Stare.
 
2004 Notebook: Weak LI
 
  
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18 December 2004
No. 1,974 (cartoon)
I walked by your place on Wednesday.

Thank you.

19 December 2004
Driving Advice from Canada
A few months ago a motorist was killed in Saint Joachim, Quebec, by another car that drifted into his lane and crash smashed into him. Although the victim was on the correct side of the road, police investigators discovered he probably wasn’t paying full attention since he was having sexual intercourse with a passenger at the time. A police representative opined that such distracting behavior “makes driving that much more dangerous.”

I appreciate such cautionary tales; I can always learn from others’ mistakes.

20 December 2004
Dissembling Strategically
Claudia called to chastise me about the story about the urban matador.

“You were lying, weren’t you?” she demanded.

“I wasn’t,” I replied.

“You were too!” Claudia shot back. “You said Karl was there, and Karl said it never happened.”

“Have you never studied rhetoric?” I asked rhetorically. “I was dissembling, not lying.”

Arguing with uneducated people is a waste of time even for me, so I changed the subject.

21 December 2004
Let’s Face It, Within Reason
My father, who died fourteen years ago today, had two phrases which he used repeatedly: “within reason,” and “let’s face it.”

Let’s face it, dad’s dead ... within reason. I think he would have laughed at that sentence. Of course, I’ll never know.

22 December 2004
Witnessing Death
Betsie, who’s beginning her nursing career, just watched a patient die. She asked me if I’d ever seen someone check out; I replied that I never had. (I didn’t mention that I’d seen men club seals over the head then rip the skin off their twitching, steaming bodies, but that’s not the same thing, not even close.)

Although I can appreciate that watching someone die is one of those cathartic experiences that puts everything else in perspective, I don’t want to see anyone die except me (in a reasonable number of decades from now).

23 December 2004
According to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game
I told Christina that scientists working for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game report that both genders of reindeer grow antlers in the summer, but that the males lose their racks in late November. The females, however, keep their antlers until spring.

“That means,” I concluded, “that Rudolph and the other flying reindeer are all girls.”

“Maybe yes, maybe no,” Christina replied with a wink.

I smiled; I almost forgot that Christina was Christopher when I met him and/or her.

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©2004 David Glenn Rinehart