Nerds, like me

Last month, Star Trek actor Leonard Nimoy, best known for his role as Spock on Star Trek, died on February 27th died at the age of 83. He will be missed, but as the saying goes he lived long, and prospered. Usually, I am relatively un effected by what goes on in the life of Hollywood celebrities, but as a science fiction nerd, Nimoy's passing saddened me.

Macky Rae, my younger dog, took it hard as well.

Regular readers of this blog are aware that Macky Rae enjoys Science Fiction, and is a big fan of Star Trek.

He is also fond of Dog Movies, "1950s Era Black and White Giant Insect Films," and Zombie Flicks.

Nimoy was also dog lover.

He co-authored a book with

his "best friend" entitled

I Am Not Spock's Dog

Like many Trekkies, Macky Rae was effected by Leonard Nimoy's passing.

Being only five (and a dog) Macky sometimes doesn't distinguish from reality and things he sees on TV and/or in the movies. As such, he did not distinguish that there is a difference between Leonard Nimoy the actor and Mr. Spock the star trek character

But neither could many Trekkies.

Macky asked me why they didn't do the Fal-tor-pan (the re-fusion) and bring Mr. Nimoy bake to life like they did in Star Trek IV: The Search for Spock. I wasn't sure how to explain it to him, so I just told him that you can only do the re-infusion once.

He accepted that.

Spock, Star Trek, and Science fiction had (and still does have) a significant impact on our culture. Here's just one example:

When you go to the doctor, especially during a hospital visit, you may be surrounded by a collection of monitors with display screens which allow the doctors to quickly know your assorted vital signs and other bodily statistical information.

This had it's origins (to some degree) from Dr. McCoy's sick bay

A doctor in the 60s was watching Star Trek and after seeing the Sick Bay thought how nice it would be if, as a doctor, he could just look up at a screen and know his patients vital signs (instead of stopping to take a pulse, or any other time consuming procedure). And the more he thought about it, he began to wonder if it was possible to do something like that then.

He called a friend, who developed medical equipment, and asked "Could we do something like that?"

The technology was there in the 60s for such equipment, but nobody had thought to do it - except for Sci Fi nerds.

This is a common fault amongst doctors, and for that matter everyone else. We become so part of the routine, we fail to see how things can be changed and improved.

The doctor and his friend eventually arranged to visit the sick bay set of Star Trek, observing and taking notes and sketches, and the friend began developing various monitors for heads up displays.

If the Sci Fi nerd has any role in our culture, it is they who say "Hey, wouldn't it be neat if...?" Eventually, someone else says "Yes, it would" and before you know it, something new enters our lives that we didn't realize how much we needed.

Sometimes the nerds themselves come up with the new innovations!

Say what you want, but the most significant technological innovations of the 20th and 21st century were not from those people who were the jocks, or the prom queens, or any of the other so-called popular kids. It was the nerds.



I have been a Sci Fi nerd most of my life. I began reading Sci Fi almost as soon as I could read. And I was watching Star Trek before I even started grade school, and I am talking the original run of the original series.

From Space Dog goes to Mars I moved up to more significant stories and books as my reading ability improved, eventually reaching an adult reading level (by the 8th grade - most Sci Fi nerds have an above average reading ability) .

After graduating High School, I briefly attended Columbia Basin College before enlisting in the Air Force. Another Sci Fi nerd, who I new from gaming, also was attending C.B.C and we would meet up for lunch every day. We eventually spotted other nerds we new from gaming, and they joined us for lunch as well.

Eventually, one of the nerds had a great idea: Let's form a Sci Fi club, and the school will let us have a room for us to be nerds in. So we did the paperwork, got the approval, and put the announcement in the bulletin.

And something weird happened

On Thursday, 11 o'clock, we went to our assigned room, and found that there were other people coming as well. They had read the announcement, and wanted to join the Sci Fi as well.

Nerds, like us.

After returning from my time in the Air Force, I decided to return to C.B.C. and finish my degree. I was introduced to a nerd (through another nerd) who was part of the Sci Fi club - the same one that I and other nerds founded years before. I was invited to visit, and when I arrived at the meeting, I found the room full of Sci Fi people

Nerds, like me

I joined the club (again), eventually being made (breifly) the club president.

It was during this time that I, and the Sci Fi club nerds became involve with Rad Con. For those of you who are not from the Tri-Cities, WA area (or have just not heard of it) Rad Con is a Sci Fi convention - and by Sci Fi I mean science fiction, Tolkienesque fantasy, vampires, werewolves, etc.

Build it, and they will come. And they did. Hundreds.

Nerds, like me.

As a special guest, we invited former congressmen Mike McCormick to be a quest speaker. I won't go into detail, but McCormick was a science guy at Hanford before getting elected to the state legislation, and later to congress. McCormick was impressed with the number of people interested in science and science fiction that were attending the convention.

And I knew what he was thinking: Nerds, like me.

