245 Point Zero?

Steve Jobs yacht was finished recently and it is said to be "between 230 and 260 feet".

What?

That's a guess-ti-mate with a 30 foot gap, more than 10 percent of the average.

I think I wiLL start teLLing people I am between 4 and 7 feet taLL. Yes, I'm rich, I have somewhere between 500 and a billion dollars, and 0.5 and 1.5 wives.

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While wandering outside in my backyard I invented something useful. Organic dental floss.

How? What? When? Huh?

I discovered that a piece of grass in my backyard makes an adequate dental scrubber. I took the outside layer off to get to the "clean" inside tiny circular relatively stiff shaft. Rub, rub, rub. Perhaps I should have taken a photo? No! A photo of the grass piece, not me actuaLLy using it, um, [no], you don't need to see that.

-------

How Strange: I have worked on Portuguese for more than 30 years and just now discovered the word 'Lusophone'. It means someone who speaks Portuguese.

That discovery taught me another word: lusophobia - the fear of Portuguese

Yes! That's a real word! I can't wait to see my friend Lucy and teLL there is a new word I created "Lucyphobia" - the fear of Lucys. ActuaLLy, My Lucy of Spearman TX is veRy un-scary. She wiLL laugh when I teLL her this, I love her laugh.

Previous Lucy post: I Am Not A Vampire

Much Monkey Noise

Do I own a monkey?
No
So why am I waking up to monkey noises?

"If an apple traveling at the speed of light hits a static banana ..." ... there is a question mark in his voice.

"That way he woke to the sound of happy birds."

"Oh, baby possum tracks!"

He made himself an apple and banana sandwich.

Maybe the baby possum was lost.

Eee eeee ee ee E

Maybe he only knew the day animals(?).

A veRy brief period of French nasal monkey laughter. -from the teleBision, not me-

George held him high so he could help look.

He was imagining possums everywhere.

Now owl noises. [that could be a contraction: nowlneses]

Pronounced: now-L-ne-sez [I realize much later that this is how some New Orleanians pronounce 'New Orleans']

[I turned the volume down completely with the remote control. But there was stiLL dialogue. Then I reali-ZZZ-ed that the sound was coming from the other teleBision in the living room. Doing Double Dolby. Do I get completely out of bed to eliminate the noise? I try reflecting the remote signal off several waLLs hoping it wiLL snake its way down the haLLway. No success. Obviously not enough mirrors or mirror equivalencies.
Note to self: Buy more mirrors tomorrow]

[That could be a contraction too: mormirmorrow]

Need zzzz's.

[Suddenly Wonder Boy Genius Ernie realizes he has BOTH teleBision remotes in bed with him at the same time. He gets a bold idea of sending TWO signals at the same time. He tries several combination for blasting the double signal strength signal down the hallway from the comfort of his bed. No luck, the volume doesn't go down. So he turns around on the bed to get a better shot at the cheap chandelier in the hallway hoping for a reflection. He has a sudden thought, they should use this technique in the neXt Die Hard movie. Suddenly the teleBision remote signals set off the smoke alarm in the doorway causing it to go blasting into a test pattern. This upsets the dog. Poor Cooper, its okay, baby. Bruce Willis is putting away the lasers. Luckily the smoke alarms go to sleep by themselves.]

Recorded and performed from the comfort of my mattress.

No animals or fruit were harmed in the production, eXcept one slightly disturbed doggie.

All rights reserved world wide.

Seven And A Half Score Ago

I was born slightly less than 100 years after the Civil War began, and now that I am slightly more than half of 100 years old I feel closer to Abraham Lincoln, as I am just slightly younger than Abe when he died.

Thank you Steven Spielberg for indirectly reminding me. His Lincoln movie is coming out soon in November, veRy close to the day of the month of the Gettysburg address, November 19th, seven and a half score minus one years ago (149). I hope I did my score math correctly.

I celebrated by buying 'Team of Rivals' by Doris Kearns Goodwin.

