Laugh, I thought I'd cry

It happens every year, without fail: Someone pulls an April Fool prank, and no one thinks it's funny at all, and all hell breaks loose, when all along, it would have been better to leave the "joke" undone.

This year's Big Fool Of The Year is Akis Tselentis.  Akis is a well-known Greek scientist. As I'm sure you know, an adroit sense of humor is a prerequisite for achieving prominence in science, and what Akis thought would provoke gales of laughter was posting on Facebook a warning that a sizable "funnel" might form underneath Santorini Island.

I'll wait until your paroxysms of laughter have subsided before going on to tell you that Tselentis is the head of Greece’s Geodynamic Institute and Tsunami Center. Just after April Fools Day, he put a picture of himself on Facebook that simulated a mugshot with a sign that said, “guilty of April Fool’s hoax.”

“We live in a country where humor is persecuted,” he added.

This is the post on Facebook that got him in hot water in the first place:

“Unfortunately we are not doing well as far as Santorini is concerned. Since October we have been monitoring the island with 20 additional seismographs and we have noticed that since January we have had a gradual disappearance of the magma under the volcano. At the same time, on the opposite of the Earth, another volcano, the well-known Tripanteco, presents the opposite phenomenon according to the Japanese Institute of Volcanology. In other words, magma is rising.

“Recent measurements made by a team of Japanese volcanologists show that there is a high probability that all the magma that was under Santorini is moving towards the Tripanteko volcano in Pinokistan creating a huge funnel under Santorini.

 

“If this happens we will have the absorption of the waters of the Aegean which will turn into a lagoon with what this entails for tourism. Of course, this has its advantages because we will now be able to go to many islands by road! The probability of this happening is not at all negligible and exceeds 30%,”  

Now, a prosecutor has ordered a preliminary investigation to determine whether the false news Tselentis spread actually qualifies as being false news that he spread. 

I think so.

 

And he didn't help his case an iota (Greek word!) by claiming to be "selectively targeted." 

“Should I laugh or cry? I should probably laugh. We are in a country where jokes are criminalized,” he said.

Then he went on to say that no one is doing anything about other scientists who were seriously predicting earthquakes.

And this challenge to prosecutors everywhere:  “I wish I will be prosecuted, it will be great publicity for me.”

But he said he is sure that the prosecutor will come to understand how funny a gag this was, perfectly fit for April Fools Day.

I have known and worked with my share of prosecutors over the years, and I can't tell you how many of them loved to recount the myriad tales of prank calls and April Tomfoolery that they laughed at and decided not to prosecute.

April Fools! That doesn't happen.

 

 

Fast Times At New Brunswick High

I can't help it. I am still living in what the late humorist Doug Kenney called "a homeroom of the mind." I love everything about high school culture - the easy availability of ice cream sandwiches, having a stash bin locker for my stuff, lots of friends to talk to, exercise in fresh air, and, occasionally, learning something. 

I will readily admit that I would be spotted as an outlier, were I to try to blend in and fake being a high school student again. Gray hair and an unsteady gait would give me away at once. But hats off to Hyejeong Shin! She's 29 and faked them out for a whole week, posing as a new student at New Brunswick High School in New Jersey before the school administrators got wise to her fake birth certificate.

It's not as if Ms Shin was trying to make up for missed education. She is a graduate of Rutgers University, for crying out loud. Her attorney says she knows she goofed, but it was all out of her longing to have the kind of friendships she had in high school that made her do it

See what I mean?

Shin is a South Korean citizen who was sent here at 16 to attend a private boarding school, and she just missed that atmosphere.  The pep rallies! The smoke-filled lavatories! The Geometry quizzes! The morning announcements! 

Her attorney, Darren Gelber, said, "At no time was anyone or any student in danger and this entire case is more about my client wanting to return to a place of safety and welcoming and an environment that she looks back on fondly and nothing more." 

Maybe he gets paid by the word.

I think this is a serious case of hyperprosecution, but she has been indicted by a grand jury and been charged with issuing false documents and hindering her own prosecution in the third degree. Through her attorney, Shin says she is hoping to be accepted into a  pre-trial intervention program and serve no time.

Gallantly, the New Brunswick Police released a statement, saying their investigation found nothing to indicate her enrollment was part of a plan to bring harm or violence to anyone. 

Gelber says as soon as this is over, Shin wants to return to South Korea, after 13 years in the US.

Maybe if I dye my hair and buy the cool clothes that kids today wear, I could pull it off...