After graduating C.B.C. (twice) I continued on with my normal life - as normal as Sci Fi nerds can be anyhow. One of my friends who also graduated C.B.C. and was part of the Sci Fi club asked me if I wanted to join another Sci Fi type club: The Romulan Internaional Empire (a Star Trek based fan club). Well, I really didn't, but I didn't want to offend him by saying I have better things to do that topretend to be a Romulan once a week, (or however often we would hold meeting), so I said maybe and that I would think about it.

So some time later I got an odd call. And I do mean odd.

The first thing that was wrong was that they called at 9:30 in the morning. Normally, that is not bad. But by profession, I am a cook. Since people generally prefer to eat dinner at dinner time, as a cook I usually work evenings, which means I get off work at !0pm (or later) and don't get to bed until around one of 2 in the morning. This means 9:30 is early for me - the same as 5:30 for normal people.

The man, with a distinct southern accent, ask for me by name and identified himself as Admiral Brok Jomar, stating his "name" and "rank" as if it would mean something to me (it didn't). He said that Commander Hadrian could not be reached because he was on reserve duty and I was listed as the Sub Commander of the Starship Farseer. Eventually it dawned on me: this had something to do with my friend's Romulan club.

The more he talked, the more confused I became. He claimed he attempted to contact Commander Hadron, but he was informed that he was doing his two weeks reserve duty.

OK, now I am starting to see a bit of light. My friend was in the Army reserves, and was away at Ft Lewis for his two weeks. Could this be related...?

Brok said I was the vice president/ sub commander of the club. He needed some info, which I didn't know.

I had just found out that very moment that I was a Romulan.

When my friend got back from his two weeks reserve duty, I asked him about it. What he told me was that he knew I wanted to join so he filled out an application and sent it to the club headquarters. And it gets better: having started the club, he was the President/Commander and he designated me clun Vice President/Sub Commander.

I had ben drafted into the Romulan navy.

So periodically, I met up with the other club members.

Nerds, like me

When I was in the Air Force, I lived in a dormitory, much like those used by college students and prison inmates. There was a holder for a door tag in which you put your Name, Duty Section, and Work Phone. There was olso a section that said comments. I had seen another Airmen write scripture in his (John 3:16) so I decided to write something non-military related as well. What I wrote was

Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn

which was from the writing H.P.Lovecraft, a horror writer who is credited by Steven King as being a major influence on his writing.

One afternoon, there was a knock on my door, and when I opened it, there was another Airman standing in the hallway. He had seen my door tag comment (and knew the reference) and told me he had to stop and introduce himself as another fan of H.P.Lovecraft.

Even in the Air Force.

Nerds, like me.

Ars gratia artis

When I logged into my blog account the other day, I found a notice from Google (the service host) that they were changing their policy regarding blogs that contain explicit content

In the coming weeks, we'll no longer allow blogs that contain sexually explicit or graphic nude images or video. We'll still allow nudity presented in artistic, educational, documentary, or scientific contexts, or presented where there are other substantial benefits to the public from not taking action on the content.

This doesn't apply to Dances With Dogs as it is a relatively tame blog. The most explicit content I published was the series of Guns and Nudity blogs, and that was only PG-13. There are some "suggestive" pictures, but anything "explicit" was not seen, thanks to strategically placed happy faces.

Many web and blog hosting services has a no nudity policy regarding content. This is fine, and I understand there position, but this blanket policy would also exclude many famous classical art paintings by established artists.

Some years back, someone created a webpage on GeoCities that showed paintings and other artwork by by Michaelangelo, Raphael...

(No, not the Ninja Turtles)

...Leonardo DiVinci, Reuben, etc, which were nudes, and on the top of the page wrote a big bold caption that stated that in accourdance with the webhost terms of Service, these images are prohibited.

Some libraries have a similar policy: Nude art depictions are prohibited from being accessed on their computers, and sometimes are even blocked by web filters.

Ironically, the same images can be found in books on art available in the very same library that prohibits them on the computers.

But we do not want our children to be exposed to nudity. Or Art.

They should stick to there violent PC games, I guess.

I'm a creative person with a vivid imagination.

Obviously. I publish a blog that has talking dogs.

I'm very artistic, the result of genetics, environment, or both. My talents manifested themselves early. Even in pre-school director noted that my finger paintings were better than the other children, both in technique, composition, and subject matter.

I was also unique in that, as an infant, I did not attempt to eat crayons.

Speaking of crayons: When I was a child, there was a "Flesh" colored crayon in the 64-pack of crayola®.

Back in the day, Crayola® came in 8, 16, 24, 48, 64-packs. If you had the 64-pack, you was the shizzle, because you could be so much more colorful than the others in your class (except for those who also had a 64-pack).

And the 64-pack had a built-in sharpener so your crayons could always be sharp (8-pack students always had dull crayons)

And in the 64-pack, there was a crayon labeled as flesh. As kids, we were curious, and tried to match the crayon to everyone's flesh, and found that nobody in our class was flesh colored. So we compared other crayons to our skin. Most of the kids in the class were white, and by "white" I mean Caucasian - nobody in the class was actually white.

