“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”
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Part eight of the series on classified ads written by the intellectually challenged.
They probably thought what they said was smart. In fact they probably thought that what they said was what they said, only when you read what they said, they said something they didn’t mean to say. If you see what I mean. You soon will.
Enjoy!
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“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”
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It’s not often that I post twice in one day. I did the funny post earlier but there is something else that I want to say and today is the day to say it. Strap yourselves in!
I don’t remember where I was when JKF was shot. It was a bit too far back in time for me to be worrying about such things. I do remember where I was when I saw my first movie about the assassination, though. I was in a cinema. The movie was called Executive Action and starred Burt Lancaster. Some critics panned it at the time but I thought it was very good, based on a conspiracy theme naturally enough. I actually thought it was better that Stone’s acclaimed effort, ‘JFK’, made many years later.
I also remember where I was this day eleven years ago. It was the day that the world changed for ever and I was sitting in my study at home battling with a few spreadsheets for a business plan I was putting together. The TV was on in the background and the normal programs suddenly cut to what was happening in New York.
Of course that was the end of my spreadsheets for the day. I became totally enthralled in the news coverage which was to say the least confused. By that time the first tower was belching out a steady stream of smoke. It was clearly on fire and had been very badly damaged.
The reporters were speculating as to what may have been the cause. They talked about ‘accidents’ and eyewitness reports of a small private aircraft hitting the building. But, to anyone with any wit at all, it had to have been much more than a small airplane to do that amount of damage to a building that huge.
Then, as I continued to watch, the second plane hit the other tower. Some of the reporters still could not come to grips with what was happening. The second plane was clearly a large commercial jet and, equally clearly, it had been flown deliberately into the second tower.
This was the real deal. And all of the multi-billion dollar military/intelligence defense network had been caught with their trousers down round their collective ankles.
A massive terror attack was in progress and we were able to watch it in real time on our televisions. It was at the same time mesmerizing, engrossing and, not least, horrifying.
The horrific nature of what had happened became clearer when everyone began to realize that, not only had many innocent people probably lost their lives when the airplanes had struck the buildings, but also that there was little or no hope of saving those on the floors above where the impact had occurred. It got even worse when some of the trapped people threw themselves out of the building and could been seen falling to the ground and to certain death.
Emergency services rushed to the scene. Many acts of extreme bravery followed as police and firefighters went into the burning buildings with little or no regard for their own safety. I can’t say this for sure, but I imagine at least some of them knew there was little chance they would get back out again. But they did it anyway.
Then we heard that the Pentagon had been the target of a further attack and yet another airplane, also bound we were told for the Washington DC area, had gone down somewhere en route.
In all 2,977 people were murdered as a result of the terrorist attacks that morning.
We know who was responsible for the attacks. We know that many of their terrorist comrades, including the figurehead Bin Laden, have since been killed. And we know the terrible cost in terms of lost lives and serious injuries to the various armed forces who were sent to do that job.
September 11 is now officially ‘Patriot Day’, a day of remembrance. And we should all take at least a moment in honor of the victims.
Sadly the aftermath of these terrorist attacks eleven years ago brought only knee-jerk reactions from jerk politicians. They had the audacity to call it the Patriot Act, but it attacks the freedom of innocent law-abiding citizens just as much as it does the terrorists and criminals.
Contaminated by the hellish liberal inspired ‘guilt’ that now pervades all government decisions and means that it is no longer perceived as acceptable if we take our own side in a fight, a raft of idiotic, unnecessary and unfair legislation has, and is, being enacted.
This is being done in the name of defending the homeland, but unwilling to only target the national, ethnic or religious groups who are responsible for the vast majority of the terror, poor old law-abiding Joe Public gets targeted as well.
Everyone is now guilty until they can prove their innocence. Get on an airplane at an airport and you are treated as a potential terrorist and irradiated and probed and so forth. Open a bank account and you are treated as a potential terrorist trying to launder money – despite the fact that it was the banks themselves who were doing that job.
It’s not that any of this is a great hardship. It’s just that it is completely unnecessary and unproductive. It is the typical politician’s and bureaucrat’s way of trying to con the populace by substituting activity for real progress.
A lot of potential terrorist attacks in America and elsewhere have been thwarted during the past eleven years, but not one of them as a result of all the overt claptrap at airports and so forth.
Will it change? Will sanity and intelligence take over?
Not a chance.
Will it get worse? Will the bureaucrats’ hunger for control and interference increase?
Of course it will, regardless of whether the regime is Republicrat or Democrican.
So who really did win?
The terrorists may well have lost, but the people certainly didn’t win!
“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”
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In case you were wondering, this post has nothing to do with Michael Crichton’s mind control novel with the same title. Rather it is about people with no minds trying to control the rest of us.
Strange, as well as stupid, people feature on the fasab blog.
None come stranger than Mehran Karimi Nasseri, also known as Sir, Alfred Mehran (yes, including the comma).
Nasseri is an Iranian refugee who was expelled from Iran in 1977 for protests against the Shah. After a long battle, involving applications in several countries, he was awarded refugee status by the United Nations High Commission for refugees in Belgium which permitted him residence in any European country.
