The Old Blue Volvo Putts Merrily Along

An old Volvo was stopped along side the highway where no car should be stopping adjacent to the fast lane.  A 20 something year old guy with thick dark rimmed glasses and goatee was standing beside the car making a thumbs hook sign.  I flashed him back, hang loose, dude, then realized that sign was more of 80's thing and  he was apparently hanging loose like a phone off the hook.  But why would he want me to call him, I wondered?  And how would I call him if he didn't sign his phone number?  I thought, probably it is some new way of advertising, not real safe but an effective promotion of the need to have a mobile phone, if only for this type of situation.  Then more somberly, I said to myself, I'm a good Christian, or a least was once and probably still mostly have at least some humanitarian morality scared into me.  And besides, it feels good to do good.  Though if I call the auto club to get him assistance, they'll probably end up billing me and my insurance won't cover some guy I don't know.  And then I'll try to find him to pay and he'll just call me a rich dick, even though I don't believe I am either, although to some extent that is what I probably would have thought of me now when I was his age.  So maybe I should call the highway patrol to have them get this dangerous car and potentially more dangerous hipster off the side of the highway.  He could get hit and hurt himself, damage another vehicle and cause no end of misery and guilt to some poor helpful grandmother who pulled over to help him but hit him instead hit him, weaving around the way he is, leaning into towards traffic and waving his hand unintelligibly.  Besides, I am late for a meeting and if the highway patrol is dealing with him I could push the pedal down over the speed limit a bit and not be late for my meeting.  Although,  for highway patrol such a call is pretty low priority, maybe I should embellish the story, say to the patrol line that he has a gun, that should get even the traffic patrol cars out of my way.  But then they would probably just say well he has the right, haven't I heard of the US Second Amendment?  Perhaps if I said he was also of African descent, they'd be there promptly, I probably wouldn't have to say there is a gun involved.  But again, being a good Christian, or at least once was with a residual morality which truly would not want to play upon racism, I could just say he looks learning disabled.  Another kind of ismism I am sure, but what kind of old Volvo driving hipster with holy jeans and leather vest does not have a freaking mobile phone?  

quit smoking now

Easy new amazing pill to quit smoking, just pop one in your mouth like an M&M.  Side effects include:  heart disease, yellow teeth, lung & breathing disease, basically the same hazards as smoking but without any enjoyment.  May cause judgmental attitudes, holier than thou isness, and spontaneous lectures about the health impact of smoking and second hand smoke in restaurants and movie theater lines. Instances of spontaneous lecture often followed by secretive smoking in stairwells, closets and airline restrooms.  Linked to multiple shooting deaths, suicide and suicidal ideation (note: this side effect may be relieved by smoking.)  But what's a few stress induced murders and a bit of internal organ damage induced by relatively untested medication in the advance of the great cause against tobacco?

food rant of the day

No fat, no trans fat, no salt, no MSG, no preservatives, no genetically modified ingredients, no hormones, no flavor either!  You pay 6 dollars for a bag of chips, 3 bucks extra for all the stuff it doesn't have in it.  Sort of like with the old phone books, you have to pay to have an unlisted number.  Pay more to not be included in your corporate crap agenda.  Genetically modified produce?  I don’t want it, have to pay more not to have it.  Guess it’s cheaper for the farmer if the plant grows its own pesticide, except it only works with Monsanto fertilizer.  So maybe it is easier for the farm workers who actually have to spray the stuff, easier on their backs, not their internal organs.  The korporate klown kings would  get the environmentalists off their backs though, or drown them out if they just came up with BBQ flavored Brussels’ sprouts, grows its own spicy sauce,  or cheesy modified spinach, potatoes genetically spliced with bacon, or just plain pig fat.  The people would say shut the fuck up to the regressive lefties, I've got to have that.  If they can get the stuff to grow its own batter and deep fry itself, we’d never hear about whether it is safe or not for you, you’d just have to try it or how about strip steak modified into tasty garbanzo beans.  They’d have trouble rejecting that even down at the food co op.  Is there meat in it? No.  Forget vegetarian, it’s vegan.  And vegans have trouble finding food that is palatable, no matter what they tell you.  Whole Grain millet, rice, amaranth soaked in pure spring water…, that’s just unbaked bread with no spice.  Talk about lying about your food.  

mind teaser

What if the mothers of all pro abortion advocates had had an abortion with them.  Then, conversely what if all the pro anti abortion advocates mothers had had sterilizations?

If you look at the above sentences and think primarily about the proper use of "had had", then your mind is just fine.

trees

From the front window I like to look out towards a stand of pines on a hill off to the southwest a little.  Sometimes it snows on the tops of these trees whereas the snow doesn't quite reach down to my front window.  The pines around here are fairly well rooted, although none of them 'virgin' and apart from being cut down have probably burned over centuries as well.  Even now that houses have been built upon much of their old turf, little pines sprout up about everywhere.  The land is fairly inhospitable to any sort of proper lawn or garden and except where more amenable soil or sod has been imported, the pines or scrubs grow.

On the radio, which I still prefer to internet feeds or pod-casts, the news caster is announcing the status of the so-called Fiscal Cliff.  The federal legislature in their wisdom enacted a budget which was bound to fail should they not by the calendar year's end enact a new budget.  If a newer more solvent budget is not soon passed, then pundits and even many experts predict the national economy will fall over this Fiscal Cliff,  causing millions of individuals to plummet with it.

The season's long chilly dark hours set me in a contemplative bend, so I wonder what the pines would think of the Fiscal Cliff.  Perhaps they are sympathetic to the humans here about them.  After all, despite our use and abuse of their lumber, they're still here and quite majestic.  If the timbre from the winds through their branches were a form of their expression, more likely the sound is laughter at the ridiculousness of such situations humanity has placed itself in and towards no apparent reason.

Of course, the pines really have no feeling whatsoever about the Fiscal Cliff.  

Dennis the Menace

On the retro TV channel today I saw Dennis the Menace in a classic piece of Americana singing Silent Night, sleep in heavenly peace at the end of the show in front of the Christmas tree.  He kind of smiles, sort of sweet, but a little strange.  I wonder what little Vietnamese children would have thought of it if they had the freedom to watch in 1959.

more spew on Michael Jackson

The morning was very chilly downtown, so I had on my gloves and hat while walking to the coffee shop. I went by the counter, ordered an espresso and went back to the restroom.  I was still shivering slightly approaching the urinal, so still had my gloves on.  I put my left hand under my right arm, pulled off the glove as it wasn't possible to unzip and pull out my private with both gloves on.  Then it occurred to me, I had solved the mystery of the Michael Jackson one handed glove.

Wisdom from George Orwell

George Orwell wrote in 1946 on Politics and the English Language:

(i) Never use a metaphor, smilie, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.

(ii)  Never use a long word where a short one will do.

(iii) If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.

(iv)  Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.

(v) Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

To which I say the Limey has struck gold on a hotbed of literary lachrymose jibber jabber cutting to the heart like a cardiovascular surgeon slicing the Archilles' heel (typo intended) of the average Joe searching for clear verbalization.

dream thoughts

If people were invisible, then how would deaf people communicate?
_______________________________

Are you looking at my daughter?  Yes, sir, she is definitely pretty enough to look at, don't worry.

_______________________________

Do not be dismissive of American culture as thin nor shallow nor without substance, that is, do not view it as Americans tend to view the cultures of all other countries.

Yin without Yang

Dark and no light
Wet with no dry
Cold, never hot
Only ever soft
diffused focus
fuck you,
or rather no.