The closest to white was Andy Lindholm. He was pasty, but he had some color. Andy was sort of a Light Beige.

Most of my classmates were either Apricot, Peach, or Tan (Except Juan who was Burnt Umber, and Leroy who was Brown. And Light Beige Andy). There were no "White" people in the class.
 

You won't find a Flesh colored crayon in the box, 64-pack or other. It got fired. Actually, it just got renamed along with a few other colors that were not politically correct.

You wouldn't think crayons would offend people.

Another color that got changed was Indian Red (to Chestnut) out of concern from teachers that their students wrongly thought it was supposed to be the color of Native American's skin. The name actually referred to a red pigment from India.

Hey, maybe the NFL should consider this for a team name: Washington Chestnuts.

(Or maybe Congress should find more to worry about that the name of a football team.)

In 1992, Crayola® released a set of eight multicultural crayons which "come in an assortment of skin hues that give a child a realistic palette for coloring their world."

And even that offended some people.

One of many crayon colors you
won't see in a box of crayolas®:

 

I have some "formal" art training (other than finger painting). In college a took several art classes as electives. On of them was Drawing I, taught by an instructor who was one of those "formal" art teachers who believed everyone should adhere to the formal rules of art.

I believed that as an artist you should make the rules as you go.

One of his teaching techniques was to give us an assignment, then wander around the class to observe and critique of progress.

"Critique" is a French word that means "to criticize."

It sounds nicer in French

After "observing" my progress on an assignment, he "critiqued" my progress, primarily on my usage of numerous lines.

"There are no lines in nature" he reminded me.

"Yeah?" I responded. "Well, the are lines in Doug's art!"

I have always been a troublemaker.

On the average, males only know about a dozen colors: red, orange, yellow, light green, dark green, light blue, dark blue, purple, white, pink (sometimes called "salmon"), gray, brown, and black.

Show a guy a shirt, and ask him what color it is, he will give you a simple answer, like blue.

Women, on the average know about 4000 colors.

Show a woman a shirt, and ask her what color it is, she will give you a different answer, like Sky Blue. Or Navy. Or Aqua. Or Cyan. Or Cornflower.

Computers, like the one you may be reading this on, understand 26,777,216 colors. A few of the have specific names, most don't and are only known by an alpha-numeric code (such as #D2691E), and unless you are a programing geek you probably don't ever need to know this.

Show a computer a shirt and ask what color it is, you will get an answer like ##1E90FF

Can you sing with all the voices of the mountains? Can you paint with all the colors of the wind?

Bob Ross
The Joy of Painting
 

He estimated having painted

between 25,000 and 30,000

paintings in his life.

Do you know who knew lots of colors? Bob Ross.

 

Bob Ross was the host of The Joy of Painting, an half-hour instructional television show which ran from January 11, 1983, until May 17, 1994. In each episode, Ross taught techniques for landscape oil painting, completing a painting in each session.

 

Bob became known for his soothing tone and reassuring comments, and his use of catch phrases such as "happy little trees" and "happy little clouds" while painting.

"We don't make mistakes; we just have happy accidents."

Some of the colors Bob used were titanium white, phthalo green (and phthalo blue), midnight black, dark sienna, Van Dyke brown, alizarin crimson, sap green, cadmium yellow, and yellow ochre.

And you won't find these colors in a box of Crayolas®. Even the 64-pack.

Bob irritated me, though.

First off: what was up with that hair? White (or rather Beige) people are not suppose have afro's like that.

Bob would sit at the canvas, easel in hand, and in thirty minutes, he could create a majestic landscape full of "happy trees" and "happy mountains."

And he painted the @#$% mountains with a spatula!

He'd scrap up some paint from his palate with said spatula, smear it on to the canvas and "voila! " a mighty mountain.

It would take me thirty minutes just to paint one happy tree.

And it wouldn't be as happy as one of Bob's.

She comes in colors everywhere She combs her hair She's like a rainbow Coming colors in the air Oh, everywhere She comes in colors

The Courtyard of the

Old Residency in Munich

by Adolf Hitler

Adolf Hitler painted. Maybe if he had

been able to earn a living as a painter,

World War II may never had occurred.

I have a theory that if you say something ridiculous, if you say it with a straight face people will believe you.

This is how Adolf Hitler was able to come to power. He didn't smile.

I've learned to do this on a smaller scale. One of the"ridiculous" things I tell people (with a straight face) is that the color orange did not exist until the 1600s. I further explain it was invented by Rembrandt van Rijn, who named it after Filbert, Prince of Orange, his chief patron (and I pronounced it "oh-rahnj" to make it sound European). I further challenge people to verify (or disprove) my claim by inviting them to go to the library and find a book on classical art (or go online) and try to find a painting done prior to the Renaissance that has any orange color in it.

