All About the Benjamins

We don’t live far from our local Sam’s Club.

You know Sam’s Club.

The younger shorter stepbrother of Costco.

Not so fast.

Believe it or not, Sam’s is actually older than Costco.

By five months.

And Sam’s is actually bigger.

With more warehouses...    more warehomes?...

... more locations than its better known rival.

Well either way, we love them both.

And we are just a hop, skip and a couple of freeway exits away from either place.

And that’s not necessarily good news.

Since nearly every time we go there, our bill is all about the Benjamins.

Benjamin Franklin.

The face on the $100 bill.

But membership does have some privileges.

Today we entered Sam’s Club as a hungry family of five.

We left VERY full.

After a well-balanced 13-course sample platter.

There were chicken wings.

And chicken salad.

And chicken sausage.

And polish sausage.

And pastrami wrap.

And pesto hummus.

And fresh fruit.

And chocolate chip cookies.

And chocolate chocolate chip cookies.

And Snapple tea.

And carrot juice.

And guava nectar.

Whatever nectar is.

Oh and the Yoplait yogurt.

Mixed with Cheerios.

And granola.

They also had one-a-day vitamins for us to sample.

But we passed.

Figured we got all the supplements we needed with the other stuff.

Now before you think we were acting like Minnie the Moochers.

Think again.

We didn’t quite reach Benjamin Franklin status.

This time.

But we did give up a few Andrew Jacksons.

He’s the face on the $20 bill.

Did you know that?

Can you tell me who is on the dime?

The quarter?

The Susan B. Anthony Dollar?

You better get that one.

Somehow we started talking about who’s on what on our ride home.

The quick ride home.

It started with the $20.

For years I thought Peter Gammons was the face on the twenty.

Turns out I was wrong.

It’s really Andrew Jackson.

My wife knew that one.

My real guess was Alexander Hamilton.

That would make me 0-for-2.

Then we jumped to the hundy.

From my many trips to Vegas, I was sure of this one.

Big Ben.

Someone in the car blurted out....

“He wasn’t a President!”

Correct.

That revelation spun the conversation in another direction.

Who was the 13th President of the United States?

Do you know that one?

Hmmm....

Me neither.

I knew George was 1.

And Abe was 16.

And Obama is 44.

But 13?

That would take a lucky guess.

Or an iPhone.

Fortunately I had the latter.

So I searched.

And found the answer.

The car asked for the first initial in his last name.

F.

Then the first initial in his first name.

M.

My 12-year old son thought it was hysterical that his initials were M.F.

But he still didn’t have a guess.

They asked for the first name.

Now I thought that would give it away.

But I said it anyway.

Millard.

Pause.

Crickets.

Not a guess.

Which surprised me.

Considering there was an incoming high school freshman in the car.

And a 17-year elementary school teacher.

Now I’m not being critical.

I’m just sayin.

But after I announced that Millard Fillmore was the correct answer.

We moved on to President #19.

Do you know that one?

Me neither.

My wife knew that Andrew Jackson followed Abe.

But nobody knew Ulysses S. Grant was followed by Rutherford Hayes, the 19th President of the United States.

To her credit, my 14-year old daughter knew the answer 1.6 seconds after I said his first name was Rutherford.

The final Presidential challenge of the trip was #31.

To me #31 was an easy one.

Greg Maddux.

But Greg was never elected President.

Although he could’ve been the Mayor of Chicago.

The car figured out the 31st President came early in the 20th Century.

Correct.

1929.

The guesses were plenty.

And they were all good.

F.D.R.

Coolidge.

Wilson.

And that was before I announced that the first initial of his first name.

And first initial of his last name.

Were the same.

And since Woodrow W. and Calvin C. were not the correct answer.

The right answer came seconds later.

From the back of the car.

Herbert Hoover.

The 31st President of the United States.

Good answer.

Good stuff.

The type of quality family stuff you just can’t buy.

Not even at Sam’s Club.

Striking Gold

Last Friday I spent the most I've ever spent at Costco.

And that's saying something.

We use Costco for everything.

Apples to EZ chairs.

And everything in the middle.

About a month ago I walked into the megastore to get a photo printed.

$3.20 later, I had that picture.

That’s only the beginning of this story.

While I was in the photo department I noticed a sign.

It had a picture of one of those old 8-mm tin cans.

And it said that they can transfer the films from those cans to DVD.

For $17.95.

Per can.

My eyes opened up.

Almost nine years ago I inherited a bunch of those cans.

I know it’s almost nine years because that’s when my dad died.

And shortly thereafter, his wife and I went over to his storage unit.

To make us cry even more.

Well crying wasn’t the plan, just the result.

But while we were there we went through a bunch of his “junk”.

Junk that I still treasure.

Pictures.

Books.

Magazines.

And some old family films.

42 of them.

Unedited.

Of course.

And for the next almost nine years they sat in my garage.

In a storage bin.

Waiting to be transfered over to a format that I could actually watch.

Enter Costco.

The store that has everything.

Well just last week I got a call from a lady there that the DVDs were ready to be picked up.

One credit card swipe later, those DVDs were mine.

I spent this past weekend watching those DVDs.

All of them.

And what I saw absolutely blew me away.

It all started with me.

Doesn’t it always.

Tons of footage of me as a baby.

At my first birthday party.

Running around in diapers.

Running around without diapers.

When I should have had diapers on.