A Crime of Paint

My son far away had the back of his vehicle massively splashed with paint. We don't have any idea why this happened. He knows few people where he lives and doesn't know of any personal enemies. His out of pocket expenses will be at least $500 to get it repaired.

If anyone would like to help him, please send funds by mail to:

Family Style
Attn: For Fixing A Bad Paint Job
717 N Main St
Borger, TX
79007 

Funds Received: $10 Thanks A Bunch!

Why My Dog is Probably Going to Vote Democrat

Why my dog is probably going to vote Democrat.

Cooper was peacefuLLy working on his chew bone on the livingroom floor during the David Letterman Show. Dave was showing the fake video of Mitt Romney driving when a dog suddenly comes down the exterior side of the window knocking on the glass making canine whining noises, while Mitt just keeps driving and talking, ignoring the dog. Cooper stopped chewing and looked up at the teleBision for the rest of the comedic bit.

So I am guessing it was a real dog noise even though it was visuaLLy a fake dog.

Update: My friend over at Facebook reminded me to get Cooper registered to vote.

My response to her: I asked him about it this morning to make sure he wasn't too traumatized by the video, and I tried to eXplain about Mitt's dog on vacation traveling on top of the car, but aLL I could get out of Cooper was something Scoobie Doo-ish that sounded like, "H. Rosh Rutt-Roh?", so I guess he going third party now.

Registered? I think he got registered when he got micro-chipped.

Update: The same FB friend asked: Does he work? Did he pay taxes? The answer is clear.

My response: Work? He guards, comforts and entertains me, and I figured up the approximate annual amount for the sales tax on just his chew bones: $34.32

Update: (From the same FB friend, can you teLL she is a lawyer?) He's a 47%-er for sure. Maybe he's a yellow dog Democrat!! Errr, or white dog Democrat?

My Response: From a distance during a Texan sunset there is a bit of a yellow cast to him. If you went to Ace Hardware and asked for paint color that was 4.7% yellow, that would be it. Just ask for an incomplete mix, I'm sure that wiLL confuse them.

Crisp Is In, and Seeing Twenty Twenty

On a journey for new floor tile and other supplies we discovered a new restaurant in Amarillo, Texas. For my meal I decided against my usual ice water and chose a hard apple cider. I rarely drink alcohol in public. My choices were either 16 oz or 20 oz, and I thought, that was odd to have bottle choices that close together in size. The waitress didn't eXplain and I didn't ask. 

I chose a 20.

But when beverages arrived on the table it was a draft in a tall thick cold cylindrical glass, no bottle. Again, I am a neophyte at things brewski. I just saw the large Crispin logo art on the waLL and had decided to try something completely new. 

 

I liked it. It very weLL with the BBQ pork sliders and the horrible deviled eggs that we found out later were missing some ingredients. My wife's chicken quesadilla was above average. I didn't care for their BBQ sauce, so neXt time I wiLL bring my own from the house, just like I have a bottle at my favorite local diner.

There wiLL be a neXt time because I found out that they have Guinness, and I had told Badger that I would try that soon.

So ... mid way through the meal with 20 oz of hard cider, my wife declares she is going to be the designated driver and demands the ignition keys. I know I'm not debilitated but I gladly aLLow her the key ring. 

I am not against drinking and driving, but I am truly totally against drunk driving. But my wife does not understand things like blood alcohol math, and besides, I don't reaLLy feel like driving, as I just got finished driving an hour.

We head out to the SUV after the slightly better than average supper and the vehicle is facing east with a curb immediately in front. So my wife backs out of parking spot by turning left 90 degrees, so then she is facing straight south. BUT then she immediately starts going straight! 

.... And I with medium volume yeLL, "You are heading over the curb!!!" 

- she stops, looks, and says, "Are you sure?!?!?" 

- "YES!!! You are headed over the curb, the exit is right there ..." pointing to the west. 

"Oh!", she replies, and goes out into the side street and stops to look at the curb. 

She says, "Are you sure that's a curb?" 

- THOUGHT: HOLD it, I was the one drinking, right? "Yes, Honey, that is a curb!"

