Astute Observations

As we meander through life, we come across many things which are simply wonderful, some things that seem so-so, and a couple that are mediocre.  Then there are a few that fall into the category, “What Were You Thinking?” or WWYT.

 

One of the WWYT category items includes Google Glass.  Google Glass are odd-looking spectacles that have the ability to garner looks from nearby people – akin to a monster truck with 5-foot tall tires.

 

In any case, Google Glass are semi-frameless eyeglasses that have a tiny screen on which you can view internet-like applications, maps, and GPS, and allow you to record what you see – all day long.

 

They appear to be a contrivance fresh from a Star Trek episode and resemble corrective eyeglasses as closely as I resemble Michael Jackson.

 

Of course you will soon see more and more techno-weenies wearing these contrivances, although they look foolish.  Witness those Bluetooth thingamajigs that were oh, so popular a few years back.

 

As a kid, I needed to wear corrective eyeglasses, and suffered from bullies calling me names such as four eyes, and the like, just to be able to see the chalkboard in school. 

 

Then, we saw WWII veterans wearing hearing aids.  Those devices were large and resembled an eggplant protruding from ones ear.  Nonetheless, these prosthetic devices were needed to proceed through life with some sense of normality.  But, I digress.

 

But, Google Glass, like Bluetooth aural devices, are more for convenience and social status, than fashion.  Sure, you’ll say, “I need my Bluetooth so that I can talk while I drive.”

 

WRONG!  You should be paying attention while you are driving.  Period.

 

Still, these cutting-edge electronic apparatus’ easily identify the wearers as - well – dorky.

 

Back in the 1970’s, Texas Instruments released a new invention called a ‘pocket calculator.’  It, too, was cutting edge, in that it could add, subtract, multiply, and divide.  Those mathematical miracles were soon being worn on trouser belts, much like a soldier would wear war ribbons on his chest.  They were supposed to immediately identify the wearer as an engineer or accountant.

 

And, many folks were misidentified when they were commandeered by the masses and worn by anyone with the $100 to buy a pocket calculator.  But I digress, again.

 

Then, we entered a similar phase with cell phones.  They were proudly displayed on the britches of people with a sense of importance, and to display to the world that they had enough money to pay $7.18 per minute to talk on the early phones.

 

Today, we enter a new phase of the electronics age and are now witnessing a new fad that includes Google Glass.  And, we have new taunts for their users that refer to them as “Glass-holes.”

 

So, to all those jerks that tormented me when I was young, WWYT?  You’re getting yours now.  Congratulations!

Vaping

All the rage these days is the ability for “scientific” sorts to look down their noses, and point and sneer at the peons.  They make lofty statements in the line of, “Use science to get the facts,” or “Deniers have no place in America.”

 

These pithy statements are meant to shame non-believers of the ‘cause du jour.’ Particularly these days, the cause is “global warming,” or “climate change,” whichever fits your agenda.

 

If the weather is too cold, the correct term is climate change; if the weather is too warm, it is global warming.  Pretty simple, actually.

 

Day after day we hear this same droll drumbeat about using science to quell the naysayers.  And often it works.

 

I, and countless others, smoked cigarettes and cigars, starting before the Surgeon General pointed out that smoking was bad for us.  Little did we know that the cigarettes issued in c-ration packages were going to kill us faster than a speeding bullet.  Or, that my smoking was worse for my sainted wife in the vein of ‘second-hand smoke,’ than me actually puffing my own coffin nail with my personal lips.  Go figure.

 

Nonetheless I tried to quit.  And, like Mark Twain said, “Quitting is easy; I’ve done it a thousand times.”

 

That quote infers how difficult it is to stop using those addictive sticks loaded with chemicals and tars and nicotine.

 

Along the way, people invented patches and chewing gum containing nicotine.  Even nicotine-laden pills were available to stop the smoker from lighting up.  All have their strong points and weak points.

 

The self-righteous bullies insisted smokers stand in another room or outside to get their fixes, or not even live in the same building as non-smokers like lepers.  The smoking Gestapo made it clear that science dictated smokers needed to die to make way for healthy Americans and keep health care costs down.

 

And then, someone invented the electronic cigarette, or e-cig.  The e-cig is a device that resembles a paper and tobacco cigarette, instead with a battery and a filter filled with water vapor and maybe some nicotine.

