The reporters acted stupidly

Pic from wikipedia

While visiting eastern Europe, Mitt Romney stopped to visit the Polish Tomb of the Unknowns.  I've never been there.  I've never even been to Europe.  I have been to Arlington, though...

Go there someday.  Take your time walking up the hill.  Visit General Lee's house.  Watch a Changing of the Guard.  For me, the whole experience was very moving - prompting feelings of sadness and loss but also surges of pride and reverence.

No doubt the Poles feel similarly about their Tomb.

There are places where, for lack of a better phrase, you just don't be an a**hole.  You just don't.  Ever.  This is one of those places.  There is absolutely no room for partisan dickswinging at such a solemn place. 

Which is why I'm so PO'd at the reporters following Romney around.  Screaming questions about Palestinians?  While in Poland?  At their Tomb of the Unknown?  That is a hundred kinds of wrong.  Every once in a while, a person/topic/event comes along and really riles me.  I can't mentally afford to get ticked at everything that merits being ticked off about.  I try to let most of it roll off my back, but this is one of the exceptions where I just can't shake it off.  I'm sick of sacrifice being disrespected and I'm sick of eastern Europe being treated like garbage.  We don't need to put these people on a pedestal; we don't need to go Nation Building along the Danube.  But can't we at least treat these people with some decency and respect?

I hope to visit Arlington again.  I'd love also to visit similar sites in Europe someday.  Though I haven't been in a fistfight since elementary school, had I been in Poland yesterday, there would be a reporter in a dental chair today getting his front teeth surgically repaired.

Slacker, no slacking!

Hey, slacker!  What's your deal?  Moogie has already dropped SIX (6) comments, just today.  The rest of ya?  Zip, zero, nada.  Moogie is young and fit and well-armed.  She's probably able to pull all your dead weight for a while.  But it isn't very gentlemanly or chivalrous.  So.  You know what to do.  :)

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I finally did it...  Ever since it came out, I've been saying that twitter was whey to ghey for this guy...  But a lot of the blogs I like have gone dormant.  Sure, I've found a few new ones.  But sometimes ya just gotta have a little more.  So I signed up for twitter.  I've had Facebook for a couple years, and I've *never* posted a single thing there.  Twitter will likely be the same way for me, so don't try to follow me.  Just don't.  So far I'm only following a few funny people like iowahawk, Frank from IMAO, Jim Treacher, and such.  If you know of anybody funny and/or insightful, lemme know, K?

So far, today's winner is Frank:

1.5% GDP growth means we haven't been building that. 

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Found my glasses!  They went AWOL Wednesday night.  I'm nearsighted.  Up to about arm's length away, I see better without them.  (Which is just fine for an engraver).  I mostly only wear them for driving and at church.  I can squint things into focus but it leads to eyestrain and headaches.  Where did I find them?  In the bottom dresser drawer.  The drawer that only has swim trunks and sweats and stuff, that I almost never get into.

FOR SALE (CHEAP!): One thieving granddaughter who likes to hide things.  Prefer to sell to circus or clan of gypsies but willing to negotiate.

Have another question

The other day, I asked about flag handling and got good info from y'all.  So I'm going to that well again to draw up another bucket of your wisdom...

A funeral home brought in a bronze urn to be engraved.  Not that unusual.  It had bronze legs on it.  Still not that unusual.  But the bronze legs are arranged such that I can't hold the thing still with the legs attached.  So the legs gotta come off.  Of course the screws are on the inside...

(Breaker-breaker.  Scooney, ya got yer ears on?)

The urn already had cremains in it, from the spouse of the person who just passed.  The funeral home removed and stored those remains, to go back in after the engraving is done.  If you've ever messed with cast bronze, you might know that the inside (where nobody ever sees) is rough and nasty.  Lots of little nooks and crevices that can hold cremains.

So all of a sudden, I have a little pile of stuff on the engraving table.  Coarser than sand but finer than cornmeal.  So that's what cremains look like...

