Stories My Grandparents Told Me

My grandfather is a schmuck. Yet to him, that insult is doubly offensive, because he is also anti-Semitic. He tried to stop my father, who was raised Catholic, from marrying my mother, who was raised Jewish. He recently divorced my grandmother, after 58 years of marriage. My grandfather has told me many stories, most of which were either exaggerations for the more boring ones or altogether facetious, but always mind-numbingly dull. In fact, I have fallen asleep on the telephone with him before, only to wake up to his snarling, growling voice reprimanding my ear. He also repeats stories many times, because his memory is equivalent to that of a mosquito. I have to thank him three times for any gift, which is always money, because if I don't, he forgets and refuses to send a $20 check for the next occasion.…