You Can't Make This Stuff Up

Hello World,


Well, there is no way to wish anyone a "happy" Good Friday, so our only alternative is to wish you a very happy Easter weekend and leave it at that. Of course, last Sunday was all cats' favorite day in the liturgical calendar, Palm Sunday, when the palms come home from church and turn immediately into cat toys. They always seem to know when the big day has arrived, and you don't dare go home from church without palms, for fear of your life, or at least, your ankles. Fortunately, I bring home enough palms for everyone, so my ankles are perfectly safe on that score.
Earlier in the month, of course, we had the annual St. Patrick's Day parade in New York City, and even managed to have the usual controversies around it, in spite of the fact that some of the usual adversaries declined to participate this time. With no one on the other side to fight against, all of the people on the same side were left with no choice but to fight among themselves instead, which they did with their usual fervor and acrimony. In fact, I believe that the NHL negotiators also showed up to help things along. It said in the newspaper that they've been having a St. Patrick's Day parade in New York since something like 1762, and you would honestly think that they would have gotten all of the bugs worked out of it by now. This is clearly a case of people with too much time on their hands, and too little green beer.
Never one to miss a bet (pun intended) the New York State Lottery Games put out a special Super Shamrocks edition of their scratch-off games during March, so people can try to cash in on the fabled luck of the Irish. I know this, because one of my co-workers gave me one of these tickets along with a birthday card, and it actually turned out to be a $5 winner. So that turned out to be a nice treat for my birthday, although I will say that neither of us is Irish, and everyone knows that I'm also not particularly lucky.
Speaking of work, last week our crack IT department greeted us in the morning with this message on our computers: ATT ALL USERS: PLEASE SIGN OFF YOU TERMINALS BY 6:45 PM WE WILL BE PREFORMING OUR DAILY BACK UPS ANY JOBS STILL ACTIVE WILL BE TERMINTED. TEH SYSTEM WILL BE GOING DOWN. NO USERS SHOULD NOT BE ON THE SYSTEM FOR AN HOUR WHEN THE SAVES BEING. And here's the scary part, it's that I understand that message completely! Another scary thing at work was that we apparently spent $399.50 for something that we referred to as "The Complete English Grammer DVD Series." By golly, I certainly hope not! I mean, I like Kelsey Grammer as much as the next fellow, but I don't see that being worth almost $400. And if that was just a typo on our part, and hopefully not the DVD people, then I think what we need more is a DVD on English spelling, before we get to grammar. Heck, if we can't even spell it, what chance have we got to learn anything from it? You know what I always say, you've got to walk before you can gerund.
Speaking of walking, I've just made the most delightful discovery, and you should definitely NOT walk, but run full-tilt and go buy this book called "You Really Couldn't Make It Up" by Jack Crossley. According to the review, it is a riotous compendium of weirdness and eccentricity as told in bizarre-but-true newspaper items, such as this priceless gem:
==================================
"Commenting on a complaint from a Mr. Arthur Pardey
about a large gas bill, a spokesman for North West Gas
said, 'We agree it was rather high for the time of year.
It's possible Mr. Pardey has been charged for the gas
used up during the explosion that destroyed his house'."
- Daily Telegraph
==================================
Well, you know how I always say, you just can't make this stuff up, and it's really true! This certainly sounds for all the world like a book that is not only after my own heart, but also right up my alley, and you can be sure that it will be on my Wish List for any upcoming gift-giving events that may happen along. If you can't rely on friends and relatives, you should buy it for yourself. After all, you can't make this stuff up, and now, you don't have to.
While we're on the subject of newspapers, here's one of my favorite bits in a long time, that appeared recently in our local press. They printed a picture of some people bundled up against the cold, with their pup tents, backpacks and coolers. Underneath the picture, honest to God, it says:
====================
UNHAPPY CAMPERS
Golfers put in long hours
waiting to get prime spots for
EZ-Reserve tee-time system.
====================
I've got a news flash for those caption writers at the paper. If people have to camp out in freezing weather for hours with their tents and coolers, then what you have there cannot be called an "EZ-Reserve tee-time system," no matter what the golf course may want to tell you. This is what I call a system that has a lot of room for improvement, and that would be putting it mildly. Normally, I would recommend that the golf course get in touch with the NHL negotiators to develop a new and improved system, but I have the feeling that this is already their handiwork in place. EZ-Reserve, indeed.
It is true that I live within a mile of my job, and if I were a more energetic sort of individual, I could certainly walk there and back, but I don't, I drive. It usually takes me about 10 minutes to get to work, or 13 minutes if I let the car warm up first. In very bad weather, or when the construction crews are out making a hash out of rush hour, it can take 20 minutes, but it doesn't matter, because I leave 45 minutes early in any case. You would think that there wouldn't be a whole lot of traffic in a 10-minute commute, and you'd be right. But a lot of what there is constitutes a menace to society, composed of people who should not be allowed to drive, and sometimes I'm one of them. At times like that, it's nice to get a little more space, and create a bit of breathing room between yourself and other cars. So even though I take the same way home from work every day, and have for at least 15 years, I find periodically that when I make the turn behind the hotel, I take that curve a little too close, and go bumping noisily over the curb instead. You'd be surprised how people scatter when you do that, and suddenly everyone else on the road is happy to give you a very wide berth. I can ditch people who have been tail-gating me for 6 blocks, and who have climbed so close into my trunk that I can tell what they had for lunch, faster than you can say, "Sorry about your luggage cart, lady!" This very simple maneuver can give you oceans of space, even in the most congested areas, and it certainly makes the pedestrians a whole lot more alert. Of course, you know what I always say, if you don't like my driving, stay off of the sidewalks.

