumbs and you gotta hold it by heart and

push it out. That's worse than Hal Hitler. To me, I'd rather see a Hitler salute than than the fucking ten thing is doing the heart. I can't stand it. Whenever I see Ariana Grande or the green bitch from Wicked doing that, I want to snap their fingers in half. I hate the fingerhart thing. So I'm looking at Megan Trainer, especially her nose, and I couldn't help but think what my father would say if he was still alive to see this, he would have said, my own, This one's

got the map of Israel on her face. He always called people with big noses, they look like the map of Israel. Normally those people are Jewish, you know, Jewish noses. Jews have noses that are very distinct. Some Italians do too, look at Justin Baldoni. Matter of fact, a lot of good looking guys have noses that are a little bit too big for their head. I think, so it's my finding. But like Chuck Schuma, Chuck Schuma, his nose gives him a face that could be the map of Israel, but

he's Jewish. Megan Training is not you, so it's weird. But me while my father had a big nose, so the whole thing is weird. That even says it. I thought I got my mother's Roman nose. Speaking of my father. The last few days, I've had a picture dump on the Facebook podcast Obsessed page, and the pictures have been

from the late forties into the fifties. They were taken back in the day when my father and mother, as well as many aunts and uncles, would leave Brooklyn or Queens or Bronx wherever they were living and they'd spend the weekends at this place my grandmother had out in the country in New Jersey. The house, little house on like twenty acres of land on a lake, streams, the very nice wild animals roaming, not wild, not lions, you know, like animals. Only Roselie in the rain went to this place.

I wasn't born yet. I wish I were, because the pictures and the stories that I grew up hearing, they were so fun to listen to. This place was where everybody would spend weekends. Look at how rich knobs and celebrities leave this New York city and flock to the Hamptons. Well, this place was in a town called bud Lake. There was another house in a town called Upper Hibernia that I sometimes confuse. That's the story for another day. Either way, we referred to this place as the country, or those

years as the country. But you know how if you move around a lot, or if you've left your house or two houses. Most of us live in two or three houses as we get older, you know, and whenever you're telling the story, you'll always preface the story by saying, remember back on Lington Street, like you'll mention the address you know how we go to the beach on Saturdays

when we lived on Arlington. You know, hey, let's just think of that an Terry have her daughter once you lived on at least deck or was that that the grand planes has. I don't know why we do that, as if we need to be shocked into that era to correctly remember a story, but against the person in the proper state of mind. You know, do we have this car on Sneeker review or was not taken from Brooklyn?

There's stupid questions like that. So I grew up with many great tales from the country, and as I got older, as you know, my family always had cameras around. As you can tell, I'm so thankful for that, because now that's none, they're all gone. I cherished those pictures more than anything. And we were moving this big trunk that belonged to my grandmother, and Roseley has it in that trunk or all photo album. So I took the big trunk downstairs and I opened all these albums, and oh

my god, I love what comes out. So many great shots, some of which I've never seen before. But when we were younger, living on Long Island, living at the Snetter Care Avenue house. Many times after a big Sunday meal, we would start to beg my father, Daddy, can we see home movies tonight? Can we see home movies? I want to see the country. I want to see Brooklyn.

And that meant that I all into the walking closet under the stairs and pull out the projector and the white screen on which we'd watch a bunch of old eight and sixteen millimeter films of bygone days. I mean, and Mary had a shit ton of films from all of her world travels. I mean, I hate to say, but we got rid of them when Rosie and Jack move. We just I just threwmn, like who even has that

projector anymore? Who's even gonna convert them? We're not. It was a Marian Polity, French Polynesia, Alaska, Africa, feeding groupers with a diving bell and the butterfly outfit, like Mary was crazy. But they're gone. But there's plenty of videos of the Brooklyn days and the country days, and there was a lot of me as a baby in benzonurse Brooklyn. But I love watching the movies from the Country because I was in awe that all the stories I'd heard