 

 

Sunday Rerun: Let's Do Lunch

 I remember seeing a sign that said "She who dies with the most fabric, wins." Meaning that the goal of life is to collect enough chintz, corduroy, cotton, denim and flannel to make Christmas pajamas for all the grandkids and still leave a big pile of swatches for your family, none of whom have any idea how to work that Singer sewing machine, and will deposit it, along with all that fabric, at the Goodwill, which will eventually have to talk a sewing machine museum into taking it, because no one sews anymore.

But at least, for those who sew, collecting fabric is fun, and a good hobby.

I think it's slightly odd that some people, who have enough money stashed away to buy Christmas pajamas for the entire universe, still get a thrill out of amassing more more more moolah moolah moolah!

I mean, this Warren Buffett guy, whose current net worth is about 63.3 Billion-with-a-B US Dollars, has yet to retire, and he certainly could scale things back a little if he wanted, maybe get a little condo down at the beach and ride to WaWa in a little golf cart to get his morning dark Colombian coffee and a donut and the paper.

But no, he keeps on working every day, and now comes news that someone who wisely chose to remain anonymous is shelling out $3,456,789 to eat lunch with Buffett.  It's for charity, a San Francisco outfit called Glide, which puts out food, health care and services for needy people - the homeless, the financially challenged, those fighting substance abuse.  So, it's for a good cause.  Over 17 years of this event, which was started by Buffett's late first wife Susan, $23.6 million has been raised.  All good.

So if your bid wins next year's Buffet With Buffett (I offer that name for free!), you will be able to bring up to seven friends to lunch at the Smith & Wollensky steak house in Manhattan. You can ask the aging zillionaire about anything EXCEPT what he plans to invest in next, which would be about the only thing anyone wants to hear about anyway.   

It's 50¢ extra if you want bleu cheese dressing.

The Saturday Picture Show, April 8, 2023

 

Someone gave someone on the grounds crew a reflective vest and broom and then, hilarity ensued.

Baltimore has a free circulator bus that takes one and all around downtown. One of the drivers is April Harrington, and she treats her passengers by singing popular songs as they scoot around the streets. A famous English singer, born Terence Parsons, did the same in postwar days, singing as he drove, until someone talked him into changing his name and making a record...and he sold millions of records under the name Matt Monro.

I don't know just where this trash can is, probably somewhere where bicycle riding is much more prevalent than it is here. The can is angled so that bike riders can drop their trash in it as they roll on by.

This guy (it has to be a guy!) loves his truck so much he carries a painting of it on the tailgate.

These strawberries are so big, they wouldn't do for shortcake...you'd have to have longcake.

These are egret nestlings in Florida. I give them a week before the governor down there finds something objectionable about them.

A formerly popular performer, whom I once held in high regard for his versatility and showmanship, has now decided to be one of those jerks who hates everything that's "woke." He was recently all worked up about the inclusivity slogans on a can of light beer. So, in the time honored fashion of American gunslingers, he bought two cases of Bud Light and shot at them. Since his career is in sad decline, let's just call him "Skid Rock."

As long as you had a job, I don't see what business it was of Wm. B. Wilson, who was the Secretary of Labor from 1913 to 1921, if you changed jobs. I know that used to be looked down upon, and people who went for better jobs or more pay were thought of as "flighty" and "unsettled" by people who seethed with jealousy as they sat and rued the chances they had let slip away. 

Lieutenant Broccoli, say hello to Sergeant Pepper, Corporal Punishment, and Major Disappointment.

I believe most nutritionists would recommend a well-balanced diet to get you through the day, rather than gobbling an Almond Joy for a quick lift. But dang, those Almond Joys are tasty, where butternut squash is not.

Tales of Brave Ulysses

Much was made this week of the fact that, up until this week, no American president in history had ever been indicted for a crime, but there's an asterisk to that.

*

President Ulysses S. Grant was still in office when he got in trouble with the law. 

Now, Ulysses was a war hero, having been the leader of the Union troops in the American Civil War (1861 - 1865) who sent the Confederate running home, no longer able to own other human beings. (They're still mad about it.)

Grant was a brilliant military tactician, outfoxing Confederate General Robert E. Lee time after time, but he did like to hit the sauce now and then.

And then, he would get behind the reins of his horse and buggy and haul ass around the streets of Washington. It was on M Street, to be precise, where Grant was stopped several times in 1872 by Officer William H. West. West, a formerly enslaved person, was one of two Black police officers on the DC force at the time when he saw Grant speeding around. 

The first time, West allowed Grant to pay a fine and walk home to the White House, but the very next day, West (like Grant, a Civil War veteran) caught the president breaking the law again and took action.

