Don't Bug Me
Greetings, Evil Yankee Capitalist Lackey:
This is Comrade Mischka from the Regulatory Office To Transform Environment & Nature, or ROTTEN, at the Kremlin in the glorious homeland of Mother Russia. So you think it is funny to laugh at us when our Clima-Tron 100 gives you weather that you don't like, nyet? This is bad. You should not laugh at Mother Russia. We know where you live, thanks to our spy satellite, the Flying Cossack 2. (It is a hideous bourgeois lie that the Flying Cossack 1 was lost in a card game to a circus elephant. We are still dragging the Volga for it and expect to locate it any day now.) You will not be finding it so funny, I think, when we send a blizzard, tornado and typhoon just to your house and not anywhere else around you. Ha-ha! Then the joke will be on you, and it will be Mother Russia who is laughing, da? Now if you want to make more jokes, remember that the Clima-Tron 100 also has raining frogs, locusts and boils. Please to enjoy the ROTTEN weather that we are sending you right now!
April Fools! Okay, I admit that for some people, it's a little bit early for April Fool's Day jokes, but I bet I really had you going with that one. (Oh admit it, you looked out the window to see if it was really snowing outside, courtesy of our friends with the Kremlin's infernal weather machine.) Actually, our weather here is much improved from what it was, although it would be hard NOT to be an improvement, the way things were going there for a while. But now it seems that the tide has finally turned, and our yard is awash in perky purple crocus, jolly yellow jonquils, and even a rare early pink hyacinth, which I've never seen in March. So there is reason for optimism, and for many of us, life has regained its meaning.
Not all of us, perhaps. I had an irate co-worker storm into my office this week, asking permission to kill the Accounting staff. (Her own boss had waved her away with a weary, "Oh, the line for that would just be out of this world.") For my part, I told her she would have to wait until after Easter, because after all, this is Lent, and right on the doorstep of Holy Week besides, so it wouldn't do to be killing anyone at this point. She accepted the logic of my argument with bad grace, and said that she was just about ready to scream and pull her hair out. I reminded her that she was building character, and pretty soon, she'd have so much character that she wouldn't be able to bend. She laughed and said that she was sure that I was going to Heaven, so I said I would save her a spot. She didn't think she would need it, she admitted, because she thought that she was going the other way, and I said that many times, I was also convinced of that eventuality for me as well, and I would save her a spot there too. That might have just been my Evil Twin speaking.
Speaking of going in the wrong direction, what the heck has happened to gasoline prices lately? I drive past a Sunoco station on my way home from work, and I started noticing a few weeks ago that every time I went past, the price had gone up another few cents a gallon. At first, I thought this was just some strange isolated occurrence, and it would soon come back down again, but apparently not. The price of regular has gone from $2.50/gal the last time I got it, to over $2.90/gal in just about a month. And the odd thing is that I haven't heard any frenzied news reports of national or international (or even inter-galactic) catastrophes recently that could account for this whopping increase. (And really, as Edwin Newman once ruminated, at what point does an increase begin to “whop” anyway?) Frankly, I don't mind saying that I'm disgusted with the whole bunch of them, and I am unanimous in that. I've been telling Fabio, my Escort, that if the prices don't come down soon, he'll be staying at home and I'll be walking to work, because I'm certainly not shelling out more than $2.90/gal just to drive to my job halfway across town. I may be a lot of things, but I'm nobody's fool. On the other hand, it seems to me that the gas prices around here invariably go down as soon as I've filled up the tank, so I should probably do everyone in the area a big favor and just go and get gas, so that everybody else can benefit from the lower prices afterwards. 'Tis a far, far better thing I do .....
Speaking of Fabio, one thing I discovered with the recent nasty snowstorms and ugly conditions, is that the Escort handles fairly well in snow, but there’s no point in trying to drive it through drifts. I've gotten used to cars that are a little heavier in the front, and once you got some momentum on their side, the Tempo or the Gremlin would muscle through piles of snow to a clearing on the other side, and eliminate some shoveling by sheer force of mass. I found out too late that the Escort and I were of two minds about this prospect, when I attempted this maneuver in front of the house, and found myself high and dry and stranded precariously atop the plow tailings in my way. According to the owners manual, the Escort is not really much lighter weight than the Tempo or the Gremlin, so I have the feeling that the problem is more a ground clearance issue than anything else. The Escort rides so close to the road, on its teensy lawnmower tires, that it can't possibly drive through anything deep without running aground on it under the chassis. It wouldn't do to call Fabio a "fair weather friend," but you can be certain that I'll always be carrying a snow shovel with me, that's for sure.
