Francis Bellamy

Each day life gets more confusing for me.  And I’ll bet it’s not just me who is at sea.

In kindergarten, the hardest thing I had to remember after my name and address and phone number was the Pledge of Allegiance.

My previous four years were mostly concentrated on where certain toys were and when Roy Rogers was going to be on television.  Suddenly, I was thrown into a world of order that was totally foreign to me. 

Along with a morning prayer for all people, including the Pope and President, and our families, we recited the Pledge with our hands over our hearts, just as most every child in America.

We faced the hanging flag during the Pledge, and then turned to face the crucifix for the prayer.  It was pretty simple, actually.

None of my scholastic equals really knew what we were saying, as four of us were likely peeing in our pants during this exercise.

Not the Nike logo, alas

In any case, as we grew and co-mingled throughout elementary school, we eventually realized what those words meant.

By way of history, the Pledge of Allegiance was penned by a man named Francis Bellamy in 1892.  That special writing consisted of 29-words; it was modified to 31-words in the 1950’s with the Congressional addition of two more, “under God.”

And all was well.

All was well until an atheist named Madalyn Murray O’Hair, known as The Most Hated Woman in America, fought for the right of her stupid son to be free of saying a morning prayer in school, that is. 

Activist O’Hair received the attention she desired and, through the court system, got schools to cease forcing kids to recite prayers.  The logic there is the separation of church and state.  Of course, they got it wrong.

In any case, the toothpaste was now out of the tube, and liberals were agog with ways to break our nations back of sense and order by invoking subtle mayhem to brains of elementary school mush.

Since the door was now open, those offensive words “under God,” became the new target of America haters and general rabble-rousers.

Although it took a few years, the court system decided – with the benefit of commie malcontents – to attack the Pledge of Allegiance.

Sensitive minds were being infiltrated with a sense of pride and hope through freedom and civility.  We were a nation from many turned into one.

It’s hard to believe that after all those years of pledging allegiance to the country in which I am living is now considered something bad.

Who says so?

At least a few newly elected Congressfolk – one of whom was born in the toilet named Somalia – has become pretty testy.  She was brought here as a child and wound up in Minnesota, from whence, after a brief political career there, she was elected to the United States Congress.

Because she clearly hates America, white men, and its close ally Israel, she has been spouting hate toward both nations, with impunity.

However, she is in good company.

A handful of years ago, a central New Jersey family brought a lawsuit on a New Jersey school district to remove the hateful words, “under God,”  from the Pledge.

Clemson University’s Student Government members refused to stand for the Pledge during a meeting, because of its racist and hurtful meaning.

The Santa Barbara City College Board eliminated the divisive Pledge of Allegiance before meetings.

And Minnesota’s St. Louis Park City Council felt it necessary to quit saying the Pledge, out of concern of inclusiveness.  Sure.  In all fairness, after a near-riot, this brain trust decided it prudent to re-instate the Pledge.

In kindergarten, I also learned a cute saying, “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.”

Welcome to the Sensitive States of America.

Greasy

 

There are three vocations in life I simply detest; jewelers, telemarketers, and auto insurance agents, are on the top of my list.

Jewelers exploit the joy of marriage and the angst of holidays with over-priced metal and stones from the dirt on which you are standing.  They smile as they hand over rings and bracelets and watches while convincing you this moment is special and needs to be remembered.

Of course you remember that moment every month when the payment is due, for the next seven years.  But I digress.

Then there are telemarketers.  They call when you least expect it, and pretend to be offering you a service you need; you don’t.  Their spiel goes like this: “I’m Ted from…”

Click.  This is when I abruptly hang up.

They are using your time on your phone to steal your data minutes to annoy you.  There’s a special place in Hell for them, and I want to be the warden.

Rounding out the top three are insurance agents.  Auto insurance agents are arrogant, smarmy, narcissistic, greasy, smelly, leisure suit-wearing, hair comb-over, yellow teeth, douchebags, for which I have a mild disdain.

Since I began driving, these jerks have been doing all the driving for me.  They steer the insured toward very expensive options for personal injury, bodily injury, comprehensive, collision, and fire.  Theft is another option they won’t mention unless your car was stolen, at which point you’ll receive a free lecture on why you should have bought it.

At one time, I had a rare antique car.  Someone stole the windshield.  You read that right – stole it from the car.  It was hard-to-find and expensive. The insurance agent began his free lecture at that time.  It didn’t help my blood pressure.

Recalling another instance was when a snowplow kicked up a stone and put a pebble divot in another windshield of mine.  I got is fixed and sent the bill to my insurance company.  My agent at that time gave birth to puppies on his office floor over the $100 bill.

That was a free lecture that wasn’t free.  But I didn’t care.  Over the years I likely spent enough for car insurance to buy General Motors.  One little claim sent Allstate over a cliff, though.

But it was always the “age” thing that got my underwear in a bunch.  As a young man, I was charged and “extra” premium.  That was because young men were dangerous on the roads.  The bonus is that when I reached my mid-twenties, my premiums would drop.

The exception to that rule is that the baby-boomers were such a large group a slush fund was needed to cover the anticipated higher costs.  Sure.

