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Happy New Year - December 31, 2004 -
Whoopti-doo!! Ah, yes, New Year's Day. What would we do without it? I suppose
some people would actually have a difficult time getting through the new year
ahead if they didn't have this day. I'm talking resolutions here.
Why do we need one day out of the year to "make a
pledge" or "resolve to be better" or some such nonsense. It reminds me of a Bill
Cosby story he tells about cocaine. He asked someone once what good was cocaine
and they told him "It enhances your personality." In a way that only Bill could
do, he says, "Well, what if you're an asshole?"
You see, I think there are basically two kinds of
AHs in this world - you were born as one or you become one. To be born as one
means that you are too stupid to see that you are one and can't change to be
something else. To become one means you are one of those people who enjoy making
others as miserable as you are so you decide to enhance what you are by working
very hard at it. People like this don't need New Year's resolutions - what for?
To become bigger assholes?
If you're too stupid to know what you are, why
make a resolution. You probably aren't bright enough to think up a resolution.
Maybe that's my problem.
And that leaves the rest of us (you). Do you make
resolutions? If so, why? I know the answer to this question. I just didn't want
to come across as too big of a know-it-all. BECAUSE IT MAKES YOU FEEL GOOD!
Feel good is what it's all about these days. Our
motivational forces come mostly from how certain things make us feel. "If it
feels good, do it", came from the tail end of the hippie generation. Take for
example, one thing that we all do that makes us feel good. I am not alone when I
say I bitch and moan - it makes me feel good, I think. When I get bitching and
moaning, somewhere in the ranting and raving will come this statement: "There
ought to be a law!"
If you think about it for a minute or two, we do
this a lot. We strongly believe that passing a law will cure what makes us feel
not so good about. My favorite is this one. "There needs to be a law prohibiting
those who speed all the time from having a drivers license!" So, we did make a
law and boy do I feel better!
Of course, the next morning you pick up the paper
and here's another story of some "unlicensed" individual running down some
innocent bystander. Man, taking away that license sure helped but at the time it
made us feel good.
The pendulum begins to swing further and higher
because now we are mad about that and we want something else done and on and on
it goes. Where do we stop?
It's now New Year's Day and we are contemplating
resolutions - to make us feel good. We feel good because our intentions, in the
front of our minds, is to do something good. In the back of our minds - deep,
deep somewhere - we know we won't carry them through. If we wanted to, we would
have already done it.
After we resolve to "lose twenty pounds" - of
course I need about a good 50 - we try "really hard" for a week or maybe an hour
and give up. We are now mad because we can't keep resolutions and vow never to
make one again.
This year, while sitting around thinking of some
nice easy resolutions, ask yourself this question. If I really WANT to change
something in my life, why haven't I already done it?
So why not be like me - fat and happy? I resolve
never to make New Year's resolutions because they suck!
Mainard True
Son-of-a-bitch! - December 28, 2004 - Got
your attention though didn't I. Do you know how many ways there are to say or
use that expression? I hope not because if you did, I would assume that you were
screwed up in the head.
No matter where you go, people use that expression
and say it in many different ways. An example of that is Blake Shelton's country
music hit "Some Beach". another would be "Son-a-bitch" or "Some bitch" -
you get the idea right.
It's late in the day and as you can tell, this
post sucks.
Mainard True
Are You in Sync? - December 27, 2004 - Have
you ever read any of
Patrick McManus' stuff? Good reads if you like Garrison Keillor and Mark
Twain kind of stuff. Sometimes he gets a little off the wall and most of the
time his hits the nail on the head.
He writes of the need for or actually his lack of
being in sync and believes that for things to happen the way you would like them
to, everything needs to be in sync. Here's an example: If you decide to go
fishing and once you get there, wet your line and find out 6 hours later you
haven't caught anything, it isn't that you were using the wrong bait or you suck
at fishing. It's that things weren't in sync. You either arrived too late or too
early and the fish weren't ready to eat.
Expounding on that theory for a bit, we can find
many uses for applying it into our daily lives. Of course, McManus blames most
of his life on being out of sync and he doesn't offer up any means of making the
correction. I always thought that if you thought things were just all screwed up
that you could stop what you were doing and either spin yourself around once and
see if that helped or spin yourself in the opposite direction twice, that would
help. I've never had a lot of success leaving the room and re-entering.
