As we enter the new year, I still remain a confused senior . . . I hope our readers enjoy this humorous dose of reality.

So now cocaine is legal in Oregon, but straws aren’t. That must be frustrating.

Still trying to get my head around the fact that ‘Take Out’ can mean food, dating, or murder.

Dear paranoid people who check behind their shower curtains for murderers. If you do find one, what’s your plan?

The older I get, the more I understand why roosters just scream to start their day.

Being popular on Facebook is like sitting at the ‘cool table’ in the cafeteria of a mental hospital.

You know you’re over 50 when you have ‘upstairs ibuprofen’ and ‘downstairs ibuprofen.’

How did doctors come to the conclusion that exercise prolongs life, when the rabbit is always jumping but only lives for around two years, and the turtle, that doesn’t exercise at all, lives over 200 years.

I too was once a male trapped in a female body . . . but then my mother gave birth.

If only vegetables smelled as good as bacon.

When I lost the fingers on my right hand in a freak accident, I asked the doctor if I would still be able to write with it. He said, “Probably, but I wouldn’t count on it.”

I woke up this morning determined to drink less, eat right, and exercise. But that was four hours ago when I was younger and full of hope.

Anyone who says their wedding was the best day of their life has clearly never had two candy bars fall down at once from a vending machine.

We live in a time where intelligent people are silenced so that stupid people won’t be offended.

The biggest joke on mankind is that computers have begun asking humans to prove they aren’t a robot.

When a kid says “Daddy, I want Mommy” that’s the kid version of “I’d like to speak to your supervisor.”

It’s weird being the same age as old people.

Just once, I want a username and password prompt to say CLOSE ENOUGH.

Last night the internet stopped working so I spent a few hours with my family. They seem like good people.

We celebrated last night with a couple of adult beverages . . . Metamucil and Ensure.

You know you are getting old when friends with benefits means having someone who can drive at night.

Weight loss goal: To be able to clip my toenails and breathe at the same time.

After watching how some people wore their masks, I understand why contraception fails.

Some of my friends exercise every day. Meanwhile, I am watching a show I don’t like because the remote fell on the floor.

For those of you that don’t want Alexa or Siri listening in on your conversation, they are making a male version . . . it doesn’t listen to anything.

I just got a present labeled, ‘From Mom and Dad’, and I know darn well Dad has no idea what’s inside.

Now that Covid has everyone washing their hands correctly — next week — Turn Signals.

Someone said, “Nothing rhymes with orange.” I said, “No, it doesn’t.”

The pessimist complains about the wind. The optimist expects it to change. The realist adjusts his sails.

There’s a fine line between a numerator and a denominator. Only a fraction of people will find this funny.

Reading gives us someplace to go when we have to stay where we are.

I have many hidden talents. I just wish I could remember where I hid them.

My idea of a Super Bowl is a toilet that cleans itself.

Apparently exercise helps you with decisionmaking. It’s true. I went for a run this morning and decided I’m never going again.

—CC—

The passing of one year into the beginning of another is marked around the world by New Year’s Eve customs ranging from high-spirited parties to solemn prayer and thought. The biggest and most famous New Year’s party takes place in New York City. Millions of people around the world watch the ginormous Waterford Crystal Ball drop over Times Square.

“Auld Lang Syne,” written by the Scottish poet Robert Burns, is the song most identified with the New Year’s celebrations. Almost all of us can sing “Auld Lang Syne,” but few of us really know what it means, which happens to be “old long since.” The song was first popularized in 1929 by Guy Lombardo and His Royal Canadians orchestra.

We make New Year’s resolutions, vowing to better ourselves in the coming year. But most of these resolutions go in one year and out the other and are forgotten shortly after they’re made. In fact, roughly 80 percent of all New Year’s resolution are broken by February.

I believe that taking a few moments to reflect on our shortcomings and optimistically plan to overcome them is better than making no attempt at all. And sometimes, when we are ready for a change, those resolutions do stick – some for a lifetime.