My fourth birthday party.

A talent show in elementary school.

Family vacations.

To Mexico.

And Hawaii.

And Lion Country Safari.

My mom and my dad.

Smiling.

Together.

My brother.

As a teenager.

My cousin Lary.

Looking exactly like his son Ryan.

And that’s just the beginning.

In all there was more than eight hours of footage.

HOURS! of footage.

My seven-year old daughter and I spent several hours on Saturday night watching this footage.

And it was pretty amazing how much she looks just like me.

Poor kid.

There was no audio on any of the footage.

Which really cut down on the production value.

And really confused her.

So I opened up iTunes.

Clicked on The Beatles.

And hit play.

It was incredible how well EVERY Beatles song mixed together with grainy film footage from 40+ years ago.

“In My Life”.

“Revolution”.

“All My Loving”.

Even “Julia” sounded like it was meant to be there.

And I don’t even know anyone named Julia.

There’s probably not a whole lot of monetary value for all this footage.

(Until Sir Bacon hits it big of course.)

But to me it’s worth a buzillion bucks.

Which is far less than what I paid at Costco.

But the more I watched the video, the more I noticed some amazing things that didn’t include me.

(If you can believe that.)

How about home video of Mickey Mantle.

And Roberto Clemente.

When they were alive.

And playing.

The 1960 Kentucky Derby.

Nixon’s Inauguration.

Unfortunately that one was WAY out of focus.

Game footage from Super Bowl II.

And V.

And VII.

My parents taking a helicopter tour of New York City.

And seeing shots of the World Trade Center.

Being built.

That had to be in the early 70’s.

Every now and again I stumble across an old picture and I feel like I won the lottery.

This.

This is like winning the SuperMegaPowerUltra Lottery.

My dad left me nine years ago.

And he left me with more memories that I can count.

And I can count real high.

But to see this footage.

After all these years.

It made me cry.

Crying wasn’t the plan.

Just the result.

Fable Of My Deconstruction

“If I could lift my leg right now, I’d kick your....”

Well you can guess the rest.

Those were my exact words for my personal trainer after yesterday’s 45-minute session of muscular masochistic misery.

Now before you think I’m hangin with the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.

There is no MY personal trainer.

But what I do have is three free sessions with A personal trainer.

That came with my month-to-month membership at a local gym.

A membership that costs me $50/month.

And is worth every penny.

Especially when you get free stuff.

And the philosophy of this club is to give a free sample of extra attention.

So that I get addicted.

And then I will start paying to feed that addiction.

Hey, why not.

It works for drug dealers.

And it works for Costco. 

Of course, if they charged me even one of those pennies for a personal trainer, I probably would’ve passed.

But it was free.

And who can turn down free?

Not me.

So as part of this new personal training mission, they had me take a series of tests to determine my physical well being.

And to make sure I didn’t expire during an ab crunch.

The tests were quick.

And simple.

A little treadmill.

Pull on this weight.

Reach as far as you can.

Tada.

The results are in.

And congratulations Sir.

You have the body of a 44-year old.

Not bad.

I suppose.

Considering I am 43.

And will be 44 in a few months.

But honestly, I would’ve hoped for a little better.

I don’t feel a day over 41.

But wait, there’s more.

At no extra charge, you get a five-page analysis of the test results.

And with that analysis, comes a dangling carrot on the last page.

IF I can improve my “sit and reach flexibility” by 2.5 inches, I would improve my body age by two years.

And IF I  my can improve my body composition by 8%, I would improve my body age by five more years.

And IF I can improve my bicep strength by 14 pounds, I would improve my body age by two more years.

And IF I can improve my cardiovascular VO2 score from 39.7 ml/kg-min to 47 ml/kg-min.

Whatever that means.

I would improve my body age by three more years.

Ok.

44, minus two minus five minus two minus three.

Whoa.

So if I buy a couple of months of personal training sessions... 

...my body age will be like negative 16.

By April?

Where do I sign?

Well I signed on the computer that’s where I signed.

For the first of three free sessions.

What do I have to lose?

Except a couple of pounds.

And what’s left of my dignity.

My personal trainer showed up at noon, right on time.

He had less body fat than one of those Old Navy mannequins.

And he took me to a part of the gym that I’ve never seen before.

I knew immediately I was in trouble.

About 12 seconds in, I was sweating more than Mel Gibson at a Passover Seder.

This guy had me doing lunges.

And leg lifts.

Push ups.

And squats.

Plus he introduced me to a bunch of new places.

The Roman Chair.

The Russian Kettlebell.

The Bosu Balance Trainer.

By this point, I was praying this torture would take an immediate detour.

To The Dairy Queen.

But every step of the way, this guy was giving me all of the  encouragement any out of shape 43-year old could hope for.

“Come on you fat f***,  just 73 more.”

Ok, that may not be an exact quote. 

But when you are literally one exhale away from passing out, “just two more” sounds like 73.

He must’ve asked me 40 times if I needed water.

And I must’ve answered 40 times.

"Huh?   What?"

Finally after 45-minutes, which felt like 45 days, this mercifully came to an end.

I used what little strength I had left to shake the man’s hand.

A man who had just tried to kill me.

But he wasn't done there.

It was then he reminded me of the two sessions I had left.

The two FREE sessions I had left.

Free?

Who could pass up a deal like that?

Not me.

Round 2 is on Monday.