If Kenny Rogers Wasn’t My Uncle
August 31st, 2005
I once wanted Kenny Rogers to be my uncle.
That was before I sat down and really thought about all the things that might happen because of it. In fact, after mapping each of the moments out on a piece of old D&D graph paper, I came to the conclusion that having Kenny Rogers as my uncle would not only be a bad idea…it just might turn out to be fatal.
So, for argument sake purposes, let’s just assume for one minute that Kenny Rogers IS my Uncle.
He comes over one Thanksgiving to my family’s house and right off the bat the guy shows up with chicken from his Kenny Rogers’ Roasters place. You know, like KFC. Well first of all, Uncle Kenny — it’s Thanksgiving. You eat turkey for thanksgiving. But no. Kenny says, “You got to know when eat it, know when to feed it, know when to make a meal…that’s what I feel…”
Well, my mother looks at Kenny and so does my dad and they give him this look like, “get that damn family carton of Kenny Rogers’ Roasters chicken out of this house before we kick you out ourselves” because let’s face it — my parents worked long and hard to host Thanksgiving and if Mr. Uncle Chicken is going to undermine that by bringing his own chicken (as if to say, “I don’t want to eat what you’re making”) then he might as well be forced to leave.
Which my parents make him do.
But the thing is — Uncle Kenny doesn’t have a car. Never has since ‘78. He has town cars drive him all over the place and the town car isn’t coming back until the end of the night. So there I am standing on the front step with Uncle Kenny and he asks if I can give him a ride back to his hotel. Ugh. I try to make up some kind of an excuse and he starts telling me, “You never count your family, while you’re standing on front stoop, there’ll be time enough to love ‘em, when the driving’s done.”
I ask him what the hell that means, but he shrugs. The guy wants a ride. From me. Or else the family guilt will forever follow me until the end of time.
So I get my car and the first thing he says when he gets inside is how small the car feels, which I ignore, and I start driving him back to his hotel. Well, along the way back we’re stopped at a traffic light and Uncle Kenny does what he always does. He challenges a truck next to us to a race. You know, he reaches over and HONKS my horn to get their attention and then points to them, points to himself, and points down the road.
Bad idea.
About thirty minutes later, when the police are still writing us up for the ticket, Uncle Kenny gets out of the car even when the cops tell him not to get out of the car and he says to them, “You never write your ticket, when the perps are sittin’ in the ‘mobile, there’ll be time enough to write ‘em, when day is done.”
Of course, the cops think he’s strung out on heroin or something and then arrest him and me and we end up in jail without our one call because we don’t get that one call until 9AM the next day for some reason, although I suspect it has something to do with the fact that Uncle Kenny tries to bribe the overnight officer with free chicken and buttermilk biscuits.
Some time passes as the two of us sit in that jail cell and I eventually fall asleep, ON THANKSGIVING, IN JAIL, no thanks to Uncle Kenny. I wake up to the sound of a horse whinnying — there is a HORSE standing outside the jail cell window. And Uncle Kenny is securing a thick rope to the bars, of which the other end is connected to the horse. Old school Uncle Kenny does his little whistle and the horse goes running — pulling the bars out of the window and giving us an escape.
But I’m not going anywhere. I tell Uncle Kenny that I’m not going to BREAK OUT OF JAIL on THANKSGIVING with him. He looks at me with that pouty look he gives when he either wants more food or wants you to do something for him and says, “You got to know when to go, know when to go-oh, know when to go oh oh, know when to go!”.
And he bolts, dragging me behind.
Somewhere between the sirens and the floodlights and the helicopters there’s a bunch of rifle shots and I feel a sharp pain in my chest as I collapse in the wet muddy marsh — with Uncle Kenny by my side. It is an unfortunate situation, all thanks to having Kenny Rogers for an Uncle.
Well, at least that’s how it all broke out on the graph paper. It might have played out a little bit differently in the real world, but…well… You know.
No siree. I don’t want Kenny Rogers as my uncle.
Yeah, you know Kenny is my uncle, and he’s constantly just “dropping in to see what condition his condition is in.” Ugh!
Comment by Fun Joel — August 31, 2005 @ 8:29 am
Hmm. Maybe he’ll meet someone in jail, and when they’re released, he’ll tell her: Sail away with me, to another world. And they can rely on each other, and all that crap.