Brushing them into the trash seemed uncool.  So I took a can of "Blow Off" canned air and scattered them to the four winds.  Is this sacrilege?  Have I just opened the Ninth Portal of Hades?  Are cats and dogs gonna start living together?  Are Captain and Tennille going on a Worldwide Reunion Tour?

Please, tell me everything is going to be alright!

Ranting is theraputic

The other day, I'm standing there doing the dishes (in a most manly way, of course) when I note that the floor is getting REALLY wet under my feet.  Thought to myself no big deal, the granddaughter spilled something.  Again.  Then, during a break in the action, I could hear the tinkle of running water.  No big deal, these grandkids tinkle anywhere any time.  Finally I had to stop and investigate.  Turns out the metal housing of the garbage disposal was broken, and yucky funkwater was streaming out of it - looking very much like some kind of swamp robot pissing on my floor.

Landlord brought over a new unit and I handled the install.  Old one out and new one in - took only a few minutes.  "You're pretty handy" says the landlord.  "Drove finicky old cars as a teenager" I explained.  "A lot of the time it was either 'be handy' or 'walk home' so I got pretty good at fixing things."  Landlord went on to tell me about a fixer-upper house they'd bought years ago, and they made it a family project for one summer to get it into shape.  He said that he had a son-in-law who was in his 20s at the time, who had NEVER USED A HAMMER.  (I was bending nails in my dad's new deck when I was 3).  OK...  Here's the deal:  if you're 20-something years old and can't use a hammer, you simply aren't worthy of being numbered among my countrymen.  Please, just, just... move far the heck away.  Maybe a country that is tolerant of those who have, um, "expressive wrists" should be at the top of your list.

Anyway.

New disposal unit has half again as much power and is much quieter.  It sounds like one chainsaw instead of a chorus of chainsaws. All is well, right?  The next day I note that the dishwasher has barfed all over the floor.  Upon opening it, I find that is hasn't drained out any if its wastewater.  Chalking it up to a fluke, I ran the cycle again.  More barfage.  Tore into the dishwasher (there I go being 'handy' again) but couldn't find and clogs or mechanical problems.

"Hmmmm..." Thinks I...  "This problem must somehow be related to the new disposal, 'cuz having two appliances crap out on consecutive days is just too weird..."

Both sides of the sink were draining fine, so I couldn't blame it on a downstream clog...  Disconnect the dishwasher drain hose and turn it on for a split second... Funkwater streams out the drain hose normally.  Wow, this is getting strange...  Reconnect the drain hose.  No flow.  Inspect fitting. It is blocked by a knock-out.

"Are you even freaking serious??!?" yells my brain, inwardly.  "Why the bloody hell should that fitting be blocked off?!"  Thought about it briefly, and concluded that the fitting comes blocked for people that don't have dishwashers.  For Reals?  Is there really a caveman out there somewhere who has a disposal but no dishwasher?  He rinses his gristle down the drain and then, what, lugs his dishes down to the river?  Scratches the dried lasagna off with a stick and rinses them in the stream?  WTH??

Alright, whatever.  Now everything works.  OK, not everything.  The bottom shelf in my fridge broke.  Yeah, the one that supports the crisper drawer.  No biggie.  The crisper now just hangs a little lower and interferes with the door closing.  Just close it FIRMLY and all is cool.  Except toddler granddaughter doesn't close it firmly enough.  So the contents of the fridge get warm.  And the fridge tries to keep things cool by running and running and running until an adult eventually notices that things are awry.  So my milk and my coke and my gatorade are warm now, and the ice cream up in the freezer is frozen SO @#(*&^%ing SOLID that I could use it to cut glass and/or chip my teeth.

Hey, inno, are you done yet?  HELZ NO!

