Thoughts of a Twitterless Thinker 10-29-2010 edition

I thought it was about time I got rid of that ghastly snake picture so I’m pushing it down the page via this new post.  Since I’m not a Tweeter, but I am a thinker, here goes the latest installment of Thoughts of a Twitterless Thinker.

I’ve had a lot of “whys” running through my brain lately. If you know the answer to any of these nagging questions, please feel free to jump in.

*Why is starting a forest fire as easy as dropping a match, but starting a fire in your wood-burning stove takes scientific precision? Then try to keep it going for at least thirty minutes. It’s almost as if you have to play matchmaker (ha, I’m funny!) with the flame and the wood.

*The word camouflage is generally shortened to the word “camo.”  Why then, is the word ammunition shortened to “ammo?”  Shouldn’t it be “ammu?”

*The average lifespan of a housefly is thirty days. So why are fall flies much more vicious than summer flies?  Summer flies hover around your watermelon and your lemonade and your macaroni salad. Fall flies go for the head. It’s as if they sense that their thirty days will soon be over---“I want my last meal and dang it, it’s going to be someone’s face!”

*Why don’t dishwashers ever really work? I have had six dishwashers over the past ten years and all of them require intensive scrubbing before placing the dishes inside or else I will end up with a fine coating of foreign quang all over my dishes, glasses and silverware. I’ve tried different detergents, different rinses, and vinegar to no avail. It’s basically more a dish sterilizer than a dish washer.

*Why is a lion called King of the Jungle when he doesn’t live in a jungle?

*Does anyone know why Nacho Doritos contain pork products? My daughter called to tell me that gem this week and I had to look it up to see for myself.

Fun coincidence of the week: Computer Geek and I were watching a documentary on warthogs last night. (Yeah, we’re fun.) Although the adults are rather odd looking the babies were quite fetching.  I said, “Even warthogs are cute at this age.”  The very next sentence spoken by the narrator was, “Even warthogs are adorable at three weeks.”

Confession time: I am a Halloween wimp. My email box is flooded with food recipes for faux body parts such as fingers, eyeballs, brains, intestines, other internal organs, and skulls. Let’s not forget decorating all these with fake blood.  Is it just me, or does eating this kind of “food” seem a tad bit…oh…cannibalistic?

While I’m on a mini-rant, what is so cool about skulls? When did our society decide that it was all right to start decorating with the body parts of dead people? I see skulls on kids’ clothing, shoes, skateboards, bikes, not to mention all over in their artwork.  I’ve even seen skull wallpaper! And did you hear that the man who started Body World now wants to make jewelry out of body parts? It is all just a little too creepy for my taste. I guess I’ll crawl back into my wimpy cave.

Computer Geek’s father passed away a couple of days ago. He was eighty-six years old, and was not in the best of health even before they found cancer a few weeks ago. CG was able to sneak away last week and go visit his father one more time. I am so happy he was able to go.

We were disturbed though by something one of his nurses said. When CG’s dad lost his appetite, we were told that the nursing home would no longer feed him. Apparently “they become euphoric when they lose their appetite and no longer notice that they aren’t being fed.”   Seriously?  Let’s try that rationale the next time a farmer gets arrested for starving his animals to death. “But officer, when my cows are near death they become euphoric, so they didn’t notice a thing.”  Luckily CG’s sister snuck in some peanut butter sandwiches.

On the brighter side, I was feeling crafty this week and made this sign for my kitchen. 

If you like it, you can make one too at one of my favorite sites, Tatertots and Jello. You can download the picture there. It is a spin-off of the re-discovered British sign from WWII.

When you hand out a box of paperclips to a group of ninth graders and tell them to attach a header sheet to their assignment, you never  know in what shape that box of clips will make its way back to you.

Computer Geek had a birthday this week. He turned fifty-two. Hoolie, Pinque and Avatar stopped by to wish their Grandpa Geek a happy day.

I guess I’m done with all the thinking for now, so I’ll head off to bed—as soon as I get rid of this fly that’s trying to use my face as a landing strip.