Only one person has actually taken me up on the challenge.

Regular readers of this blog are

aware of my love of coffee and

coffee shops

A friend to whom I told this came to the coffee shop carrying a book entitled "Religious Art of the Early Middle Ages (Vol I). Before she even ordered her coffee, she sat the book down on the table in front of me, opened it to several bookmarked pages, and pointed out several examples of pre-renaissance art in which the color orange was used.

I was actually proud of her. Most people accept my bullshit without giving it a second thought.

"See? See?" she taunted. "How do you explain that?"

 

"Hmm" I responded (with a straight face). "Maybe it was the Ancient Greeks who invinted orange."

 

"Yeah" she said, "It must have been."

Well, I was proud of her for a few minutes.

 



My Dogs are artistically creative. I explained in a previous blog entry that I try to expose my dogs to the Humanites: Art, Music, Theater, etc.

 

My dogs like to paint. Lacking opposable thumbs, however, they cannot utilize crayons, brushes...

...or spatulas.

But they did like the episode of The Joy of Painting I showed them on YouTube. They especially liked the was he talked. One morning, they asked me to cook "happy bacon" and "happy eggs" for breakfast.

So instead of brushes (or crayons), my dogs fingerpaint - or "paw"paint to be more accurate (as dogs don't have actual fingers in which to "Finger"paint with.

 

I might be biased, but there work is above average both in technique, composition, and subject matter.

Reba, my newest dog (4 month old), likes to lick the paint.

And tries to eat crayons.

 

 

I turned in a finger painting for an assignment in a college art class.

Yes, I said finger paint.

The assignment was to make an artistic composition that used colors in the order of the spectrum - red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet.

 

Sometimes ones artistic muse goes out on a beer run, and forgets to come back for some time. It was on an evening like this I tried to complete the assignment, but no matter what I did, it just didn't come out the way I wanted. After a while I stood up, and unfortunately was not paying attention and I placed my left hand in my paints.

 

Then out of frustration, slapped my oil paint covered hand on of poster board.

 

I went into the bathroom and washed the paint of my hand, then went to the kitchen for more coffee. When I returned, I noticed that the hand print on the poster board was clear and went from a red thumb to a violet pinkie finger - the hand print was in spectrum order!

 

It was dry by morning, so I took it to class and turned it in. The instructor loved, praising my originality, and even held it up for the entire class to admire.

A lot of my educucation resulted from B.S.

I will cover this in a future blog.

I am green today
I chirp with joy
like a cricket song

I'm a rainbow today
all the colors of the world
are in me

I am blue today
calm as glass and
cool like the sea

Sports Talk

Macky Rae preparing microwave popcorn in preparation for tomorrows game. When I got home yesterday, I discovered my dogs had decorated my living room. It was actually already decorated, so what they did was (technically) re-decorate my apartment. There was blue and green crêpe paper streamers in the window, a "Go Seahawks" banner hanging from the ceiling, and posters of Wilson, Lynch, and Sherman on the walls. It could only mean one thing: The local 12th Dog Association was coming over to watch the game tomorrow. For those of you who live in a cave, by "the game" I mean Super Bowl XLIX. For those of you who don't follow my blog on a regular basis, are new to this blog, or just forgot, the 12th Dog Association is about two dozen or so canines of assorted sizes and breeds who live in the area who are devoted Seahawk fans. And a cat named Freddie. The Association allowed Freddie to join the club, because there isn't a 12th cat association because (as I was informed) most of the local cats are not Seahawk fans. I only used this image so I wouldn't get fined. They were in the kitchen, preparing for the festivities: Microwaving popcorn, roasting Chex™ Mix, and arranging appetizer trays. Judging from the grocery bags on the floor, and the fact that my debit card was not in my wallet when I was looking for it earlier, it would appear that I may have fimanced the party as well. Oh well. I'm in.

 

I'm a freak.

I'm one of those people who listens to news and other informational programing. I like to know what's going in in the universe, or at least on my particular planet. I'm interested in global warming (or cooling, one of the two - I forget from week to week which we are believing at the time), racial unrest, police shooting, radical terrorists,

and the 2016 elections.

But only because I'm worried that Hillary Clinton might not only run for president, she might actually win.

Don't get me wrong, I have no issue with electing a woman as president.

Just not THAT woman.

So one evening I was listening to Jim Bohannon and the topic was the police safety in the light of recent terrorist activities, and threats. Bohannon had just asked a good question, and was about to receive (what I hoped would be an) equally good answer from his guest, when suddenly the show was interrupted by the station.

An amber alert?

A storm warning??

A nuclear strike by radicals???

No, something even more important: basketball.

Yes, I said basketball.

The station deemed basketball more important than the safety of our nation.

And it wasn't even NBA, or even college basketball.

It was High School Hoops!

And it wasn't even my alma mater.

(Go Bombers!)

It was bad enough when the station stopped airing Star Talk...