The light switch in the hallway bathroom is acting up.  It won't stay off.  Seriously.  As soon as you let it go, it springs back into the 'on' position.  Unless you point it down in the off position and jiggle it just right.  Thankfully, I have many years of experience with the "point it down and jiggle it just right" process.  So I can turn it off.  Seems I'm the only one capable in my household.  Which means most of my free time is spent getting up and turning the light switch off.  I know I can get a new switch for about a buck and a half.  But then I gotta install it, and the wiring in my house is STUPID.  None of the single-pole breakers turn off what they say they do no their labels.  So I gotta systematically flip breakers until I happen upon the right one.  In the meantime, everything else in the house has its power interrupted.  So it's a blinking 12:00 everywhere I look.  Grrrah!  Either that or work on the switch hot.  120V doesn't hurt that bad.  More startling than painful.  But still.

But wait, there's more!  Now that it's finally warming up around here, the ceiling fans are seeing some use.  Two of them work like champs.  Two of them are more wobbly than a drunken Michael "Our Lady of Guacamole" Moore in-line skating down a tin roof.  On one of 'em, I tried to tape a quarter to the fan blade to help the balance.  No go.  No matter which blade, still wobbles.  And launches quarters when the tape fails.  And now it clicks like a metronome from time to time.  Yay.

By now, I bet you're thinking "Wow, inno, your house sounds like a real dive.  Maybe it should be condemned" and you'd be right.  But I LIKE it that way.  A run-down foreboding house in a state of ill-repute-repair discourages visitors.  I don't like visitors.  I don't like people.  I don't like YOU!  If you drop by, I'll punch you in the gut with an old disposal wrapped in barbed wire!  Bwaaahaahaahaa!

Barry batty campaign strategy

Scene: Obama in meeting with his campaign staff.  Cabinet members, Czars, and anybody with a role in actual governance notably absent, though they can be seen through the windows  playing beer-croquet on the lawn. 

[Obama] "I don't see what's so bad about what I said the other day.  It's the truth."

[Axelrod, vexed] "Dammit!  That's exactly what's so bad!  Truth undermines everything we're trying to do.  Truth is toxic.  This is another Joe the Plumber moment and it could cripple us.  Remember: Never Tell the Truth.  K?"

[Obama] "But they really didn't build those things!  They didn't build the roads.  They didn't build the schools.  They didn't build the teachers.  They didn't build the fiber-optic networks that carry the cold air to their air conditioning.  They didn't do anything except win life's lottery."

[Plouffe] "We know all that.  But you can't say all that.  We, unlike most, are smart enough to know it takes a village to run a taco wagon, but we have to let the people think they're important and that they're accomplishing something."

[Obama] "But I'm just reiterating what Elizabeth Warren has been saying."

[Axelrod] "She can say stuff like that.  She's running for state-wide office in a very blue state.  She doesn't have to worry about cheesing off the independents.  You do. You just don't have enough Cherokee blood in you to make a line like that work."

[Obama] "Neither does Elizabeth Warren!"

[Messina, laughing] "Mon Dieu!  You just said something clever, without aid of a 'prompter!  Progress!"

[Axelrod] "Besides, can you imagine what Romney's campaign will do with a gaffe like that?" [reaches for remote, turns on TV]

[Romney, on TV] "According to the pResident, nobody is successful on their own.  He says that anybody who enjoys success does so on the backs of everybody else.  Alright, then what about the failures?  If every last person deserves a Happy Joy Participation Trophy when a business succeeds, is everybody also at fault when a business fails?  See the vacant storefront down the street, that used to be a nail salon?  Has America failed?  Has all of America, working together, been unable to run a nail salon?  Is that what we have sunk to under pResident Obama?  300 million Americans can't keep a nail salon up and running?  That right there tells us how awful barry's stewardship of the economy has been.  He needs to go back to Chicago and stay there."  [super-tight zoom-in on Romney's steely stare] "I'm Future President Mitt F'n Romney and I approve this message."

[Axelrod, clicking TV off] "See what I mean?"