 

The user charges the battery and inhales – much like they would with a paper cig – and the resulting concoction is a water vapor/nicotine blend that is odorless.  The vapor tastes like a real cigarette but, with no ill effects or smell for the user or bystanders.

E-cigs helped me, and thousands of other smokers, quit this habit in short order with no withdrawal of Mark Twain do-overs.

 

Thank goodness for the smoking Gestapos, though.  It seems as though they have a new cause to take up.  They now fear that somehow, that water vapor is dangerous to them and others and wish to ban the use if e-cigs from anywhere outdoors.

 

That scientific stuff they worried about with the global warming and climate change crap doesn’t mean anything now because their “science” is flawed.

 

If those whiners want people to quit smoking, let them use e-cigs as a tried and true method, and keep their noses in their own business for a change.

Easter Eggs

This is a special time of year when bunnies around the world begin laying eggs.  Since my cholesterol is usually sky-high, I resort to eating a more healthy choice of egg – the Easter egg.

 

They look enough like an egg to qualify for protein, although most dieticians would probably argue that fact.  Dieticians are those people who actually believe food can be bad for you; things like red meat, potatoes, and eggs, are among those bad things.  But, I digress.

 

In any case, chocolate bunny eggs and peanut butter eggs magically appear on store shelves, along with jelly beans.

 

President Ronald Reagan had it right when he announced his favorite candy was Jelly Belly jelly beans.  Jelly Belly makes all sorts of flavors – some of which are absolutely terrific, while others are absolutely awful.  Nonetheless, they’re worth trying.

 

But still we have chocolate-filled eggs.  Those chocolate-filled eggs are different than those whose innards resemble a “real” egg.  Yes, some chocolate eggs appear to have a yolk and albumin – that’s the white stuff – much like a chicken egg.  Of course, the yellow and white goodness is sugary sweet with the consistency of toothpaste.

 

Some eggs have peanut butter guts that I simply adore, and others even have raspberry or maple stuffing that is often whipped.  Those, too, aren’t all that bad.

 

Still, it is the confectioner’s world that brings us this special variety of candies that occur only at Easter time.

 

To me this is odd.  Catholics observe Lent – the six weeks before Easter – in pious ways, even giving special things up as a demonstration of devotion leading up to this most holy time of the calendar.  Too often, Catholics give up chocolate for Lent, and never get to taste those special flavors that create a party in your mouth.

 

Nonetheless, somehow this egg-from-a-bunny-rabbit tradition grew legs and is now difficult to explain to anyone, especially children.

 

It seems as though kids get classes in “sexual education,” shortened to “sex ed,” likely because they can’t spell for receiving too much sex ed.  They know that eggs are part of the reproductive system and that somehow, those chocolate eggs, whether filled with peanut butter, whipped raspberry, or merely hollow, don’t fit with the rabbit story.

 

Kids need the truth when it comes to real life.  Telling them bunnies lay chocolate eggs goes against everything they learned in school.  They see the Easter bunny as a giant lie that creates distrust later when you tell them about getting pregnant.  But, I digress, again.

 

Everyone of adult age knows that if left alone, all Easter eggs eventually will hatch marshmallow peeps.  If you don’t believe me, try it.

 

Happy Easter!

Tips

Each year around that time of year when Christians celebrate the birth of a special baby – whose name we cannot mention out of fear of offending some atheist douchebag – the topic of “tips” arises as a form of annual gift.  For those not so easily offended, I refer to Christmas.

 

Tips are those things that are tokens of our appreciation of the service that was extended to us by service personnel throughout the year.

 

Subject to receiving tips are people like barbers and hairdressers, regular waiters, our caddies, and landscaping and lawn mowing folks.  These people provide a service for our monthly, weekly, and daily needs, and include newspaper deliverers, garbage men, and even postal workers.

 

I must admit that in all my years of working at various jobs, I never got a monetary tip.  This is likely because my line of work – although rigorous and well performed – was not subject to the average Joe giving me extra money for diligently doing my work.

 

While this is not that generous time of year when gifts are exchanged, it is a splendid time to discuss giving tips to service personnel.

 

Our trashmen pick up our garbage twice weekly and arrive during the early morn hours of betwixt 3:30 and between 6:00 am.

 

These are ungodly hours for retired folks who desperately need their beauty rest.  The banging and slamming of the cans is nothing compared to the roar of the giant truck that can be heard making its way to my abode, blocks away.

