It’s Called Theft

When I was out today, I saw a phone on the table outside a coffee shop that had been left there, so I pocketed it. It started to ring….
I took it out of my pocket and the caller I.D. said ‘Mom’.
I put it back on the table and slowly backed away.
How did she know I was up to no good?

***

Trump managed to do in 4 years, what 80% of presidents didn’t do in 8 years.
Lose an election

***

Two women were playing golf.
The first woman teed off and watched in horror as her ball headed directly toward a foursome of men playing the next hole.

The ball hit one of the men. He immediately clasped his hands together at his groin, fell to the ground and proceeded to roll around in agony.

The woman rushed down to the man, and immediately began to apologize. ‘Please allow me to help. I’m a Physical Therapist and I know I could relieve your pain if you’d allow me,’ she told him.

‘Oh, no, I’ll be all right. I’ll be fine in a few minutes,’ the man replied. He was in obvious agony, lying in the fetal position, still clasping his hands at his groin.

At her persistence, however, he finally allowed her to help. She gently took his hands away and laid them to the side, loosened his pants and put her hands slowly and carefully inside.

She then administered a tender and skillful massage for several long moments and softly asked ‘How does that feel’?

Feels wonderful, he replied; but I still think my thumb’s broken!

***

A man goes to see a fortune teller.

She begins “your name is Steve”, “Wrong”.
“Your favourite colour is green”, “Wrong”.
“You have a dead uncle who passed away 2 years ago”, “Wrong”.
“Your wife’s name is Carol”, “Wrong”
“You have 2 children named John and Christian”, “Wrong”.
“You are a painte…”, “Wrong”.

Getting flustered the woman asks “What in bloody hell do you do then?”
“I investigate fraud.”

***

A man is walking in the desert with his horse and his dog when the dog says, “I can’t do this. I need water.”

The man says, “I didn’t know dogs could talk.”

The horse says, “Me neither!”

***

Hee-Haw!

What happens when you put a sex-crazed female donkey and Donald Trump in the same room??
Nothing!  Even donkeys have standards.

***

WEBSITE IDEA: “HOT OR NOT?”
Where husbands post pictures of thermostats, and other guys comment on whether to turn it up or down.

***

Did you know today is Pancake Day? Apparently it just crêped up on us….

***

I don’t believe in a deity, but I faithfully observe all holidays that involve baked goods or candy.

***

I don’t think I was a difficult teenager, but I’m not sure my parents would agree. One night, we were discussing over dinner what we wanted to have happen when we died.  I said I didn’t want a funeral; I wanted a party.  Without a pause, my mom said, ”Oh, there’ll be a party.”

***

Jesus decided to help St. Peter at the Pearly Gates.  A very old man approached.  Jesus asked him what he had done in his life.  The old man replied that he was a carpenter.
Jesus looked closely.  “Is it??….  Is that you, father?
The old man peered back at him.  “Is that you, Pinocchio?

The Better To See You With My Dear

TURNABOUT IS FAIR PLAY!

In case you wonder how I got to be a Grumpy Old Dude – let’s take a quick…. Uh, slow trip through Bureaucroland.

I had three operations on one eye last year – a retina tack, a new, plastic lens installed because of developing cataracts, and a laser scrub when the new lens went cloudy.

Worsening cataracts on both the wife’s eyes were making reading and knitting difficult, and they’re a big part of her life.

Shortly after my third treatment, late last year, the wife finally got an assessment appointment with my specialist.  It was decided that she rated an operation on each eye.  When COVID19 erupted, what should have been a 3 to 4 month wait for a surgical theater, stretched to almost a year.

Finally, recently, we got a call from the Ophthalmologist’s office, giving a date, but telling us we’d have to wait for a time-of-day scheduling.  After another 2-week wait, they called again to tell us that the wife would be the first operation of the day at 9 AM, and to have her to the hospital by 7 o’clock.

For a guy who normally goes to bed at 5 AM, this was not optimal.  Don’t you have something after lunch??  We had some discussion about me sitting in a waiting room for 3 to 5 hours, during COVID.  The day before the operation, the hospital called and said that I would have to remain outside somewhere, until I was called.

The second wave of COVID has rolled into the Region.  We had a one-day count, higher than any day in April.  We worried that the surgery might get cancelled.  It was to be on Thursday.  As of Monday, the Region went to Red-status.

In the first wave, many of the most vulnerable – the elderly, the youngsters, and the breathing-impaired – had died.  In this wave, while the numbers were up, most of them were hardy young partiers who could tough it out in quarantine at home.  The hospitals were actually less busy.  Everything was still a go.