"I am very sorry, Mr. President, to have to do it, for you are the chief of the nation and I am nothing but a policeman, but duty is duty, sir, and I will have to place you under arrest," West said, according to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund. 

Grant was released on $20 bond ($430 in 2023 money). 

The Washington Evening Star newspaper wrote about the arrest in 1908. West retired in 1901 and lived another 14 years, telling the Star, "The General's Love for Horses and His Pleasure in Driving Were the Cause of His Trouble."

Things change, but not too much.

Pedro wanted a hippopotamus for Christmas, only a hippopotamus would do

I know the name "Pablo Escobar" sounds like something from a "Miami Vice" rerun, but Pablo was the prototypical South American drug kingpin in his day, which ended in 1993 when he was killed by the Colombian National Police. Before that, he amassed a fortune estimated at around $70 Billion with a B, and so naturally, he had enough loose change from the sale of drugs to entertain himself with a private menagerie of hippopotami.

The current head count is 70 hippos needing to be moved out, because who is about to stop the herd from procreating? Actually, they tried to stop them from reproducing. Methods employed included castrations, shooting them with contraceptive darts, and forcing them to watch Julia Roberts movies. 

It's going to cost approximately $3.5 million to farm them out to other sanctuaries, with 10 of them destined for the Ostok Sanctuary in Mexico; the other 60 will find a home in India. There's no way to take them to Africa, where the herd originated; that would upset the local ecosystem. 

 

 

Escobar originally imported one male and three females, and now look. They are spreading all over Colombia from their original home at Escobar’s former ranch of Hacienda Napoles, which is now some sort of theme park in the country where he is still regarded as sort of a Robin Hood for his habit of providing basic needs to the poor with a fortune derived from selling enough cocaine around the world to alter and/or end millions of lives.

Not to get all gross, but the Colombians need these beasts removed because, with no natural predators, they are running rampant on the countryside, and their waste is having deleterious effects on oxygen levels in the waters, reducing water quality and killing many fish in the Magdalena River basin.

Say it with me now: ewwwwwwwwww. 

Fool me Once

To paraphrase an old saying, the Lord must have loved foolish people, because he made so many of them.

Now comes evidence that strongly suggests that believing COVID-19 was a hoax is a "gateway drug" that leads to believing in other conspiracy theories, in which we are all awash, sad to say.

The journal PLOS One contains the research that found that among those who cling to the belief that the number of  COVID-19 deaths was a wild exaggeration, or that someone in China developed the virus for evil purposes and sent it out into the world, a substantial number also tend to believe that UFOs create crop circles and moon landings were Disney productions. 

"The widespread damage created by the COVID-19 pandemic has heightened people's anxiety, uncertainty, feelings of powerlessness, and has created friction between members of different social groups," said the research group. "Such conditions represent a near perfect recipe for the proliferation of conspiracy theories."

The team looked at two surveys: one from June 2020, and one in the early part of 2021, surveys in which people were asked about their beliefs in conspiracy in general and and their notions about COVID in particular. 

No surprise to me, but those who think that "COVID-19 was intentionally brought into the world for dark purposes" or that "the severity of COVID-19 was exaggerated" also nod vigorously when asked about the 2020 presidential election being rigged more than any election in history, very bigly, or that  “some UFO sightings and rumors are planned or staged in order to distract the public from real alien contact.”

In time, it was found that the more people bought into the "COVID is fake" myth, the more likely they were to believe that John Kennedy Senior and Junior are alive and running a shrimping operation in Lake Charles, Louisiana, and mass shootings of school children are produced by cable TV as fodder for the mainstream media. 

Try as you might, you cannot get adherents to these nutty notions to explain why the people they dismiss as incompetent government or military personnel are at once so stupid as to allow these horrible things, and also so brilliant as to pull off these gigantic mass deceptions.

 

Goodbye to a good guy

A story about a friend of mine...whose funeral viewing I attended on Sunday.

His name was Jack McClean. He served not only my fire company, the Providence Volunteers, for around sixty years, as an active firefighter and financial administrator, but also, he gave of his considerable expertise in money matters to the Baltimore County Volunteer Firemen's Association, and if you know anything about volunteer fire companies, you surely know they have to make every dollar do the work of five.

Jack knew about money. He was graduated from the University of Maryland and worked for many years in the banking industry. In fact, I called on him any time I had a question about a mortgage structure, or anything that was beyond my ken in wallet and checkbook matters (I was able to make change for a twenty and that was about it as far as doing things without expert advice.)

The viewing was packed with people, and that tells you a lot about the amount of people Jack reached with his friendly personality and helpful ways. 