Me and Macky Rae (my younger dog) liked Neil Degrasse Tyson. Regular readers of this blog are aware that he is fond of science and science fiction.

...and now this!

---

The public have an insatiable curiousity to know everything,
except what is worth knowing.

~ Oscar Wilde

---

Don't get me wrong, I like sports. But some thing are more important that sports. Like the safety of the free world.

And why do they still broadcast sports on the radio? We have TV (and have had for well over a half century) and (IMHO) it is a much better medium for visual entertainment.

There was a time, when human being lived in caves, that radio was the only was transmit immediate information of sporting events.

Or if you didn't need immediate sporting information, you could wait until the following day and hear the results announced by the town crier.

Some sports you just have to watch, either live or on TV. Football I can understand, but that's because I like football. But Basketball? High School Basketball???

 

Other than parents (and maybe a few other family members), I can't imagine anyone wanting to listen to high school basketball (or any other high school sport). I might be wrong (and often am) but I can't believe they have enough listeners to warrant preempting other programming.

At the very least, KONA shouldn't run a show that the plan to interrupt for "high school hoops." The should either do a pre-game show, or just play some music until the game starts.

Just don't get me involved with a show, only to yank the rug out from under me (figuratively speaking) just when it gets interesting.

So, lets talk sports.

In the United States, there are only 6 sports played: Football, Baseball, Basketball, Hockey, NASCAR,

and everything else - This is according to a 2013 Harris poll.

2176 people were surveyed between December 12th and 18th of 2012, and these are the results:

 

Football was #1 (anyone surprised by this?) at 46% - 35% favoring NFL, 11 favoring college (NCAAF).

Canadian Football did not make the list.

"You can't be a real country

unless you have a beer and

an airline. It helps if you have

some kind of a football team,

or some nuclear weapons, but

at the very least you need a

beer."

~ Frank Zappa

 

Outside the United States (and Canada), "American" Football does not enjoy much popularity. Worldwide, the #1 sport is Soccer.

Most countries enjoy some form of "foot" ball: Soccer, Rugby, and American Football being the most preeminent.
 

My dogs like football. They are Seahawk fans.

You probably guessed that from the intro to this blog entry.

Two weeks ago, went down to the Zip-E-Mart and bought sodas, chips, and beef jerky - snacks for the NFC championship game. As the game was about to start, I reached over to turn up the volume.

That's when they attacked me.

They thought I was going to change the channel, and panicked. Freedom (my oldest) bit my hand, Sarah (my female) bit my leg, and Macky Rae jumped up on me and head-butted me until I lost consciousness.

Green Bay - 22

Seattle - 26

Trip to the ER for stitches- $300

Laying on the floor in a daze, bleeding, listening to the NFC playoff game - Priceless

It was an awesome ending, so the dogs told me.

 

 

 

Nipper listening to the 1919 World Series.

The Cincinnati Reds defeated the Chicago

White Sox 5 to 3

Baseball was #2 with 16%.

How can anyone enjoy listening to baseball?

I played baseball as a kid (little league) and it's a fun game to play, but (IMHO) it's boring to watch, let alone listen to. Very little happens unless a player gets a hit - otherwise most of the players are standing around, scratching and spitting. Only the pitcher and the catcher are (more or less) constantly playing. The pitcher's aim is to strike out the batter (thus preventing anything from happening), and a perfect game, when all the batters are struck out, is when absolutely nothing happens.

 

 

 

5% said Ice Hockey

 

There is a WHL team in in my hometown, called the Tri-City Americans

which is an odd name for them, because most of the players are Canadian.

Some years ago, I worked near the coliseum where they played, so many of the players came in for lunch. One afternoon, a few of the "Americans" came in and ordered lunch. While waiting for their sandwiches, the boys engaged in a bit of playful jocularity. One of them elbowed another in the ribs, to which the victim responded with an exagurated "ow!' along with the appropriate emoted gestures.

My co-worker, a hockey fan, was not impressed.

"You know" he told the 'injured' player "as a hockey player I expect you to take a body check better than that."

 

 

 

9% said Basketball, of which 6 % said NBA and 3% said college basketball (NCAAB)

Note: nobody in the survey said "High School Hoops"

I've already had my say on this subject.

 

 

7% said Auto Racing and although the survey did not distinguish, I think it is safe to assume...

yeah, I know: ass / u / me

... that they were mainly referring to stock car racing. Stock car racing in the United States has its origins during Prohibition, when drivers ran illegal whiskey. Bootleggers typically used small, fast vehicles to better evade the police. Many of the drivers would modify their cars for speed and handling, as well as increased cargo capacity.

 

Practice driving and competitions began to attract spectators, and soon stock car racing (NASCAR) became a formal an approved sport.


Especially popular in the south, and by rednecks everywhere

Just Sayin'

Dale "#3" Earnhardt is one of the most noted of these, primarily because he died.

I think that some rednecks believe that NASCAR drivers are taken straight to heaven.

