Resting in Pieces

Don't worry, I feel fine. Today though, I have been thinking about what will happen after I shed this mortal coil. What will happen to me when I pass away?

I am not thinking about the whereabouts of my soul in the afterlife. My mind is on much more practical matters: What will my loved ones do with my remains? Since I don't wish to take up valuable real estate in some cemetery, I would prefer to be cremated. This presents some problems for my survivors. They either have to find a fitting place to scatter the ashes the funeral home has told them are mine, or find a stylish urn to place them in.

Ideally, I would love to have my ashes scattered across Disneyland. Apparently, though, this is against Disney company policy. That's a shame. For any child vacationing in the Magic Kingdom, my ash-scattering ceremony would be something they would never forget, try though they may.

Since I can't be strewn about where I wish to be, I guess my family will have to plunk me in an urn. I was worried, until recently, that finding a suitable vessel would be a challenge. Was there an urn out there that would honor the good taste and dignity that have been the hallmark of my life?

I needn't have worried. I will have the dignified, tasteful resting place I deserve, thanks to this company.

Please don't let all this morbid musing bring you down, though. Really! I feel fine!

Happiest of Happys!

There is a danger of this blog becoming the Bill-Rambles-On-About-His-Perfect-Wife Blog. I know I do it a lot, and I hope that those of you out there who are living a bitter, loveless existence will not think I am rubbing your nose in my good fortune. No, as I have mentioned before, I cite my relationship with PW to give hope to all that there is someone out there for everyone.

Also, today I have a really good excuse for dragging PW into the spotlight: It's her Birthday! In honor of this most special of days, instead of one of my usual scribbles, I am illustrating today's post with an actual photo of my amore (she's on the left). This picture was taken on a trip  we took to Disneyland. I chose this image because I wasn't sure PW would want her face plastered across the interweb, and this image seemed innocuous enough, while still showing off her general babealiciousness.

This photo also reveals my skill as a photographer, as well as my right index finger, which appears in many of  the pictures I take.

So Happy Birthday Perfect Wife! Thanks also to your Folks, The Perfect In-Laws, for making you possible!

The Bus to Disneyland

As a lad of  about age 3 or 4, the highlight of my week was watching "Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color". Each Sunday night at seven, my sisters and I would get in our jammies and gather in front of our TV set. Mom & Dad would make sure we had plenty of refreshments (Usually a glass of TANG® and some bacon and mayonnaise sandwiches on white bread. This repast fortified us for the hour ahead, and I still carry on the healthy eating habits my parents established for us back then to this day.), and we'd sit back and enjoy the program.

Oh how I loved this show! I loved seeing Uncle Walt in his office, telling us what wonderful piece of entertainment we were about to watch. Was it going to be a Ludvig Von Drake cartoon? "Sammy the Way-Out Seal"?

Or were we going to have to sit through another "True Life Adventure"? I really didn't care for the TLA's, but I would gladly suffer through them, because maybe, next week, the show would feature one of my favorite segments, A VISIT TO DISNEYLAND!

I lived for these episodes! Disneyland looked to me like the most fantastic place on earth. I especially loved seeing the costumed characters walking around. As impressionable as I was, though, I never believed that that was Mickey. I knew it was a guy in a suit, but I thought that was the coolest  job in the world! THAT'S what I wanted to be when I grew up! I would actually spend hours drawing pictures of people dressed as the Disney characters. When an adult would say, "Oooh, Billy! What a good Goofy you drew!", I would have to patiently point out that I hadn't drawn Goofy, I had drawn a guy in a Goofy suit! Sheesh!

Disneyland was an obsession to me, so naturally I had to go there, but how? My parents wouldn't take me, citing the old, "it's too expensive" excuse. They would also remind me we had already visited Storybook Land, and wasn't that pretty much the same? No. It was not. It was Disneyland or nothing, but it seemed like a trip there was out of the question. Or was it?

One Summer day my older Sister ran excitedly into  the room. "Billy!", she cried, "Pack your suitcase! The Bus to Disneyland is coming!" There was a bus to Disneyland?! How come I hadn't heard of this? Why hadn't my parents? My sister was seven, though, so she must have known more than I, so I quickly ran and packed whatever I could find into my little Samsonite®. 

"Where is the bus stop?", I asked. "It's stopping right outside our front steps", Sis replied, "Hurry! Go out and sit on the front steps, or you'll miss it!" Out I went, and sat, my little heart racing. I was finally going to Disneyland! I sat there on the steps anticipating how wonderful this was going to be. Maybe they were even hiring four year olds to play Mickey Mouse! Once I was established there, maybe I would even send for my parents, to show them there were no hard feelings about not taking me before. So I sat. And sat. And sat.

The Bus to Disneyland never came.

