Just after 5:30 yes­ter­day Mark heard two words he had been lon­ging to hear for over a year.  “You pas­sed”.  He took his road test to get his driver’s license.  He is now a licen­sed dri­ver which opens up a new world of free­dom for him, and an excuse for me to brush up on traf­fic laws.  In the last year during one our many dri­ves prac­ti­cing, we spot­ted dozens upon dozens of peo­ple making silly dri­ving mis­ta­kes.  Not just run­ning red lights or rolling stops, but other driver’s swer­ving around yelling out win­dows,  peo­ple dri­ving large trucks like they think it’s a Camaro in the movie “Can­non­ball Run 2”.  These were all lear­ning moments follo­wed by each of us utte­ring “Stu­pid peo­ple are everywhere”.

So, Mark, you are embar­king in another new phase in your life of mobi­lity. Just remem­ber  as you drive solo, beware of the stu­pid peo­ple.  They really are everywhere.

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I like your shoes.

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5.  Star Trek has ama­zing simi­la­ri­ties to accounting.

4.  If your boss says “rInpa’ jaj­vam, De’ vIghaj­nIS” you know they need that report by the end of the day.

3.  There’s no harass­ment laws regar­ding squashing tribbles

2.  All orga­ni­za­tions should encou­rage diver­sity.  If they don’t, then they should feel the wrath of Klingons

1.  Don’t ask, yIghelQo’!

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It’s a sultry sum­mer Tues­day eve­ning.  My beau­ti­ful wife and I wan­der into a Best Wes­tern loo­king over the inters­tate like friendly gar­goyle.  Inside, we are gree­ted by a sign with an arrow.  Being the lem­mings we are, we follow the signs and end up outside a dar­ke­ned ball­room filled with peo­ple wea­ring pea­sant skirts, stoc­king caps, and goa­tees.  I am pretty sure that was just one per­son wea­ring all those at the same time.

We pay our cover charge and enter.  The Live CD is pla­ying and peo­ple are min­gling, some lou­der than others, when a man in Middle Eas­tern garb enters and starts spray pain­ting “F” then “U” then “N” on the back­drop.  He finishes spe­lling Funky Arabs and they kick off the show.

 A few things I wan­ted to share about the show—an overly-happy dude wea­ring a thrift store hat and a shirt that reads, “Quit work, Make music” is enthu­sias­ti­cally han­ding out ska­ter stickers.

A cer­tain local poli­ti­cian wea­ring red snea­kers (bonus points for you, sir) is dan­cing with who I assume is his wife, to a song about lying girlfriends.

 It was fun all around, plus on the way home, I got to have an Ice Cream Snicker’s Bar.

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I am what science would refer to as a mosquito-attractant.  I was outside briefly and I have dozens of bites, inc­lu­ding three right in a row on my foot.  It’s like they lined up at Mos­quito Bonanza and got their fill.  I go inside and find 3 more that track me down inside.  It’s not even mos­quito prime time yet!  This could be the year I cross the 50% threshold of bites to open skin.  By August, I’ll be a big swo­llen mound in sneakers

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Today in history….

In 1178    5 Can­ter­bury monks report an explo­sion on the moon (only such
           obser­va­tion known) which is belie­ved to be the ori­gin of lunar cra­ter Gior­dano Bruno

And

In 1980 “Blues Brothers” with Dan Aykroyd & John Belushi premiered

 To cele­brate, here’s today’s playlist:

“Man in the Moon” – R.E.M.

“Theme from Big Bang Theory” – Bare­na­ked Ladies

“Every­body Needs Some­body to Love” – The Blues Brothers

“Theme From Rawhide” – The Blues Brothers

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Father’s Day is this Sun­day.  It is one of my favo­rite days of the year.  It’s the day that no one asks me to fix anything …for at least a cou­ple hours.

I can­not speak for all fathers, but I can tell you what would make a great Father’s Day.

-  Make sure any chil­dren under 8 years old refer to him as “Daddy” and not as “Steve” or “Hey you”.

-  Never under esti­mate the power of beef.

-  If Dad is wea­ring a pair of comfy shorts with holes in them, just avert your eyes and know your dad is comfortable.

-  If Dad calls you by your brother’s name, just let it go.

-  It’s the dog’s fault all day.

-  If he likes to golf, insist he goes gol­fing, if he likes to work on cars, tell him to spend the day in the garage, and if he likes to build things, tell Mom to give Dad wood.

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There’s no one more inte­res­ting to lis­ten to know than a “Know-it-all”.  That per­son, whether or not they really know about it, will tell you all about anything you talk about.

Recently I was visi­ting with a new acquain­tance about gene­ral tech­no­logy items.  While tal­king about sen­ding e-mails via a soft­ware appli­ca­tion, he says, “I really think the best way to do it would be using “Muh All Toe”.  I stop imme­dia­tely and ask him to repeat that.  He says it again—it sounds like “Muh All Toe”.  It was then I ask, “You mean ‘Mail to’ (refe­rring to the HTML syn­tax of ‘Mailto’)?”  The guy doesn’t say another word, turns around and doesn’t say another word to me for the rest of the day.  I felt really bad that he was so emba­rras­sed but—as he so elo­quently put it ear­lier, “The point was mute”.  I’d say so.

