Raining Elephants

At some work-related seminar in my not-so-recent past, the teacher used the phrase “raining elephants” to describe obstacles that prevent you from reaching your goals.

I seem to be thinking a lot about that lately.

For example, as I consider retirement and the income I’ll need then to ward off starvation, Michigan’s governor Rick Snyder has decided to tax my meager 401K. That became the law this past week. Like I said, aining elephants.

Ironically, to make it easier for those baby boomers already close to retirement, the law only affects those born 1953 and after. My birth year? 1953. Uh, raining elephants, like I said.

Well then, maybe I could be more entrepreneurial and come up with some cash to make up for what the governor took away. My ‘found on the ground’ has been lagging lately, because all the real rain we’ve been getting prevents me from bicycling to my usual spots (might as well call it raining elephants too), so Wendy and I dug through our excess household baggage and joined my sister-in-law in a garage sale this past Saturday.

Our take? One quarter for a pair of safety glasses. Didn’t help that it again was raining (elephants?) much of the day. Since I had to make a couple trips with our Grand “gas-slurping” Caravan, I figure we’re about $40 in the hole.

But Wendy and I could take some solace in the fact that we got to bring our grandson Grant home, as well as his Boston Terrier brother Simon, to entertain while his parents enjoyed a night out for their anniversary.

That didn’t go so well either. He gradually grew fussy as the night wore on so we decided to feed him a bottle. Elephant showers anyone? Whether we fed him too quickly, not enough, or something else, Grant was the antithesis of a happy baby afterwards. Cried and cried, very loudly. Could not be consoled.

For better than an hour we tried rocking him, singing to him, even giving him a bath. He just wailed and wailed. While we dressed him for bed, I took a look over at Simon who was unusually placid lying there in a chair, his head resting between his front paws. I thought he would be antsy and nervous seeing his brother in such distress, but he just looked at me with this “welcome to my world, folks” expression.

Eventually, after another bottle and more rocking, Grant finally settled down and went to sleep in grandma Wendy’s arms. But even as he nodded off, his shoulders shook as he choked up occasionally, leftovers from his marathon cryathon. Made Wendy feel terrible.

You have to believe that the skies are going to clear up some time. Not tonight though. I've been up and down our stairs here a dozen times re-booting my modem since I keep losing my internet connection. I see it's happened again. Right now I think if I encountered an elephant in our front room here, I'd give it a good whuppin'.