Chum Bucket: Leonard Nimrod.

So this is where I write about people who have come and gone in my life.  And some who have stayed.  For these entries, I will focus on a certain associate.  A friend.  A chum, as they say.  Sometimes I will remember him or her fondly.  Sometimes I will vent some frustrations.

I will use a fake name for each pal.  I'm not sure why.  No one reads this blog, let alone anyone who might know me.  But o-welles.

The first person I chose, which totally surprises me, is, as the title states, Leonard Nimrod.  It surprises me, because I had somebody else in mind to start with when I first thought of this section of my blog.  But also, he is my brother.  And no, I'm not about to say that he ain't heavy because he wasn't easy to get along with.  We haven't spoken in years.

My wife was cooking dinner the other night, and she said something that made me want to joke around that she was hoarding food, or somebody was hoarding food or something.  But I stopped.  Suddenly an old memory came to mind.  And then a few more on top of it.


It was back when I was in the eighth grade.  My older brother Leonard had just moved in with us the previous summer from the Philippines.  He attended community college and was home most of the day.  Everything went fine for a while.

One Sunday afternoon, I was watching "The A-Team " and he wanted tennis.  We only had one TV, and I let him change the channel without complaint.  Later on that night, he was watching "Lois & Clark" and I asked him to switch it to "Married with Children".  He wouldn't do it, and we argued.

I think that was the first time we had a real disagreement since he reunited with us.  I told him that he already got his choice earlier in the day, and now it's my turn to pick.  Maybe I took the wrong approach.  Maybe I was lacking in tact and he felt respected.  But my feeling was that he was going to watch his show no matter what.  He just didn't give a shit.

Then one day I come home from school, and he wasn't plopped in front of the tube like normal.  I found sitting on the open window sill in the kitchen.  He was looking outside and wasn't talking much.

I returned to the living room and turned on the TV.  Nothing but static.  I discover that the antenna wasn't plugged in (we didn't have cable) and that the part that connects the wire to the TV was taken out.  I asked him where the missing part was and why he did that.  He simply he just ignored me.  That was a confusing episode, to say the least.

Then there were the many times when I would come home and find the fridge empty.  Obviously, he couldn't have eaten all that when our mom just filled it up with groceries the previous weekend.  I later discovered that he was hiding them.  I never told my mom about it.  She was oblivious to everything, and I did my part to keep her that way.

I ended up storing my share of groceries.  It didn't really make much sense though, because he was home all day, and it's not like I had a safe to lock up my goodies.  But for some reason, he never touched them.

I always thought that it was an absolutely inane and shameful thing that both of us went through.  Obviously, the fridge was never totally empty because there was still the uncooked products and perishable items that had to stay there.  I did drink a lot of warm soda for the longest time though.  I also felt guilty because by hiding away the food I took, I was depriving my mother of them.

Later in high school, I found out one of my friends was going through the same thing with his older brother.  He just kind of offered that information out of the blue one day after we went to his house and he started complaining about the mess.  I didn't ask him about it.  We just kind of brushed it aside.  I thought he might have been embarrassed to talk further about it.  I would have been.

What else did I want to say?

Why did I fake-name him as Leonard Nimrod?  One night we had another wild argument.  He was bigger than me and he was punching me, and before I could find out if I could even get a couple of shots in, our mother got in between us to find out what was going on.  I don't remember what the fight was about because now I can only remember the following.

The two of them got into a bit of a heated exchange.  Then my mother said something.  He replied that it wasn't logical, and he went on screaming and yelling about Mr. Spock.  Apparently, he's the most logical person in the universe or something.

So he's going off about, "Don't you know about Mr. Spock?  He's this guy on "Star Trek".  He approaches everything logically.  You're not being logical like Spock."  Something along those lines.  It was kind of comical really.  But not when you're in the middle of it, I guess.  It was kind of sad, too, and pitiful.

And that's how I'll end this first installment.  Maybe I'll revisit Mr. Nimrod one day.  Now that I think about it, he was a pretty good choice as the first "chum", depending on what you mean by it.

P.S. I hope you are all enjoying the holidays!
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