Volunteers from Lutherville filled in
for the funeral and viewing.

And here is the story I promised: In my first summer as a firefighter, I told the other guys that my family and I were going to Salisbury, MD, the next day. Jack said, off handedly, "Hey, stop in at our First National office on the downtown mall and tell Mr Fitzgerald I said hello."

I did that. I like to meet new people. Skinny Mark in t-shirt and cutoffs was ushered into Mr Fitzgerald's office as soon as I mentioned "Jack sent me." I had a nice chat with Mr Fitzgerald about Salisbury and what a great town it is and how great the fried chicken is down there and whatever else can get discussed in fifteen minutes, and I left him with a promise to say hey to Jack when I got back home.

Five years later, I moved to Salisbury to work at WICO AM-FM and, not knowing anyone at any banks where I could safely deposit my $90 weekly pay, I wandered into the same bank and asked for Mr Fitzgerald. He bounded out of his office with a grip and grin and said, "Did Jack send you again?"

So now Jack is straightening out checkbooks at a whole new location and he takes a lot of great memories with him. As someone said, he was one of the last of the breed of people who work so hard for so many people...for nothing but the satisfaction of having helped.

Don't Heckle the Magpies

It happens here, too, England, so don't feel like you're all alone here. American fans are often victims of premature etattoolation, and it's always embarrassing.

English soccer fan Kris Cook follows the Newcastle United team, so he thought that the time was right to get a four-inch tattoo to salute his squad's victory in the Carabao Cup.

And that would have been great, except that the Newcs lost 2-0 to Manchester United.  

Two goals in a soccer game is the ultimate, one supposes, for a game where people can spend hours aimlessly kicking a ball around.

 

His team is called the Magpies. He doesn't regret rooting for them, or getting the leg tattoo too early. His family does not think much of the ink, but his friends find it hilarious.

Newcastle was trying to end a championship drought that dates back to 1969. That was the year I was graduated from high school, and now I'm celebrating graduation from physical therapy for the 37th time, so...

Kris Cook is from the most English-named town I've seen in some time:  Cramlington, Northumberland. He says, "I was going in for a day session at the tattoo place anyway to get a sleeve done and then decided last minute to get the Newcastle tattoo on my leg too."

"It was all for a laugh and I had mentioned to my mates that I might get it done, but they were shocked when I went through with it."

"One of them said,'(blasphemy deleted) what have you had done'."

"It took about 10 minutes to do and was thrown in with the £400 (that's $495.75 American) cost of booking the tattooist out for the day to have my arm sleeve done. The tattoo says, 'tell me ma me ma' which is a NUFC chant from the 90s and one we sing at St James' Park. I don't regret getting it done at all. I might when I'm older but for now, I just think it's funny."

So he is cool with the tat, but his grandma does not like it, or to quote him directly, "My eight-year-old daughter Honey thinks it's funny and my mum is not fussed but my gran hates it."

"She has always been anti-tattoos and I am covered in them. I think the Newcastle United one was just a step too far for her."

"The girl who does my tattoos is from Sunderland so she probably enjoyed it that little bit more."

I think we're all aware of the legendary Sunderland/Newcastle enmity.

Anyway, Kris and his friends made the 280-mile trip to see the game, but, "I can't remember much of the match if I'm honest as me and my friends had been drinking all day and celebrating so the initial defeat didn't hit me. I am disappointed that we didn't win but I am so proud of the team for getting to Wembley and we will be back. Give Newcastle a few years and we will start winning lots of things. I am still very proud of my team despite the outcome."

Trade "New York" for "Newcastle" and this is the most American English story ever! 

Sunday Rerun: No No No, It Ain't Me, Babe

 I've been following Bob Dylan since forever, and if there's one thing that always stands out about the folky balladeer, it's that he is consistently inconsistent. This goes way back to when he was a pure acoustic performer, before he plugged in a band at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival. It's the hallmark of a good performer, and a good way to become legendary like Bob - always keep the audience wondering what's next. 

Show business is part show and all business. Just ask anyone who is shelling out $700 for one ticket to see "The Music Man" on Broadway. You get the experience of seeing a true legend as Hugh Jackman struts across the stage as Professor Harold Hill. If that's what you want to do with $700, fine. We all saw on "CBS Sunday Morning" that there are people willing to pony up $250,000 to get in a mini submarine and drop in on the wreckage of the Titanic. Those who go will see the unmistakable bow of the great ship at rest on the Atlantic floor and know it's for real, and not some old sunken garbage scow.

