"Normal" is a relative term

Looks like things are returning to normal here.  Over the past week we buried my 96-year old aunt (on Tuesday) and yesterday we laid to rest my 96-year old step-mom, too.  They both just wore out and died peacefully....they did it right!

Interesting factoid:  If I understood the story correctly, my step-mom invented the "conference call".  It was during WWII and she was working for the Southwestern Bell phone company.

  
She figured out a way to plug in the wires to the switchboard in such a way that she could connect calls from servicemen to multiple people on the other end at the same time, enabling them to all hear their loved one during the very brief calls the soldiers were allowed.  

Later the phone company techies of the day ran with her idea and, in the true spirit of capitalism, perfected a way to charge us extra for it.

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They are officially zero.  I'm talking about the odds that I will ever travel to India.  Before I read today's paper my odds of visiting India were about the same slightly lower than my sweeping Scarlett Johansson off her feet and driving off into the sunset with her beside me in my vintage Ferrari.

It seems in the northern Indian state of Uttar Prapesh the heat spiked to 117 degrees and the power company shut down.  The story said that on a good day power only works for a couple of hours anyway, but now they don't even get that.

And being the super intelligent folks they are, they rioted, took the electric company employees hostage, and burned down the electric substations.  Yeah, that'll show 'em!

So now they have 200,000,000 people (literally) running around without even their usual 2 hours of electric service a day.  And to make matters worse, I'll bet you $100 the stores are all sold out of deodorant, too.  Man, they can't buy a break!

Nope, sorry. No air conditioning, no Scotty boy.  Texas in the summer is bad enough.  I'm not going looking for trouble.

Stay cool everyone.  :)

S

Careful what you pray for

I think I've figured out why the weather this summer is so hot:  During last winter's never-ending blizzard all you Yankees got down on your knees at the same time and said, "Dear God, PLEEEEEEEZE make this snow stop and give us some heat."  And hearing it from all sides He said, "OK, done."  Uh Huh....that was it.

There are some things that you can just count on.  Every spring the grass greens up and the trees bloom.  The track of the sun moves a little closer to the equator, and the temperature gets warmer miserably hot.  And I write a blog post bitching about the grass getting greener and needing mowing, the trees blooming and making me sneeze, and the sun track moving toward the equator making it miserably hot. 

Summertime as a school-age kid was fun, for obvious reason....school was out for 3 months.  WooHoo!  Even tempered by the fact that I was charged with mowing our lawn, summer was still a fun time.  

Now as an adult, however, I see absolutely NO redeeming social value whatsoever to summer.  Working/playing outside in the summer makes us HOT.  When we get hot we SWEAT.  When we sweat we STINK.  So basically we just walk around STINKING up the place for 3 months.  Why would anyone want to do that?  I'm pretty sure "summer" is an old Indian word for "stink".  

The only excuse I can figure for there even being a summer at all is because God must have wanted to make it up to you Yankees for sticking you way up north like that with all those blizzards.  "Oops, sorry guys.  To make it up to you I'll give you a few months of warmth, OK?  We good?"  But then He realized that was burning all us southerners to a crisp, so He gave us air conditioning....and ice cream with fresh strawberries on top. ;) 

*Sigh*  Oh well, I guess it's all part of The Plan.  Enjoy your Saturday, and stay cool.

S

The greatest invention of all time

What is the greatest invention of all time?  I suppose that depends on where you are and your circumstances.

If you go back far enough it might be the wheel.  Think about it....without wheels we'd probably still be walking.  No carts, wagons, stage coaches, cars, nothing.  We'd spend our lives just dragging stuff around.

Maybe the bow and arrow, and later gunpowder?  Then you could defeat those pesky 'ol Huns trying to storm your castle without having to ruin you nails in hand-to-hand combat.

The telegraph / telephone?  Then you could communicate with friends or do business with people hundreds of miles away.  The common man began to understand there was a big wide world out there.

The harnessing of electricity?  Then we could see and do things after dark.

Oh....these were huge!....trains and automobiles.  Where they were originally rich man's toys, Corny Vanderbilt and Henry Ford put us all on wheels.  Now we could work and play and make stuff for people far away from where we lived.  Until then most people grew up, married and raised families, worked and eventually died within maybe 25 miles of where they were born.  Easy transportation opened up commerce, created jobs, and raised the living standards of the masses.

The airplane?  A personal favorite of mine, it did the same as the automobile, but over longer distances.

Personal computers and the internet?  Now we had the knowledge of the world at our fingertips.  

And of course there are probably regional favorites, too.  I'm sure If you live in the Mid-East you're probably still amazed by toilet paper.  And judging by the way they like to throw them, rocks.  

NOTE:  This is NOT me, although the resemblance is striking.

But for me, a guy who grew up in the South and has become increasingly intolerant of heat, my personal favorite invention of all time is air conditioning.

Definitely, air conditioning.  ;)

What say you?

S

Which way did he go?

The headline read....

Family Concerned After John McCain Wanders Into Syria

Washington--Members of Sen. John McCain's family expressed deep concern Tuesday after receiving word that the aging legislator had wandered into Syria.  

Ha!  Poor old John can't buy a break.  That was reported, of course, in The Onion, a parody newspaper.  Unfortunately I'm afraid there might be more than a little truth to this one.  There are a lot of those guys in Washington (or Warshington if you're from Boston), of both parties, who are doing things I just find bizarre.  

Still, he's lived an amazing life and I sincerely wish him well.

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I was watching Good Morning America earlier and noticed Robin Roberts interviewing Will Smith.  When she's on camera she normally speaks "unaccented TV" for lack of a better term.  But when she was interviewing Will she started speaking "inner-city street".  Then some rapper was on, and listening to him (I tried unsuccessfully to tune him out) I assumed he was black.  Then I saw him...some white guy named Pit Bull.  (Really?  Who names their kid "Pit"?)  I guess you just never know these days.

K said she lapses into and out of other dialects, too.  She's a corporate recruiter and daily talks to people from all over the country.  She said she subconsciously slips into Cajun when she's talking to people from Louisiana, deep south drawl when appropriate, etc.

I find myself doing the same.  When speaking with a sophisticated potential client my speech is The King's English, but when talking to one of my blue-collar subs it's "Hey, how y'all doin'?  Sup?"

Do you do that, too?  Is it intentional or subconscious?

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My trusty (until now) chariot is in the shop getting its air conditioner fixed.  I know.....a car in Texas without working air conditioning is just scrap metal.  We're down to just one car, and I'm having to take K to work and pick her up and plan my day around my chauffeur duties.  

At one time a while back K and I discussed me retiring for real (not semi retiring) and just having one car.  Now I truly like living lean, but after experiencing a one car household, even for just a day, I'm afraid that might be just a bit too lean.

Speaking of cars, tomorrow is Cars and Coffee, weather permitting.  We need the rain, but please God, let it come after noon, OK?  :)

Have a great weekend everyone.

S