Bear in mind all the while that while trying to
re-synchronize your synchronization that you run the risk of not being in sync
with the correct moment in which one must synchronize.
If you don't understand this you are probably out
of sync! Have a good day!
Mainard True
A Truck Load - December 26, 2004 - I was
awoken yesterday morning to the sound we have all come to recognize - beep,
beep, beep, beep..... I looked out the window to see a 12 yard dump truck
delivering a load of coal. Yeah, as bad as I've been this year, I got a truck
load of it.
Christmas holds so much meaning to so many people
I can't get over it. Like the email I got yesterday morning to greet me on a
cloudy and rainy Christmas day. It went something like this: "Now that the
holidays are over, what else do we have to look forward to? The Super Bowl, what
else!" Holy, cow! They hadn't even finished swaddling the baby Jesus in the
manger and it's on to the Super Bowl.
Mainard True
Coal in Your Stocking? - December 22, 2004
- More than likely for me but what about you? What kind of a Christmas person
are you? Have you been naughty or nice? Are you a Santa celebrator or that other
guy - oh, what's his name? They say he was a pretty important guy in his day?
Oh, yeah, Jesus!
My wife and I just got home from a ride in the
country and while out traveling about, we came across a small pond with a
plastic Santa Clause standing in the middle of a row boat with his right arm
pointing toward the sky - I assume in a friendly gesture of hello. My comment to
my wife was, "Oh, look! There's Jesus in the boat. He must be getting ready to
walk on water." To which my wife backhanded me for saying something like that,
so I responded with, "Well, maybe he is getting ready to cast his fishing nets
to the other side of the boat."
Mainard True
Gag Me With A Spoon! - December 20, 2004 -
Hey, everybody! How about another television commercial with a nauseating
rendition of "Santa Baby". I don't want to come across like a "Bah Humbug" but I
can't take any more. There's one commercial that has a woman coming outside to
see her new Christmas - oh, I mean HOLIDAY cause we can't say Christmas it might
offend some senseless, no-life SOB (and they worry about whether or not saying
Christmas is offensive) - Jaguar (on TV pronounced Jag You Are. I don't remember
my English teachers through school pronouncing it that way. I guess Jag-You-Are
is some how richer and let's not forget sexier).
After the woman takes a look at her new HOLIDAY
JAG-YOU-ARE, she throws him on the front lawn and begins to sexually accost the
poor fella.
"Santa, baby, put a present under the tree, for
me!" Oh, please! And while we are on nauseating holiday commercials, Lexus don't
get no better. Uh uh! This guy, who I think would like to be sexually accosted
on his front lawn, somehow manages to get a Lexus SUV of some kind, into his
living room and wraps it in a big red bow. When he leads his wife (oh that
should probably be, partner) blindfolded into the living room on HOLIDAY
morning, all she can say is, "Where did you get the big bow?"
So, with that said, let me say this before I go,
Merry CHRISTMAS, CHRISTMAS, CHRISTMAS, CHRISTMAS and broken down that would be
Christ mas, CHRISTmas, CHRIST, CHRIST, CHRIST. If I offended you
then all I can say is, "Have a Merry, Merry, Christmas"
I'm very bad! Nothing but coal in my stocking!
Mainard True
Wonder No
More! - December 17, 2004 - Billy has arrived! Just when I was wondering
if we would ever get to lay eyes on what Billy the Dog looked like, this
morning there's a picture of that fella over at
Virgil and Florena's place.
Mainard
True
Virgil and Florena have Faces - December 16, 2004 -
Since the beginning, I wondered what Virgil
and Florena must look like. Well, this morning I dropped in to pay them
a visit and see what, if anything, was new with them. When I arrived at
their place, low and behold, there were two
faces staring me straight in the eye. I don't know though. That Florena
woman scares me. She reminds me of my 3rd graded teacher I had for 3 years
in a row.
I wonder if we'll ever get a look at Billy?