We can't take it away from Bob Dylan that he has written and performed hundreds of great songs, too many even to think of listing here. But I'm throwing a penalty flag and walking off five yards against the wire-haired boy from Hibbing, not that he would even care what I think, but because he recently tried to cheat his fans, only to be caught and turn red.

Through his book publisher, Simon & Schuster, Dylan hawked 900 "personally hand-signed" copies of his new book, “The Philosophy of Modern Song.” Each copy set the purchaser back $599, but again, for a true believer, that's not too much to exchange for a true totem - the actual autograph of the author on a book he wrote.

The books sold out and were shipped a week or so ago, and it took two days of people proudly Instragramming pictures of their treasures before people started saying, "These signatures all look alike...."

It took two more days before Simon & Schuster acknowledged that complaints about the autographs actually being mechanical duplicates were true and legitimate.

The book's cover shows Little Richard, Alis Lesley (one of the several hundred "female Elvises"), and Eddie Cochran.

“To those who purchased the ‘Philosophy of Modern Song’ limited edition, we want to apologize,” said a tweet from Simon & Schuster.  “As it turns out, the limited edition books do contain Bob’s original signature, but in a penned replica form. We are addressing this information by providing each purchaser with an immediate refund.”

Such double-speak! Yes, it's Bob's autograph, but it isn't. The books were all signed by an autopen, a machine used by people who have to sign their names many times. (In high school, I looked into getting one for my father so he wouldn't get writer's cramp from signing so many letters from the school, but anyway...)

The people at Simon & Schuster have not learned much about crisis management, it would seem; their first response was to stonewall the criticism, saying, “We certainly understand any concerns you may have, however – Each individual copy of the limited signed edition of Bob Dylan’s THE PHILOSOPHY OF MODERN SONG was personally signed by the author and is accompanied by a letter of authenticity from the publisher of Simon & Schuster.”

Each book had been mailed with a letter signed (?) by Jonathan Karp, president and CEO of the publishing house, saying, “You hold in your hands something very special, one of just 900 copies available in the U.S.  This letter is confirmation that the copy of the book you hold in your hand has been hand-signed by Bob Dylan.”

Within two days, the company buckled, with Karp emailing each purchaser to say, "We apologize for the mistake that was made and are offering a full refund of your purchase. Please keep your copy of ‘The Philosophy of Modern Song’ at no cost. We hope you will enjoy reading it.”

We who try to understand Dylan understand that confounding us is the basis of his game, as when he refused to accept a Nobel Prize or attend the ceremony involved, only to say later he was sorry about all that. But explaining is something he doesn't do...until now. From his Facebook:

“I’ve been made aware that there’s some controversy about signatures on some of my recent artwork prints and on a limited-edition of Philosophy Of Modern Song. I’ve hand-signed each and every art print over the years, and there’s never been a problem. However, in 2019 I had a bad case of vertigo and it continued into the pandemic years. It takes a crew of five working in close quarters with me to help enable these signing sessions, and we could not find a safe and workable way to complete what I needed to do while the virus was raging. So, during the pandemic, it was impossible to sign anything and the vertigo didn’t help. With contractual deadlines looming, the idea of using an auto-pen was suggested to me, along with the assurance that this kind of thing is done ‘all the time’ in the art and literary worlds.

“Using a machine was an error in judgment and I want to rectify it immediately. I’m working with Simon & Schuster and my gallery partners to do just that,” he concluded.

It does not take a "crew of five" to get books signed. Just deliver 900 books, and a handful of Sharpies to his house, and tell him you'll be back to pick them up when he's finished scrawling his signature on the inside cover. 

It's disappointing to me that he did not write and record his 1/2-assed apology in the form of a song and release it as a special edition Holiday Gift To You on vinyl, cassette, CD or MP3, but I guess he can't think of every scam.

The Saturday Picture Show, April 1, 2023

 

As Mr Hilton said to Mrs Hilton, "We'll always have Paris." 

One of the "Nine Stories" in the great collection by that name from J. D. Salinger was "A Perfect Day For Bananafish." And here are two of them!

So when you run out of clothespins, try chip clips!

The wheatfields are hard at work, getting ready to bring you bowlsful of Shredded Wheat.

Who hasn't wanted to do this, timing themselves on the radar gun?

I don't know where this flag hangs, or for what reason. I guess I could look it up, but that would be....easy.

Many was the time, during my radio DJ days, that I sat while playing some dirge like "The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald" or Morris Albert's sleep-inducing "Feelings" and thought how great it would be to play nothing but songs that made people feel good, not songs about sunken ships in Lake Superior or gooey laments like "Feelings." Anything by Jan And Dean would fit that format, most of the early Beatles, and of course, the Beach Boys before they got all self-conscious and ponderous. You can bet my iPod has no sob to it.