I dropped the wife off shortly before 7, and went back home and got another hour or so of sleep, before they called at 9:40.  I went back to get her, and parked in the pickup lane, by the front door.  👿

The Provincial Government has ordered that masks must be worn to enter any business.  I put mine on, and approached the door, to be met by a Security Guard who insisted that I douse my hands with antiseptic gel.  Then I had to stand back six feet from the woman who entered directly behind me, but who couldn’t seem to operate a pump dispenser.

Next I was ordered to use my newly-sanitised hands to remove my Government-mandated mask, and install a single-use paper one, issued by the hospital.  Finally, I was able to break free and head across the lobby towards the elevators.  Suddenly, a young woman, not wearing a hospital uniform or identity tag, stepped in front of me – well within my 6-foot (Cdn. 2 meters) safety distancing space. I almost knocked her over.

She said something.  I thought she asked why I had come to the hospital.  I answered that I had got a call to pick up the wife.  Oh, no, this is the safety interrogation – the special extended hospital version.

Did I have….
any fever – No
a cough – No
shortness of breath – No
aches or pains – No
loss of taste or smell – No

In the last 6 months – 6 weeks – 6 days – 6 hours…. Did I leave – the country – the Province – my home – my bedroom?  Did I travel to – Hong Kong – Bora Bora – Yucatan – Iceland?  Had I ever had toenail fungus?  Was my Mother left-handed?   no, No, NO, NO!, NO!  Finally, she came to a stop…. I thought.  I stepped past her and headed for the elevators….Sir? I’m not finished.  YOU ONLY THINK YOU”RE NOT FINISHED!

I went up in the elevator to the surgery floor and got off.  The ‘can’t-be-used’ waiting room was to my left, and the surgery suite was behind a locked door to my right.  Perhaps they’ve put a clerk in the waiting room.  I poked my head around the corner.  Three men were sitting in it??!  Two of them simultaneously asked me. “Are you George?/Are you John?”  “No, I’m confused, and grumpy, and it’s getting worse by the second.”

A passing nurse let me into the recovery area.  I collected the wife, and headed back out.  In the hallway to the front door, the wife asked if I would get her a Tim Horton’s Coffee.  There’s an outlet directly beside the main door…. Behind a slalom obstacle course of bollards and straps and signs.  ENTER HERE, EXIT HERE, despite the fact that there was no-one at the counter.

I managed to get to the order window, and the perky little perk-server said, “Sir, please use some hand sanitizer,”  The stuff I slathered on, eight feet away, and five minutes ago, still hasn’t dried on my hands.  I said, “I just did!”  “Sir, please apply some more, to enter the coffee shop.”  You know, the wife didn’t really want a coffee that bad – at least that’s what I told her when I went back.  “Have a nice day, sir.”  OH…. It’s Wayyy too late for that.  👿

And I’ve got another one to look forward to in January.   😯

Giving Thanx For Comedy

Since so many people like a drumstick at Thanksgiving, geneticists developed a six-legged turkey.  No-one knows what it tastes like because they can’t catch one.

A collection of quotes about Thanksgiving, from people you may know.

I celebrated Thanksgiving the old-fashioned way.  I invited everyone in my neighborhood to my house, we had a big feast, and then I killed them all and took their land.
Jon Stewart

Thanksgiving is an emotional time.  People travel thousands of miles to be with people they see only once a year – and then discover that once a year is way too often.
Johnny Carson

Cooking tip: Wrap turkey leftovers in aluminum foil – and throw them out.
Nicole Hollander

Thanksgiving, man, not a good day to be my pants.
Kevin James

I took me three weeks to stuff the turkey. I stuffed it through the beak.
Phyllis Diller

I come from a family where gravy is considered a beverage.
Erma Bombeck

The Thanksgiving tradition is, we overeat. ‘Hey, how about at Thanksgiving we just eat a lot?’ ‘But we do that every day!’ ‘Oh. What if we eat a lot with people that annoy the hell out of us?
Jim Gaffigan

If you stand in the meat section at the grocery store long enough, you start to get mad at turkey. There’s turkey ham, turkey bologna, turkey pastrami. Someone needs to tell the turkey, man, just be yourself.
Mitch Hedberg

Vegetables are a must on a diet. I suggest carrot cake, zucchini bread and pumpkin pie.
Jim Davis

If you want to save a species, simply decide to eat it. Then it will be managed—like chickens, like turkeys, like deer, like Canadian geese.
Ted Nugent

Most turkeys taste better the day after; my mother’s tasted better the day before.
Rita Rudner