Mainard
True
A Bit of Yule Laughter - December 15, 2004 - It seems
that there were three fellas died and went to heaven just prior to
Christmas. One fella he come from Lewiston, one from West Paris and one from
Caratunk.
They met St. Peter at the gate and Peter
explained that in celebration of the upcoming Christmas season anyone
wishing to enter into the pearly gates had to show something relating to
Christmas. All three men began to pilfer through their pockets to try and
come up with something.
The fella from West Paris immediately produced a Bic
lighter and flicked it on you see. Peter looked a bit puzzled and the West
Paris fella explained that the lighter represented a candle. Peter thought
that would be alright and opened the gate and let him in.
Next was the Caratunk native who continued to fumble a bit
and pulled out a set of car keys and began shaking them kind of fiercely.
Peter again looked a bit confused when the Caratunk man exclaimed that the
keys sounded like bells. St. Peter agreed and opened the pearly gates and
let him in.
Now the man from Lewiston could only find one thing in his
pockets and he showed a pair of women's underpants. Peter was quite shocked
to say the least and stared at the Lewiston man with an eyebrow slightly
raised. "What on earth do you think those have to do with Christmas?" asked
St. Peter. "They are Carol's" replied the Lewiston man.
Yeah, enough
of that. See you later.
Mainard
True
Reflecting on Our Intelligence - December 14, 2004 - I
admit I am a cynic but for the life of me, I don't understand why we are so
dumb. I have to comment on two recent stories that appeared in the newspaper
over the past week.
The first one was health
related. "New Study Finds Sitting in Traffic Can be a Health Risk".
The article goes on to state that studies have shown that anyone who spends
a lot of time stuck in traffic jams breathing the exhaust from automobiles,
could risk lung and other diseases in the future. DUH!! How extraordinarily
brilliant and money well spent I'm sure. This would be a great study had it
been done by the 3rd graders at Dreamworld Elementary School.
I'll also admit that I'm not the brightest bulb on the
Christmas tree but I do know a thing or two. I know that if you walk up
behind a bear and kick him in the ass, it could pose a health risk. I think
I also have it figured out that if I stood in front of a pulp truck that was
traveling at 50 mph it could result in conditions not favorable to good
health.
Are these same people aware that going to the press and
revealing these kinds of wasteful studies to the public can cause long
lasting physical and psychological damage to people like me who read about
them? Oh, hell, let's make a law. That would make me feel better.
Here's another one that proves that President John F.
Kennedy was either an idiot or he was so far ahead of his time the rest of
us Americans just humored him when it came to his far reaching dreams.
A headline in a paper reads, "School Board to Take a
Closer Look at How Exercise Can Stimulate Learning". WHOA, NELLY!!!!
Another taxpayer's study showed this particular school board, (and we don't
want to reveal which school board it was because they are all extremely
obese and upon further review, we have discovered that in fact because of
lack of exercise it made them stupid) that if students are given
opportunities to exercise as part of their daily education plan, it may
stimulate certain chemicals in their brains and this could allow them to
learn better.
"Great Caesar's Ghost", as Editor White would say. I'll be
willing to wager that whoever headed up that study walks down to the corner
every morning for their exercise and gets a cup of Dunkin Donuts coffee and
a glazed donut. BRILLIANT! ABSOLUTELY BRILLIANT!
Come on people! We know this can't be all true. I would be
willing to bet that the marketing plans for McDonalds, Burger King and ilk,
weren't created while out on an early morning jog. Then again, maybe they
were. I am beginning to understand how this study could be shocking to some
people. It contradicts what all of us already know about certain things.
Take for example, Michael Moore. Not to pick on him but he did pick on us so
therefore he deserves it. Here's a man who obviously doesn't exercise or a
lot of other things that most of us would consider normal everyday personal
hygiene habits, and he is an intelligent man. Look at what he has done and
accomplished over the past couple of years. First, there was ...............
Well, I guess maybe this isn't so contradictory after all.
Okay! Enough ranting and raving this morning. I have
better things to do. Actually I don't. Have a nice day!
Mainard
True
Spam -Not the Kind in a Can - We all get it - spammed
that is - and most of us who run online businesses don't have time to try to
adjust our spam settings on our 20,000 email sites. I can live with the
online spamming. I just start at the top and delete, delete, delete, so if
you want to email me don't try to disguise it with "bad" spelling - like ?SeeXXX.
