My great grandmother was very clear on one very important point. Well, she’s not my great grandmother. She’s my grandmother who is great. Just ask her and she’ll tell you for hours just how great she is. She’s a maternity nurse, which to hear her tell it is about two steps tougher than a marine corps sergeant, but not quite as brutal as a middle school nun.  She can also complete a New York Times Crossword in about fifteen minutes, which is cooler than the whole nurse thing. Crosswords and I just don’t get along.

All this being beside the point, she was very clear on one very important point. You know, now that we are talking about her it’s funny. She was never a doctor nor midwife, but she was said to have delivered more babies than anyone else in her hospital. She delivered one little girl on the interstate with rush hour traffic whizzing by, and a pair of twins at their mother’s home. Now is that a great grandmother or what. A funny thing she told me once was is my brain is so confused that I could never stay on a single topic.

Another thing about her is, she was very clear on one very important point. You know I remember hearing about this somewhere. Maybe I shouldn’t say anything for fear of repeating myself. Oh well, what the heck, my grandmother’s advice is worth repeating. You see she always drank tea because she thought coffee was bad for you. She believed it would stunt your growth. Boy, was she ever wrong.

My wife and I are coffee drinkers. When our oldest son hit the ripe old age of twelve, he asked to taste our coffee. There was no going back. He began drinking it every day. We thought nothing of it and frankly if it had stunted his growth, I would have been a much happier man. Unfortunately, it did not. My son has just hit six-foot-five, That’s a full two meters for my non-American friends like the politicians in Washington. My second son who’s two years younger, is pushing six feet or one point eight meters, and he’s never touched coffee. The problem is, I am stunted by both of them.

How am I supposed to maintain my dungeon-like discipline when I have to stand on a stool just to avoid looking at their chests. It’s true. I carry around a little red stool with me all around the house. I stand on it when I talk to my sons, and my daughter stands on it when she talks to me. I think my wife must have run out of DNA after the boys, so my princess got the short end of the tallness factor. Literally!

Then again, my daughter has started drinking coffee. If she grows as tall as the boys, I’m leaving the country. I hear that teens, all over the world, are drinking coffee, and as their growth is not being stunted, in fact the reverse is true. This is going to be a problem. Large teens scare me. I’ve seen what just three of them can do, and it’s frightening. Of course, it won’t happen until noon when teens decide to get out of bed, so mornings might be okay. But this has nothing to do with my point so if you’re taking notes you can scratch those out. Back to my grandmother.

As she is a grandmother, she has been around for more than a few years, quite a lot really, but don’t tell her I said this, she’ll hurt me. Anyway, because of her years she has become very opinionated. One opinion I love is her loathing of cheeseburgers. I’m not sure what a cheeseburger ever did to her. She was adult before I was born, so I never knew her as a child, but it must have been traumatizing.

If you ever have occasion to invite my grandmother to a barbecue, tread lightly. If you shout out if anyone wants cheese on their burgers you are in for a lecture. If you spread the word around quietly you might be safe. Trust me on this I’ve heard the sermon; Three and a half hours of pulpit thumping that a Baptist preacher would be awed by.

Apparently, once the cow has been separated from the milk by whatever yucky means it happens. With all due respect to John Denver, “Thank God I’m not a country boy!” Anyway, to my nana, beef is beef and milk is milk and never the twain shall meet. End of statement. “Would you put a thick slice of Colby-Jack on a beautiful steak?”, she’ll ask, then continue with, “Then why would you slap one on after you grind that steak up?” You have to admit the woman is very straight forward, nuts, but very direct about it.

The thing is I like cheeseburgers and coffee never stunted anyone’s growth. That’s O for two. She also yelled at my daughter saying, “Shoulders back, boobs out!” Hang on a sec granny! This is my daughter we’re talking about. I don’t want to even know she has boobs let alone have her push ‘em out. No thanks grandma. Then with my princess’s boobs jutted forward, nana advises her not to think about boys till she’s twenty-five. Well, if my angel keeps standing like that, boys will certainly be thinking about her

Another thing she says is, “Eat a biscuit and everything will be all right”. And just where am I supposed to get these highly medical biscuits? She told me to stop whining and make them. I kid you not. So, there I was, terribly upset because I lost my job, in the kitchen making a horrible mess, that I would have to clean up later, waiting for biscuits to come out of the oven. No, they didn’t help.

The old lady has been proven to be wrong, wrong, wrong, and wrong. More intelligent folks than myself have asked why I continue to associate with her. I could call her every couple of months and let it go. No, I can’t, and it’s all because of the vegetable soup. It’s the grandma secret weapon. They all have that one thing they make that no one else can. It forces you to keep coming back. I keep wondering if drugs might be involved.

Think about it this way. Your grandmother has a cookie recipe that she makes every Halloween. Your mother makes the same cookies, but they’re never quite the same, i.e., quite as addictive. Perhaps bingo night has a little more to take home than the hundred-dollar grand prize. I’ve seen the folks walking around selling instant tickets, maybe there selling magic dust as well. A bit of dust in the cookies, or soup, or whatever, and grandma becomes the best cook in the world and everyone wants to visit and sup with her.

I’ve sent a letter to the DEA, and called them as well. They assure me they’re looking into the problem. But are they?

They’ve all got grandmas who make cookies too, ya know. I’m just saying.