Facts

 

 

 

 

 

 

Facts are good, except when Democrats are speaking.  No, this is not a political column today; rather it is the truth with an analogy.  Nonetheless, here are a few facts.

 

• Gale-force winds will appear when you try to sweep your sidewalk.
• Not a breath of air will blow if you attempt to fly a kite.
• You cannot lick your elbow.
• Someone will call when you are sitting on the toilet.

 

In that same vein, someone asked me if I was going to see the new Star Wars movie.  I told them it had been some time since I’ve been in a theater, and it’s not because of armed patrons sitting next to me.

 

The last time I was in a movie house was 1997, when I saw Batman, starring George Clooney.

 

Back then, the cinema was packed and, as usual, someone jumped up in the middle of a tense scene as the villain was creeping up behind Batman, and yelled, “Look out!  He’s behind you!”

 

Yes, this person believed she could warn Batman he was in danger.  She couldn’t.  She did get the attention of everyone else, though.

 

Before that, I would enter a theater and scope out a good place to sit.  Stereo was coming into vogue and that was instrumental to a pleasurable movie experience, to me.

 

I also needed a place where I could see the screen fairly well.  And although I’m a spitting-image of Tom Selleck and built like him, I usually found myself in a poor position.

 

Just as the upcoming trailers were running, a giant cowboy with a 30 gallon hat would mosey over to the row in front of me and settle into the seat directly in front of me.  I’d be better off listening to the movie on the radio.

 

Or a woman with one of those queen-sized hairdos – the kind that would shame Carmen Miranda (look her up) – would plop her derriere in my line-of-sight, rendering me blind to the screen.

 

Keep in mind this sort of bad luck was not limited to movies.  Seminars at work, classes in school, and civic meetings were also subject to this sort of artificial blinding.

 

Not unlike parking your car in a lot, only to return to discover the Queen Elizabeth II docked right next to you.  You can’t back out because you can’t see.  As you ease your sedan into the aisle in reverse, Dale Earnhardt, Jr. comes by at 210 MPH blowing his horn to tell you he’s an assclown.  But, I digress.

 

My seat was rendered useless because I was unable to see the screen to the overhead projector, missing the important points of the entire exercise.  I would lean the left, the big coiffed woman would lean to the left; I would lean to the right, and she would too.

 

The only way I could see around her was to jump up and yell, “Look out!  He’s behind you!”

 

 

Really?

While traipsing about The Eastern Shore last week, I came across a sign that read “The Eastern

Shore’s Best Fried Chicken.”

 

I eat a lot and a lot of that food consists of fried chicken.  And, some of that chicken was had at restaurants, fast food joints, diners, even gas stations, but this sign was prominently placed in front of a flea market.

 

This is a place I visit semi-frequently, going inside to use the restroom, on occasion.  The restrooms are located very nearby the kiosk that vends food, including that “Best Fried Chicken.”

 

Fearing being a victim of a grease fire, I do my business as quickly as possible, then exiting.  On the way out the door I always notice a lengthy queue of food patrons awaiting their orders.  And I always say a brief silent prayer for their continued health.

 

Not being the bravest soul on the planet I have trepidations about eating fried chicken from this oily spectacle.  I’d ask those in line about the quality of that chicken but, I don’t speak Spanish.

 

Nonetheless, I went about my trek and wondered about how the judging was accomplished.  Awarding this hole-in-the-wall “The Eastern Shore’s Best Fried Chicken” trophy was odd, to say the least.

 

Not recalling a ballot or questionnaire regarding the gustatory perception of fried chicken anywhere near The Shore, I felt compelled to research this matter for our readers.

 

It so happens that there are lots of “bests” on The Shore.  There are oyster roasts, parties, hotels, beaches, high schools, weddings, festivals, bands, car dealers, ceramic tile centers, variety stores, coastal towns, magazines, newspapers, universities, and crabs.

 

I had no idea.

 

Evidently these elections are private affairs, as I have never seen a ballot for something akin to the “best bait,” or “best incomprehensible dialect.”

 

Still, I tried to help our readers sort out the best from the mediocre and the so-so.  You’ll likely never see a sign reading “Stop Here for The Eastern Shore’s So-So Tire Shop.”  If you do, write me.

 

So I realize this is, in many cases, a self-assigned honor designed to lure the hapless and misinformed into a particular business for the sake of saying, “gotcha!”

 

This sort of blind faith is okay for hotels, store, and ceramic tiles, but if you hear the word “ptomaine,” then it’s gotcha!

I’m Sick, Too!

Like cycles of the moon, fads come and go.  Pokemon©, Hula Hoop©, Frisbee©, and Paris Hilton, are all examples of fads that had their heyday and thankfully vanished into has-been status.

 

This also happens with foods.  Liquid chocolate fountains, chicken wings, fondue, and burned-tasting over-expensive coffee, are another few examples of fads that are going the way of the dodo.

 

Even medical woes have their days on the fad list.  Peanut allergies, kid’s braces, and over-tanning, have been added to that list.  And so has celiac disease, aka. CD.

