Conversation

One of my favorite movies: The Wrong Box has an elderly character who likes to share facts with anyone who is nearby. At one point in the movie, he gets a chance to ride on a horse-drawn wagon for an hour, seated next to the driver.

As they enter the town, he breaks off his monologue and tells the driver that he would now be able to disembark. The driver, clearly battered and worn from his rider's incessant chatter, says: "Oh, would you?" (with an implied PLEASE!)

So it is with blogs. The good thing though, is that one can avoid visiting the site or one can block the writer's entries, at least on Facebook.

With that bit of off-hand advice, I will continue with my blog entry.

01. Death of another Icon: Dan Shorr passed away at 93 on Friday. I didn't always agree with his actions, but usually I agreed with his commentary. Besides, anyone on Nixon's Enemies List has to be someone I admire.

02. Hate Groups. The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) says that they are now tracking 23 organized extremist groups in Maryland. They also state that there are 1,753 active extremist groups in the U.S. Anti-immigrant groups have grown astronomically recently.

Let me ask one question related to immigration: If suddenly all illegal aliens were kicked out, who would pick our fruit and vegetables, clean the toilets in our fast food joints, or watch the children of our elected officials?

03. Gun control: Comic, Chris Rock says he has the solution to the "bearing arms" issue. "Bullets should cost $3,000 each." That way, only serious hunters would have them..and children and crooks might be deterred. What do you think?

04. Bliss. Jeremy Quinn, Mensan, says: "The beautiful thing about marriage is that you can wear your old, discolored shirt in front of her when it would embarass you no end should anyone else witness it."

05. Harvard grads? Massachusetts put out a list of the top 1,000 State tourist attractions.. but the list only showed 996 places, and some of them don't exist. (I'll have to look for New Bedford entries. A few years ago, I compiled my own list of about 100 places to go and things to do in the geater NB area. I would be glad to share it.)

06. Nature's Bounty. Last year, we discovered the Earthbox and grew lots of vegetables on our back deck. This year, we bought three more and are enjoying lots of delicious home-grown veggies, such as giant zuchini, giant cucumbers, tomatoes of all kinds, patti-pan squash, .. and even corn!
(Google Earthbox)

07. Toastmasters take note: Shakespeare wrote 31,959 speeches! (Could Bacon have done that?)

08. Mushrooms: The Crystal Falls, Michigan Humungus Fungus Fest will be held in August. I believe that they make a 10' x 10' mushroom pizza. (Is it true that there is a mushroom growing on 37 acres underground..that is 1,500 years old?)
http://www.humungusfungusfest.com/

09. Sarah sez: New word.. refudiate. Is this related to Elmer Fudd's dislike of Bugs?

10. The Bard: Sarah said that Shakespeare made up new words all the time..when he wasn't writing thousands of speeches. Mensa has a Special Interest Group (SIG) for Shakespeare lovers.. it's called Bardolatry and can be found on Facebook.

11. Jobs: Maybe we should move to Bell, California. Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me reports that the Bell City Manager is paid $787,000 and it's Police Chief is paid $457,000. I wonder what the salaries are for L.A., which probably has a rather larger population?

12. Burning Question: Is this the year twenty ten, two thousand ten, or two thousand and ten? (Answer, from Mensan Richard Lederer.. "twenty ten ... saves five letters, one syllable, and one word." I know, you are wondering why us guys with genius IQ's are spending time on this subject. I wonder too.)

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