 

My redneck friend (Keith) likes NASCAR and Earnhardt. About a year or so ago he posted a picture of Earnhardt on this Facebook page. It had Dale in his racing regalia, and in the background was an American flag and a bald eagle, and the caption underneath all this read "American Hero."

I had to comment on this.

"Keith" I wrote, "crashing in a car doing 200 mph does not make him a hero. American Heroes are firefighter and police officers, and GIs serving in the middle east."

 

His response: "So what does that make him?"

 

"A redneck who crashed at 200 mph!"

 

 

 

Another sport popular amongst rednecks is "professional" wrestling, or as it is called in the south "Rasling"

 

Spoiler alert: Wrestling is not real.

No other sport is so, well, colorful.

 

Can you imagine freaky characters in other sports?

Oh wait. Dennis Rodman.

I was stationed in San Antonio (Texas) when I was in the Air Force. While I was there, a railroad bridge collapsed, causing a few railcars to drop into the Medina river. Not good, especially if one of them is a tanker filled with toxic chemicals, breaking open and leaking fumes into the air. And even worse when it occurs near a residential area.

Specifically, a trailer park.

(This fact is important to the story.)

The television stations, notified by the emergency notification system, alerted the residence (primarily rednecks) to the danger and advised them to evacuate.

Immediately.

And all the rednecks went to the designated meeting spot.

Which was a convenience store.

One of the local stations sent out a news crew, and did a live report from the store. The crew filmed the evacuees as they roamed around the parking lot, drinking sodas and eating hot dogs, nachos, and whatever else they could buy from the convenience store. The reporter picked one of them at random (more or less) and asked him what had happened.

Noted comedian and redneck expert Jeff Foxworthy once said that not all southerners are dumb, it's just that they can't keep the dumb ones off the TV.

"Well, he said "me and the wife was watching wrestling when the TV told us we should leave, so we put the kids in the truck and came here."

"Here" being the convenience store.

What saved the residents was that the accident occurred between 9 and 10pm so everyone was still up (watching wrestling), and thus got the warning to evacuate the area.

If it weren't fer wreslin' a whole lot o' rednecks may've been kilt!

 

 

At the time of the accident, I was drinking a beer...

(actually it was more than just "a" beer, but who's counting?)

...in the lounge of the Airman's Club...

which means you can't blame me for the train wreck - I have an alibi

...with Bill MacHines...

and a witness

and was on my 2nd or 12th beer when the station cut away to the impromptu refugee center, interrupting the regularly scheduled programing, which just happened to be a local show called "Weekend Sports Update."

KONA people, please take note: this is how you are suppose to do it. You interrupt sport for news, not the other way around!!!

Cellphone, Part 2 - Ringtones and Stuff

Last time on this blog, I covered cellphones (and phones in general), which included the Ten Commandments of Cell Phone Etiquette.

If you did not read that blog, click here and do so now. This is part two of Cellphones, and shouldn't read part two until you've read part one.

 Go ahead, we'll wait.

For those of you who did read part one, here is a quick recap:

• We learned about phone.
• We learned about pay-phones, and phone booths
• We learned about heroes, and how my Uncle Theo (and Chuck Norris) fought comets.
• We learned the Ten Rules of Phone Etiquette.

Riding the bus to the phone place.

• We also learned that Macky Rae (my youngest dog wanted a cell phone (and has, for sometime, been recycling aluminum), which is where we ended last month - heading to the phone store.

I do not drive, nor does Macky Rae (or either of my other two dogs). Therefore, in order to reach Phones R Us, we must take the bus. With nearly $400 inside a empty soup can, me and my dog boarded the bus, and rode to the phone store.

In case you are curious, we ride the 110 bus to the transfer center, then transfer to the 160.

There are several phone stores in our community, but Macky wanted to go to Phones R Us. He says its "dog friendly."

You might be surprised to learn that many stores are not "dog friendly."

Many stores and other establishments have a "No Dog" policy, and many of them announce this policy by placing "No Dog" signs in their windows. I'm not allowed to patronize these establishments. My dogs say this is racism, and we should not condone racism, or any other isms.

Sarah wants to sue some of these places.

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I have a dream that my little dogs will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their fur but by the content of their character. We can never be satisfied as long as our pets are stripped of their self-hood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating: "No Dogs Allowed."

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Info on service animals can be found at

the DOJ's ADA website.

Now, by law, even if these stores have a no dog policy (or a sign), they have to allow "service animals" for people with disabilities. My dogs don't understand why some dogs can go into stores, and some can't. They  don't understand why dog aren't allowed in stores in the first place. I told them that the stores are afraid that the dogs might pee on the floor, to which Macky asked

"How does the service vest prevent dogs from peeing on the floor?"

We encountered this sign while walking past the local elementary school. Naturally, my dogs found it offensive.

MACKY: That sign is stupid. Dogs do not even play golf.

FREEDOM: Or ride motorcycles.