[Obama] "Hey! It isn't my fault that some greedy bastard tried to open a nail salon.  He could have got a government job or volunteered at a non-profit or something.  But no... He gambled.  He lost.  I do NOT feel his pain."

[Messina] "Ummm, you do realize that the salon was probably owned by a femal..."

[Axelrod] "Don't bother, Jim.  He doesn't get it."

[Plouffe] "Yeah.  Let's shift gears.  Mr. President, you no doubt are aware of the popularity of the Batman movies.  Interestingly, the villain in this latest release is named 'Bane' and... [holds up leather bat-costume] "...this is your Bane-battling batcampaign batsuit!  The people will love it!"

[Obama] "Yeah, baby!  I'm gonna get to crush that evil capitalist entity!"

[Plouffe] "Actually, sir, the bad guy is 'Bane', not 'Bain'."

[Obama] "Yeah.  'Bain'."

[Axelrod] "Sir, 'Bain' and 'Bane' are homophones.  They're pronounced the same."

[Obama] "I thought the homophone was what the mayor of Gotham would use to bat-call me when he needs me to bat-save the city from capitalism."

[Messina, eyeroll] "Here's the deal.  Since you don't weigh no more than a buck-oh-five, the wings on the batsuit will create just enough lift that you can jump off the roof of the campaign bus, swoop down and land on your feet.  There'll be a guy in a costume.  He'll look like Bane from the movie, but also wearing a Romney mask.  We're counting on most Americans being so intensely dumb that they begin to mentally associate Bane the Movie Bad Guy with Bain and Romney."

[Obama, pensively] 'You know, I'm really starting to form a mental connection between Bane and Bain.  Almost like they're one-in-the-same."  [less pensively, more excitedly] "So then I get to swoop in and kick him in the face/neck/chest/breast/inseam areas?"

[Plouffe, facepalm] "Yep.  But we should rehearse.  Suit up!"

[Obama] "Whoohoo!"

VP Biden walks in, wearing a VERY ill-fitting Robin suit which appears to be made of old bowling league shirts held together with safety pins.

[Biden] "Hey guys!  I want in on this!"  [ties piece of rope to doorknob] "Look! If somebody'll hold my cape up, I can make it look like I'm scaling a vertical wall!" [squats down, pulls on rope]  "See?!" [door pops open, Joe falls over backwards] "D'oh!"

[Obama] "Not now, Joe!  This is one of the most important moments of my life!" [urgently, into telephone] "A terrorist dressed as a homeless Robin has made it past security.  He might be high on bath salts.  Arrest him immediately and lodge him at Gitmo."  [Burly men enter and drag the VP away]

[Obama] "Jim, thanks for leaving a gap in the mask I can smoke a cigarette through.  The mask goes over my upper lip, though, which may cause trouble with my choom bong.  And I'll need much bigger earholes.  Look into it, OK?  But in the meantime let's try it out."

Obama and crew go up the service stairs to the White House roof.  Obama inserts his arms into the batwings and jumps!  The wings immediately fold behind him and he lands in a disheveled heap on the grass.

[Plouffe, quietly, to Axelrod] "He has the pecs of a man that don't weigh no more than a buck-oh-five"

[Axelrod] "Yep."

[Obama] "¡Jaime! ¿Porque is there Bo stuff in the grass, right in my landing zone?"

[Jaime the Guatemalan illegal alien groundskeeper] "Sorry, Señor Presidente!"

[Messina] "It's OK, sir.  We'll use wires like they did in Peter Pan."

[Obama] "Alright.  Let's get back out there on the campaign trail and start killing Bain/Bane!"

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[Chris Matthews, MSNBC host] "Let's go live now, to the President's campaign appearance in Hope, Arkansas!"

Obama leaps from roof of CampaignBus1 and lands gracefully on his feet.  He slaps Bane/Bain in the face with a white glove and then begins to beat him up.

[Matthews, split screen] "This is the most amazing thing I've ever seen this amazing President do.  It makes me want to jump up and throw a batarang.  In my pants!"

