Creative Endeavors

The monkey never learns, you see the monkey, he loves brown rice.  And the monkey knows that if he sticks his hand in the tray to retrieve the brown rice, he is going to get shocked by electricity.  But still, he sticks his hand in and he gets shocked, because you see, “he loves the rice” and unfortunately for the little furry critter, “he never learns.”

And of course …. “The monkey is always surprised when this happens to him, over and over again.”

Said all that, to say this …. I did it again. 

Have a calendar on the wall, a date minder book thing, even a tear off on the desk, but no, I have to click on my computer calendar, it is right there, a mouse click away.  I need a date, and a day, instead of getting up off my porky butt, and walking over to the wall, lifting up the page of the calendar and looking for the date, I click on my internal computer calendar. 

I mean … gee whiz, this is supposed to be the “information age” right? 

But the monkey, he never, ever, learns.  I go for the obvious easy solution, not the practical one.  I don’t use the any of the items available to me on the desk ….. Noooooooooooooooooooooooo .. I click on the one in the computer!

So here I sit, locked down on June 24^th, 2008 and everything is just peachy, and then the power spikes and everything goes down!  Pow!  It all goes south, oh yeah, I forgot. 

When the computer went down it also remembered the new day and date, and locked me into June instead of May. 

So now my virus checker doesn’t work, and it will not re-set.  

Why?  Mr. Computer says that “Someone has tried to manipulate my clock/date setting” and therefore I have to contact support.  Now that is a hoot.  I contact support and they say, user name, password, I check my list.  I type it in.  They say no such user name, password in the known free world or the central part of the United States. 

I re-type it, type it, type it … And you know the rest of it dont’cha? Support my ……..

Well, time to move on.  I am getting cranky again.

Yeah I know, how can anyone be this stupid you are asking yourself.  Well, it is rather easy to tell you the truth, regrettably it happens to me all the time.  I am descended from a long line of men with opposing thumbs who were prone to do something stupid from time to time, like the time my grandfather told me about getting his tongue stuck in the roller of a typewriter. 

Stuff like that.

Here is one more and then I am outta here.  Don’t under any circumstances; squeeze a lemon for your Ice Tea when you have a cut on your finger, handy-dandy internet tip of the day.  I found out this weekend that this can be extremely uncomfortable. 

Gonna be an interesting week, I can just feel it in my bones.

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Not long ago, I wrote a piece called “Shock & Awe” that proved to be very popular (April 10th). It concerned men and the stupid things that they do. Unlike the Oil Companies, who in their malafide manner, fabricate oil shortages, there are NO shortages of stupid men, or the acts that they often perform that are considered not so swift.

I should know, I am a charter dues-paying member of the stupid things that men do club.

Today’s science lesson, or rather, “Why men should not be allowed in the kitchen.” I am noticing that my coffee is tasting a little bit rank here lately. More so, that usual, so I decide to clean out Mr. Coffee Maker. I go to the cabinet, locate the vinegar and pour in the water into the coffee maker reservoir. At this time, I add about two cups of the vinegar to the water mix.

I run one cycle thru the appliance and then decide, if one is good, two ought to be better. So I now refill the chamber with the extremely hot liquid (the vinegar/water mix), which I now believe, was my first mistake in the process. Again, figuring that vinegar is a good cleaning agent, I decide to do a very stoopid thing.

I decide in my infinite wisdom, that “baking soda” would in fact, make this appliance and the beverager it brews, a lot sweeter, so I decide to add about a half-cup of Arm & Hammer baking soda to this very hot, caustic mix of water and vinegar, which unknown to me has been magically transformed into basically a dangerous, caustic form of home-made acid.

BAD MOVE. I mean, REALLY BAD MOVE.

Whoosh! The entire mix is now (because of this previously inexperienced phenomenon) all over the counter. The Vinegar and the Baking Soda do NOT like each other. Please remember this, it may save you considerable embarrasment in the future.