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It never fails that every time I fly I learn something new.  Things like.…going on a trip without a poc­ket full of quar­ters and Immo­dium is like going into battle without ammunition.

One trip I lear­ned that ANY bag can fit in the overhead com­part­ment if you push it hard enough.

This time I lear­ned that GPS units in cars are very use­ful, and a huge pain in the bot­tom.  It took me 10 minu­tes to drive from the air­port to my hotel when I arri­ved.  It took me over an hour to drive from my hotel to the air­port using the GPS.  I saw the sce­nic views of Minneapolis/St. Paul, and ended up dri­ving roads only locals drive.  The lesson.….make sure the GPS is not in “Pedes­trian mode” before you start driving.

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The Tri­ple Long Hei­fer Jammer

The Quin­tu­ple Loop Loop Scoop –a–Doop

The Dou­ble Gingham

The Super Flint Knuc­kle Squeezer

The Hun­ga­rian Waf­fle Iron

The Left-handed Girdle Hurdle

The Loon Leap + Tri­ple Frog Spin

The Ice­ta­tor

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The first thing that I noti­ced is that I remem­ber being so bored that I watched TV shows that kids wouldn’t nor­mally watch…like soap ope­ras, old Ger­man guys pain­ting on PBS, and  Donahue.  With the advent of Car­toon Net­work and Nic­ke­lo­deon, they don’t have to try to find anything amu­sing, it’s just fun.  I had to wait for Satur­day mor­ning for that kind of fun.

Second, back yards now look like small amu­se­ment parks with huge pools, tram­po­li­nes, and jun­gle gyms fit for schools.  I remem­ber the back­yards being pretty barren besi­des a small A-frame swing set—maybe.  Only kids like Ricky Sch­roe­der on Sil­ver Spoons had trampolines. 

Lastly, there aren’t very many mom’s and dad’s stan­ding on their front porch screa­ming names at din­ner time.  Ins­tead quiet text mes­sa­ges are sent.  Sure the result is the same, but the cho­rus of voi­ces is mis­sing.  Not to men­tion the need for naming chil­dren so their names are easy to yell.  This is why we have so many kids with long com­pli­ca­ted names now.  I think parents would recon­si­der if they had to yell “Loqueisha” every night.  The saliva expe­lled on every yell could dehy­drate a per­son in less than 20 minutes!

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Asus Eee Pad announced. 

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/06/01/asus-eee-pad-challenge-apple-ipad/

Apple must be the cool kid in class.  Remem­ber when the one cool kid in class sho­wed up to class one day in a big puffy vest, within weeks, ever­yone was wea­ring a big puffy vest.  The ques­tion was never asked, “Hey, cool kid, why are you wea­ring a puffy vest?”  Maybe his mom made him wear it.  Maybe he was cold?  Maybe his father is a lum­ber­jack?  Who knows.  My dad isn’t a lum­ber­jack.  I should have been wea­ring music teacher clothes.  Loo­king back now, I think I was wea­ring music teacher clothes.   I’m digressing. 

Maybe we need to ask Apple if its father is a lumberjack.

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Well, today my beau­ti­ful bride and I did our civic duty and sho­wed up for Jury Duty. The more times I get to have jury duty the more I rea­lize it is a snapshot of huma­nity. We had mams and dads, grand­pa­rents and sin­gle folks. Big hair, short hair, and even a mullet. Dress clothes, t-shirts with adver­ti­sing, and even a leather jac­ket com­plete with HD patches. Yes, my friends, jury duty does mirror society…and 30% of society needs to bathe more.

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Love this idea. 

http://www.bismanonline.com/getListing.php?tcat=7&cat=207&p=1&a=591838

Using the local “Craigs­list” site to post a shot of two guys who stole from a busi­ness.  The image appears to be from a secu­rity camera.  LOVE this idea!

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Mother’s Day is this Sun­day, so if you haven’t pic­ked up a card or gift for that mother, here’s a few ideas to stay away from.

- The entire Dis­co­graphy of Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Inven­tion (pro­bably because she already has it).
– A mono­gram­med box of dryer sheets.
– A card addres­sed to “That lady that makes pizza with hot­dogs”.
– A subsc­rip­tion to the Poo of the month club.
– A muu­muu fit for a queen.
– A swea­ter for the cat made out of her favo­rite pair of pants.
– Don­key Kong-a-thon.
– Scis­sors to take jog­ging.
– A poke in the eye.
– A cake that reads, “Good luck in pri­son, Carl”.
– A car­ton of ciga­ret­tes in dirty tube socks.

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Lots of stuff going on and some announ­ce­ments to make soon.  Very very good announ­ce­ments.   Until then, here’s a few items to inter­ject when the con­ver­sa­tion has stop­ped or not even started:

- If an ambu­lance is on its way to save someone, and it runs someone over, does it stop to help them?

- Why is Grape Nuts cereal called that, when it con­tains neither gra­pes, nor nuts?

- Can you buy an entire chess set in a pawn shop?

- Why do peo­ple point to their wrist when asking for the time, but peo­ple don’t point to their crotch when they ask where the bath­room is?

- Can blind peo­ple see their dreams?

- Where in the nur­sery rhyme does it say humpty dumpty is an egg?

- Why does Donald Duck wear a towel when he comes out of the sho­wer, when he doesn’t usually wear any pants?

- Why isn’t there a spe­cial name for the tops of your feet?

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