MACKY: Do you know why we do not play golf?

ME: Why?

MACKY: Because we can not hold golf clubs because we do not have thumbs.

ME: Is that why dogs don't ride motorcycles?

FREEDOM: No. That's because our legs are to short.

MACKY: I wonder what they would do if a group of dogs rode up on Harleys carrying golf clubs?

FREEDOM: They'd probably call the SWAT team.

SARAH: You guys are stupid.

Dogs are not permitted on this beach,

even if they have clothes on.

Man invented writing about 10,000 years ago (give or take a week). There are various theories as to why man invented writing, but one theory is that it was so that signs (such as "No Dogs" and "Keep of the Grass") could be placed in various locations.

Here's a sign story for you: Some years back, the owner of a strip mall was having problems with people parking directly in front of a coffee shop (instead of in the parking lot) and then going in to order there café lattes (or whatever) - this all despite the red painted curbing and a sign that said "Fire Lane - No Parking - Tow-Away Zone." He even hired a security guard, who tried to tell the people not to park by the curb. He (the guard) was pushed aside by yuppies who told him "I'm only going to be a minute" - like that made it O.K. Finally, he (the owner) was force to resort to having a towing company come in and tow away the offending cars. The rent-a-cop took pictures of the cars by the "no Parking sign. Personally, I'd love to see a picture of some yuppie coming out of the coffee shop holding a cappuccino while his (or her) car was being towed away.  So after several yuppies had to bail their vehicles out of an impound, some lawyer of the ambulance-chasing variety got several of them together and filed a class action suit against the property owner, the towing company, and no doubt anyone else he could think of. The case didn't get to far. The presiding judge, no doubt smelling something malodorous, requested that the lawyer explain the premise of the law suit. The lawyer began to ramble, and the judge cut him off and repeated his request. Again, the lawyer rambles, and again was cut off. This time the judge asked the lawyer if he believed that his clients had some legal right to park illegally. The lawyer said they didn't, and the judge dismissed the case, and suggested to the lawyer that he should file a class action suit against the educational system that failed to teach his clients how to read a sign that said "Fire Lane/No Parking/Tow Away Zone."

No Shirts   No Shoes
No Service

If you lived through the 70s (like I did), you may remember this poster.

You may not remember the happy face on her derriere. I had to add that, because I am trying to keep this blog rated PG or under. 

This barely relates to the subject of signs (and has nothing to do with cell phones), but the young lady's response to the sign is inspiring.

Butt (pun intended) I have digressed.

Where were we... Oh, yes. Phones R Us.

This quaint little shop is owned and operated by a Hungarian immigrant by the name of Slilard Rakoszczi.

Macky can't pronounce his name.

Hell, neither can I! Vanna, we need to buy a vowel.

Macky calls his Mr. Lizard. 

The Barkia™ 2000.

Mister "Lizard" runs a small shop that sells cellphones (and related paraphernalia), sports cards, and espresso.  So while I was drinking a complimentary coffee, Macky Rae was on the counter - literally, standing on the top of the glass display case examining the cellphones. After examining the phones, studying the brochures, and listening to Mr. "Lizard" explain the service plans, Macky Rae mad his selection.

The Barkia™ 2000.

Mr. "Lizard" even threw in a special collar attachment, to help Macky carry it around.

I found it interesting that he wanted a cellphone. Humorous in fact, because of his reaction the first time he encountered a cellphone. Fat bottomed girls You make the Rocking World go round When Macky Rae was about 6 month or so (still a pup) I took him with me to the convenience store, conveniently located a short walk from our house. While we were waiting in line to pay for our purchases, Macky noticed he woman in front of us. "Dad" he whispered to me (loudly) "that lady has a big butt!" And she did, too! Don't Get me wrong, I have nothing against a woman with a booty. I like big butts (I can not lie), but there are limits. This woman's ass was more than just big - it was ginormous! And it stuck out so far that not only could I have rested a beer on it, but there was still room for the rest of the six pack. However, I told Macky that it was not polite to say things like that in public, and we continued waiting.   The woman had a cellphone, which for some odd reason she kept in her back pocket. We discovered this because as we were standing behind her (waiting to pay for our purchases) she received a call and her right butt cheek started beeping. "Dad!" Macky yelled. "Get out of the way, she is backing up."

 

One of the first things Macky did when we got home was to download some ringtones. They weren't "tones" per se, they were dog noises. Barks, growls, etc. You know, stuff that a dog would use on his cellphone.

At least they weren't musical ringtones.

I hate musical ringtones.

Some people have got the most annoying ring tones, usually some stupid hip-hop or redneck song. And to make it worse, they turn the volume up full. And its not even the whole song, it's a 15 second bite that repeats over, and over, and over.

Makes you want to scream "answer your @#$% phone!"

In the original Star Trek Captain Kirk

used a simple ringtone. The reason for

this that most ringtones are annoying,

even in the 23rd century. 