The chairs at BIC headquarters are made to resemble parts of the legendary ballpoints we all fiddled with in school. No kidding!

The planets lined up this past week and if you were outside around dinnertime and had a clear view westward, you could see the sky show. 

In his heyday with the San Francisco Giants, Sergio Romo was a pretty good relief pitcher with a nasty slider that helped his teams win three World Series. As often happens, he finished his career with other teams, and came back to the Giants this spring to retire as a member of the team where he got his start. Throughout spring training, every time a kid asked him for an autograph, he had the kid sign his hat as well, and now he takes with him to his leisure time an estimated $12.5 million in savings, and one very cool hat.

More than we know

At first, you see this story and you think it's about a person who should have had better sense, but then you read on, and it's far deeper.

The surface story is, a woman from New York state got her finger caught in one of those beehive holes in a grocery cart, and it took an hour and a 911 response to separate her and the cart.  

But there is more to Ashley Nolan, 38, of Johnson City, than someone who absent-mindedly fiddled with the cart as she browsed the aisles. She can't help the fidgering, because she suffers from anxiety, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD).

She says she does this sort of thing a lot (think of those fidget-spinners that were so popular a couple of years ago) due to her emotional condition, but this is the first time that she ever needed emergency services to get involved.

“I was shopping, and the next thing I knew, I was stuck,” Nolan, who is a school bus driver, told the news.

She called her friend Sarah, who was elsewhere in the same store, to be with her.

Here is a great reason to leave even the simplest of rescues to trained professionals: when the store employees tried to get her free, they cleverly used a pocketknife and wound up stabbing themselves and Nolan. That led to someone having the best idea, calling 911. 

Police and fire responders took a half an hour to get her freed, and then left with what I think is bad advice.

“We stood and spoke with the authorities, and they suggested my friend spray me with a water bottle to stop me from putting my fingers in holes. I thanked them, and they left,” Nolan said.

That's harsh, and I should think it would not meet with the approval of therapists, who would tell you that  these are common but serious neuropsychiatric disorders, one result of which can be restless feelings and uncontrolled impulsive behaviors.

Nolan says her ADHD and OCD lead her to touching and fidgeting with objects, for example. The goal is to control those urges before they lead to problems such as what happened in the supermarket.

What I take away from this is, nothing is as simple as the surface would lead us to think it is. 

 

Delayed Winning

Here's one of those thoughts that dash across our brainpan for just a fleeting second before being replaced by more important thoughts, like "what's for dinner?" and "what I am doing here?"...

They come on the news now and then and mention an unclaimed lottery prize and your check your pockets before wondering if the real winner will ever come forward.

Well, a man right here in Maryland won $50,004 on a Powerball drawing last November...and didn't know he won for four months!

The man is 74 and lives in Laurel, and he told Maryland Lottery officials that he plunked down a ten-spot for tickets at Modern Liquors in Temple Hills (near Hillcrest Heights!). For whatever reason, he mentioned that he usually buys his tickets next door to Modern Liquors, but did not mention what the usual store is. 

He matched four numbers and the Powerball on one line ($50,000!) and on another he matched one number and the Powerball on another line ($4 more!)

But not until this month - March - did he get around to checking his numbers.

I can't blame him. I have no idea how those lottery games work, and I was once the grand prize winner of $1 on a scratcher, so you'd think I would know. 

This fellow down in Laurel told the lottery people he had no idea what he was going to do with his 50 Gs, but you can share my hunch that it's donuts for everyone at the Senior Center every day this week!

Southbound

There is a fast way to get to Virginia and see Colonial Williamsburg, Busch Gardens, Jamestown, and all the great historic sites in Tidewater Virginia, and that would be taking superslab I-95 from Baltimore on down through DC and into the Commonwealth of VA.

You'll get there fast, but you'll sit through traffic jams at any hour of the day.

The other way is to meander on down Rte 301 through Southern Maryland, breezing through Upper Marlboro, LaPlata, Waldorf,  Delight, and Bel Alton.  All nice towns, and lots of places to stop for a bite to eat, and then you get back on the road and cross a 1.9 mile bridge over the Potomac River and you notice they start calling Rte 301 "James Madison Pkwy" and...you're in Virginia!

Next time you take that ride, you will be riding on a new bridge. Crews are currently dismantling the old Gov. Harry W. Nice Memorial/Sen. Thomas "Mac" Middleton Bridge, but don't worry, they built a new one and it opened last fall, and so far, it's working fine. 