 

Upon arrival, they feel the undying need to compact the contents of the previous houses in front of my house.  This noisy operation usually wakes everyone including the deceased – successfully, I might add.

 

When done with this un-ninja-like process, dogs-a-barking, they toss my garbage can on my front lawn to be dealt with upon my retrieval of my morning newspaper.

 

The paper is delivered daily at roughly 5:00 am, because apparently there isn’t enough ado in my neighborhood before the sun rises.  Once again, with dogs agog and 0-dark-thirty traffic jams, the hoopla continues.

 

My newspaper search begins.

 

Often it is on the lawn but, sometimes a little sport is involved.  A few times it was beneath the car, a couple of times it was on the neighbor’s lawn, twice I found it on the roof, and once it floated away during a torrential rainstorm.
 

When I talk about those Christmas tips, I am going to begin a new tradition that will likely please no one but me.

 

To the garbage men, their tip will be to be quiet before 7:00 am, and place my trash can upside-down on the curb.  Do not let it roll around in the street in order to cause a traffic wreck or simply be run over dictating my need to buy another new one.

 

And, to the newspaper gal, my proposed tip is to not make a game out of where it will be when I go out to get it in the morning.  I’m not on a treasure hunt or looking for truffles.

 

Those are pretty good tips that should be appreciated and savored year-round.

Radio

Since being a small child, I listened to the radio for music, news, sports, and general companionship.  At the time, “transistor radios” were new on the market, as all other radios were more clumsy than portable.  Radios were powered by plugging them in to outlets or by enormous batteries, most of which are now obsolete.

 

My radio was my best friend because it gave me a passport to the outside world, and a glimpse into popular music.  Eventually, though, I graduated to also listening to something termed “talk radio.”

 

Music is all well and good; with songs helping set your personal mood – making you smile, ruing for an old flame, or simply helping sustain the latest craze in melody – is so often needed.

 

But talk radio is that medium I used to think, “Who’s listening to that crap?”

 

Talk radio includes political pundits and sports gabbers.  I defer to the actual sporting events – such as ball games – over self-anointed authorities.

 

Answer: Me.  Now.

 

Rock and roll was terrific stuff to get your foot tapping and your head bobbing in rhythm. 

Some was really good, some not; much is still not, even though it can be heard on “oldies” stations.  There’s no technical definition of what an “oldie” is.  But, somehow, it was what I used to listen to in my younger years of dinosaur fighting.

 

Then, country and western music became appealing because its singers exuded my values and that of the Constitutional United States. 

 

Unfortunately, the airwaves became flooded with singers whose names had to begin with “Kellie,” “Carrie,” or “Kelley.” 

 

Some of these yodelers sprung up from that savior of talent void, American Idol.  Yes, that show produced many, many vocalists who closely mimicked a cat being beaten with a violin.  And yes, that also implies they all sound alike to me.

 

Unless you are stone-deaf, you likely heard those morons driving their cars that sound like fart machines with blaring “music.”  That junk pumping out of the rust holes and door seams is “urban hip-hop,” or rap.

 

There’s not much to it except for the poetry part.  The droning thuds that are rattling the glass are supposed to be there and evidently keep beat for this stellar display of any lack of real talent.  It is akin to listening to Jesse Jackson slurring a rhyme about silver oranges, while being accompanied by a toddler banging on a five-gallon bucket.  (An aside: Nothing rhymes with silver or orange, but I’ll bet Mr. Jackson would try.)

 

But listening to indecipherable speech with teeth-rattling, annoying thuds has some genuine appeal.  No it doesn’t.

 

So on I moved to sports and talk radio.  These yakkers aren’t much different than I, and most of the time they are preaching to the choir.  Still, it beats a sharp stick in the eye.

Frank Royalty

Being someone who enjoys eating, I had to learn to cook in order to save time and money.  Time, because traveling to and from restaurants, is costly; Money, because I’d rather tip myself than some strange waiter who secretly wants me to leave the restaurant.
 

At work I would talk to the women who were more than eager and willing to share culinary secrets with a kitchen novice such as me.

 

Hot dogs were becoming boring but, just as with ice, I had a good recipe.  And, you stick with what works.

 

As a bachelor, my cupboards were somewhat bare except for a few spices in vein of salt, pepper, hot sauce, and garlic powder.  Something exotic such as baking soda would errantly wander in but, that was rare.  Tooth picks and napkins were the rule.