Alert readers might be wondering what's going on in the wonderful world of firewood. Well, wonder no more. Everyone knows that if February has come and gone, I must have already started chopping firewood for camping, and they'd be right on the mark. We have branches falling into our yard all year long, and I usually saw them up in the winter, to avoid the twin problems of insects and over-heating. I've made some good progress already, and have a sizable collection of cut logs drying nicely in the garage, which I would expect to be in perfect condition just in time for my vacation. I can't think of anything that could be better, and all of that hard work will be well worth it. Not so fast! I know this seems like just another April Fool's Day joke, but I actually got this message last week:
==============================
Dear New York Park & Campground Visitor,
Please read the important information below from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation concerning important information for your next visit to a Park or Campground in New York State.
Don't Move Firewood!
Bringing your firewood with you? Most people don't realize they move bugs along with their firewood. You could be spreading diseases from insect invaders that can quickly kill large numbers of trees. Our forests are at risk from the transport of firewood infested with tree killers. Help STOP THE SPREAD of these pests:
Leave firewood at home, do not transport it to campgrounds or parks.
Use only firewood from local sources.
If you bring firewood, burn ALL of it before leaving your campsite.
For more information go to: www.dec.ny.gov (search word: firewood).
==============================
Now, my only question about this is, are they hallucinating, or am I? I don't know how many millions of people go camping in this country every year, but apart from me, have you ever in your entire life, heard of one single, solitary individual who brings firewood camping with them, ever? Who thinks that this is such a huge national problem that they have to send out mass warnings against it? I already know that it's not true, because whenever I mention to anyone that I carry firewood with me, they invariably look at me like I'm a three-headed polka-dot space alien who just landed from another planet. There is absolutely not one person in their right mind that brings firewood camping with them, and I ought to know, because every year I'm the only camper out of 250 campsites with my own wood. This message may as well have said: "Dear Louisa at Wildwood campsite C-35" for all the relevance it has to anyone else in the world at large.
Saving the best for last, we are coming up hard and fast on Opening Day for baseball, which is no April Fool's Day joke, but a welcome harbinger of Spring and better days ahead. There is nothing like the sight of young men in pinstripes to chase away those winter doldrums once and for all. A home run, a couple of stolen bases and a double play should be all it takes to wipe those grim reminders of sleet and slush right out of our memories, and not a moment too soon. That is, unless Comrade Mischka lets loose with his infernal weather machine again, and we all have to head for the hills. Just don't bring any firewood with you.
This is Comrade Mischka from the Regulatory Office To Transform Environment & Nature, or ROTTEN, at the Kremlin in the glorious homeland of Mother Russia. So you think it is funny to laugh at us when our Clima-Tron 100 gives you weather that you don't like, nyet? This is bad. You should not laugh at Mother Russia. We know where you live, thanks to our spy satellite, the Flying Cossack 2. (It is a hideous bourgeois lie that the Flying Cossack 1 was lost in a card game to a circus elephant. We are still dragging the Volga for it and expect to locate it any day now.) You will not be finding it so funny, I think, when we send a blizzard, tornado and typhoon just to your house and not anywhere else around you. Ha-ha! Then the joke will be on you, and it will be Mother Russia who is laughing, da? Now if you want to make more jokes, remember that the Clima-Tron 100 also has raining frogs, locusts and boils. Please to enjoy the ROTTEN weather that we are sending you right now!
April Fools! Okay, I admit that for some people, it's a little bit early for April Fool's Day jokes, but I bet I really had you going with that one. (Oh admit it, you looked out the window to see if it was really snowing outside, courtesy of our friends with the Kremlin's infernal weather machine.) Actually, our weather here is much improved from what it was, although it would be hard NOT to be an improvement, the way things were going there for a while. But now it seems that the tide has finally turned, and our yard is awash in perky purple crocus, jolly yellow jonquils, and even a rare early pink hyacinth, which I've never seen in March. So there is reason for optimism, and for many of us, life has regained its meaning.
Not all of us, perhaps. I had an irate co-worker storm into my office this week, asking permission to kill the Accounting staff. (Her own boss had waved her away with a weary, "Oh, the line for that would just be out of this world.") For my part, I told her she would have to wait until after Easter, because after all, this is Lent, and right on the doorstep of Holy Week besides, so it wouldn't do to be killing anyone at this point. She accepted the logic of my argument with bad grace, and said that she was just about ready to scream and pull her hair out. I reminded her that she was building character, and pretty soon, she'd have so much character that she wouldn't be able to bend. She laughed and said that she was sure that I was going to Heaven, so I said I would save her a spot. She didn't think she would need it, she admitted, because she thought that she was going the other way, and I said that many times, I was also convinced of that eventuality for me as well, and I would save her a spot there too. That might have just been my Evil Twin speaking.