Old bridge on the left, new one on the right

The old bridge, built in 1940, was only two lanes. The new one is four, with a concrete median to prevent head-on smashups. 

AND! the people in charge of these things are using the old bridge parts to create an artificial reef for the fish of the Potomac. It's good all around.

If you go this way, you will notice the two great industries of Virginia that have lured Marylanders south for all these years. Ham, and fireworks. Both are available for sale every five feet down there. And that's where you'll start to hear the delightful sunny Southern accent served up with your lunch.

Go try the new bridge and let me know how you like it! 

 

Barney Rubble

There's a great song by Jerry Lee Lewis called "Hell And Half Of Georgia," but lately it seems you have to go a little farther south to get there.

So here it is! FLORIDA MAN - the chairman of the school board of a charter school, a man named Barney Bishop III, forced the school's principal to resign last week after the parents of her sixth-graders complained that her Renaissance art syllabus was not appropriate for kids of that age.

As we all know, today, the parents - no matter their level of education or sophistication - are the deciding force in school curricula. Which is not to say that parents' voices should not be heard, but any sensible person would know to lend a bit more credence to career educators with experience and education over, say, a maleducated redhatter with little or no education and worldly wisdom.

This principal showed her class Michelangelo's "DAVID." Not surprisingly for a state that close to the equator, one parent called this classic sculpture "pornographic." 

Merriam-Webster defines pornography as "the depiction of acts in a sensational manner so as to arouse a quick intense emotional reaction." Friends, if seeing this statue arouses in you an intense emotional reaction, please consider counseling at once.

Bishop told Slate that that wasn't so much that kids who can go home and see hours of bacchanalian debauchery on their phones before dinner got to see a nekkid man, but that the teacher told the kids it was a nonpornographic picture they were seeing.

Note the wisdom in this statement from Bishop, a man who self-describes as a "serial entrepreneur": 

“Parents choose this school because they want a certain kind of education. We’re not gonna have courses from the College Board. We’re not gonna teach 1619 or CRT crap. I know they do all that up in Virginia. The rights of parents, that trumps the rights of kids. Teachers are the experts? Teachers have all the knowledge? Are you kidding me?”

They simply cannot refrain from saying "trump," even in lower case, and CRT, as if they know what it is. 

Hope Carrasquilla, the now-former principal of Tallahassee Classical School, said that one parent felt “point-blank upset” and that “her child should not be viewing” the 16th-century Renaissance sculpture showing David, the man made famous in the Old Testament’s Book of Samuel for KO-ing Goliath.

This school goes by the “classical education curriculum model” that Floridians seem to think is just great, and here's why they do: it's all about the “centrality of the Western tradition,” or what the Tampa Bay Times calls “a historical focus on white, Western European and Judeo-Christian foundations.”  

These are the kind of people who think their children should not learn to use Arabic numerals.

More from Bishop: 

“Showing the entire statue of David is appropriate at some age. We’re going to figure out when that is. And you don’t have to show the whole statue! Maybe to kindergartners we only show the head. You can appreciate that. You can show the hands, the arms, the muscles, the beautiful work Michelangelo did in marble, without showing the whole thing.”

The "whole thing." Paging Dr. Freud!

 

Finding Nemo and Garza

You have to hand it to some people; they are willing to move mountains to get to where they want to be.

Or dig their way out of prison "Shawshank-style" with a homemade tool made of an old toothbrush and a piece of metal.

And then, after all that work to get out of the IronBar Hilton and on the road to freedom, did they

a) keep high-tailing it until they were far, far away 

or 

b) stop for pancakes?

You know they had to have those flapjacks.  It was a week ago today that John Garza, 37, and Arley Nemo, 43, turned up missing from Newport News Jail Annex in Virginia at the regular 7 PM headcount.

Garza (left) and Nemo

Somehow these geniuses knew that within the prison walls were untied rebars, and that gave them the gap they needed to get out,  scale a high wall, and leave.

But instead of getting away like Andy DuFresne in the movie, our two heroes here stopped at an IHOP early on Tuesday, and other diners who saw the news bulletins about their getaway tipped the server with both a couple of dollars and the info on Garza and Nemo's current whereabouts.

“I’m thankful for the citizens who observed Garza and Nemo at the Ihop and notified law enforcement,” said the Newport News sheriff, Gabe Morgan. “It reinforces what we always say:  ‘See something, say something’.”

Something else we always say:  When you're hopping away from the law, don't IHOP in the same town.