While we are talking about this sort of thing before I get to
the meat of my ranting for today, who do they think cares about the email
spam they send? Do stupid people actually open these up and buy something
from them?
And of course my favorite starts something like this:
"Hello, I have want to make acquaintance at you. My name is the Prince
Abdullah and I have 50 billion dollars I have not to do with. I request
you're assistance."
Oh, boy! I'm going to be rich! Is there that much
stewpadity...er a stuppitty.... umm stoopiddy...STUPIDITY?
Anyway! Back at the ranch. Spamming - on television is big
time. First and foremost let me say, I DO NOT SUBSCRIBE TO CABLE TV. I have
better things to do with what little money I don't own. What I watch comes
over the airwaves, free, with all the incessant commercials. What I want to
know is how - and not that I approve of any of this - ABC got ragged on big
time by showing a pre- Monday Night Football lead-in of a half naked woman
jumping into the arms of "MR. TUDE" Terrell Owens of the Philadelphia Eagles
football team.
While this is going on, some woman is talking about Cialas
or one of those wonder drugs and describing her "partner's" "strong and long
lasting erection"! WHOA! TMI, TMI, TMI (too much information).
This is okay? Like, what? Is this educational? I guess! I
learned that anything goes when it comes to selling drugs. Drug companies
got most everything cornered and if I could find my Vioxx, I could open the
damned bottle of Paxil and then I wouldn't write such depressing stuff.
I wonder if the drug companies include a sign in the
package the buyer can hang around their neck or someplace else it might hang
well from that reads: "I have an erection - strong and long lasting"? Then
you can head out to the mall.
Please, in my old age I don't have time to first locate
the remote control - only to discover I can't find it until I find my
glasses - and then stumble through all the buttons, again, to try to find
either a mute, off, or change channel button to stop the SPAM!
Mainard
True
Teaching Bears about Contraception? - December 9, 2004
- I just can't help it! I'm sick! I was browsing through the Editorial
section of the Bangor Daily News and I noticed that someone had submitted a
letter referring to the bear hunt in New Jersey that got canceled this year.
I haven't really followed the issue but that is not the
point. What I read was this:
New Jersey's supreme
court canceled its proposed bear hunt last Thursday ruling that the state
needs to establish "a proper management program for bears before it can
allow the animals to be hunted."Management in New Jersey would include
contraception programs and public education campaigns.
Contraception
programs for bears - someone please explain! Free bear condoms? The morning
after pill? What????? Are we going to trap the big boys and give them a
vasectomy? Just shoot em!!!! And public education campaigns? Where do these
bears sign up for free classes. Maybe I'm mistaken! Maybe we are supposed to
teach the public how to administer contraceptive devices to a bear. I want
to see nurse Jones teaching the proper way of donning a condom to a bear.
This is just way too funny! But I
got an idea! Let's appropriate a few million dollars to study the issue some
more. I'm for that even though I don't live in New Jersey but being that I
am a curious sort of an old geezer, I want to see this "contraception
program" in progress - I told you I was sick!
Pets - December 8, 2004 - I'll say it right up front -
"I am not a pet lover." There, I feel better. Don't get me wrong, it's not
the pet I have the problem with as much as it is the owner. I can already
tell I'm going to make some people unhappy with me.
Let me try to explain it this way. You see pets - let's pick on dogs - do
what they think their owners want them to do. So what a dog does is a
reflection of the owner. (there are some things dogs do that owners don't do
and in some cases owners wouldn't want them to do, but this is not the forum
to discuss those in)
You ever been around a couple and one of them talks
incessantly? You ask yourself, "How in the hell does Betty stand it?" "How
can anyone live with someone who never shuts up?" Well, this one's easy! To
put up with it, you learn to turn a deaf ear (experience speaking here).
After a while it becomes part of the landscape.
It's the same with dogs. People let their dogs bark and
after a while, they don't notice - trust me though, the rest of us do. And
dog's barks have distinction like people's voices - some have a quality that
ruffles the hair on the back of your neck.