Comment by Hilary — August 31, 2005 @ 9:46 am
my friend thinks Kenny Rogers is hot. i find this gross. i’m going to share this with her so that she may see how one bad decision after a night of drinking with her old-man crush will, well, kill her. thanks, paul.
Comment by kristine — August 31, 2005 @ 9:58 am
The more I read this, the more I believe the song The Coward of the County was written about *you*, Pauly!
Comment by Meg — August 31, 2005 @ 11:27 am
you are hilarious. seriously. this is good stuff.
side note: downstairs from my office is a barber shop. they cut hair for $6.69 a ‘do. why $6.69? i don’t really know. it is irrelevant. pay attention. there is a fella, a barber, who i think owns the shop. he is the spitting image of Kenny. i think he is his brother!
ok. i can’t prove they are related but i can take a picture to show you if you don’t believe me.
if that guy was your uncle, at least you could get free haircuts.
Comment by ms. sizzle — August 31, 2005 @ 11:47 am
“So, for argument sake purposes, let’s just assume for one minute that Dolly Parton IS my Aunt…”
Comment by purpletwinkie — August 31, 2005 @ 12:38 pm
Okay, seriously Ms. Sizzle — if Kenny Rogers was giving out free haircuts instead of free chicken, I’d let him be my Uncle.
Comment by Pauly D — August 31, 2005 @ 1:05 pm
I think Aunt Lucille had the right idea, when she picked a fine time to leave that loser. I hope she got the 4 hungry children, and at least half of the crop in the field.
Comment by Eve — August 31, 2005 @ 1:28 pm
“You gotta know when to disown ‘em … “
Comment by nic — August 31, 2005 @ 2:29 pm
Funny post, Paul.
Comment by Amy — August 31, 2005 @ 5:53 pm
is there anyone named Lucille in your family?
Comment by The Moviequill — September 1, 2005 @ 7:00 am
What do you get when you add 8 children + 2 adults + 10 hours on the road + 1 station wagon?
= many hours of listening to Kenny Rogers on the 8 track, my friend.
Fortunately we had some Karen Carpenter and John Denver thrown in the mix, too.
Good times.
Oh, and thanks. I now have “Lucille” stuck in my head.
This time the hurtin won’t heal..
Comment by JanO — September 1, 2005 @ 8:00 am
” … with four hundred children and a crop in the field … “
Comment by nic — September 1, 2005 @ 10:01 am
Wow, Duuuude, that’s like, cosmic or something … you and me had the same bad acid trip. Did you wake up wearing a banner advertising a coffee and donut special at Speedway too? Whoa….
Comment by Alejo — September 1, 2005 @ 10:05 am
My banner didn’t advertise coffee and donuts, it advertised those creams you use instead of getting botox.
Apples and oranges, I know.
Comment by Pauly D — September 1, 2005 @ 10:52 am
You are hilarious. That’s all — just hilarious. I guess thank god he’s not actually your uncle, or this blog would have a completely different tone. Because I’m not sure what the blogging privileges are in prison (because of the initial jailbreak), and also, well, you’d probably have a lot of other Uncle Kenny-related baggage. Which could make for funny posts as well, just different. Bittersweet, maybe.
Comment by Amber — September 1, 2005 @ 12:56 pm
Oh, Amber. It would totally be bittersweet and I’d have all my banjo MP3s available for download.
Other than that, the exact same.
Comment by Pauly D — September 1, 2005 @ 12:58 pm
Sadly, there are children all over the world who might actually confuse Kenny with Michael McDonald. Can nothing be done to help? I look to you. By the way, you’ve got a little mayo right there. Nope, other side. Got it.
Comment by Dave — September 1, 2005 @ 1:02 pm
purpletwinkie already stole my mindwaves re: Dolly. But I bet I’m closer to Dolly’s height, if not her chest-level girth.
When I was at primary school (that’s elementary school for Limeys) we had a special assembly about Coward of the County. The headmaster brought in a nun to lecture us about how it’s good to be a coward. (It was a Catholic school; Catholicism considers standing up for yourself to be very bad form.) The headmaster banned us from listening to the song, so of course we all went out and bought it, like the Sex Pistols.
Good to meet you, Paul. Love the blog.
Comment by Lady Muck — September 3, 2005 @ 12:29 pm