Greetings once again from the Friday guy who has missed several recent Fridays due to travel and laziness. I did finally make my annual week trip to Colorado where I saw a number of old friends and skied with my brother and other of his/our friends. And speaking of skiing, I’ve been enjoying some nice spring skiing here during the last week as well. We are finally getting warmer days, although it cools down a lot at night, which is good for the maples to produce the sap that is extracted and turned into maple syrup. I am trying to understand the new names of the new grading system of the types of maple syrup. But a rose by any other name would smell as sweet!
At the beginning of this week, we still had a foot of snow on our lawn, while just a hundred miles south of here it is all gone. However a couple of warm and sunny days have melted quite a bit of it. We are in for one heck of a mud season!
Let’s see what is happening in our nation’s capital and its politics to start off this week’s edition.
Obama's approval rating is at an all-time low. He has a plan to make him look better. It is called letting Joe Biden make a speech.
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The White House announced a change to Obamacare. They keep making adjustments. They say people can now keep their insurance plans for two more years. When asked what would happen after two years, Obama said, "After two years, I don't give a damn."
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Reverend Al Sharpton (longtime civil rights activist early on with Martin Luther King) commented recently on the conservative right's constant criticism of President Obama: "If he walked on water they'd say it was because he couldn't swim!"
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Jimmy Fallon (the new host of The Tonight Show) recently said "8% of Republicans want Chris Christie to run for President in 2016; 0% want him to jump onto the other end of their seesaw."
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From the Confessional
A Man walked into a Washington D.C. Catholic Church Confessional. He tells the Priest "Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. Last night, I bumped off a Congressman."
The Priest responds: "My son, I'm here to forgive your sins, not discuss your community service work!"
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Lenten Humour
Each Friday night after work, whether there is sun, snow or rain, Jack, being from Newfoundland, would fire up his outdoor grill and cook a moose steak.
But, all of Jack's neighbours were Catholic. And since it was Lent, they were forbidden from eating meat on Friday.
The delicious aroma from the grilled moose steaks was causing such a problem for the Catholic faithful that they finally talked to their priest.
The priest came to visit Jack, and suggested that he become a Catholic.
After several classes and much study, Jack attended Mass, and as the priest sprinkled holy water over him, he said: "You were born a Protestant and raised a Protestant, but now you are a Catholic."
Jack's neighbours were greatly relieved, until Friday night arrived and the wonderful aroma of grilled moose filled the neighbourhood.
The priest was called immediately by the neighbours, and, as he rushed into Jack's yard, clutching a rosary and prepared to scold him, he stopped and watched in amazement. There stood Jack, clutching a small bottle of holy water which he carefully sprinkled over the grilling meat and chanted: "You wuz born a moose, you wuz raised a moose, but now you is a codfish."
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The Talking Clock
A couple of guys are leaving the bar at closing time, when one says to the other, "Hey, you ought to see my new apartment."
A little later, making their way through the apartment they arrive at the bedroom. Dwarfing all else in the room is a large gong.
"What in the world is that?" asks the guest.
"That's my talking clock."
"Talking clock? How does that work?"
"Just watch." And the guy rears back and pounds the gong with tremendous effect.
Through the wall from the next apartment comes a plaintive voice: "Good heavens, man, it's 2:30 in the morning!"
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A Norwegian Text Message
OLE TEXTS LENA ...
“Lena, I’m having 1 more beer with Sven.
If I’m not home in 1 hour .... read this message again
“Lena, I’m having 1 more beer with Sven.
If I’m not home in 1 hour .... read this message again
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The Three Little Pigs
A teacher was reading the story of the Three Little Pigs to her class.
She came to the part of the story where first pig was trying to gather the building materials for his home.
She read. "And so the pig went up to the man with the wheelbarrow full of straw and said: 'Pardon me sir, but may I have some of that straw to build my house?'"
The teacher paused then asked the class: "And what do you think the man said?"
One little boy raised his hand and said very matter-of-factly,
"I think the man would have said - 'I can't believe it! A talking pig!'"