Then when I was married, my rates would automatically be reduced.  But they weren’t automatically reduced inasmuch as I now had a newer vehicle whose replacement cost would be prohibitive.

Rest assured, though, when I retired my rates were guaranteed – GUARANTEED – to make Ripley take notice.  Alas.

Since I was now older, my reflexes were thought less than that of one of those exuberant young men in their teens and early twenties.

Just as an aside, many insurers “bundle” to lower your costs to insure your vehicle, boat, home, helicopter, and trampoline.

Unfortunately, many insurers – including Allstate – refuse to insure homes in Florida.  That means bundling rates don’t apply.

I’m delighted the arrogant, smarmy, narcissistic, greasy, smelly, leisure suit-wearing, hair comb-over, yellow teeth, douchebags, are finally getting theirs with the guvment putting the squeeze on them through health insurance bills.

Soon they’ll be able to get telemarketer jobs since they’re already qualified.

Gaming the System

We have just passed the magical mark in American history.  A soccer team only recently won another World Cup title.  Yeah!

Real winner in contest with American sports

I remain sufficiently vague about the winning team details because of the antics proudly produced by its members. At least one captain knelt during the National Anthem, and afterward, this team refused to meet President Trump.  This is not the idea “national” representation a patriot would like to see.  But I digress.

This team was made up of lesbians and black and white “women.”  I felt the need to use the word “women” in quotes because no one seems to have the desire to check their hormone make-up either before or after the contest.

I also used the word lesbians because a team member specifically said lesbians were among those players, as were black and white women.  I left out the colored hair punctuation made during her lame speech.

Not a big deal, you say?

Under the Soviet Union, the old Russia, female athletes fielded by some of their satellite countries were more man than woman, from a hormonal perspective.

We know because they won much too often over other athletes, and therefore were tested for gender.

Unfortunately, most did not pass.  But the damage was already done.

So it was in the name of purity in the sports world that women should compete with women-like women.  And all was good.

Until American politicians felt they needed fix things.  And just as they always do, they couldn’t have messed it up more.

Guvment lawyers, most of whom are politicians, are not very good either; they are awful politicians, and likely the worst lawyers.  A good lawyer working in the private sector can make $500,000 per year, without trying.  Guvment lawyers start at $90,000.  You decide.

So it was those guvment types that created the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) to remedy this women problem.

It seems they felt there was rampant discrimination in schools against women, women’s sports programs, and pregnancy issues, only smart guvment-types could fix.

Since it was illegal to discriminate against anything – including stupid, dangerous behavior that could endanger an unborn baby – those who wanted to keep pregnant woman out of wrestling venues could be sued for discrimination.  Yeah!

Suddenly the balance of common sense was tilted toward ignorance, but some opportunistic individuals noticed and decided to exploit the system created by the guvment lawyer brain trust.

Fast forward to today.  Men are rapidly becoming transgendered and entering women’s sports as women.  Of course, they’re not either, but they usually have a hormonal advantage against the “fairer sex.”  This is taking a page from the Soviet playbook about which we complained some decades ago.

Competing against women-by-birth, men usually win.  This has been happening in many high schools in America where kids vie for scholarships in college to play sports.

The high school girls are now carping about boys out-performing them in track and field events, and are now crying “foul.”

And so they should.

But because we, as a nation, have crossed an imaginary line of identity politics, saying women are men and men are women, discrimination allegations are easy to levy.

So, who’s to blame?

Could it be the transgender community? Maybe the guvment lawyers?  How about media whore politicians?  Perhaps the smarmy kids who are learning to cheat the system?

Here’s a thought: get naked, look down, and then decide what sex you are.  Then you can play sports or use the appropriate bathroom the civilized way.

In any case, it’s time to say, “Stop it!” right now. 

Not My Baby

Over the past few years I’ve seen more and more commercial ads for something called DNA testing.  Deoxyribonucleic acid, otherwise known as DNA, is the substance that holds genetic information.

That information includes our race, sex, eye color, hair color and texture, and physiologies such as height, weight, and even propensities to develop diseases and maladies.

DNA results

DNA kits were initially sold to identify biological parents of children born to mothers and fathers of questionable chastity.  They popped up on smarmy television programs over the years and have finally made their way into the average person’s home.

The companies vending these simple identification methods are now telling the prospective consumers this will help discover ancestry via testing.

For example, theoretically you would get tested to determine what information your genes possessed.  Those data would be compared to data submitted by other DNA testees.  Eventually, an overlap in genetic material would be found, which would be able to determine country of ancestry.

While seemingly innocuous, this information, besides recognizing long-diluted races of peoples and families, can suggest possible links to familial maladies.  Angelina Jolie discovered a possible link in her genes to breast cancer and subsequently had a double mastectomy performed as a proactive means to avoid future issues.

Other people are learning their heritage was from Sub-Saharan Africa, only to have been watered down into believing their background as Caucasian.  Even a current Democratic presidential candidate, Elizabeth Warren, touted herself as an American Indian, allegedly receiving financial and other beneficial treatment as a government-approved minority.

Subsequent DNA testing indicated Smokey the Cat has more American Indian blood than Ms. Warren.  Alas.