Spring Ahead

Hello World,


Bill was just remarking the other day that no one ever says "the Ides of March" any more, making this just one more in a long series of expressions that have lost all relevance with people nowadays. (Just go ahead and try "that's the way the cookie crumbles" on some young whipper-snapper and see where that gets you!) But for those of us "of a certain age," I can report that we have indeed passed the legendary Ides of March already, and well on our way to the first day of Spring, and after that, it's anybody's guess. The calendar may say March (although Bill is convinced that he forgot to wind his, which is why it seems to be still stuck in December) but around here, there are still piles of snow in shady areas, and the ground is rock hard. Sunday may get all dolled up and come prancing in as the first day of Spring, but as long as my bird bath is still frozen solid, I'm just not buying it.
Everyone knows that if our anniversary was last week, could my birthday be far behind? If you answered "Absolutely not!" you're right on the money. There's hardly time enough to catch your breath in between our anniversary and my birthday, so it's been some busy times around here lately. The best part about my birthday was having that Friday off from work (HOORAY!!!) although you know what I always say about those short weeks. (For the record, it's nothing good, and requires the use of words that you can't print in a family newspaper.) It also included presents, and dining out, which are about my two favorite things that can happen in any one day. I found myself with even more clothes, more music CDs, more books and more hand-made earrings. You may be wondering if one person could stand any more excitement, or whether they'd just have to go into seclusion. Au contraire! (That's French for "Let me at that cake!") The birthday caravan continued apace, and the very next day, we went to Mom's for more presents and dining out. It was another beautiful day, and a jolly time was had by all, and I have the pictures to prove it.
As long as I was off from work on my birthday (and Daffy Duck was obviously otherwise engaged, so he didn't show up and shout, "Shoot me now! Shoot me now!") I decided to take the train into the city and run a couple of errands. I figured in the middle of the day, this would be a cinch. I thought I gave myself plenty of time to get to the train station and still buy a ticket, but I wasn't counting on long lines at the ticket window when I got there. I decided instead to use the ticket machine on the platform to save time, although I already knew what was going to happen. I told the machine that I wanted a round-trip off-peak ticket plus a $4 MetroCard, for a total of about $15, and gave it a $20 bill. I was already resigned to the idea that it was going to spit a bunch of those screwy Sacajawea dollars at me, but it surprised me this time. What it spit at me instead was two Sacajawea dollars, two Susan B. Anthony dollars, and two of the new State quarters. Talk about Monopoly money, this was really hitting the jackpot in spurious coinage!
When I got to Grand Central, I was disappointed to see that the MTA Transit Museum was still having their Fashion Underground exhibit, so there was nothing to see there. But since I wasn't rushing around like I was when I was in the city on Jury Duty, and I had time to look around and see what was there, I noticed signs for a place downtown called CityStore that seemed to be right up my alley in the way of souvenirs. It was near where I was going, so I stopped in along the way, and was glad I did. Although small, the store had a nice variety of New York-themed souvenirs, from books to T-shirts, key chains to wind-up toys, and lots of other fun, different, interesting or just plain peculiar things. They did have a set of souvenir salt-&-pepper shakers, although they were ones that I already have, but I was surprised that they had no collectible spoons. But I was glad that I went, and picked up some souvenirs anyway, and it certainly beat the pants (or rather, the togas) off the Fashion Underground mannequins at the Transit Museum.
