01-Sep-2009
There’s a new word our there now that’s vexing me: precycle. I’m not sure what it means yet, but I think it has to do with getting rid of the need to recycle by getting rid of things that need recycling.
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This one was found in the corner mixed in with a dust bunny: Do you suppose we could get rid of those parentheses around the area code of a phone number? I mean, is there anyone who knows how to use a phone who doesn’t know what an area code is?
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I don’t mean to throw cold water on anyone’s retro parade but – guys – that backwards baseball cap is done, out, don’t do it anymore. It looked silly when Bruce Willis first did it. It looked silly when virtually a whole generation of young (and some not so young) men did it, and doing it today places you at whatever age you are somewhere between trailer trash and an unemployed garage band.
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An old quote (I don’t recall the source): A recession occurs when your neighbor is out of work. A depression occurs when you are out of work.
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As an offering of help to the many pig farms in this area, and in the spirit of great public service, I hereby rename the swine flu: let’s call it potato chip flu.
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Nadya Suleman, after giving birth to octuplets, was asked if she was hungry. “No thanks,” she said, “I already eight.”
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While I try to be sympathetic to the plight of so many who are suffering because of our poopy economy, I remember the time last winter – twice, actually – when we had to dip into some savings just to pay the bills. Yes, we had it to dip into and that was good. But it was there because we’d given up a lot of things over the years just to make sure we had that rainy day cushion. As I look around town here and see the For Sale signs on a good many houses – sales that aren’t being willingly undertaken – I also see the big SUV’s in the driveways and the garages full of all manner of largely unused crap, and seeing all of that I feel strangely Republican: You filled your pool. Now sleep in it.
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Is there a Republicans Anonymous group one could join to counteract those Republican moments?
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Certainly anyone who has read more than one of these columns knows that my feeling Republican is a lot like the Pope getting on his knees and facing Mecca five times a day.
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It’s interesting to note that senior citizens have the lowest priority for receiving the potato chip flu vaccine. Do you think that might be one of those new health care death panels at work?
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Holy cow! Was that another Republican moment?
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For those who read last month’s column, I’m extremely happy to report that my neighbor has made remarkable progress in recovering from the injuries she suffered in the motorcycle accident. By the time you read this she will be home from the University of Wisconsin hospitals and undergoing therapy locally. By the way (and this is not a Republican moment), her father showed me the bill for her first week in intensive care: $148,000.
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Architectural annoyance: This isn’t just a midwestern thing because I’ve seen it in other parts of the country – an old plow under a tree in the yard, or (this one is only a few blocks from me) an old buckboard wagon in front of a house festooned with planters and foliage. Or in other places you’ll see garage, barn, or even house walls decorated with old tools, farm implements, axes, bow saws, buck saws, hammers. I hate to burst anyone’s decorating bubble but these things never work. They always look odd, out of place, or simply stupid.
G. K. Wuori © 2009
Photoillustration by the author