Last Thanksgiving I shot my own turkey. It was fun. That shotgun going, Blam!  Everybody at the supermarket just staring. Why track them when I know where they are?
Kenny Rogerson

We’re having something different this year for Thanksgiving. Instead of a turkey, we’re having a swan. You get more stuffing.
George Carlin

Even though we’re a week and a half away from Thanksgiving, it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas
Richard Roeper

You can tell you ate too much for Thanksgiving when you have to let your bathrobe out.
Jay Leno

If you wish to make an apple pie truly from scratch, you must first invent the universe.
Carl Sagan

I got to go home for Thanksgiving and sit at the adults’ table. That’s ’cause, you know, somebody had to die for me to move up a plate.
Andre Kelley

Thanksgiving is America’s national chow-down feast, the one occasion each year when gluttony becomes a patriotic duty.
Michael Dresser

An optimist is a person who starts a new diet on Thanksgiving Day.
Irv Kupcinet

I’m from Canada, so Thanksgiving to me is just another Thursday with more food. And I’m thankful for that!
Howie Mandel

Thanksgiving is a magical time of year when families across the country join together to raise obesity statistics.
Stephen Colbert

Here in my city, the Canadian Thanksgiving becomes the first weekend of a 9-day Oktoberfest, where over-drinking and overeating go hand-in-hand, like Hansel and Gretel.  I am thankful that I don’t have to drive through that insanity anymore.  If you’ve seen one drunk guy with bare legs, in leather shorts – you’ve seen one too many.

 

’20 A To Z Challenge – Q

My mind grinds fine, but exceeding slow.

The lesson for today is taken from the Second Book of Archon, Chapter II: Verse 6.  Words beginning with the letter Q, while a bit more plentiful than those with X, Y, or Z, are not thick on the ground.  The word of the day is

QUERN

a primitive, hand-operated mill for grinding grain.

The first time the wife and I went to Charleston, SC, we continued on past to visit the Middleton Plantation.  Yankee troops burned the original mansion down.  All that remains are the stone and concrete veranda, and the slaves’ quarters at one end.  These now comprise a small museum, and the living quarters of the current owners.

Still, the building is larger than many homes in upscale, gated communities.  I can only imagine how grand and epic the original structure must have been.  Included in the museum are three Faberge eggs – one complete, and two missing their internal hidden treasures.

The plantation sits beside a long stretch of slow, shallow, river.  The biggest cash crop was rice, but, up on the flats, cotton was grown as well, along with fruits and vegetables for sale, and to feed the residents.

Huge amounts of corn flour and corn meal were required to supply annual dietary needs.  The river could not be used to drive a mill, so dried corn was fed into small hand mills – querns – and ground down.  Adult and adolescent slaves were needed for other plantation tasks.  This job usually fell to Negro tweens.  A hardwood dowel handle was inserted into the upper mill half, and children spent ten or twelve hours a day – alternating arms, turning and turning and turning….

Not to downplay the evils of slave ownership, but poor white folks – and free Negroes in the North – used to face mind-numbing, and body breaking, drudgery to keep themselves alive and fed.  The modern motorized technology has replaced most of these types of onerous tasks, but has made many first-world citizens physically soft and weak.  To achieve what honest labor used to provide, it has been replaced by ‘The Gym.’  Run 5K on a treadmill – but don’t actually get anywhere.   😯

I Feel Great

I have been ‘Grand’ for decades, but I just found out that I’ll soon be getting a promotion to ‘Great.’

After getting everyone’s forehead blasted with a phaser infrared thermometer, we had the daughter, and her son and wife over for a long overdue, COVID-prevented family meal and visit.

The grandson and his wife provided the dessert – warm, soft, deep-dish brownies, with either French Vanilla ice cream, or coconut-flavored whipped cream.  Before they brought that out, they served up something much sweeter.  They had news that they’d held for almost four months, until they were sure, and had the chance to reveal it to the two older generations, all at the same time.  They are pregnant (Well, she is.) with their first.

The Grandson married a bonnie lass with a good Scottish heritage.  She doesn’t so much have a bun in the oven, as a solid serving of haggis.  Here is an image of their wee bairn, a Scotch egg, building up power to burst forth and amaze the world, as the first in the next generation of the NSFW Clan.

The kilt is still a bit long.  It will be a few more months before we know whether we will get a bagpiper or a Scottish dancer.  You just know that I will keep you informed.

The wife says that she is willing to start being called Gigi – GG – Great-Grandmother.  I think I’ll just stick with Archon, or G.O.D.   😀  😀

Proof – Of The Desperation Of Christian Apologists

You can not prove (or disprove) the existence of God through philosophy, logic, argumentation or debate.