Of the numerous songs and/or ring tones that came with my phone, I use two. One goes beep-beep-beep and the other goes beeeep-beeeep.

 

The first I assigned to people on my "A" list, that is people that I like and who's call I will answer (provided I am not otherwise engaged in some other activity). The other one is for people I don't really want to talk to. I never answer these, they go straight to voice mail. That way, If someone calls I know whether its worth my time and effort to dig my phone out of my pocket and answer.

If you have ever called me, and I answered, congratulations, you are on my A list.

If you always seem to only get my voice mail... Beeep Beeep! 

There is a third ring tone I use that goes ding. This tells me I have just received a text.

I don't need hip-hop, redneck, hard rock, or any kind of music on my phone. If I want music, I turn on my stereo. That's what I got it for.

And my phone does not have a radio app. Again, that what I got a stereo for.

 

 

Level 150 Happy Dance

The other thing he did when we got home was download a ZombieLand™ app, so he would get instant notification if something important was going on in ZombieLand™ while he was offline. 

Regular readers of this blog are aware the Macky Rae likes computer games. His favorite is ZombieLand™ which he has been playing for about two years.

Recently, he proudly announced that he had reached level 150.

I assumed it was significant by the fact he was doing a happy dance.

I addition to playing ZombieLand™ he spend time in Z-Chat™ talking to other Z-Heads. After he downloaded the ZombieLand™ app, he downloaded the Z-Chat™ app, so he could talk with his Z-Head group with his phone.

He also downloaded a  ZombieLand™ screensaver.

ZombieLand™

ZombieLand™ is one of a dozen or so games created by a company called TechnoSoft® for online play, usually through social media.

 

TechnoSoft® was in the news last year when it developed a software glitch. The company uses one computer to operate all their online games, and a glitch allowed zombies from ZombieLand™ to infest some of the other games because of shared sofeware between all the game systems. TechnoSoft® attempted to patch the glitch, but was unable to do so because the zombies were every where.

If they were unable to solve the problem, they announced in a press release, they were going to have to shut down ZombieLand™

Macky (and the other Z-Heads) became concerned.

Although Macky explained it

to me, I was never clear as to

why they commandeered the

John Deere tractor.

Fearful that there game would be shut down, Macky Rae and the other Z-Heads™ met in Z-Chat™ and devised a plan to save TechnoSoft® from the Zombie Apocalypse.

 

They all logged into their ZombieLand™ accounts, then hacked into ArmyLand™ where they broke into an arsenal and acquired weapons normally not available to ZombieLand™ players. From there, the crossed into FarmLand™ where they commandeered pick-up trucks and a John Deere tractor and drove through CowboyLand™ until they reached CityLand™

Going block by block, Macky and the Z-Heads™ rooted out the zombies and hearded them back through the breach and held them there long enough for the programmers at TechnoSoft® to repair the program (and close the breach).

Macky Rae and all the Z-Heads™ each received $50 Visa gift cards and  "I ♥ ZombieLand™" t-shirts.

And they were allowed to keep the military weapons they took from the arsenal.

 

I came up with an idea for a phone app:   I am affiliated with an organization that helps people in need. Without being judgmental, the people that frequent the facility have a higher frequency of knowing someone (or being someone) on a state mandated time out. That means "in jail" Often times, when somebody hasn't been seen for a day or two (or three), missed an appointment, etc., the chances are good that he/she is in the county hotel. That means "the jail" Usually, calling the sheriff's office (or checking the online inmate list) locates the missing individual. If that turns up negative, the next call is to the hospital. Then the morgue.  So what I was thinking was this: Most jails are connected to the internet, and publish a daily inmate roster of their guest, usually along with the charge and the amount set for bail.   For those people with a friend and/or family member that has a tendency to visit the county jail on a regular basis, what we need is JailApp®  After you download this to your smartphone, you enter the name of your friends(s) and/or loved one(s) into the app. Every so often, the server sends an inquiry to the county jail, and if it receives a confirmation, it will sends an alert to your smart phone, something like this: Alert! You brother John Doe has been arrested. The charge(s) are: Mopery, Resisting Arrest Current at Dogpatch County Jail Bail is set at $2500 I think everybody knows at least one person for which this app would be helpful. And if you don't know of one, you probably are that one!

 

 

One of the problems we encountered was Macky's texting. Mr. "Lizard" sold Macky a plan that had unlimited texts, and the dog is trying his hardest to get his money's worth. He texted everyone he knew on a regular basis. When I go to the store, I would get texts reminding me to pick up this, or that.

Once I got a text from him, asking me what we were going to have for dinner. He was on the sofa, about 10 feet away from me at the time.

And my personal favorite: While going to the Zip-E-Mart one evening to get a soda, I received a text from Macky warning me to "watch out for zombies on the way home, and pick up some beef jerky."

 

I once told Macky that when I was growing up, we didn't have cell phones and text messages.

"How did you send messages to your friends?" he asked

"Drums" I told him.