 

So it was with great enthusiasm that I listened to all those wonderfully helpful and anxious women dishing out cooking hints.
 

They brought in recipes and usually had to add a verbal tip that somehow got left out of the written instructions.

 

“Oh, don’t forget to let it cook for and extra ten minutes for every pound,” they would insert in a squeaky Southern voice.  And then add, “350 degrees if under six pounds, 375 if over,” was another important fact that should not have been missing.

 

To avoid any such problems in the “real kitchen world,” I figured I would simply buy a real recipe book.

 

Much like panhandlers, cookbooks are everywhere.  Usually they are listed by food groups such as meats, desserts, grilling, and even special diets in the order of meals for vegetarians, and diabetics.

 

These books are written for the masses and I assumed – wrongly – that following these written kitchen roadmaps to cuisine Eden would be fairly simple to follow.

 

Zucchini-stuffed chicken seemed like a good beginning since I liked both zucchini and chicken.  This particular recipe called for two three-pound roasters; I immediately saw the need to half these instructions which called for some things like rice, chicken broth, zucchini, carrots, onions, and the basics of salt and pepper.

 

But, then came the ringer.  I call these stupid ingredients “ringers” because they either don’t exist or people feel they won’t use them and wind-up with an awful meal that can be blamed on the absence of those ringers.

 

My zucchini/chicken meal called to something called “chervil.”  As old as I am, I still do not know what chervil is and, have never bought any.

 

Being a tad short on chervil, the next recipe candidate was mustard-glazed country ribs, since I love pork ribs.  Once again, the four pounds were reduced to two and I shopped for the balance of the ingredients.  Sugar, vinegar, mustard, onion, garlic, salt, celery seed, and finally turmeric, comprised the list of fixin’s.

 

Once again, turmeric was the ringer and must be in the chervil family of must-haves.  I looked at chicken soup recipes, but that required saffron which – unbeknownst to me – was selling for the premium price of $139 an ounce!

 

It wasn’t long before I returned to work and began talking with the ladies about my stellar cooking skills that consisted of being able to prepare a hot dog nine different ways.  Call me the “Hot Dog King.”

Random Thoughts

Every now and then, the martinis wear off and I come across what I consider ‘random thoughts.’  Cogent beliefs are conjured-up in my puny mind when that fog clears and here are the results:

• Why are we now naming winter storms?
• With all the recalls, why would anyone think it a good idea to manufacture miniature toys to put into fast-food meals?
• Who wastes their time reading the warning labels on extension cords?
• When was the last time you changed a tire on your car?
• If I order my prescription drugs from Canada, does Justin Bieber deliver them?
• Why did you buy a four-wheel drive car just to stay home during a snowstorm?
• Who will be New Orleans’ Mayor Ray Nagin’s cell mate in “Chocolate City” prison?
• Does anyone really care about Phillip Seymour Hoffman’s drug overdose?
• Would people other than me like to see some new American athletes in the Olympics?
• Where are those kids getting their sub-standard educations?  Shouldn’t the government close those schools and fire those teachers?
• If people are so smart, why do they do such stupid things?
• Does your doctor think you realize you are overweight?
• Why do cops usually begin the traffic stop with a quiz?  “Do you know why I stopped you?”  I’m always afraid there may be more than one answer.
• I probably would have graduated from high school even if I didn’t pay attention.
• If it is critical to care for your sick child at home, you should not be at the movies, texting.
• How do I get a job making a fool of myself on the Weather Channel?
• Ford, Chevy, and Jeep are advertised as being so tough, but they won’t compete in the Dakar Rally.  Why?
• Do those “Buy American” people know those St. Valentine’s Day roses they purchase come from Kenya?
• Who decided that February needed an extra “R”?
• Is all the 2014 snow, ice, and sleet the result of that pesky global warming?
• There’s a big difference between “asking” and “axing.”
• Who decides the expiration date on water?
• Gas prices rose because oil prices were high; when oil prices fell, gas prices didn’t.  Why?
• Why do people from Pittsburgh always feel compelled to add ‘Pennsylvania’ when asked where they’re from?  How many Pittsburgh’s are there?
• Does every household have ‘show towels’ in their guest bathrooms?
• Are the Christmas decorations I see displayed early going up or late coming down?
• Why do people have “hot water heaters?”  I would guess the hot water is already hot.

Now that I got that out of my system I’m going back to my pitcher of martinis.  Until next week, thanks for reading and, so long.