FLASH! Hiatus ended.
Elaine and I spent a week in an elegant ocean front mansion on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. And nobody asked us to submit to a genital search or wanted to see our birth certificates.
After our nice experience in NC, we spent a night at a flea bag motel in Salisbury, Maryland. A place filled with very rude, grasping, smoking and swearing folks. I'll talk about out adventure in a future blog entry. Meanwhile, I need to catch up to my goal of a blog entry for every day in the year, and I'm a bit behind.
Pet Peeves
Frank Batavick, columnist for the Carrroll County Times, Westminster, Maryland, wrote about his 16 pet peeves. I would like to address each of them to demonstrate to anyone who might be reading this, that I am not always Mr. Niceguy.
01. "Host families needed for students from Spain." Every year we see these signs everywhere. Frank thinks that more planning should be done beforehand, and not at the last minute. I agree.
02. "Hearing Aid Mailers." Sometimes I get four of these in the mail in one day. On the days that I don't get any, Elaine gets them. How come those guys don't know that I already have a hearing aid?
03. "Bridge design." Bridges built in Carroll County are plain. Bridges built in Baltimore County look like they belong to the Taj Mahal. (Hey, Frank... you know that Baltimore County votes Democratic and Carroll County votes Republican. And, you know that the Maryland legislature is Democratic.)
04. "Tailgating SUV's." It's "survival of the fittest" out on the road. So, pullover, let them pass. Do not, in any case pump your brakes.. it only makes them mad.
05. "Child programmers." Kids these days are not afraid of computers, and they all have hand-held ones from the age of 18 months on up.
06. "Slow payers at supermarkets." Frank, I'm sorry, I'm one of those guys. I always wait until I see the total before I take out the credit card or cash.
07. "Aging Botox Beauties." We all want to look good, but using aids like Botox make you look like a zombie. Frank and I agree on this one too.
08. "Relatives in Florida." Yes, they sometimes call and gloat about how nice and warm it is while we are freezing our asses off here in the North. Yeah, but they sure would like to be back up here when it's 110 degrees in the shade in Florida during the Summer.
09. "Japanese Beetles." What a lot of people don't realize, is that when you put up a trap filled with pheromone, you don't just catch the beetles that are in your yard, but you also put out a call for reinforcements/
10. "Cell phone batteries." My hand-held cellphone, computer must be recharged each and every night. What a pain in the butt!
11. "Charity Solicitations." Every time I donate to a charity, along with their thank you note comes a request for more. Boo.
12. "Assault Rifles." I feel that anyone who owns one of these is planning to overthrow the Government.. otherwise, what could they be used for. I know a guy who keeps a machine gun next to his front door.. "just in case."
13. "Passwords." As a former Government Cryptographer, I am very well acquainted with passwords. Make it easy on yourself. Use some dates or addresses that you can readily remember, but which would make no sense to anyone else. If you write them down, others could read them. Put them in that pretty little head of yours.
14. "The use of 'LIKE' in every sentence." Well 'like' "I mean, you know" ... this usage should die off in a while.
15. "Uptalking." This is especially troublesome for me too, Frank. Usually, it is restricted to young females on the West Coast, but not always. Hearing it, one might feel inclined to squeeze the neck of the person who insists on talking that way.
16. "Metal Detecting on the Beach." Come on, Frank.. this is fun. My daughter, Elizabeth bought me one recently and we tried (unsuccessfully) to find anything while at the Outer Banks. However, I still remember the thrill I got when I found an 1812 nickel at the ruins of an old church. Was this the nickel that some kid's mother gave him for collection? And he dropped it, and I found it, 160 years later!
So... as you may have guessed, this was an exercise to get me warmed up to make some "intelligent" blog entries. Bye for now.
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