And now that the Sheriff is aware that his retaining walls do not do a very good job of retaining criminals, he and his team are fixing things as fast as they can. "Until all weaknesses are identified and secured, we will not discuss the situation further for security reasons," his office said in a statement.

Garza was a guest of the county on charges including contempt of court, probation violations and failure to appear.

He appeared at IHOP, though!

Nemo was up on a laundry list of charges, including credit card fraud, credit card larceny, forgery, possession of burglary tools, grand larceny, contempt of court and probation violation, the sheriff’s office said. So, now that he's back, maybe he can work in the lockup laundry.

The sheriff will be adding escape charges for both men, as well. Maybe this time, they'll stay around.

Sunday Rerun (from 2018): My New Hero

 Don't get ahead of me here! My new hero is NOT the racist madman lawyer from New York who went off on a foul rant in a restaurant across the street from his Manhattan office, screaming hate because people had the audacity to speak Spanish in his royal presence.

"He heard us speak Spanish and started yelling, 'You mf---ers!' " said Oscar Villanueva, a Honduran immigrant and employee of Fresh Kitchen.

"He said we have to speak English," Villanueva went on. "He started saying a lot of ugly words . . . . We felt really bad, humiliated."

It won't be long before ALL of us have been exposed to this sort of nonsense. I was pushing my cart around the Food Warehouse one day as a young woman talked on her cell. I guess I need to add that she was holding her conversation in Spanish; that's the only way it will make sense when I tell you that a random unhinged harridan ankled up to her and croaked, "Speak English!"

To her everlasting credit, the young woman said, "I am speaking with a friend who does not speak English...if you don't mind..."

I then followed the old hag around the store and placed embarrassing items in her cart when she wasn't looking.

Anyhow, back in New York.  This guy really went bazoo, threatening to call ICE and questioning the citizenship of any and all speaking Spanish. Invoking the threat of deportation, he said the employees are all in "my country."

"My guess is they're not documented," lawyer Aaron Schlossberg bellowed. "So my next call is to ICE to have each one of them kicked out of my country. If they have the balls to come here and live off my money — I pay for their welfare, I pay for their ability to be here — the least they can do is speak English."

He went on to claim that he is better-educated than the employees, although he clearly was not referring to being taught manners or human decency.

Schlossberg is 42, a registered Republican and a donor to the 2016 presidential campaign 2016 donor of Donald J. Trump, another ill-bred New Yorker. 

You saw the rest on the news. The video of his nativistic nonsense "went viral" and exposed him as a loon, and soon he was asked to vacate the office he rented and was last seen being chased down by the relentless Gotham press.

Within a day, there were petitions calling for his disbarment and/or discipline by the state bar ass'n.

And then, because The Internet Is Forever, someone showed up with a video showing a cursing Schlossberg caterwauling at a rally last year protesting a Palestinian speaker in Manhattan.

But really, Schlossberg and people like him, cold sores upon the sweet smiling lips of humanity, can all just go kick rocks barefoot, because from the smoke and and tears of all their ineffable enormity rises a new hero.

Please stand and applaud a man named Mark Goldberg, who started one of those GoGimmeMoney pages and rounded up $800...to hire a mariachi band to play "La Cucaracha" "to cheer up the staff and attorneys at The Law Office of Aaron M. Schlossberg Esq. . . . after a difficult day."

Goldberg for President 2020!

The Saturday Picture Show, March 25, 2023

 

It's hardly fair when the proverbial needle in the haystack is this big...

Yes, by golly, spring is here at last. Make of it what you will, and I will go sweep the dust off my unused snow shovel and wait for next year...

Hummingbirds make their nests to look just like themselves!

Pay no attention to this sign! They even weighed it down with sandbags.

This officer will have to go home and tell his wife he is sick and tired of dealing with these drunken clowns.

Edgar's plan to replace his taillights was going great until Helen needed to put the leftover succotash in the plastic containers she used to have.

Growing up, all families bought mercurochrome ("an organomercuric disodium salt compound used as a topical antiseptic") every time someone fell down and scraped their knee, or cut their finger, or whatever. If it bled, it got painted with mercurochrome, and it was the cool thing to also paint a red skull-and-crossbones "tattoo" above the abrasion. Then we found out the stuff is toxic, so no one is allowed to fall down or get cuts anymore. 

So call me surprised! I had no idea that sharpshooting circus star Annie Oakley was so pretty! Today, she would have her own reality show.

This is the only way to reply when a shipping company asks you to prove that you did not receive something they say they sent!

This is a multi-level Zen sort of statement about doors and door stoppers and packaging in general. It's similar to leaving an IKEA television stand unassembled in the box it came in, and just sitting the TV on top of the box.