Suddenly I am doubting who should be driving and I create a cute little bouncy syncopated song on the fly, "Oh, Who shouldn't be driving right now?" With that same words repeated three times, music varying slightly on each line.

She smacks me on the arm, grinning, teLLing me to shut up. I crack up laughing. 

I sporadicaLLy start singing pieces of my new song in a semi-whisper-hum with my mouth open slightly more than normal enunciating sharply with a Cockney accent, as she gives me a dirty look but with her cute smile.

So we are now headed to the lumber yard passing by Tascosa High School on Wolflin Avenue, children practicing footbaLL, and make it to the stoplight at the intersection with Western Street. While stopped, I look to the right at the building, point at it, and say to my wife, 

"Do you remember me teLLing you about that bakery (pointing at the building) about how it is named Frank's Bakery, that it advertises itself as the only French bakery in town and that the name 'Frank' reaLLy means French, so it is like saying French Bakery French Bakery?" 

She says, "No, I don't remember you telling me that." 

I responded, "I remember teLLing you when we were stopped at this intersection at this stop light, only we were facing south on Western. I believe it was August of 2007. (5 years and 1 month ago)" 

My wife immediately responded, "You can't possibly know when we had this conversation! - um, FIVE years ago!" 

So I told her that I had recorded this story on my blog in a post about 700 posts ago, in a piece caLLed "200 Percent French". 

So I puLLed up my blog on her iPhone and found the publication date to be August 16th, 2007. So I started singing the "Who Shouldn't Be Driving Right Now" song again, as I thought that was a pretty good demonstration of my current right then under the unfluence of alcohol mental capabilities. 

She smiled, wide eyed. 

I read the blog post out loud to her which confirmed everything I had just told her and it ends with these words which make her laugh:

(Don't worry, my wife never reads this stuff)

We made it to the lumber yard without my wife kiLLing me. We go through the long process of picking out tile for our business property. The first one she picks has 20 tiles to the box and she asks me how many boxes we need. I divide the 20 into 600 to get the answer 30 boxes. But there are only 4 boxes available in stock. So she picks an even better tile pattern that now has 30 tiles to the box, so that means we need twenty boxes. So we load them up along with glue and a new Welcome mat.

We are going through process of checking out and her cart is in front of mine. She is puzzled and teLLs me what the total is, and it seems a little bit too high. I go around to the POS screen and see that my wife has told the clerk the wrong information and mixed the 20 and 30 quantities of boxes and 30 vs 20 tiles per box. I was shocked that the check-out clerk hadn't even counted the boxes but relied simply on what my wife told him, 30 boxes instead of twenty! 

I wiLL keep this in mind if I ever decide to start shoplifting, mental note: "look for this particular clerk"

I forget how much eXtra money would have been lost, but it could have bought quite a bit of cider.

So .... what did I do? Why, I sang my cute little new song, of course, "Oh, Who Shouldn't Driving ..." AGAIN. 

My wife closed her eyes and smiled shaking her head, humorously moaning, teeth grinding, only this time she didn't threaten to kiLL me. I asked her if she wanted me to puLL the SUV up to the loading zone, and she handed me the keys. I think by this time she finaLLy realized I wasn't intoxicated AND she was ready to get rid of me and my song. 

I did let her drive home from the lumberyard.

Let Me Explain The Presidential Debates, So That You Will Not Have To Watch Them

The 2012 Presidential Debates are soon. I don't know when because I basicaLLy don't care.

Here is what is going to happen. Each candidate, thankfooly there are just two, wiLL teLL you eXactly the same things they have already told you during the last several months, only this time they are in the same room at the same time.

The new twist is that each of them wiLL try to figure out how to say the eXact opposite of the other one, only figure out the logic whereby they have the better deal for you.

My favorite parts are when each candidate tries to eXplain what the other candidate is reaLLy saying.

The real deal is I want neither of them, so the real loser in this election is me. In the long run the real winner of this election is most likely China, the big one, not the little one.