I had one inadvertently funny moment when my hunger got the better of me, and I stopped at a push-cart for a snack. The man ahead of me was having a hot dog with everything on it, and there was a wide-ranging discussion in progress about the merits of various toppings compared to others. I was just waiting patiently until this whole exchange was completed, and I suppose my mind had wandered, as it so often does, when the proprietor of the cart asked me what I wanted. I said, "Pretzel, please" although probably not very vigorously, as I was still following the tail-end of the sauerkraut debate, since the hot dog customer had moved over but had not left. I don't know exactly what I was expecting to happen next, so when the vendor reached inside of his cart, I didn't find it in the slightest way unusual. That is, until he pulled out a can of cold soda and handed it to me, saying "one dollar," and which was the first I realized, along with Cool Hand Luke, that "what we have HE-ah is a FAIL-yuh to co-MYOON-icate!" I'm sure he understood pretty quickly that I didn't want a cold soda, while I was shivering in a 35-degree drizzle, by the way I was eying the can in a hostile manner, and my mouth was opening and closing but no words were coming out. It took me a while to realize that he must have thought I had said, "Pepsi" rather than "pretzel," because that's what he handed me. I apologized through my chattering teeth, and asked him for a hot pretzel instead of a cold soda, and he was quick to oblige. When he asked me for $1.25, I didn't even give him any of my Monopoly money from the ticket machine.
Speaking of things that are inadvertently funny, one of the wonderful new gifts that I received for my birthday was a nice jacket with a hood, since the jacket that I had been wearing had become literally nothing but strips of tattered cloth held together with safety pins. This was not only extremely unsightly, but trying to get through any of the myriad security devices encountered in every day life now was becoming more and more of a trial. So I got a beautiful new jacket for my birthday, and couldn't toss out that old ratty thing fast enough. I love the jacket, but I admit that I was not expecting to find this on the label of care instructions --
====================
DO NOT MACHINE WASH
DO NOT MACHINE DRY
DO NOT IRON
DO NOT DRY CLEAN
====================
I said to Bill, "It's a disposable jacket! You wear it, and when it gets dirty, you throw it out!" I mean, usually they tell you that you can wash something, or that you have to have it dry cleaned instead, but they don't usually tell you that you can't do either. I've never seen anything like that before, and I don't mind saying that it gave me pause. For someone that wears out clothing until it's being held together by safety pins, having a jacket that can't be washed is going to present some unique challenges, I can tell you that.
Since there's been too much snow to cut firewood lately, I've been giving my attention instead to clearing out the ivy patch along the rock wall. I've been chopping down over-grown weedy bushes, virulent clumps of wild roses, and dense tangles of rampant porcelain berry vines that had literally climbed all the way up to our electric wires, and without a pole or anything. It's slow going, but I can see some incremental progress. What with all the chopping and dragging, my shoulders and back have really taken the brunt of it, and they let me know it in no uncertain terms. Last week, my lower back was so sore, I couldn't reach my feet to put on my slippers. Fortunately, I've been taking mega-doses of therapeutic junk food, which may not help the pain, but certainly takes my mind off things. I can highly recommend it, and that's not just Daffy Duck talking, mind you.

