Veterans Day; AARP Genie; Dancing Joke; McConnell; Religious Right; Money Giveaway; Marriage; Governors; Protein Source; Lame Duck ToDo; Nixon; Student Loans; Baltimore Trivia

70 degree day.. nice.. too nice for Fall, but, we'll take it!


"See how the world its veterans rewards!
A youth of frolics, an old age of cards."


Alexander Pope (An Essay on Man)


Yes.. its Veterans Day.  I spent a couple of hours looking out the window and wondering why the mail person was so late.  Dummy me!


Let me try to catch up on some interesting (to me) "stuff."


01.  AARP Notes


I tell so many "Genie grants three wishes" stories at our AARP meetings that people are beginning to sing:


"chills run up and down my spine,
Alladin's lamp is mine" .... da da da da


Nice song.    Want to hear my latest?  Good:


A man was  walking on the beach and he came across a beautiful lamp.  He began to rub it with his handkerchief to make it shiny, and a Genie popped out, and said:
"Master, you have released me from one thousand years inside that lamp.  Therefore, I would like to reward you with three wishes."
The man was excited and gave his first wish:  "I want to have a million dollars."
POOF!  His hand now held a briefcase filled with $100 bills.
He then gave his second wish:  "I want to have a new Mercedes automobile."
POOF!  He now was the owner of a beautiful car.
Excited even more, he gave his third wish:  "I want to become irresistible to women!"
POOF!  The genie turned him into a box of chocolates.


So, be careful of what  you wish for.


Unfortunately, fellow AARP members are passing away too quickly these days.


Dave, a very nice guy.. looking lots younger than his 81 years, passed away just one week after learning of his cancer.


Audrey, a lovely lady of 96 years, also looking much younger than her calendar shows, passed away after being sickly for a few months.


Milton, a still-practicing dairy farmer, passed away at 86 the other day.  I was trying to arrange for him to get a large wheelchair from somewhere.. preferably from his own doctor.  I have a small wheel chair that he could have had, but it would not hold his 300 pound body.


Norman, a real nice guy who was probably 7 feet tall, passed away yesterday.  We always joked that when he attended a meeting, the average height was raised by 6 inches.  And when he didn't attend, but I did, the average height dropped by 6 inches.  Its hard to believe that a guy like Norman, who took care of horses and his landscaping chores, could leave us in such a short period of time.


02.  Dancing Joke


A woman and her husband are attending a ball in their hometown.  On the floor, in the midst of hundreds of dancers is a man who is obviously enjoying himself enormously.
The woman clicks her tongue and says: "Look at him, making a spectacle of himself.  Did you know that he once asked me to marry him, and I turned him down."
The husband replied: "Well, it looks like he's still celebrating."


03.  The Senate's Big Shot


Even though Alison Lundergan Grimes  put up a great fight, Mitch McConnell beat her for his Senate Seat.   I liked what she said at one point in the campaign: "Thirty-five is my age, but it is also Mitch McConnell's approval rating.. if Mitch McConnell were a TV show, he'd be 'Mad Men' .. treating women unfairly, stuck in 1968, and ending this season!"


By being in control in both houses, the Republicans have a chance to do something other than to sit on their behinds as they have been doing for a long time.  If they do nothing, they risk losing the 2016 Presidency race.


04.  Does the Religious Right feel energized?


With the Republicans ensconced now.. will the Ultra Religious guys see their goals be achieved?  Such as:


a. The elimination of reproductive freedom and the reduction of access to birth control.
b. The institution of mandatory prayer in public schools.
c. The insertion of creationism and "intelligent Design" into school curricula in place of science.
d. The ignoring of election law by using tax-exempt churches to promote their political candidates.
e. The passing of laws that discriminate against the LGBT community.


05. "Buddy, could you use an extra $5?"


In September, to celebrate his 59th birthday, Bob Blackley stood on a busy street corner in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, handing out $800 worth of $5 bills.  He likes to make people smile.

06.  It was time..


After living together for 70 years, Vivian and Alice, now in their 90's, decided to "tie the knot" recently.  Let's hope they have many more years ahead of them.


07,  Illinois Joke.. holds true for other States too


Carolyn O'Hara in This Week magazine said that she heard this while growing up in Illinois:
"Our governors are always assured two terms: one in the statehouse and another in the Big House."


Reference: former Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell and his wife Maureen. 


08. New Source of Good Protein


According to This Week, a new company named EXO has started selling snack bars made from ground up crickets.. they want the world to know about the nutritional and environmental benefits of consuming insects.


09.  What's a Lame Duck to do?


Thomas Frank in the Progressive Populist suggests some things that President Obama could do, that would not be assailable by the Republicans:


a.  Instruct his (old or new) Attorney General to start enforcing the nation's antitrust laws the way Democrats used to do.
b.  Investigate and prosecute fraud committed during the housing bubble.
c.  Make it clear that he will no longer tolerate the college tuition price spiral.


or.. initiate Price Controls like Nixon did.


The President did say something about college tuition prices in a recent speech, but I doubt he said it  with all the force he could have.






10.  Speaking of that "Tricky" President


According to the Baltimore Trivia book by Dennis McClellan, (If its Trivia about Baltimore, It's Far from Trivial), in 1946, a Republican group in California needed a candidate to run against Jerry Voorhis, a wealthy democrat seeking a sixth term as a representative.  They actually placed 26 newspaper ads in an attempt to find somebody.


Eight men applied and were rejected. Then somebody thought of Richard M. Nixon, a 33 year old lawyer and Navy vet.   The group found him in Baltimore, of all places, and enticed him to California where he trounced his opponent unmercifully. 


11. Student Loan Forgiveness


The Nation:  In September 2014, the Occupy Wall Street offshoot organization, Strike Debt, purchased almost 4 million dollars in student loan debt owed by almost 3,000 students of the For Profit Everest College.  It then forgave the debts.  (How about that!)


12.  More Baltimore Trivia


From McClellan's book, cited above:  A widely known Baltimorean had the Washington Press Club falling on the floor laughing in 1976, when she said that some people in Congress had mistaken her for Carl Albert in drag.  That lady?  The irrepressible  and beloved Senator Barbara Mikulski.
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Had enough?  Yeah.. me too.