Figures lie, and liars figure – and words, and those who wield them, are not much better.

I once had a mathematics professor who had some spare time after one lesson.  He erased two blackboards.  At the top of one, he wrote x = 1.  He then wrote a simple binomial equation beneath it. Below that, he began to add factors – multiplying, dividing, squaring, till the seventh equation was fairly complex.

At the top of the next board, he began to solve and simplify – each equation becoming less complex, until the seventh line solved, to show that x = 2.  😕  I thought that I followed the sequence, and my buddy, the numbers nerd later assured me that I did – we all did.  The teacher had just proved something that was observably false.

The Arguments For The Existence Of God

The Cosmological Argument: An argument for the existence of God based on the observation that, since every known thing in the universe has a cause, which can only be God.

The Moral Argument: An argument for the existence of God which reasons that there must be a God who is the source of man’s sense of right and wrong.

The Ontological Argument: An argument for the existence of God that begins with the idea of God as the greatest of beings that can be imagined. As such, the characteristic of existence must belong to such a being, since it is greater to exist than not to exist.

Teleological Argument: An argument for the existence of God which reasons that, since the universe exhibits evidence of order and design, there must be an intelligent and purposeful God who created it to function in this way.

The Cosmological Argument – every known thing in the universe

Mealy-mouthed, and weasel-words, which only prove a narrow mind, and a pile of assumptions and pre-suppositions.

It is possible that there are things within the Universe which have no cause.  Just because they have not been observed does not prove them impossible or nonexistent, or limit the choice to ‘only God.’  It seems likely that the Universe itself has no cause.  It floated about, apparently forever, in the timeless, spaceless Meta-verse that God is supposed to “exist” in.  But the Universe is palpable, observable, malleable, and measurable, while God cannot be proved to exist beyond the hopes and faith of religious believers.

The Moral Argument:

Reason: to think or argue in a logical manner.
to form conclusions, judgments, or inferences from facts or premises.
to think through logically,
There doesn’t seem to be much in the way of ‘reasoning,’ ‘thinking,’ ‘logic,’ or ‘facts’ in this unproven claim.  It denies Atheists’ claims that they are Good Without God, and ignores the observed fact that most Atheists are ‘good’ and moral, while many God-botherers fill prisons and divorce courts.

The Ontological Argument:
Like many Christian arguments, this one starts at the desired conclusion, and works backwards to somehow justify it.  There is no suggestion, no evidence, much less Proof, that there is a “greatest being,” and even if there is, there is no indication that it is the Christian God. As the argument even says, it’s all based on imagination.

Teleological Argument:
Apophenia is the tendency to mistakenly perceive connections and meaning between unrelated things. The term was coined by psychiatrist Klaus Conrad in his 1958 publication on the beginning stages of schizophrenia. He defined it as “unmotivated seeing of connections accompanied by a specific feeling of abnormal meaningfulness”. He described the early stages of delusional thought as self-referential, over-interpretations of actual sensory perceptions, as opposed to hallucinations.  Such meanings are entirely self-referential, solipsistic, and paranoid (Emphasis mine)—”being observed, spoken about, the object of eavesdropping, followed by strangers”.  Pareidolia is a type of apophenia involving the perception of images or sounds in random stimuli..

It is considered poor form and bad manners to say that religious people are crazy, but it seems that portions of their delusional, unsupported beliefs, must fall within the parameters of the clinical definition.

 

Jesus! More One-Liners??!

I found $20 in a parking lot today, and I thought, What Would Jesus Do?….
….so I turned it into wine.

You know what borders on stupidity?….
….Canada and Mexico

My wife bought me a 2021 calendar….
….My days are numbered now.

Neutering your pets….
….makes them less nuts

Helvetica and Times New Roman walk into a bar….
….”Get Out Of Here!” shouts the bartender, “We don’t serve your type.”

Hear about the new restaurant, named Karma?….
….There’s no menu.  You get what you deserve.

How do you drown a hipster?….
….Throw him in the mainstream.

Why did the hipster burn his mouth?….
….He drank coffee before it was cool.

What kind of exercise do lazy people do?….
….Diddly-squats.

I got my wife a fridge for her birthday….
….I can’t wait to see her face light up when she opens it.

Don’t try to write with a broken pencil….
….It’s pointless.

I was gonna tell a pizza joke….
….but it’s too cheesy.

My wife complained that I didn’t buy her flowers….
….To be honest, I didn’t know she sold flowers.

I’m a social vegan….
….I avoid meet

My math teacher called me average….
….How mean!

Pilates??!….
….I thought you said pie and lattes.