When they drop the ball in Times Square on New Year’s Eve, it’s a reminder of what I did all last year. So, for this year:

· I resolve not to drop the ball.

· I resolve to get better at pretending to know the words to “Auld Lang Syne.”

· I was going to quit all my bad habits, but I realized that nobody likes a quitter.

· I resolve to take all the Christmas lights down by Easter.

· I resolve to get in shape. Round is a shape.

· I resolve to get more exercise, so I’ve moved the refrigerator into the basement.

· I resolve to lose weight by inventing an anti-gravity machine. If that doesn’t work, I resolve to help all of my friends to gain 10 pounds so I look skinnier.

· I resolve to read more, so I’m going to put the captions up on my TV screen.

· I resolve to leave the toilet seat down, as long as my wife promises to leave the toilet seat up.

· I resolve to get better at multitasking, so I’m going to start texting while on the toilet.

· I resolve to stop making the same mistake twice. Instead, I’ll start making a different mistake each time.

· I resolve to stop messing up my online passwords, so I’ve changed all of them to “incorrect.” Now, every time I key in the wrong code, the computer reminds me that “Your password is incorrect.”

· I resolve to be more positive and less sarcastic. Yeah, sure.

· I resolve to conserve water by taking fewer showers and baths.

· I resolve to floss every day, and not just with wild abandon the day before my dental cleaning.

· I resolve to stop repeating myself again and again and again.

· I resolve to stop hanging out with people who ask me about my New Year’s resolutions.

· I resolve to acquire all leftover 2020, 2021, and 2022 calendars and burn them.

· I resolve to live forever. So far, so good. If I fail to keep this resolution, I died trying.

· I resolve to break all my New Year’s resolutions. That way I can succeed at something.

As your readerfriendly Attila the pun, my final Gnu year’s resolution is to tell ewe a gazelleon times how much I caribou ewe, deer. I’m a wildebeest of a punster, and you’re thinking, “Unicorniest fellow I’ve ever met!” but I’m not out to buffalo or a llama ewe, so alpaca bag and hightail it out of here in camelflage.

May all of your troubles last as long as the success of your New Year’s resolutions!

Richard Lederer

—CC—

And last of all….

SEIZE THE DAY I don’t understand Latin, but I have learned two words, carpe diem, which translates “Seize the Day.” That’s another way of saying, “Do it now before it’s too late.” That might involve some risks.

The president of a large company had “Do It Now” signs placed around the building, hoping to inspire employees in their work. Within a few weeks his secretary eloped, two workers joined the foreign legion, and ten employees asked for raises.

I don’t think that’s exactly what the Latin phrase intended. Rather it means to value and utilize time to its fullest. Not everybody does. Different people relate to time in many different ways. As Dennis Hensley points out, “Referees call time; prisoners serve time; musicians mark time; historians record time; loafers kill time; and statisticians keep time.”

Time is not to be saved but savored, especially in our later years. Someone has said that just when we learn to make the most of it, most of it is gone. And that should challenge us to cherish the rest of it all the more. We never know how much of it is left.

Luther Rice, who helped gather scattered Baptist churches and form them into a denomination to support missions, wrote in his personal journal the following entry in January 1836: “The Lord, in His mercy, has brought me to the beginning of another year. I think I have made some little progress . . . the past year, but far less than I ought. God grant that I may do better, should life be preserved through this year also. I think it right to plan, act, and labour, as if I might have thirty years for service yet before me . . . but also so to live, plan, act and labour, as though I might die soon, any day or hour.”

Nine months later, on September 25, 1836, Luther Rice died. It’s another reminder that the future is an unknown path. To face it we need to heed the words of King George VI’s Christmas message in 1939 to the British Empire: “I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year, ‘Give me a light, that I may tread safely into the unknown,’ and he replied, ‘Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the hand of God. That shall be to you better than light and safer than a known way.’” We don’t know what our futures hold, but we know Who holds our futures. So, seize the day.