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Burton Cole

Summer Games need to add thrifting

“I’m going for the gold,” she said. “That’s nice.” I nodded. “Or maybe the silver. Do you think I should pick the red instead?” “I don’t care. Get one purple, and one orange. Whatever. Just pick something. Shoe shopping isn’t an Olympic event.” She tsk-tsked me. “If it was, we’d have to buy that display case on the other side of the thrift store for all my medals.” Basketball is a competitive sport. The marathon is a competitive sport. Dancing with swirly ribbons on a floor mat is… I’m not sure about that one. But I know that shopping is NOT a ...

Enjoying the great outdoors 1 drive-thru at a time

You wouldn’t know it, but I grew up among outdoorsmen. Most of my neighbors were sportsmen. At this very minute, a great deal of my uncles and cousins probably are tromping through some marshy timberland or are splashing about some lake or stream in an overly optimistic quest to slap something on the supper table. Besides Cap’n Crunch. Through some apparent mutation of my genes, I lost my way to the great outdoors. As a boy, I could hunt black bear in the woods behind our family farm any time I wished. “But Burton, no bears live around here,” one of my he-man cousins ...

Look! Up in the easy chair! It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s Super Burt!

It began when I was 4 years old. I found a baby blanket with the satin binding ripped loose on one end. I slipped my head through the loop that it formed, and that’s when it happened — I was Underdog! Underdog’s cape was solid blue, while mine was white with pink and blue bunnies on it, but it didn’t matter. I had a cape, so I was a superhero. Simon Bar Sinister, you had a need to fear because Underdog — and his bunny cape — was here! I pedaled my tricycle around the driveway as fast as my legs could pump, hoping the cape would flap in the wind, because — I was ...

U ken spail that jest like it sowndz

Hey, U! Scram! That, apparently, is the first thing the Colonists said after defeating the British. Oh, sure, the history books claim it was to end taxation without representation, but what really happened is that the newly minted Americans snatched the letter U out of a whole bunch of ...

Science verifies men’s selective sniffers

“I don’t smell,” I confessed to a friend. “Don’t jump to conclusions,” he said, holding his nose. “No, not that,” I said. “I might stink, but my nose doesn’t pick up scents very well. At least that’s what I’ve been told.” “Let me guess,” my buddy said. “Your wife told you that your sniffer was out of order.” I nodded. “Yep,” he said. “My wife’s olfactory nerves are honed to perfection, while mine are not quite up to sniff. I mean, snuff. That’s why I declare myself the winner.” “How so?” “Unless I’m right on top of it ...

Dinosaur tries to decipher the code of QRs

I’m on an unintended diet. I can’t order a thing until I figure out QR codes, cash apps and all the other modern conveniences that get in the way of getting things done. Yes, I’m a dinosaur from another era. I think I know why those first dinosaurs went extinct — some critter came up with a technologically advanced way to order prey, and the old guys, not able to figure it out, starved to death. I’m in danger of becoming an old fossil myself. I remember my first run-in with this code beast. It was a few years ago, and I’d been sent to a hip and happening bistro in a ...