[Heckler #1] "Hey, barry!  I can see your wires!  Or are those puppet strings?"

[Heckler #2] "Yeah, are those supposed to be special effects or special ed?


[Obama, to hecklers] "Knock it off!  I killed Osama bin Laden!"

[Heckler #3] "No you didn't.  Somebody else made that happen.  Nobody has ever been successful by himself, right?"

[Obama] "buhh... umm... let me be clear..."

Romney's campaign bus honks in the distance, and the crowd waves approvingly.

**UPDATE:  Linked at the Amazing and Awesome IMAO and the ever Bobberific Bob's Blog

Harmonic Convergence of Awesome

You will need:

1.  Vacant lot that's practically a Superfund site
2.  Wal-Mart
3.   Ridiculously restrictive municipal zoning rules.

Mix these ingredients thoroughly.  Stir until vacuous hippie (Hey, BTW hippie, HEMP is NOT a Food Group!) Subaru-driving morons begin to boil.  Stand a safe distance away and enjoy the show.

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So far, I'm guessing you have no idea what this is about.  Lemme tell you:  It is about pure, uncut awesome straight from the bottle.  There's a vacant lot adjacent to a auto parts store I worked at back in the early '90s.  That lot has remained vacant for decades because the ground is so polluted.  Seems that back in the day, the power company used to creosote their utility poles on that site.  This was back when it was OK to make dirt flammable, so they were generous and sloppy with their creosote.  Then they moved away.  The land went to waste and people even dumped garbage on it.  It became one of the most ugly eyesores in all of Corvallis.

Here's how it looked a while back when the Google SpyCar drove by.

For a retailer, this location would be a very attractive place to put a store.  It is on the busiest street in town.  The lot is large enough to place a good-sized store on and yet have plenty of room for parking.  Many potential tenants/builders have looked at it and said "How in the world is this land still undeveloped?!?" only to notice that they've spontaneously grown webbed feet and fangs from exposure to the dirt. 

OK, that's part of the story.  Another part is that Corvallis flat-out won't allow a retail building larger than 55000ft².  For years, that rule has kept out every big-box type retailer that has tried to enter this market.  After years of wrangling, Home Depot was finally allowed to build one of their stores on industrial land, after successfully arguing that they sell industrial products.  Nobody else has ever been successful.  Walmart, for example, has wanted to put a store here for years.  But there's no buildable land.  And every time they sought a zoning change or variance on other pieces of land, the people would freak out.

And the alliance of "hippies + downtown mom'n'pop stores" liked it that way.  Mustn't allow any Evil Corporations into our blessed little town, nosirree!  Doesn't matter if most people WANT those kinds of stores and are willing to drive their SUVs (which run on 92 octane Gaia Blood) to neighboring towns just to save $1.88 on diapers.  No Big Box was the rule, and it looked like it would be that way forever.

Enter Walmart...

They said "Hey, you know that polluted patch of dirt that makes buried pets come back to zombie-life?  Yeah, we'll clean that up and put a store on it.  And it'll just be groceries and only 36k ft² to get past your stupid zoning laws.  How do you like me now?"

The soy-latte crowd is freaked out.  "There's gonna be a Walmart in our town!  Oh no!"  The city says Walmart has followed all the rules and they can't discriminate against anybody, no matter how loathed.  So the leftards are fighting amongst themselves in the Letters to the Editor section of the paper.  Some are "we can't discriminate because, we're like, against discrimination and stuff" while others are "It isn't discrimination if we're talking about Corporate Evil Incarnate. I don't care if they followed our own dumb rules!  They must be stopped!"

It is a joy to behold.  Personally, I'm looking forward to the news reports like "Commie McGreeniepants made a martyr of himself when he tried to burn down the Walmart and the very dirt beneath his feet erupted in flames and consumed him.  In lieu of flowers, please smoke a bowl in his memory"

we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow this ground.

But we can put a Walmart on it!  Whooo!

