Some Old Stuff

I'm making a concerted effort to get my junk in order before I hurtle off this mortal coil.  I am eliminating one whole box of "stuff" each week and also reading 10 magazines from my big pile of them.  Now..  by talking about it, I may be tempted to stop.  Let's see how my resolve holds up.

Anyway, here are a few old items that I have come across while searching through my ancient archives:

TRIAD note from 2014:  New scam:  "get free diabetic strips"  ..  Someone calls you and says, "Do you have diabetes?"  If you say "yes,"  the caller offers to give you diabetic strips for free, from a special government program.  All you have to do is give the caller your Medicare number.. which is also your SSN.

The caller then can make some fake Medicare claims related to diabetes.

Now.. 2017, Elaine and I both get free strips via Medicare, but we have to fill out a form for the pharmacist, explaining how often we use the strips.  I'm a little confused about this because WalMart sells strips like I use "over the counter" and rather cheaply.



Family Note from 2014:  Nephew-in-law, Michael, sent me some great linguica... lots of it! It was frozen, but I was able to break it down in smaller amounts for our freezer.

Now.. 2017, I thawed some linguica and included it in my latest endeavor at soup making.  I named my soup:  Quelle Surprise! (translated to Kale Surprise)... the surprise part is my inclusion of spinach, because I didn't use kale.

My late and beloved wife, Elaine, liked to make delicious New Bedford style kale soup. Daughter Elizabeth tried it and said she liked it, "all except for that green stuff!"

Now.. that frozen linguica that I used was 3 years old... and I have lots and lots and lots of frozen linguica left over..  I wonder how long I can use it.

Family Note from 2017:  Whaleman Statue in New Bedford.  My wonderful sister in law, Janine, sent me a pewter belt buckle in the shape of the New Bedford statue.  A great gift!  Here is a picture taken when the statue was dedicated.. around 1909 or so:

My grandfather, Arthur S. Vaughan worked in his father's funeral shop when the guy who posed for this statue passed away.  He was an enormous man and there were no caskets big enough to contain him, so my grandfather found a piano case somewhere and they used it to hold the big corpse.

TRIAD discussion item from 2014:  A Baltimore policeman slit the throat of a 7 year old Shar-Pei, because "the dog had nipped at the hand of a woman."  Why did he kill the dog?  The owner said that the dog had "escaped" from her house and it was not a naturally vicious dog.  (The officer who killed the dog was named Bolger... any relation to the notorious Boston criminal, Whitey Bolger?)

Someone said, "Why did they have to kill the dog?  Couldn't they just have sicced a cat on it instead?"


Mensa Bulletin note from 2011:  Begging the Question.

The meaning of Begging the Question has eluded me for years, but
Douglas Perret Starr of Jackson, Mississippi has actually looked the phrase up and says:

"To beg the question means to use an argument that assumes as proved the very thing one is trying to prove... and 'loosely'evade the issue."

Sorry, Doug, but I still don't understand the phrase.
..................................................................................................................

Damn cold weather!

......................................................................................................................