Speaking of going in the wrong direction, what the heck has happened to gasoline prices lately? I drive past a Sunoco station on my way home from work, and I started noticing a few weeks ago that every time I went past, the price had gone up another few cents a gallon. At first, I thought this was just some strange isolated occurrence, and it would soon come back down again, but apparently not. The price of regular has gone from $2.50/gal the last time I got it, to over $2.90/gal in just about a month. And the odd thing is that I haven't heard any frenzied news reports of national or international (or even inter-galactic) catastrophes recently that could account for this whopping increase. (And really, as Edwin Newman once ruminated, at what point does an increase begin to “whop” anyway?) Frankly, I don't mind saying that I'm disgusted with the whole bunch of them, and I am unanimous in that. I've been telling Fabio, my Escort, that if the prices don't come down soon, he'll be staying at home and I'll be walking to work, because I'm certainly not shelling out more than $2.90/gal just to drive to my job halfway across town. I may be a lot of things, but I'm nobody's fool. On the other hand, it seems to me that the gas prices around here invariably go down as soon as I've filled up the tank, so I should probably do everyone in the area a big favor and just go and get gas, so that everybody else can benefit from the lower prices afterwards. 'Tis a far, far better thing I do .....
Speaking of Fabio, one thing I discovered with the recent nasty snowstorms and ugly conditions, is that the Escort handles fairly well in snow, but there’s no point in trying to drive it through drifts. I've gotten used to cars that are a little heavier in the front, and once you got some momentum on their side, the Tempo or the Gremlin would muscle through piles of snow to a clearing on the other side, and eliminate some shoveling by sheer force of mass. I found out too late that the Escort and I were of two minds about this prospect, when I attempted this maneuver in front of the house, and found myself high and dry and stranded precariously atop the plow tailings in my way. According to the owners manual, the Escort is not really much lighter weight than the Tempo or the Gremlin, so I have the feeling that the problem is more a ground clearance issue than anything else. The Escort rides so close to the road, on its teensy lawnmower tires, that it can't possibly drive through anything deep without running aground on it under the chassis. It wouldn't do to call Fabio a "fair weather friend," but you can be certain that I'll always be carrying a snow shovel with me, that's for sure.
Alert readers might be wondering what's going on in the wonderful world of firewood. Well, wonder no more. Everyone knows that if February has come and gone, I must have already started chopping firewood for camping, and they'd be right on the mark. We have branches falling into our yard all year long, and I usually saw them up in the winter, to avoid the twin problems of insects and over-heating. I've made some good progress already, and have a sizable collection of cut logs drying nicely in the garage, which I would expect to be in perfect condition just in time for my vacation. I can't think of anything that could be better, and all of that hard work will be well worth it. Not so fast! I know this seems like just another April Fool's Day joke, but I actually got this message last week:
==============================
Dear New York Park & Campground Visitor,
Please read the important information below from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation concerning important information for your next visit to a Park or Campground in New York State.
Don't Move Firewood!
Bringing your firewood with you? Most people don't realize they move bugs along with their firewood. You could be spreading diseases from insect invaders that can quickly kill large numbers of trees. Our forests are at risk from the transport of firewood infested with tree killers. Help STOP THE SPREAD of these pests:
Leave firewood at home, do not transport it to campgrounds or parks.
Use only firewood from local sources.
If you bring firewood, burn ALL of it before leaving your campsite.
For more information go to: www.dec.ny.gov (search word: firewood).
==============================
Now, my only question about this is, are they hallucinating, or am I? I don't know how many millions of people go camping in this country every year, but apart from me, have you ever in your entire life, heard of one single, solitary individual who brings firewood camping with them, ever? Who thinks that this is such a huge national problem that they have to send out mass warnings against it? I already know that it's not true, because whenever I mention to anyone that I carry firewood with me, they invariably look at me like I'm a three-headed polka-dot space alien who just landed from another planet. There is absolutely not one person in their right mind that brings firewood camping with them, and I ought to know, because every year I'm the only camper out of 250 campsites with my own wood. This message may as well have said: "Dear Louisa at Wildwood campsite C-35" for all the relevance it has to anyone else in the world at large.
Saving the best for last, we are coming up hard and fast on Opening Day for baseball, which is no April Fool's Day joke, but a welcome harbinger of Spring and better days ahead. There is nothing like the sight of young men in pinstripes to chase away those winter doldrums once and for all. A home run, a couple of stolen bases and a double play should be all it takes to wipe those grim reminders of sleet and slush right out of our memories, and not a moment too soon. That is, unless Comrade Mischka lets loose with his infernal weather machine again, and we all have to head for the hills. Just don't bring any firewood with you.
posted by El Tango Fandango @ 8:50 PM
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