 

Never being a fad kind-of-guy, chicken wings are about the only one with which I got involved, and it shows.

 

But today, nearly everyone you meet has CD. 

 

“I can’t eat bread because it has wheat flour,” is often heard being uttered by simple morons.

 

“Do you have celiac disease?” queries the deli owner.

 

“Uh, no.  But I heard wheat flour contains gluten, and gluten is bad,” proudly states the moron.

 

No, it’s not.

 

CD is a digestion problem that is caused by the ingestion of gluten in the form of wheat.  These vehicles include pasta, bread, cookies, cakes, and anything else made from wheat flour.

 

An estimated 100,000,000 American fad-followers are attempting to go gluten-free because they heard gluten was bad for you.  It is not, unless you have CD; otherwise, you are simply proving you are a sheep.

 

Only 1% of the population suffers from CD, and I sympathize with them.  It must be a terrible thing to live life without pizza or brownies.

 

I, too, suffer from allergies, including one from the spice sage.  Violently ill, would be the best way to describe my personal reaction to even smelling sage, much less eating it.  I do understand about real allergies.

 

But, people who merely want to join the fad of CD may actually be hurting themselves in the long run.

 

Your stomach may hurt because of your reduction of fiber.  You’ll be extra tired because you are ingesting fewer carbs.  Gluten-free foods often use rice as the filler; rice is a source of inorganic arsenic, and can contribute to lung cancer, bladder cancer, and type-2 diabetes.  Congrats!

 

In summation, businesses are trying to capitalize on your perceived medical issue of CD and are offering everything from gluten-free lap dances, to gluten-free haircuts.

 

Caveat emptor.  For those reader living in Philadelphia, that is Latin for ‘buyer beware.”

 

Next month it will be something new.  Just keep in mind that lead, uranium, and cocaine are gluten-free, too.

My Hair Hurts

“Like shooting fish in a barrel,” is an idiom that references just that.  Before the days of refrigeration, the act of removing fish from their travel vessels – barrels – was far easier to point a gun into the barrel and dispatch them by shooting them in that confined space, than to try to grab them alive.

 

This is similar to the situation of October 2, 2015, in Roseburg, Oregon’s Umpqua Community College.  There, a nut-job with a couple of guns took aim at students attempting to benefit themselves by improving their life-skills.

 

Without going into too much detail, mass murders seem to becoming the latest trend among the mentally ill among us.

 

Similar tragedies have occurred elsewhere over the past few years.  And, those similar tragedies are closely related.  They have all been committed by crazy losers who have an imaginary scab to pick on an innocent segment of society.

 

Offices, schools, theaters, day-car centers, shopping malls, and military bases, have all been subject to heinous crimes committed by animals who should have been institutionalized.

 

Even President Barack Hussein Obama noticed the actions of this shooter.  I specify this because he has yet to mention the shooting of Kate Steinle by an illegal alien with an illegal gun, while committing illegal acts such as trespassing and firearm possession.  He had no words for her or that murder.

 

But when President Obama found out about this horrible event, he decided to address it in a televised message.  Feigning crocodile tears, albeit missing the prop Kleenex tissue, he immediately condemned gun owners and the NRA for this act.

 

Quite similar to a scene from the movie Groundhog Day, President Obama predictably called for the Republican Congress to “do something.”  Those are code words for outlawing guns in America.

 

But this tragedy was somewhat different because we didn’t get information about the gunman for many, many hours after the news broke.  Leaks are common in these cases but, this one appeared odd.  No information about anything but his age.  The Roseburg Sheriff claimed he didn’t want the killer to receive desired notoriety.  That was baloney to the nth degree.

 

And then we found out why.

 

Chris Harper-Mercer was the nut-job coward.  He was in his mid-twenties, and was actually taking a class at Umpqua CC.

 

According to witness reports, this coward cornered the fish inside the gun-free zone classrooms and methodically asked each about their religion; where they were shot was dependent upon their answers.

 

Non-Christian, leg; avowed Christian, head. 

 

Confrontation with police led to this coward committing suicide.  Thank God he saved us the agony of a trial.  Amen.

 

However, the story does not end here, and we now know why.

 

The Los Angeles Times, a decidedly liberal rag disguised as a newspaper, just released the real reason President Obama, the Roseburg Sheriff, and the balance of the media refused to provide more details about that Harper-Mercer puke.

 

“The Los Angeles Times has labeled the Oregon shooter as having ‘white supremacist leanings’ even though the shooter was black." That was the headline reported by Breitbart.com.  And CNN, the Communist News Network, also reportedly re-tinted Harper-Mercer’s photo to give the impression he was Caucasian.  Pretty neat, eh?

 

I feel great remorse for the victims and their families, and especially President Obama who desperately tries to criminalize the people and guns who had nothing to do with anything.

 

His phony rants would be better placed if he applied them to the 14,000,000 aborted babies that he promotes and actually cheers.

 

You can’t have it both ways, brother.