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TGIF Golden Classics
For you this week, I have a “golden oldie double” this week. They both have been around, but really are classics.
The Afghan Quarterback
The coach had put together the perfect team for the Chicago Bears. The only thing that was missing was a good quarterback. He had scouted all the colleges and even the Canadian and European Leagues, but he couldn't find a ringer who could ensure a Super Bowl win.
Then one night while watching CNN he saw a war-zone scene in Afghanistan. In one corner of the background, he spotted a young Afghan soldier with a truly incredible arm. He threw a hand-grenade straight into a 15th story window 100 yards away.
KABOOM!
He threw another hand-grenade 75 yards away, right into a chimney.
KA-BLOOEY!
Then he threw another at a passing car going 90 mph.
BULLS-EYE!
"I've got to get this guy!" Coach said to himself. "He has the perfect arm!"
So, he brings him to the States and teaches him the great game of football. And the Bears go on to win the Super Bowl.
The young Afghan is hailed as the great hero of football, and when the coach asks him what he wants, all the young man wants is to call his mother.
"Mom," he says into the phone, "I just won the Super Bowl!"
"I don't want to talk to you, the old Muslim woman says. "You are not my son!"
"I don't think you understand, Mother," the young man pleads. "I've won the greatest sporting event in the world. I'm here among thousands of my adoring fans."
"No! Let me tell you!" his mother retorts. "At this very moment, there are gunshots all around us. The neighborhood is a pile of rubble. Your two brothers were beaten within an inch of their lives last week, and I have to keep your sister in the house so she doesn't get raped!" The old lady pauses, and then tearfully says,
"I will never forgive you for making us move to Chicago !!!!
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The Green Thing
Checking out at the store, the young cashier suggested to the much older woman, that she should bring her own grocery bags because plastic bags weren't good for the environment.
The woman apologized and explained, "We didn't have this 'green thing' back in my earlier days."
The young clerk responded, "That's our problem today. Your generation did not care enough to save our environment for future generations."
She was right -- our generation didn't have the 'green thing' in its day.
Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over. So they really were recycled.
But we didn't have the "green thing" back in our day.
Grocery stores bagged our groceries in brown paper bags, that we reused for numerous things, most memorable besides household garbage bags, was the use of brown paper bags as book covers for our schoolbooks. This was to ensure that public property, (the books provided for our use by the school) was not defaced by our scribblings. Then we were able to personalize our books on the brown paper bags.
But too bad we didn't do the "green thing" back then.
We walked up stairs, because we didn't have an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks.
But she was right. We didn't have the "green thing" in our day.
Back then, we washed the baby's diapers because we didn't have the throw away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy-gobbling machine burning up 220 volts -- wind and solar power really did dry our clothes back in our early days. Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing.
But that young lady is right; we didn't have the "green thing" back in our day.
Back then, we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of the state of Montana .
In the kitchen, we blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us.
When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used wadded up old newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap.
Back then, we didn't fire up an engine and burn gasoline just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power. We exercised by working so we didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity.
But she's right; we didn't have the "green thing" back then.
We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water.
We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the razor blades in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull.
But we didn't have the "green thing" back then.
Back then, people took the streetcar or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a 24-hour taxi service in the family's $45,000 SUV or van, which cost what a whole house did before the "green thing."
We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 23,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest burger joint.
But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn't have the "green thing" back then?
Please share this with another selfish old person who needs a lesson in conservation from a smartass young person...
We don't like being old in the first place, so it doesn't take much to piss us off... especially from a tattooed, multiple pierced smartass who can't make change without the cash register telling them how much.
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We also didn’t have a lot of that green stuff (dollars) back then either. But, somehow we survived and thrived, nevertheless.
Time to wish you a great Friday and weekend! Maybe by next Friday all of our snow will have melted, just before the last snowfall that often hits these parts in mid-April. It usually arrives just a day or two after you remove your snow tires and replace them with your summer tires.
TGI-Jeff