Live And Learn

Hello World,


Greetings, sports fans! For those of us around here who are disenchanted with winter, and our name is legion, there's really nothing like watching young men play baseball in warm climates to restore your faith in this cold, cruel world. I can tell you that every year, Spring Training is a welcome sight, and I don't know how we would survive the winter without it. Of course, in typical fashion for the way things go nowadays, we're also having a local cable-TV and network imbroglio which is blacking out games all over the place, so not everyone is getting the therapeutic benefits of seeing the Mets and other teams tossing around the ol' horsehide, as it were. I said to Bill that they should send the NHL negotiators over to settle it, they seem to have a real knack for sports dispute mediation.
This turned into another one of those weeks that managed to have not one, but two more snowstorms in it, and I don't have to tell anyone how that sort of stuff gets really old, really quickly. I have already complained about how it has set back my wood chopping for camping, although I was able to saw some firewood last week anyway, from found logs that I had left in the garage, and which had remained dry enough to cut. So it was possible to make a little bit of progress on my wood chopping in spite of the elements. But there's nothing I hate like shoveling snow first thing in the morning, then having to clean off the car, and still go to work. Personally, I think shoveling steps and scraping windshields is already enough work for one day, without having to go to work besides. I can go for one or the other, but not both. And thank you not very much.
My favorite weather-related story from the week was the afternoon drive-time radio personality on Q104.3, complaining about people over-reacting because of the forecast. He said, "It's not like we're being invaded by flying monkeys from Saturn or anything. It's just snow. It snows all the time here, it's nothing to get excited about. It'll be about six inches. If you live some place where it snows more, it'll be more. Please stay calm. And above all, please don't everybody run to the supermarket. Ever notice how whenever it snows, everyone has to line up at the store for bread, milk and eggs? They're like, 'We have to make French Toast! After all, it's snowing'!" I had to laugh.
Yesterday at work, someone asked me what was the date, and I said it was the 9th. A co-worker corrected me and said it was actually the 10th, or as he referred to it, "a third of the month is gone already." I can't say I've ever thought about months in terms of thirds before, but there's no arguing with his math skills. There was a general consensus that the year seems to be charging right along in a headlong fashion, and nobody seemed to care for it much either. Meanwhile, in spite of the frigid temperatures outside, and occasionally inside as well (I knew I should have replaced that darned bird bath heater!) our house has been having a visitation of what I refer to as "winter flies." These are basically your standard-issue sort of housefly that you see all the time in the summer, but which I don't expect to see much of in January, but here they are. They seem kind of dazed and confused, and go sputtering around aimlessly in a haphazard manner around the house. Bill found one in the refrigerator the other day, so you know these are not the intellectual elite of the fly kingdom. On the other hand, we've all seen enough movies to know that smart insects are not a good thing either, and that's putting it mildly.
Last week, as the greeting card companies so elegantly put it, Bill and I celebrated 22 years of wedded bliss, which of course would be impossible, except for the fact that I was a child bride. That's my story, anyway, and I'm sticking with it. We started the day with presents, and to my way of thinking, there's nothing better than that. We found ourselves with new clothes, music CDs and DVDs, hand-made earrings and books. I also got a neat folding shovel to keep in the car for any digging-related emergencies that might crop up along the way. The next day, we went out to have dinner at a small Italian restaurant nearby that we had never tried before. I thought the food was good, but our meal suffered from that type of smothering service that you get when a place is empty, which as over-priced as it was, I'm not surprised. But it had the advantage of novelty on its side, so at least we did something different for our special day. Besides which, it didn't even snow, and last week, that was not only a special day, but a rarity as well.
And what's new in the wonderful world of higher education, you may be wondering? Luckily, I happen to have my handy guide to summer courses at NYU, so I am prepared to answer that inquiry. Actually, they take pains to point out that this is NYU's School of Continuing and Professional Studies, not to be confused with regular NYU, so people don't think they've gone completely off the deep end. After all, you don't want to scare off the alumni of the old Alma Mater from donating money and having buildings named after themselves. Anyway, apparently at NYUSCPS, or "nyooskips," you can sign up and actually get credit for taking such courses as "Video Game Creation," "Catering for Meetings and Events," "Graphic Design Urban Retreats," "Glamorous Designers of the 20th Century," "Improvisation Workshop," and my personal favorite, "Marketing and Sales Weapons in Technology Brand Battles." Well, I have to say that things have certainly changed in education since my day, when we were learning to make fire and chase after dinosaurs with stone tools. I can't even understand what they mean by "technology brand battles," so I certainly wouldn't know where to begin to develop any weapons for it. Any of those technology brand battles turn up in my bailiwick, and I'm a goner, there's just no way around it. I'd sign up for the course, but you know what they always say about trying to teach an old dog new tricks. (For the record, it wastes your time and irritates the pig. Or maybe that's a different aphorism, but you get the idea anyway.) Alas, how times have changed, and not always for the better, I can tell you that. Unfortunately, I have to cut this short, because it's snowing and I have to go make French Toast.

