Stupider and Stupider

Just recently I read about a young man who was in the midst of passing around a petition to get California to secede from the United States of America.  This guy, who appeared to be in his mid-twenties, insisted this move was good for California; this guy is from California.

He had lots of answers, albeit half-baked, when it came time to explain financial matters, immigration issues, military protection, and the interstate highway system.  He wanted out.  Period.

Sure this secession would be good, but not for California.  The state is run by aging communists and socialists, hippies, do-gooders, and illegal immigrants.  They are largely in debt because of all their social programs and socialist grants to solve planet Earth problems related to the environment, and fund anyone with an extended hand looking for a freebie.  The United States government picks up the balance of their frivolities for which California cannot afford.

The country would change its name to the Nearly United States of America, but the good news is that most of the country would stand for the National Anthem.

So it was with interest that I also read a news story concerning the invasion of people in California making their way to their local hospitals.  From a Redding, California, television station news website, people were crowding emergency rooms because of the recent solar eclipse.

Don’t get ahead of me.  It’s not likely what you think.

Sure, their eyes were burning, but that was because – drum roll, please – they didn’t buy those cheesy cardboard solar eclipse glasses.  No, they instead put sun screen on their eyeballs to protect themselves from looking at the Sun.

Yep.  No lie.  I can’t make this stuff up.

It seems as though these mental giants opted for a budget solution to viewing the solar eclipse of a lifetime.  It was broadcast over both network and cable TV for hours.  No one needed to look up, but they did.

Now, they are in a heap of hurt – until the next solar eclipse in 2024, that is.  You know these dolts will repeat their bone-headed stunt in seven years.  But I digress.

I must admit I never, ever thought about putting sun screen in my eyes, for any reason whatsoever, much less to stare at the Sun.

According to the Center for Disease Control, getting sunscreen in your eyes will not cause permanent eye damage.  It will make you wish you weren’t so stupid as to apply it to your eyeballs, though.

The pain should subside in a couple of days.  Yea!

But, California seceding would appear to help the other 49 states’ in their effort to lower health insurance costs.  I’m just saying.  Now secession sounds really promising.

Seeya!

Lightning

Each year at tax time, without fail, some news story will rise to the top of all others.  Invariably that story will focus on the person who feels overburdened; to make that point, they wind up paying their assessment in pennies.

Equally as entertaining are those non-tax time stories about local municipalities who really, really need the money and the taxee doesn’t.  So the taxee gets creative by wheeling a wheel barrow into the tax assessor’s office, closely followed by the eager media.

Camera flashes and guffaws from onlookers fill the television.  A startled, bespectacled clerk in a flowered nylon dress completes this scene, with the narrating news-readers smiling about how all that loose change will occupy the valuable civil servant time.

People like me cheer those rebels of local government because of the creativity and arrogance.  Because the money turned over is legal tender, it must be accepted.  Pesos and Euros are not adequate.

Here is where today’s story begins. 

I am a regular lottery player.  The Powerball and Megamillions are two games that eagerly await my money each week.  Now some readers are laughing at me because what I am doing is paying a “voluntary” tax.

This cash is nothing more than a vehicle to fill the state and local government coffers with money from idiots like me, gleefully sauntering into my favorite lottery-selling store, and plunking down a couple of bucks.

I don’t complain, carp, tear up, or whine; I just hand over the money with a smile.  And each week I discover I didn’t win, again.  And again I go out to pay more voluntary tax for the next drawing.

But today is different.  This next Powerball drawing, for August 23^rd, has an estimated jackpot, for one winner, of $650,000,000.

 

Of course, we must pay taxes on the winnings.  Federal tax alone is roughly $247,000,000!  That’s more money than I spend on cat litter each year.  But I digress.

To sum this up, we pay a voluntary tax to buy a ticket, then we must pay a tax if we win.  No wonder people pay their taxes in nickels.

In any case, this is about the time when all those logical poor folks enthusiastically give people like me their personal sage advice.

They are quick to point out how my chances of getting struck by lightning are 12 times that of winning the lottery.  Or, to put is more succinctly, I could outrun Seabiscuit for the Triple Crown.

Still, to validate my own modest spending on entertainment, I simply look at my movie watching habits.

I subscribe to a mail-order movie service.  I spend $11 per month to get movies sent to my door from a place we’ll refer to as Getflix, whose name I cleverly hid.

Over the years, my sainted wife and I have seen over three hundred Getflix movies and have only genuinely enjoyed perhaps eight. 

Those are disappointments to me, but just as with the lottery numbers, I get to select what I see, and the numbers that I play.  If I am disappointed, it’s my own fault.

But if I do win, I will arrive at Powerball Headquarters with a trailer to pick up my winnings I would like to receive in dollar bills.  Pity the bank.

