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It doesn’t happen often, but somehow my daughter and I
ended up listening to a CD of my choosing on a two-hour drive to
Grandma’s. Stephen Stills’ fine “Manassas” album to be exact, of
which I have owned at least four copies over the years. (Yes, yes,
one was an 8-track tape.) Announcing she was ready to pull off of
Memory Lane, my daughter held up two of her favorite disks and asked
which I would prefer: “Screaming, or whining?” It was a tough
choice, but decided to go with screaming. I already had the maximum
daily allowance of whining over my “fogey music.”
*****
It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s … Fluffy? Authorities
investigating reports of a UFO sighting in
Lardal, Norway discovered the charred remains of a cat beside an
electrical pole. Investigators speculate it exploded in a feline
fireball and fell to earth after touching a high voltage wire. It’s
a better explanation than swamp gas, but given the state of
television programming today I half expect the poor thing to turn up
on a special crispy critter edition of Fox’s “Alien Autopsy.”
*****
The Unidentified Feline Object story proves there’s more
than one way to skin a cat, and I darned near invented a new one
myself. Working alone in my home office, I was startled to hear the
paper shredder rev up then glanced to see our cat sitting on the
edge of my desk, casually dangling his tail across the electric eye
that starts the device. Our veterinarian is a fine animal doc but I
doubt he has much experience with tail reattachments. I wouldn’t
want to have to explain it in any event (“Well, it was on his butt
the last time I looked” sounds kind of lame), so the shredder is now
safely covered.
*****
There is apparently no acceptable way to skin a coyote,
at least not in school. Woodshop class used to mean skinned
knuckles and tetanus shots, but after a
Middleton, Massachusetts high school carpentry teacher and
amateur taxidermist decided to demonstrate his craft on a coyote
carcass he found, two students exposed to the animal’s hide
underwent precautionary rabies shots and the teacher was suspended
without pay. No animal rights protests reported, but my guess is
that the teacher has had his fill of Beep! Beep! jokes.
*****
Reuters reports
that interest in the war with Iraq has knocked sex-related terms out
of the top rank of Internet searches. Is it just me, or is there
something vaguely
something Freudian
about that?
*****
Even most folks who missed the Oscars likely saw clips
of best documentary film winner Michael Moore’s anti-everything
acceptance speech meltdown, which was mercifully drowned out by boos
and the orchestra. I know this is America, everyone has the right
to express themselves, blah, blah, blah, but I’d remind Mr. Moore he
also has the right to remain silent. It might even be a good idea
to exercise it while U.S. troops are being shot at and held
prisoner. In any event, what happened to humble acknowledgment and
a gracious “thank you?” It’s getting so one can’t tell an awards
ceremony from a junior high school speech contest.
*****
The city
council in
Mount Sterling, Iowa is considering an ordinance against lying,
purportedly to cut down on exaggerations by fishermen frequenting
local streams. Good heavens! Have they no chamber of commerce?
Unless the fishing is absolutely world class, fish stories are the
sport’s biggest draw. And one has to wonder whether anyone
considered the political ramifications: Either the council members
have no ambition for higher office, all future election campaigns
will take place outside city limits, or Mount Sterling is a very
special place.
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