that was like living proof. I'd see the proof in flickering images of black and white or muted color, sepia tones, you know, like that movie Big Fish with Albert Finney. I love that movie so much because this movie was about a guy who told great, big stories, you know, like unbelievable type stories that his son didn't believe. See the movie Big Fish. It's one of my top ten movies. It's so beautiful. But throughout the end of the movie it comes to he comes to learn that all those

stories his father told were true. And I won't tell you how he knows, but it's a brilliant ending. It's so sweet. So you have those videos, I'm sure at home where everybody's in the videos moving a little quicker than they normally do. I don't know why that film made people look quicker, like throwing a football or catching catching the ball, flipping a burger on the grill. Everything

was a little quicker two seconds quicker. Billy Crystal is a great bit where he imitates the days of watching old movies like that and how sons and fathers have baseball catches happened so quick with the ball in the midt. Don't why the film was just quicker back then, but I guess the flickering made it seem that way. But I had forever heard stories about how my grandmother built her own rock garden with these great big stones that her son's my father and brother Larry and Phil would

collect from all over the property. And my father would tell me stories of how he would unearth these great big stones and carry them to his mother where he and his brothers and cousins would help her cement them in place. Matter of fact, when I got older and my father's physique became important to me because he always had a great physique. Dad, you didn't lift weights, No, what weights? What weights? How'd you get muscles? How'd you from working in the country, from working, you know, will

barrel shovels? You know, No, I don't know. Yeah, that's so you get muscles. It's different era, different time, lift them up, big sacks of dirt and this and that. Okay. So it was there that grandma w grow you vegetables, that herb and of course there were fruit trees everywhere. There are pictures out posted my father and other men building a wooden structure. One was a big chicken coop because at one point, a weasel came in and killed all the grandma's chickens, so they had to build a

bigger coop, but the right kind of wiring. There was also an addition they built into the house. And I just asked Rosie what they were building in this picture, and she said, my mother and father had My father just came home from war. Rosalie was like two years old, and don't forget, my father didn't see over the first eighteen months. He was still overseas. So they built a small addition or a honeymoon suite that was for him and my mother and Rosalie for more privacy. But the

country was where they fished and hunted. It of course ate these great, great big meals, and it was also where the younger cousins could run wild through all these acres of forests and streams and get away from city life. And Rosie told me one of the big adventures back then was they visited a supermarket. You know, it was a place that was obviously the precursor for what markets

look like today, but way way smaller. Obviously, before that, they either took food with them from Brooklyn or went to the one general store for staples around the house, and Rosie was telling me she also remembers as as that way of life not being so great since there was no plumbing in the country. Everybody had to use an outhouse and the water pump from the well to get water. Just very different kind of lifestyle. But the one picture I posted yesterday was one of my father.

I'd never seen his picture before, holding a scythe in his right hand, and in front of him is a great, big turtle hanging from a tree branch. Looks like a big, stopping turtle and there's twine around its neck. And I was struck by that post because my father loved animals, and I remember him as a man who would fall to the floor whenever he got home from work and play with our two months Sonny and Pippin before it even ate dinner. He'd spend five ten minutes on the

floor tickling them, rubbing their bellies. And he always liked to do what I found myself doing to tutsi as I had done to dogs in the past, and that was to hold their faces and push their nose, their wet noses into your cheeks, or he take the dog or cat's hat and put it gently under his chin, with his teeth clenched, his hand bespatching them on their bellies. I do the same thing. Probably many of you do too. In fact, Lorrainium, Rosey's first dog was a little Pomeranian

named Tutu. His real name was Ozi as an o z and it had a little something to do with my father getting grief when he worked under cover for the US Treasury. His higher ups didn't like that he accepted this puppy from one of his informants. You can't do that. This guy came upon a litter of Pomeranians, asked my father would his daughters liked them? He said, of course. He took Tutu or Ozi called Osie because in the drug trade, Ozi meaning ounce was how they

measure drug. So Ozi was the day and my father surprised Rosalie in the rain with this little fur ball. And then in time he bought a female Pomeranian, so so Ozie could make anyhow, I'm saying he loved animals, So why is he in the picture holding a scythe by this poor dead turtle? Did they eat? Rosie said? I don't remember us eating it? But then she put

