Senior moments (Relativity explained here!)

Bullets for a better world.

Yesterday my wife, the little French lady, explained relativity to me and she didn't need Einstein around to explain it. She used the three hair theorem. 

• If I had 3 hairs on my head that wouldn't be very much hair.  If I had those same three hairs floating in my soup, that's a lot of hair. It's relative.  See...no Einstein required.
• Ahhh....Relativity.  When I was growing up the superheros wore their underwear on the outside and had big capes.  In the fifties they were called Superman, Batman, Captain Marvel.  Now they are called Interior Decorators or Rap singers.
• In the 50's these Superheros had young companions or proteges who lived with them. In the 50's that was OK.  Now the men would be called Monsignor.
• When Superman was a child and his  "mother" made his "uniform", what kind of thread and scissors did she use to cut and sew the cloth?  I worry about this stuff.
• I am trying to learn Spanish.  Those people have a different word for everything. When I visited Montreal,  I thought if I talked louder they would understand me.  I asked my wife what was wrong with these people?  Why aren't they speaking English?  Didn't you tell them about my impending visit?   She said she forgot.

• When I was growing up in the fifties, my dad worked, my mom stayed home. We owned our house,  my father bought a brand new 1955 Chevy,  our health plan was taken care of by my dad's employer. Everybody in our town was a Republican.  We wondered why anyone would be a Democrat.  We knew nothing of poor people, civil rights, poor schools.  We knew nothing of that other world.
• Times change.  We elected a black Democrat president.  My dear republicans are furious.  How could this happen?  I wonder?  Could it be that their leadership is less than inspiring?  Are George Bush, Dick Cheney, and Sarah Palin the cream of the crop?  Yikes.  Could it be that a majority of americans are concerned about things such as health care?  I really don't care if he was born in Kenya or Hawaii.  
• Rick Perry: OMG!!!!!!
• Former Presidents: George Washington? Father of our country? That is the only thing he fathered.  He had no children of his own.  James Madison? Ditto!!
• President James Garfield was assassinated by...his doctors.  Yeah, yeah...I know. Someone shot him.  If the doctor had left him alone he would have recovered.  He had seen 16 different doctors.  Sadly they poked around inside him trying to find the bullet.  While doing so, they lacerated his liver, he got an infection and died 89 days after he was shot.   An autopsy showed the bullet encapsulated. Oops!!
• Wakes! What a wonderful tradition.  Wakes were started because people in the olden days had a nasty habit of burying people who were still alive. Someone suggested they hold off for a few days before we bury this unmoving person.  The person may "wake" up.  I know I would be real cranky if I woke up from a big hangover, inside a pine box wearing a tie, white shirt and a suit coat, and jockey shorts.  "Hey, get me outa here. My mouth feels like I ate cotton candy. Where's my pants and socks?  What are these pennies doing on my eyes?"  I am sure this could have happened to a few of my Irish ancestors.
• People are protesting the Wall Street shenanigans? What took so long?  The liberal's answer to the Tea party?  Isn't this almost Anti-American and unpatriotic, Rush? 

I just had to get this stuff off my chest, along with those three hairs I just shaved off.

Gotta go to lunch now.

What's that floating in my soup?  Relativity?

The Coffee clatch gang.

Making new friends?

Yesterday I realized that I miss the companionship and fellowship of my male friends, so my wife ordered me out of the house until I found some cronies to hang out with.
She is the one who used the word "cronies", I did not!

Her thinking was;young guys have friends, old guys have cronies.
I qualify as old.  You may qualify as old if the hair in your nose and ears grows faster than on your head.  In fact, I nearly lopped off my ear last week trying to trim my ear hair, but that is another blog.  Let's not get off topic here.

So, here I was, quicked out of my own home by the Little French Lady... searching for a spot to meet my crony friends.  I thought I might give the Starbuck's down the street a try. I had packed my Man gear.  My GPS, my binoculars, my Ipad, my Mental Floss magazine, I put on my Mental Floss T-shirt (The one that says, "I would give my right arm to be ambidextrous"), my wrap-around sunglasses and my sparkling wit.
I was off.