Dog owners turn deaf ears to their barking dogs. Why?
Several reasons actually but I'm only going to refer to one - it's a passive
form of dog blackmail or maybe even canine extortion. Dogs can't speak in
the way that most humans do - with the exception of some past Presidential
candidates - but they see everything. Owners feel guilty because they
know that their dogs saw them doing something they shouldn't have been
doing. That' why dogs are fat and ill mannered. Owners are paying off their
debts to the dog by giving them "treats" and they let them bark because they
would feel guilty to speak harshly to a dog that has some "dirt" on them.
This is why many older women have several dogs and no husband.
How I got going on this this morning was reading an update
to a little ditty I did a while ago about lawmakers in Presque Isle putting
together a pet ordinance. You can read my little story
here! (at least my version)
Don't get me wrong. I think that anyone who opts to own a
pet needs to take care of it BUT, do we really need laws to tell us if it is
too cold outside for your dog to be out or that it is bad to let your dog
share his food dish with let's say, your husband?
How many times have you driven by the bus stop in mid
January in Presque Isle and seen teenagers waiting for the bus with no hat,
gloves and sometimes not even a warm jacket? Where are the laws? Are they
there and our police force isn't enforcing them? Doesn't this fall under the
new Homeland Security? No wonder Tom Ridge resigned! Outrageous!
Ain't it a hoot? I said it before that when I grew up I
shared dinner plates with my brothers and the only thing that's wrong with
me is I can't see anything wrong with me. I woke up mornings and it was
colder in my bed than what these proposed laws are saying is too cold for
your dog to be outside. Have we gone mad?
Well, maybe I got my own priorities all screwed up. Maybe
it wouldn't so bad being hooked on the end of rope outside when it is cold.
Barking could be fun. I don't get to do much of that at home anymore - I'm
not the dominant male. The real bonus for me would be eating out of a clean
bowl - whenever it rained. And the best thing for you is I wouldn't be
writing this nonsense.
So, I have more important work to do now so all I can say
to end this fine piece of journalism is, "Bark, bark, bark,............!"
Mainard
True
Bad Weather from Florida - December 3, 2004 - I woke
up this morning laughing because for some insane reason I was recalling a
story my son had told me about earlier this summer - something his daughter
Elizabeth said.
One morning Steven had gotten up
quite early at his home in Bangor and noticed that it was very foggy. Soon,
his daughter got up and as she arrived downstairs, she looked out the window
and she too noticed the fog. She asked Daddy what that was. He explained
that it was fog and when the sun got higher up in the sky, it would burn the
fog off and make it go away.
This was all happening at a time when, here in Florida, we
were getting what seemed to be a continual bombardment of hurricanes and
Elizabeth had heard her parents talking about the hurricanes etc.
After she looked at the fog for a bit she asked Daddy if
the fog was bad weather. When he told her that he thought maybe it was bad
weather her comment to him was, "Oh, bad weather! Did it come from Florida?"
Mainard
True
Discovery 2004 - December 2, 2004 - Yesterday I
got an email - randomly sort of - from a woman named KC. This wasn't SPAM as
it's pretty easy to tell SPAM from ALS (almost like spam). KC was interested
in exchanging links to each other's sites, so I went over to her site and
checked it out - almost sounds law-breaking. Much to my surprise I found out
she promotes laughter as medicine. Oh, yeah! Her site is called "Discover
Happiness Is....".
I searched through the place
looking of course for something to laugh at. Well, if you look around you'll
find things to laugh at that's for sure but can you imagine being in a
business where you bring people together and teach them how to laugh and in
particular at themselves. Some people!
What puzzles the hell out of me though is her business is
located in Maine. Yeah, that's right, Maine. A place where people pride
themselves on their ability to not show any emotion and that includes
laughing. I remember Joe
Perham tells a story about going to a town to do some storytelling and
once in a while he'll insert some Maine humor, and no one laughed. He was so
disappointed until on his way out he overheard two people say to each other
in a way only to 69 year old Mainers could say, "I had all I could do to
keep from laughing!"
So, KC, good luck! Boston is only a stone's throw from
where you are. I'm sure they could use a little "coaching". (insert smiley
face here)
Mainard
True
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