I told my wife that a husband ages like wine.  We get better with age….
….Then she locked me in the cellar.

I’ll tell you what often gets overlooked….
….Garden fences

Don’t start any vast projects….
….with half-vast ideas

Ever wonder if illiterate people….
….get the full effect of alphabet soup?

How was Rome split in two?….
….With a pair of Caesars….
….Nope!  Unintended.

What happens when you play a country song backwards?….
….It gets even more annoying

Be strong….
….I whispered to my Wi-Fi signal

I ran out of toilet paper and had to use newspaper….
….Times are rough

I have a split personality….
….Said Tom, being frank

I failed Math in high school so many times….
….I can’t even count

I used to have a handle on life….
….But then it broke

Don’t you hate it when someone answers their own questions?….
….I do.

It takes a lot of balls….
….To golf the way I do

People who use selfie-sticks….
….Need to take a good, long look at themselves.

 

WOW #66

The elections are coming!  The elections are coming!  Actually, they’ve been had – and so has the electorate.  It was Donald tRump against Whatzizname.  Let’s skip past Pathology and Psychology, and go directly to

PSEPHOLOGY

ORIGIN

Psephology, “the study of elections,” comes from Greek psêphos “small stone, pebble.” (The Greeks used pebbles in counting and arithmetic functions; the ancient Athenians also used pebbles to cast votes in elections and trials.) The element –logy is the completely naturalized combining form used in the names of sciences (geology, biology) and bodies of knowledge (theology, astrology).

The 20th-century British historian R.B. McCallum wrote in a personal letter that while with C.S. Lewis and other heavy-hitting philologists, he proposed the term electionology, which so offended the sensibilities of Lewis and the others that they proposed the etymologically correct psephology, avoiding the dreadful Latin-Greek hybrid. Psephology entered English in the mid-20th century.

At first I thought that I would need to be paid – handsomely – to study elections.  Elections themselves seem to be interesting only to CPAs and statisticians.  However, the dramatis personae, the cast of characters, has evolved to make them high drama, and low comedy.  After that first Punch and Biden debate, I thought that they would have to provide the moderator for the second with a cattle prod.  It seems that a simple mute switch was sufficient, although sparks still flew.

I composed this post before the Great American Election of 2020, so, no spoilers.  Don’t tell me how it turned out.  No matter who won, the American public lost.  Now we Canadians face the inevitable march to the polls, to choose between Tweedle-dum and Tweedle-dumber.  I’m gonna study my crosswords till they spend my pension on Green Energy.   😯

Remembrance/Veterans Day

No matter what you call it, this is a little reminder that today is Remembrance/Veterans Day.  Take two minutes at 11:00 AM to stand quietly and remember, respect and honor those in the Armed Services, past and present, who have given so much, so that we can have peace and security.

Take some time today – Hell, take all day if you want, and take a bit of time any other day, whenever it’s possible – to shake the hand of a veteran, or current Serviceman, elbow-bump, or otherwise COVID-acknowledge them.  Smile behind your mask, and say, “Thanks!”

 

’20 A To Z Challenge – P

Frat-boy college students did not invent – or perfect – the booze-your-face-off, lost-weekend, drinking party.  Adult men, who should have known better, have been doing it for millennia.  Modern-day drinking glasses have flat bottoms, and stand up straighter and steadier than most of the sots at bars.

Greeks and Romans, and many Medieval European hard-drinkers, went about the task with a round-bottomed pottery, or later, metal, drinking cup in their hand.  Ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce you to the

PTOMATIS

If ever you needed an incentive to drink, owning a ptomatis might be it. Derived via Latin from Ancient Greek, a ptomatis is a cup or similar drinking vessel that needs to be emptied before it can be put down, because it is shaped in such a way that it won’t stand upright open-end up.

These handle-less drinking cups were even made from wood, but as technology improved, they were fabricated in china, and glass.  This is why drinking glasses, are referred to as ‘glasses.’  While most are flat-bottomed and steady today, the earlier, fall-over versions were why they are also still called tumblers.

Aside from weapons forging, there wasn’t a lot of technology among the Norsemen.  For their drinking, they made do with hollowed out cattle horns.  After a hard day of looting and pillaging, they would settle down with a bovine ptomatis full of mead.

If you ever watched the movie, The Thirteenth Warrior you will have seen the young Muslim, exiled to the far North as an emissary.  When he is offered a little fortified fermented drink to keep the cold away, his face shows disappointment when he says that he is forbidden to partake of the fruits of the grape or the grain.  It quickly lights up again in delight when the Viking claps him on the shoulder, and explains that the mead is made from honey.

Let the party begin!