The whole Bus to Disneyland thing was just my sister "joking me". There was no bus. She was bored, and nothing chases away  the boredom like getting your naive little brother to make a fool of himself, by sitting with a suitcase in the hot Sun waiting for an imaginary bus.

Eventually, my Mother discovered my Sister's prank, and came out to get me. She patiently explained that buses generally don't make 3,000 mile door-to-door trips, and besides, what was I going to pay for the trip with? I told her I had almost 48¢, which I was sure than more than enough. Deep down though, I realized that I had been had by my Sister. Again. I wasn't going to Disneyland anytime soon.

I was right. I didn't get to Disneyland for another 21 years. Ironically, it was my Sister who took me (Sis, if you are reading this, I forgive you!). Disneyland was well worth the wait. It was everything little 4 year old me could have wanted and more.

They didn't hire me to play Mickey Mouse, though.

A Word From Our Sponsor

The writing staff here at bwhitecartoons.blogspot.com  (me) is dedicated to bringing you the highest quality laff-fest you can find on the web. Sure, there are plenty of blogs out there bringing you the details of every aspect of the author's tedious everyday existence, but only this blogspot can bring you you the details of MY tedious everyday existence!

Such jocularity doesn't come cheap, however, so I have turned to Google AdSense to help support this blog. For those of you not familiar with it, GAS lets blog authors post ads on their sites, based on the topics they write about on their blog. If a reader of the blog sees an ad that interests them, and clicks on the ad and orders said product, Google will send a few pennies to the author of the blog. Sounds pretty good, right?

Wrong!

First of all, I don't know what system the Google folks use to decide what ads will be appropriate to list on my site. It seems their computers zoom in on random phrases, and then plunk an ad on your site. Some examples:

• I have written extensively about my loathing of clowns, so why do I have a bunch of ads for clown related services?

• I have also expressed my love of squirrels in various posts. Why are there a bunch of ads for squirrel extermination services? I love squirrels! Don't respond to these ads!

• I have mentioned Walt Disney and Mickey Mouse now and again, and the products showing up here all look pretty nice to me, so there's  one point for GAS.

Then there are the ads that have NOTHING to do with my posts, like "BLACK DATING IN YOUR AREA", and "SHE HAD YELLOW TEETH". How did those pop up on my site?! I am all in favor of black dating (or anybody dating for that matter), and am not a fan of yellow teeth, but why did Google think these were product/services my readers would connect with?

I really don't know, but if you are a lonely black person with yellow teeth and a squirrel infestation problem who needs to hire a clown- This is the site for you!

Clownin' Around

As I may have mentioned before, as a lad, I was terrified of clowns (truth be told, to this day I am not really too comfortable around them). Unlike many irrational fears, however, I know the exact source of my phobia. 

When I was about 2 years old, my Mother took us to Woolworth's. I was still in a stroller. There was  some sort of family promotion going on, so there was all sorts of cheesy entertainment like jugglers, fortune tellers, monkeys and of course, clowns. I had never seen a clown before, so when this huge, white faced creature with  a red nose and yellow teeth approached my pram, giggling and twisting balloon animals, I was  terrified. I began shrieking and crying, and the clown, as they always do, tried to make things better by getting in my face to show me how "nice" he was. 

This of course, made things much worse, and we left Woolworth's posthaste. It was too late though, the damage had been done, and every future encounter with clowns resulted in an awkward public spectacle for my entire family.

Naturally, my older sister, age 7,  with her "puckish"  sense of humor, found my aversion to clowns amusing, and she soon found a way to heighten her enjoyment of my phobia. One day, she came bursting into my room and announced, "Billy! Hide! The Mean Clown is coming!" I did not hesitate to question her. All I needed to hear were the words, "Mean", "Clown" and "Coming". I was immediately in panic mode! I had to hide, but where?! "Under the covers!", my sister suggested, and it seemed as good a place as any, so I dove under the sheets, my heart racing.

Under the darkness of the covers I heard a voice growl, "WHERE"S BILLY?!" "He's not here, Mean Clown", my sister responded. "I bet he's under these covers!", I heard the Mean Clown say, and I began to feel a finger poking the covers of my bed.

If it were possible for a 3 year old could have a coronary, I certainly would have at this point.

Eventually, my sister persuaded the Mean Clown that I wasn't there, and he left. I was eternally grateful to my sister for saving me from the Mean Clown.

Of course, my sister actually WAS the Mean Clown, and if  you think I must have been a pretty naive kid to think a seven year old girl was a Mean Clown, you would be correct.

The Mean Clown popped up a few times more, before my sister tired of the game, and came up with a new way to amuse herself, by telling me the "Bus to Disneyland" was coming, and I should pack a bag and go wait for it on the front steps.

But that's a story for another  day.