Prepop Sez: Lock Picking; Guns; Inky the Octopus; Calamari Heaven; The Bible; Wazzoo Virus; The Seven Dwarfs

Another wonderful sunny 70 degree day in Westminster, Maryland.

Let's just talk about weird stuff today.

Lost Your Key?

In 2013, Chuck Shepherd wrote in Funny Times about an Oakland, California adventure in Adult Education. One of their classes was for people who sometimes accidentally lock themselves out of their homes. The class taught the students how to pick locks. They even offered lock-picking kits for sale after class. Needless to say, although burglars thought the class was great, some residents didn't think so much of it, especially because burglaries had increased 40% in the preceding year. The mayor quickly canceled the class.

Armed Citizens

In 2011, Chuck Shepherd wrote in Funny Times about a couple of people who shot themselves.

Mr. M. of Sarasota, Florida, shot himself trying to ward off a skunk.

Mr. R. of Boulder, Colorado, shot himself while he was sleepwalking.

Oops!

On the news today was a report that they still have not found Inky the Octopus.   Inky is the size of a basketball, yet he found a way to squeeze through a very small hole in his water tank, slither across the laboratory floor, and escape to the sea through a small drain hole. Who said Octopi are not smart? In fact, I read somewhere that an octopus who wanted a treat that was in a jar, wrapped a few tentacles around the lid, turned it and gobbled up his reward.

I was reading about an Italian restaurant in New York City that specializes in calamari to die for. Well, not for me yet.. I tried some and it was so chewy I could not handle it. I did see a recipe for calamari in a magazine today that advised cooking the tentacles for quite a long time to make them tender. Hey, Greeks and Italians love their calamari. It must be good for you. Maybe I'll try it again.
(But I hope it's not Inky!)

Biblical Words

I thought that you might want to know that the New American Bible, Revised Edition, which I believe is a new translation for Catholics, has been trying to get the words closer to the meaning in the original languages. Seventy translators and reviewers have been working on it. A tough job: for example: "in the valley of the shadow of death" could become just " "In the dark valley," depending on what missing vowels could indicate.

The new version omits the word "booty" (wherever that is found) and replaces it with "spoils of war."
Other than that, I have no idea what the changes would be. But then::

Remember: "It ain't necessarily so."
                     Those words that you're li'ble,
                     To read in the Bible,
                      It ain't necessarily so."

The WAZZOO Virus

Back in 1996, I wrote to some friends about a computer matter: "...I was listening to a radio show about computers. A guy called in and said that he printed a resume on his PC and in the middle of it, the word 'wazzoo' appeared. The computer experts had not heard of it. They suggested that it must be a virus related to the 'macro aspects of WORD for PC's and MAC's,' and they suggested that he try all of the virus programs to catch and fix it, especially the latest Norton and others..."

OMG that was 20 years ago and we are still worrying about virus infestation today. Over those years, I have owned lots and lots of computers, in fact, one would say that I had computer "up the wazzoo." (I know, young folks may have never heard that phrase.)

Disney's Guys

OK, did you remember the names of the Seven Dwarfs that were featured in the Snow White movie?

Sleepy