Another archive classic: February 7, 2007
PROFILING PITTSBURGH’S NOT-SO-YOUNG, BUT NOT-REALLY-OLD PEOPLE
LIFE OF DEBAUCHERY, BEDLAM AND BAD HABITS, STILL, SOUTH SIDE WOMAN GOING STRONG AS SHE REACHES MILESTONE OF 36. OK, 37.
Gertrude "Gertie" Manachan, the grandaughter of a coal miner, never met a mop she liked. Family and friends would enter her ill-appointed home and were aghast at her housekeeping habits. Lore has it that once, her own mother ran screaming at the smell of burning hotcakes, insisting to the local fire department that the house was engulfed in flames.
“My sister-in-law asked us when we were all in Cincinnati for Thanksgiving one year if we could find the one place in her spacious suburban cul-de-sac home where she forgot to clean. I just tell people when they come inside my house, I’ll give them ten dollars if they can find the spot where I did clean,” said Manachan, as she belched after chugging a Blithering Idiot and slid into a pair of maribou slippers. "I haven't had to pay out yet," she insisted.
Friends admire Gertrude for her nonchalant, carefree ways -- the kind that get you in trouble with law enforcement and such, though she claims the "undecent explosion" she was once charged with (the charges were later dropped) was a case of mistaken identity.
"That time the Overbrook fire chief had to come over and get the handcuffs off her extramarital lover was something else. We still have a good laugh about that one. Even her husband thinks it was pretty damn funny," said friend Tonya Berryberry of Normalville.
And then there were the papers piled on her desk that she was “saving” for some reason or another. It was usually another.
In her younger years, she could drink men under the table, and once she got them there, we can’t even tell you what she’d do with them. Though we suspect it was make them do little cleaning.
Mrs. Manachan is known for her flushed complexion and hair that looks like it needs a good brushing.
"I dated a law school student once who kept offering to pay for me to see a hairdresser, but I refused. He wanted a girl who looked like she made apple pies. Fortunately for me, I found a man who could just buy me all the apple pies I wanted. Ha," she said.
One of her best friends, Barb Tyranasauro, who attended high school with her way back in the ‘80s, said her favorite drink was Tab and her favorite food was Pop Tarts. “I always knew it would catch up with her. You should see her hips. As if you could cancel out the effects of Frosted Cherry with a diet soda. She’s a prime candidate for some kind of cancer, I’m sure. And then of course, there was her personality. She told it like it was. She wasn’t afraid of anything or anybody. She‘ll be the kind of woman who‘s laughing on her deathbed. Granted, it will be a maniacal laugh that will scare the bejesus out of the very people trying to save her, but she'll be whooping it up.”
Her other secrets?
“In heaven there is no beer, that’s why I drink it here,” Manachan sang. “Oh who am I kidding. I’m going straight to hell. Can somebody hand me a cigar for goddsakes?”
To be included in the Thirtysomething Club, please send your submissions elsewhere, because frankly, we don’t want them.
LIFE OF DEBAUCHERY, BEDLAM AND BAD HABITS, STILL, SOUTH SIDE WOMAN GOING STRONG AS SHE REACHES MILESTONE OF 36. OK, 37.
Gertrude "Gertie" Manachan, the grandaughter of a coal miner, never met a mop she liked. Family and friends would enter her ill-appointed home and were aghast at her housekeeping habits. Lore has it that once, her own mother ran screaming at the smell of burning hotcakes, insisting to the local fire department that the house was engulfed in flames.
“My sister-in-law asked us when we were all in Cincinnati for Thanksgiving one year if we could find the one place in her spacious suburban cul-de-sac home where she forgot to clean. I just tell people when they come inside my house, I’ll give them ten dollars if they can find the spot where I did clean,” said Manachan, as she belched after chugging a Blithering Idiot and slid into a pair of maribou slippers. "I haven't had to pay out yet," she insisted.
Friends admire Gertrude for her nonchalant, carefree ways -- the kind that get you in trouble with law enforcement and such, though she claims the "undecent explosion" she was once charged with (the charges were later dropped) was a case of mistaken identity.
"That time the Overbrook fire chief had to come over and get the handcuffs off her extramarital lover was something else. We still have a good laugh about that one. Even her husband thinks it was pretty damn funny," said friend Tonya Berryberry of Normalville.
And then there were the papers piled on her desk that she was “saving” for some reason or another. It was usually another.
In her younger years, she could drink men under the table, and once she got them there, we can’t even tell you what she’d do with them. Though we suspect it was make them do little cleaning.
Mrs. Manachan is known for her flushed complexion and hair that looks like it needs a good brushing.
"I dated a law school student once who kept offering to pay for me to see a hairdresser, but I refused. He wanted a girl who looked like she made apple pies. Fortunately for me, I found a man who could just buy me all the apple pies I wanted. Ha," she said.
One of her best friends, Barb Tyranasauro, who attended high school with her way back in the ‘80s, said her favorite drink was Tab and her favorite food was Pop Tarts. “I always knew it would catch up with her. You should see her hips. As if you could cancel out the effects of Frosted Cherry with a diet soda. She’s a prime candidate for some kind of cancer, I’m sure. And then of course, there was her personality. She told it like it was. She wasn’t afraid of anything or anybody. She‘ll be the kind of woman who‘s laughing on her deathbed. Granted, it will be a maniacal laugh that will scare the bejesus out of the very people trying to save her, but she'll be whooping it up.”
Her other secrets?
“In heaven there is no beer, that’s why I drink it here,” Manachan sang. “Oh who am I kidding. I’m going straight to hell. Can somebody hand me a cigar for goddsakes?”
To be included in the Thirtysomething Club, please send your submissions elsewhere, because frankly, we don’t want them.
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