Water + Heat + Vinegar + Baking Soda = Terrific Whoosh!  This concludes today’s Science Lesson. (I know some of you are disappointed because this did not include serious pain to the lower genital area’s, but it was still pretty messy)

Moving on … Stupid things that men do. Some guy in Fort Worth, Texas, this week, tried to cash a check for the amount of $360 billion dollars. Charles Ray Fuller, 21, tried to cash the check at a Chase Bank. The check was made out to “Fulla Comp and Entertainment,” the record company Fuller wanted to start with the bogus check.

When his paternal grandmother Sharon Laird heard about the deal she replied, “Do What? Is he crazy? We were just in awe.” She also added “that if she did have $360 billion, I wouldn’t be sitting here. I’d be somewhere drinking margaritas. It’s five O’clock somewhere.”

Thus, giving even more credence to the age old adage of …….. The acorn don’t fall too far from the tree. (You ever notice how those Texas folks like that word … Awe?)

Gasoline is up another .31 cents this week. With prices now approaching $3.75 per gallon in the area, many people are in a bind, and pawnshops are reporting a brisk business as people pawn off their stuff in order to pay for necessities. In order to say afloat and fill up her car with gas, one resident is resorting to selling her personal items on Craigslist.com. The struggling driver is selling her flat iron for $18 because she said she has no other way to get the money to fill the tank before payday. Anyone interested in some old lottery tickets, only been used one time.

I remember when Bush was talking with Barbara Walters about “the legacy of his Presidency. And what did he think about how he (or it) would be remembered?” Looks like it will go down in the history books as the Chapter 11 or Chapter 13 Administration to me.

UPS/FedEx are re-routing all of their respective delivery routes to make right-hand turns only, saying they will save millions in the next year, not having to wait on left turns at stoplights. Pretty crafty thinking. I always wondered, if these two companies were to merge, would they name them Fed-UP?

Not long ago, me and the Miss’us flew out to Lost Wages, Nevada. Recently experiencing a longing to visit my money, I went out to the airport to pick up my ticket for a new adventure in Sin City. I looked at the Airlines Rep and said, “I want a roundtrip ticket to Las Vegas, Nevada, and send my luggage to Phoenix.” She got a funny look on her face and said, “Why would you want to do that?” And I said, “well hell, that is the way you did it to me last time!”

I won’t say who it was, but it was an AMERICAN air carrier.

To save on fuel, a number of airlines are doing what a lot of driver’s are doing, slowing down. Cutting back on the throttle. Southworst began two months ago. It’s projecting that by extending each flight by one to three minutes, it will save $42 million on fuel this year alone. Northwest airlines added eight minutes to a Paris-Minneapolis flight earlier this week, saving 162 gallons of fuel and $535. JetBlue’s director of flight operations said “it’s not a dramatic change,” but his airline saves about $13.6 million a year on fuel by adding an average of less than two minutes to each flight. United has invested in flight planning software that helps pilots choose the best routes and speeds. The airline said it’s trying to fly at more “consistent speeds” and expects to save an estimated $20 million dollars. So you are going to be flying a little bit slower, but getting there.

As for your luggage making the trip with you? Well, they are gonna work on that. Does the “Paris to Minneapolis” flight strike you as strange? I mean, I have been to Minneapolis/St Paul and Paris it is not.

I will leave you with this and then I am outta here.

A German man is asking for his marriage to be annulled after finding out that his wife is a man. Yeah, I know, you think I am making this up. Farmer Wolfgang Zober, 55, says he fell in love with Randy Victoria, 38, over the Internet. And that “he was delighted when he met her and realized she was as lovely as her photographs.” It was only on the couples “wedding night” says Zober, that “she told me she had male equipment and that her real name was Ralf.”

(Insert vision of Gomer Pyle here ……. Surprise …. Surprise ……… Soooooooooooprise! Galll-lee!)

Zober said that “he was devastated, not least because “Randy” seemed genuinely interested in his work. I didn’t realize that was because she used to be a farmer herself.”

Strangers in the night, exchanging glances, strangers in the night, what were the chances ……. I told you men are capable of some pretty stupid stuff.

I leave you with that vivid picture of the German Love Nest, I am gonna go make me some coffee, or a fresh batch of rocket fuel, whatever comes first.

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