Upon arrival to Starbuck's I ordered my latte and my danish.  I gave the woman with the spanish name my $20 bill and she asked if I wanted change back.  I said, " of course!!!"
She returned a quarter, a dime and two pennies.
Huh!...oh well,  I shall commence to making friends now.

I sat a table with a nice looking young lady. She had her MacBook out and was typing like a person possessed.  She paused.  I said, "MacBook?..I have a MacBook."
She looked up and glared at me.  I figured I better straighten her out so there was no misunderstanding.
"Oh.....I'm not flirting with you.  I'm here to meet men."  Something didn't sound right about that statement.
She glared.  I looked around.  Everybody was in their own little world.  One guy was reading the Sunday New York Times. (It was Thursday).  One woman was doing a spanish lesson on her computer.  "Como esta Usted?"  I kept hearing her say that.  Finally I hollered out, "Muy Bien, Gracias!!"
More dirty looks.  It was like I pooped on the table.  People started complaining to the spanish waitress.  I guess her name was senorita Barista, she didn't look spanish.

Finally, out of desperation, I took out my Ipad.  I emailed my wife, "Can I come home now? Everybody hates me at Starbucks."  She emailed me back and told me to try a different location.  I got up to leave.  I said, "Adios, everyone."
I received a standing ovation.

I walked for about 15 minutes in the opposite direction.  I noticed this place called "Jimmie's Hole in the Wall."  written on a theater marquee above the establishment.
The parking lot was full of pickup trucks with rifle racks in the rear windows, or confederate flags on the antennae.
I walked to the clerk and ordered a cup of coffee.  "That will be 30 cents."
Wow, I like this place already.  I noticed a bunch of guys standing around a round table talking.  I walked over and found an open spot at the "round table".  They were actually talking to each other.  They all said, "How yawl doin?" I looked around.  There was no one behind.  They were talking to me!!!!  I loved this place.

The floors were kind of quirky.  They were at an angle, very much like an old movie theater.
"Where yawl from?" a guy named Joe Willie asked.  I said I lived a few streets away off ocean Blvd.
"You lie!!!!!!" Joe Willie hollered.  That brought huge laughter to the rest of the group. Shoulders were convulsing, many were snickering mixed in with a few tee-hees and guffaws.
One guy, named Marko,  raised his hand and everyone stopped laughing immediately.  "What Joe Willie is saying is that you don't sound like a native of South Carolina."
"Oh,...I am originally from Vermont."
"Vermont?...Isn't that where that Jewish Communist Congressman lives?..Burley Sanger!"
"Do you mean Bernie Sanders, Joe?"
"Yeah, That's the guy. The Communist Jew guy."
"Bernie's a socialist, Joe."  I answered.
"Yeah, well...He is still a jew. How do you expect me to trust him.  This guy has high regard for Moses. Yeah...Moses.....The guy who wandered around the desert for 40 years.  He wouldn't man up and ask directions after God parted the Red Sea.  Would I follow this guy?  No way!!!  and to compound matters he had a bunch of people behind him and nobody tapped Moses on the shoulder and say after about 13 years, 'Moses, the sun rises in the east and sets in the west.  What's your plan?" "

Hmmm...this guy, Joe Willie has some valid points; he has obviously thought about Bernie and Moses quite a bit.

Marko,  (the guy who had everyone stop talking when he raised his hand) was held in high regard by the people at the round table.  He talked fondly about his travels on the Appalachian Trail and his frequent trips to Argentina to visit his soulmate and fiance.
He seemed quite puzzled by the Catholic religion.  He understood the concept of heaven and hell.
Heaven good, hell bad.
Marko was thinking about switching to Catholism for his fiance.
He was mystified by the other places located in between...
Heaven, Hell, Limbo, Purgatory and Bridgeport, Connecticut.
I have been to Bridgeport.  If I die and end up there....hmmmmm. It ain't heaven.
Marko, Bubba, Joe Willie, and Billy Jeff seem like a bunch of nice guys.  I enjoyed listening to them.  They are a funny bunch.  The coffee taste great, the price is right.
I will email my wife and tell her I have met some new friends and I am on my way home.

"See Yawl tomorrow."