on a sad face. She said, I don't know if he ate that or not, but you know, she did say that this was a period, or there was a period after he got home from the war where he would go off into the woods and try and bring birds and small game home to eat, and shockingly, sometimes just to shoot. I mean, he was a great marksman. I have all the certificates and plaques that show his ability. While he was in law enforcement and shit like that, and in the Coastguard, he was always like first when

it came to the marksmanship. So I asked, roh, what do you mean he just would hurt animals, because that's not like him at all. And she says she remembers a period when she was very young when my father was with his gun everywhere. He had these rifles, a car being and a twenty two he'd sent home and pieces from overseas and put him back together when he got home, and he used them to hunt and whatever

the hell. So, in addition to that turtle, she said, there was a day when he shot and injured an owl, and there were other instances too that she remembers not being happy, and because she loves animals, But the story goes, and I remember my father telling me this when I was a kid, I asked him why he didn't like to go hunting, and he told me this story about one day, while hunting in the country, he set his sights on a female deer, A young doe was kind

of close to him, certainly within shooting range, and he got into place and he, you know, he fired his rifle and down went this dough. Now I would imagine this is going to be brought back to eat. You know, people ate venison, and that would have been a great big meal and for many meals to go freeze the meat had said. But before my father could go and grab the dead deer, he spots this big buck who apparently was with this dough was kind of lagging behind.

And this great buck walks up to this dead dough and sniffs her, looks at my father, looks back at the dead deer, and he picks up his chin and looks at my father again, and this time he began to take several steps toward my father. I mean, had you know, big head and everything. It was not going to be a pleasant scene. And my father always told me after that incident, he felt such shame and disgusted with himself that he never hunted an animal again, let

alone go on a hunt. And for the rest of his life, he only shot that rifle on the fourth of July. We always celebrated his birthday on the fourth. He was born July fifth. We celebrated on the fourth, and on that night every year, he'd take me up to the deck, which was right off his the master bedroom, and he'd fire about five shots into the black night sky high above us, into the and over the Great

South Bay. I guess those bullets never landed into someone's boat or into someone's body while they were fishing at night. I don't know. I mean, we never read a story about a fisherman being shot dead in his boat, so I guess those bullets landed harmlessly into the water. But there was one particularly frightening day, and there's a picture to prove it. I can't find it. It was always in Rosalie's dining room. She might know where it is. I'll post it if I find it, because it's exactly

this story. There was this one day, very frightening day, when he had his car being with him. I think it was whatever it was the twenty two were it had a sight on it right, a scope, I should say, and he was an expert with that scope. Everybody knew that. But one day, I'm sure, with a belly full of my grandmother's homemade red wine, he ordered Rosalie to hold a small stick in her hand to the side of her body and above her head. I don't know what

she was ten eleven, I don't even know. He tells her to walk twenty thirty feet away and face him. And when my relatives saw what was about to happen, obviously my father was showing off that he could shoot the stick clean from his young daughter's fingers, they all began to beg him to stop. But my father had a bad way about him. But unfortunately I've inherited that sometimes nobody could tell him nothing. So Rosalie goes, walks thirty steps away, hauls up the stick. My father lowers

his chin to the barrel of the rifle. Imagine you're a mother and that's your daughter, closes his right eye and looks through the scope with his left, and then he asked, Rosalie Railroad, do you trust your father? Yes, daddy. Then he squeezed the trigger and the stick was blown from her hand. It's when Rosalie tells me those stories that I complainly see that. In the past, she's told me that the father she grew up with and the

one who raised me were two entirely different men. And I shudder to think that that's the truth, but I know it is. You always think your father is your father, whether it's nineteen forty five or nineteen eighty five. But no Men change, sometimes for the better, hopefully for the better. But there is more than one side to complicated men. Maybe some of you out there know them, but I

know how she felt. I would have walked out there with a stick in my hand too, but he would have been much older by that, and I think cooler heads would have prevailed. But back then, home from the war, you can't tell him nothing. I'm aj Benz. So that was your Daily on Filtered podcast from March twenty fifth, twenty twenty five. Let's do this again tomorrow.