So there you have it.  If you’re a lottery player and actually do win the jackpot, remember all those naysayers and lighting statistic enthusiasts.

And say. “Hey,” for me.

Off to the Pokey

Who says there is no good news? 

While trolling the internet, I noticed that our sophisticated British brethren are every bit as stupid and heartless as our New Jersey brethren on this side of “The Pond.”

In mid-July, East Londoners were holding something they call Lovebox Festival.  Evidently, this extravaganza is well-received and well-attended; this is where it gets good.

An enterprising 5-year old lass decided it was time for her to capitalize on this situation by setting up a lemonade stand along the foot route.

We at EasternShoreFishAndGame.com are protecting her identity because of her tender age, but not the facts.

The thorough police – whom are also known as “bobbys” – from Tower Hamlets, felt they needed to change their moniker to “boobys.” 

To accomplish this task, the British cops felt compelled to crack down on illegal activities within their purview.  In this instance it was the purveying of homemade lemonade.

Yup.

This type of behavior is usually reserved for public American toilets such as New York City, Chicago, and Washington, D.C.  Not wanting to be left out of the action, Tower Hamlet bobbies decided it was time to make the arrest of the century, and the news.

It seems as though this felon-in-training was arrested by the local cops and fined $195.  The charge was “trading without a license.”

While I’m certain there is no other crime in Great Britain, and there are absolutely no scams being operated and directed toward unsuspecting Brits, this collar was the crown jewel toward breaking the back of underground lemonade operations.

I can just imagine the scene back at the bobby station.

High-fives and smiles all around.  Chuckles about how their SWAT team clearly overcame adversity of a kindergartener armed with paper cups and drinking straws.

Normal people would applaud this young lady’s entrepreneurial spirit and drive.  On the other hand, the Tower Hamleters are likely dyed-in-the-wool socialists who typically frown upon citizens who try to make a living for themselves without sucking on the guvment teet.  Their motto?  Perhaps it’s “We’ll teach you a lesson in free enterprise!”

In any case, it’s good to see there are nitwits all around the world who continue to provide fodder for our blog.

Thank you, Tower Hamlet!

American, Please

Because I’m a little long-in-the-tooth, mobility is not what it once was.  In high school, I ran the half-mile in track; it has since been changed to the “880 meter run,” something that was desperately needed because of the metric system.

It seems that the half-mile and 880 meters are one in the same but, to make our north-of-the-border, and south-of-the-border folks feel more welcome, we have slowly adopted the metric system of ruining America.

My sainted wife and I decided that our status as relics deserved a treat, so we opted for a new toilet in the guest powder room.  My sainted wife calls it the powder room because it sounds nicer than bathroom. 

I don’t think it is anywhere nearly as descriptive as it should be, because there’s not an iota of powder – talc or otherwise – to be found therein.  There is, however, a bathtub neatly situated inside.  But, I digress.

It was off to the giant hardware store to shop for powder room accoutrements.

Upon arrival, we were met with a compendium of lavatories suitable for most needs. Oddly enough, all were made of porcelain, and were white in color.

Stop laughing right now.  Back in the 1970’s style dictated kitchen and bath appliances be offered in harvest gold, and avocado green, along with white.  Matching tile and patterned linoleum flooring created a late-century train wreck motif that evoked nausea.

It so happens our house contains both the green and gold bathroom versions!

This shopping spree was to help make one powder room more comfortable by installing a taller, more elongated potty in lieu of the current round gold version.

It’s been a long time since I shopped for toilets; six decades, actually.  So, it was with amazement that I ran across more toilets than I could imagine.  It was time to enlist the aid of a store professional.

Alas, there was none so, we found Chip from the lawn mower department was willing to assist us.  Chip knew just a smidgen less about toilets than Smokey the cat.

He patiently read the information off the boxes to us, as though my sainted wife and I were Serbian refugees without the ability to form Basic English sentences.

He eventually reached the part that explained each flush used 3.8 liters of water.  Then, he went on to try to tell us this particular model was crafted in America.

But it was the 3.8 liter part that had me baffled.  Just how much was 3.8 liters?

So I asked Chip, “Just how much is 3.8 liters?”

Suddenly, Chips eyes glazed-over and began to swirl as if tiny tear eddies formed in his eyes.  Nearly 37 seconds crept by when I began calling him out of his trance.

“Chip!  Chip!  Chip!” with only modest success.

Apparently Chip was not the scholar his employer envisioned him as. 

I began thinking about all those packages bearing product pictures and copious writing crowded with both English and Spanish advertising.  Somewhere on that packaging there could surely be enough free space to include the American equivalent to 3.8 liters.

Surely I was wrong.  And so, I let the scholars among us buy all the toilets they wanted.  I will keep my harvest gold treasure for a while longer.