From the local newspaper...

As seen today in the Gazette-Times:

Benton County
Sheriff’s Office
FRIDAY, JULY 6
Warning: 8:31 a.m., 3500 block of Scenic Drive. A deputy gave a resident a warning for allowing one of his chickens to cross the road. No motive for the crossing was provided.

(emphasis added)

There are some questions in life we'll just never get an answer to...

Seeking investors!!!!1!

Artwork for label design

The only thing a product needs to succeed in the market is the right balance of Supply and Demand.  Let's face it: America is becoming a nation of overweight widebottoms.  And most of us will be toiling long hours right up until the day we die, just to pay the taxes that'll be extracted from us to pay for our national debt and unfunded liabilities.  We're getting fat and we're gonna need a lot of energy.

So we've established demand.  What about supply?  Well, here in western Oregon, we're rarely lacking for water.  Neither are we lacking for meth.  Our genius government put Sudafed behind the counter, so local tweekers can't cook it up like they used to.  But that's OK - There's an endless number of illegal alien mexithugs sneaking over the border with drugs and the AK-47s we gave them. They haul the drugs right up the interstate we paved for them, and the Border Patrol can only snipe at them with beanbag rounds.  So supply won't be a problem.  Now we have to show ID to get a pill for our sniffles, but no ID required to vote.  Ain't America grand?

All that's left for this venture to really take off is start-up cash so I can buy that old Winnebago and turn it into a mobile bottling plant.  Also, I'll need distributors in other parts of the country.  Lemme know if you want to send cash, become a Licensed Distributor, or both.

OBLIGATORY LEGALESE: Any similarities to the bottled-water product "EartH₂O" is purely coincidental.

Serious question on flag etiquette

Hokay... The flag I fly in front of my house has caught a case of the funk.  The white isn't nearly as white as it ought to be, and the other colors are a little off, too.  Is it kosher to throw an American flag in the washing machine?  Is that disrespectful?  I hope it is cool 'cuz I ain't much in the mood to buy another one right now.

I've thought of some other possibilities, too. 

1.  Continue to fly the flag as-is
2.  Fly the flag upside down because the Preezy of the United Skeezy has me perpetually distressed.
3.  Retire the flag with dignity.
4.  Douse the flag in diesel, wrap an illegal alien in it like a giant tamale, scruff my feet on the carpet 'til I get a good static charge built up, and discharge the ignition spark by poking the illegal in the nose.

Apropos of nuttin', I have another thought.  Whoa...  That's like two in one day.  Anyway, the youngest granddaughter cries and moans incessantly, expects everything to be done for her, and is completely indiscriminate about her pooping habits.  Dear gawd, my grandkid is an Occupier!

Happy Birthday, America!

Happy Birthday, America!  Trying to be upbeat this 4th, instead of beat up.  Challenging endeavor.  What with the junk SCOTUS dumped on us in recent days.  Thanks to John Roberts & sCrew, an illegal alien can now wander about Arizona with impunity while claiming military honors he never received.  On the bright side, though, he is now compelled to buy health insurance.  So, there's that.

Keep in mind the following::

1.  Barrycare is now a tax.  If you say "not fair!" and refuse to comply, they sic the IRS on you.
2.  IRS will haul you into court.  If you say "not fair!" the judge won't care and he'll try to take your money.
3.  If you say "not fair!" and don't pay, you'll go to court again.
4.  Except this time, it'll be criminal court.  If you say "not fair!" and don't pay, you go to jail for tax evasion.
5.  While in jail, if you say "not fair!" and try to leave, a large man with a gun will put bullet holes in you.

Wait a sec... my timephone is ringing...  it's a Continental Soldier at Valley Forge.  All he said was "I lost my toes to frostbite for this?!?!"

...with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

How 'bout more divine Providence and more sacred Honor?  And maybe go a little lighter on the Hope and the Change, OK?