Our Readers Write

Hello World,


Happy March! Of course, it may appear to the untrained observer, that not much happens in the beginning of March, but that is simply not the case. I have my Uncle Tommy to thank for alerting me to the felicitous occasion of St. Urho's Day, which seems to be a commemoration of the invention of pesticides in Finland, although I admit that I'm a little bit fuzzy on that part. Anyway, it has all the earmarks of a very happy day, and my uncle was not only the first person to send me a greeting card for the occasion, but remains the only person to do so up to this point, or in fact, at any point in my life previously. So he definitely wins the award for that, and while I can't guarantee that it would be a very big award, it would certainly be heartfelt and sincere. And all of you Finlandians out there who understand the significance of this feast day, please feel free to jump right in with your comments, so that we can all share the wealth of your knowledge. In fact, this would probably be a good time to dig into the old mailbag, and let some of our compatriots in cyberspace take a shot at sitting in my seat for a spell, so let's get right to it.
You may be wondering what's new in the wonderful world of junk email, and if so, you're in luck, because we have this intriguing description of what I would consider a novel innovation in the field, from one of our alert readers --
==================================
SpamSenders
I find myself for some reason plagued by SPAM.
But the names of the senders who want to sell me everything from Viagra to
software to pornography are often amusing: Ballroom P. Jitney Hothead V. Mound Incorruptibles G. Collusion Notch B. Reunion Redeemer P. Paige Gherkin H. OutfittingElection M. Especial Plurality U. Students
===================================
Well, ya gotta love that Ballroom P. Jitney! On another topic, it was gratifying to find that I was not alone in my rogue furniture experiences, when a different alert reader offered his own version of The Recliner Story --
==================================
And speaking of the dog. (Toby- our misfit Lhasa Apso)
(and another recliner story), He uses the recliner as his
personal throne- when no one else is sitting in it, and
sometimes when someone is. It's not unusual to find
him spread out on top of the recliner's back.
Sometimes I swear he's a cat. Anyway- In moving the
recliner, we found no fewer than 5 mummified carrots,
assorted dog chewies, kibbles & bits, a pair of
reading glasses and a remote control that's been
missing for nigh onto a year.
The moral of the story is: Don't look to closely into your
re-cycled recliner- you just might find the previous owner.
===================================
Well, that's certainly a cautionary tale that I'm sure we can all relate to. Lastly, a colleague who works at a community hospital in West Virginia sent me the following, after I had complained about the terrible picture on my new ID badge --
=================================
When it comes to ID's, the DMV gets to me.
My daughter went to get her WV ID. She
had to produce all kinds of stuff proving
she was who she proclaimed to be.
The next week she went to take her
driving test and they of course asked for ID.
She shows her certified birth certificate and the
very picture ID that she had gotten from them
the week before, and they said that the picture ID
was not acceptable! Can you believe that!
They will take her certified birth certificate,
voter's registration or rent receipt, all of which
do not have a picture of her on it, but will not
take the one THEY gave her with a picture!
Now that's NUTS!
=================================
I'm thinking that she meant to cheer me up, but somehow I don't find that story of governmental ineptitude in action, all that comforting. But, as I keep reminding myself, it's still better than being on Jury Duty! And thanks to all of our readers and writers for their welcome and unusual additions to what Bill always refers to as my weekly contribution to Internet clutter.
Speaking of Bill, he has a new book called "Eats, Shoots, and Leaves" (thanks, Deb!) that bills itself as a reference book for a "zero tolerance" approach to punctuation. This is no place for any laissez-faire, whack-a-doo, let-it-all-hang-out sort of carrying-on, this is a collection of serious rules for serious grammarians that will brook no insubordination. It offers "don't-make-me-come-down-there!" guidelines for all common, and commonly misused, punctuation marks, such as commas, periods and semi-colons, as well as their more exotic brethren scattered about the keyboard. The hyphen rates special attention, and with good reason. Nowadays, anyone who uses a spell-checker, or reads a newspaper, knows that use of the hyphen is universally discouraged in almost all situations, no matter the resulting confusion. The author bemoans the lack of hyphens that give us such incomprehensible disasters as "rearm," "coopt" and "deiced." Lately, I found one to top even those (literal) horrors. It was the headline in a story about retro musical genres that were being discovered by a new generation, where interest in these styles was being, as they described it, "reignited." I defy anyone to read that correctly the first time around. "A hyphen! A hyphen! My kingdom for a hyphen!"