Law enforcement has been using DNA as a means to both positively connect and rule out evidence to individuals, cementing convictions that are usually unquestionable in court.

As you can see, such innovation can be bittersweet.

I personally believe this “private” information, collected and stored by testing entities, will be subject to disclosure to health and life insurance companies.

Both those insurers have a vested interest in knowing if someone has a propensity to develop heart problems, diabetes, or cancer.  These purveyors of a means of legalized gambling, of sorts, will certainly try to charge an insured person more if they are more susceptible to wind-up with a costly, catastrophic ailment for which they are financially responsible.

So it was with this in mind that I began paying more attention to those genetic testing ads.  It didn’t take long for them to gravitate from selling these tests in order to identify long-lost relatives, to discovering which genes you have affecting your daily life.

They name some scientific identifiers for the gene causing your leg to twitch, or the gene that makes you light-sensitive, or one which can cause you to have a cleft pallet. 

But I feel such information can be intrusive – much like offering your fingerprints to the FBI – to see if you are unidentified as a suspect in any past crimes.

So it was at this point I began mentally perusing my immediate family’s heritage and history.

Breaking things down by parents, my Mother was terrible at math and spelling; my Father excelled at math and fractions, but was okay at spelling. 

My sister was a book-learner who had an eidetic memory, but had difficulty applying what she saw and read; practicality was absent.

I, on the other hand, also have an eidetic memory, but am poor at spelling. 

With words that should be spelled phonetically, you can clearly see how I could misspell “foneticly.” 

“Eidetic” is another word that seems to be spelled incorrectly; “idetic” would be more appropriate.

So to all the nuns in elementary school, I apologize, but my inability to spell was not my problem or that of the spelling books.

It’s evident I got the bad spelling gene.  I confess.

Personalized Tools

Many years ago there was a television show, Home Improvement, which starred Tim Allen as a fellow who regularly modified tools and home appliances for the sake of both inventing genius and amusement.

This weekly show had Tim “The Toolman” Taylor, played my Mr. Allen, creating such things as motorized beverage coolers, gas powered garbage disposals, and self-propelled recliners.  All this was done in jest, although The Toolman felt otherwise, much to the chagrin of his TV wife.

While this was fun and light-hearted, I took notes from him throughout the duration of the program and just realized how valuable they have become.

If you are an employee of OSHA – the Occupational Safety Health Administration – I suggest you quit reading here and find the Sudoku in the newspaper and tackle that, for your own good.

OSHA has been making tools and machinery safe for consumer and commercial use for decades, and had done a yeoman’s job.  Perhaps too good, though.

About 20-years ago I bought a self-propelled mower to replace a hand-me-down that was 18-years of age.

This new mower came fully equipped with individual wheel adjustments, a bagging attachment, and a dead man’s switch.

For the lawn mowing novice, a dead man’s switch is a device that must be constantly depressed lest the mower conk out.  It is so-named because a similar device is used on trains to ensure stoppage of a train should the engineer pass away while at the controls.

This thoughtful device is pure brilliance until you are mowing a lawn, that is.  Seasoned between the tall grass blades are hidden gum wrappers, sticks, kid’s toys, and dog poop that was all previously undiscovered.

That shouldn’t be a surprise as I have no kids, don’t chew gum, and have never owned a dog.  Sticks, I have aplenty, though.

So it is when I reach these obstacles I need to walk away from the mower pushing and begin the bending and picking up activities.  Unfortunately, this is where the aforementioned dead man’s switch becomes more of a nuisance than a safety device.

As soon as I let go of it, the mower stops.  Dead.  DEAD.

Now I have to restart the engine which, at this time, is warm and difficult to get running again.

A sleepless night and some Wild Turkey on-the-rocks gave me the answer I was seeking.  A few hours in the workshop enable to circumvent the dead man’s switch which meant I was now in control of my life, again.

Picking up debris from the grass, moving lawn furniture, and relocating potted plants, had now become the easiest my little corner of the world had witnessed in some time.

That is until last week when I needed to buy a new gas can.

It seems as though OSHA employees have raucous Christmas parties and desperately search for material to make the other office help laugh and laugh and laugh until next Christmas.

This past year they insisted all gas can sales include a pouring spout designed by someone with quite a sense of humor and lack of intelligence genes.

I filled the five-gallon plastic red can up and recapped it for the ride home.  Upon arrival, I tried to pour my recent purchase of 87-octane fuel into my Ferris mower.  And I tried.  And tried.  To no avail.

Worthy of the death penalty.  Really, as it nearly killed me.

I eventually removed the pouring spout which wouldn't pour and therefore wasn’t much of a spout.  But I digress.

Embossed in the black plastic of the spout were words that made no sense.  It instructed me to “press here” to pour, and “press here” to store.  Neither instruction worked.  Nothing came out of the can.

It was at this time I wondered what The Toolman would do.  While the pouring spout was off the gas can, I modified it with a five-pound sledge hammer/customizer, transforming it into even more useless junk than when I bought it.

I got out my funnel and poured the fuel directly through it – unsafely – into the mower.

Good work OSHA!