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"But wait!" sayeth the rubes.  "This mess will be repealed!"  So far, the best case we can see is that we hold the House and pick up enough Senate seats to have a slight majority.  Does anybody really see Boehner and McConnell unfurling the Great Banner of Repeal and sounding "charge!" on the bugle?  Yeah, me neither.

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OK, enough of that.  Time for a change of subject...  I am not yet used to having grandkids all day every day.  I am not a "kid" guy.  For that reason, I made VERY SURE never to have any of my own.  Yeah, I picked up some stepkids in marriage, but they were already middle-school age and older.  So this whole baby and toddler thing is new, and I'm still trying to develop a taste for it.  Without much success. I admit, though, that it is kind of endearing when the 2.5 year old comes home and yells "Papa!" and jumps into my lap.  However, her knees are equipped with the latest in lap-jumping GPS technology.  Groin Precision Strike, that is.  Don't think I'll ever acquire a taste for that.

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Some pointy heads claim they've found the Higgs Boson.  They say that the Higgs Boson creates a Higgs Field, which gives other particle mass.  The analogy they use is that subatomic particle moving through a Higgs Field is affected by the field like a macro- object would be affected by being dragged through molasses.  I don't know what that's supposed to mean.  But that's OK, 'cuz the entire study of quantum stuff seems like voodoo to me anyway.  As long as it makes the pointy heads happy, then hey, go with it, man!

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Having a 2.5 year old in the house means every surface of every object everywhere has on it an invisible glaze of sticky kid stuff.  This sticky kid stuff can be smelt and felt, but not seen or heard.  It was a scientific mystery that had to be unlocked, so I submitted a sample to the lab for a qualitative analysis.  The guy in the white coat told me that the sticky kid stuff is comprised of equal parts snot, apple juice, and Higgs Bosons that have been dragged through molasses.

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I deserve a Noble Prize for that, but the white lab coat guy will probably win it instead.  Bunghole.

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The 4 month old doesn't talk yet.  But she makes interesting noises between fits of crying.  One of the noises is a heh^hehheh_hehheh thing that is a dead ringer for the noise Beavis makes when he sees something on fire.  Dunno if I should be proud or terrified.

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I have two big slobbery dogs.  Roughhousing with the pooches gets slobber all over me.  Doesn't bother me at all.  Wife gets disgusted by it.  "Eh, it'll wash right off."  Baby spit, however is like kryptonite to me.  One tiny bit of it on me or my clothes, and I'm freaking out, looking for a moist towelette, running to the bathroom, screaming, prophesying Doom on All Mankind, etc, etc.   I don't know what is so gross about it, but, just wow.

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On this day in 1985, I was 16 years old and goofing off at the lake behind Savage Rapids Dam (which has since been removed by eco-do-gooders).  We were lighting off fireworks and having a good ol' time.   Many of the fireworks were of the "illegal in Oregon" variety.  One of them was like a bottle rocket but way bigger.  The rocket part was about the size of a bratwurst, and the stick was about as long as my arm.  After being lit, it tipped over at the last second and went more-or-less horizontal over the water.  Coming to rest in a patch of dead weeds and dried-out blackberries, it started a fire.  My granddaughter no doubt would have heh^hehheh_hehheh'd at the sight of it, but I went more "oh crap! oh crap! oh crap!"  Or, ahem, words to that effect.  Thankfully, it burned itself out after only a minute or so.  I could then get back to lighting off fireworks and looking forward to July 5th - because the bank that had approved my car loan would be OPEN and I'd be able to pick up the '69 Camaro SS I'd been saving up for.

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Unfortunately, I didn't know how to drive a 4-speed at the time, so my Dad had to drive the Camaro home for me.  Embarrassment of embarrassments.  Within 24 hours, though, I could drive it smoothly and do burnouts at will.

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Wait a sec... another call on the timephone...  Yep, it's that Continental Soldier again.  He said "Overpowered gas-hogging American musclecars doing burnouts?  That's worth losing toes over!"