He claimed to have one British parent, although he produced no evidence to support this, and decided to settle in the UK in 1986. But en route to there, in 1988, he claimed that he was mugged and his shoulder bag stolen while waiting at the RER platform to go to Charles de Gaulle Airport to take a flight to Heathrow.
When he tried to go to the United Kingdom, Nasseri managed to board the plane, but when he arrived at Heathrow, London without the necessary documentation, immigration officials sent him back to Charles de Gaulle airport.
Unable to prove his identity, or his refugee status, to the French officials, he was initially arrested and moved to the Zone d’attente (waiting zone), a holding area for travelers who do not have papers. However, due to the fact that his entry to the airport was legal he was released, but, since he had no country of origin to be returned to, he began his residence in the departure lounge of Terminal One in Charles de Gaulle Airport on August 8, 1988.
Mr. Nasseri’s predicament was made into a movie in 1993 entitled ‘Tombes du Ciel’, starring Jean Rochefort, Ticky Holgado, and Marisa Paredes. And he was reportedly the inspiration behind the 2004 movie ‘The Terminal’, starring Tom Hanks.
However, unlike Hanks’ character in the movie, and since at least 1994, Nasseri did not live in the duty-free transit area, but simply in the departure hall, in the circular boutiques and restaurants passage on the lowest floor.
Theoretically he could leave the terminal at any moment, although, since everyone knew him, his departure might not remain unnoticed. He did not seem to speak with anyone normally.
With his cart and bags, he almost looked like a traveler, so people either did not notice him or ignored him as if he were a homeless person. Airport workers were kind enough to give him food.
In 1992, his case was taken on by French human rights lawyer Christian Bourget. However, in one of those absurd rulings that idiot bureaucrats and judges can only dream up, the French courts ruled that, having entered the country legally, he could not be expelled from the airport, but neither could it grant him permission to enter France.
Attempts were then made to have new documents issued from Belgium, but the authorities there would only do so if Nasseri presented himself in person. However, under Belgian law a refugee who voluntarily leaves a country that has accepted him cannot return.
In 1995, the Belgian authorities granted permission for him to return, but only if he agreed to live there under supervision of a social worker. Nasseri refused this on the grounds of wanting to enter the UK as originally intended.
In July 2006, eighteen years later (yes, that’s 18 years!) Nasseri’s stay at the Charles de Gaulle Airport ended when he was hospitalized and his sitting place dismantled.
Towards the end of January 2007, he left the hospital and was looked after by the airport’s branch of the French Red Cross. He was lodged for a few weeks in a hotel close to the airport.
On March 6, 2007, he transferred to an Emmaus charity reception centre in Paris’s twentieth arrondissement. As far as I know he may still be there.
And you thought US immigration took a long time!
“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”
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This is a short selection of stories taken from the internet. I have no idea whether they are true or not, but they are amusing, and as we know, stranger things have happened.
Enjoy.
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We had to have the garage door repaired. The Sears repairman told us that one of our problem was that we did not have a ‘large’ enough motor on the opener.
I thought for a minute, and said that we had the largest one Sears made at that time, a 1/2 horsepower.
He shook his head and said, ‘Lady, you need a 1/4 horsepower.’
I responded that 1/2 was larger than 1/4.
He said, ‘NO, it’s not. Four is larger than two…’
We haven’t used Sears repair since.
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My daughter and I went through the McDonald’s take-out window and I gave the clerk a $5 bill. Our total was $4.25, so I also handed her a quarter.
She said, ‘You gave me too much money.’
I said, ‘Yes I know, but this way you can just give me a dollar bill back.’
She sighed and went to get the manager who asked me to repeat my request.
I did so, and he handed me back the quarter, and said ‘We’re sorry but we cannot do that kind of thing.’
The clerk then proceeded to give me back $1 and 75 cents in change.
Do not confuse the clerks at McD’s.
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I live in a semi rural area. We recently had a new neighbor call the local township administrative office to request the removal of the DEER CROSSING sign on our road.
The reason: ‘Too many deer are being hit by cars out here! I don’t think this is a good place for them to be crossing anymore.’
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My daughter went to a local Taco Bell and ordered a taco. She asked the person behind the counter for ‘minimal lettuce.’
He said he was sorry, but they only had iceberg lettuce.
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I was at the airport, checking in at the gate when an airport employee asked, ‘Has anyone put anything in your baggage without your knowledge?’
To which I replied, ‘If it was without my knowledge, how would I know?’
He smiled knowingly and nodded, ‘That’s why we ask.’
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The stoplight on the corner buzzes when it’s safe to cross the street. I was crossing with an intellectually challenged coworker of mine.
She asked if I knew what the buzzer was for.
I explained that it signals blind people when the light is red.
Appalled, she responded, ‘What on earth are blind people doing driving?!’
She was a probation officer in Wichita , KS
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At a good-bye luncheon for an old and dear coworker. She was leaving the company due to ‘downsizing.’
Our manager commented cheerfully, ‘This is fun. We should do this more often.’
Not another word was spoken. We all just looked at each other with that deer-in-the- headlights stare.
This was a lunch at Texas Instruments.
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I work with an individual who plugged her power strip back into itself and for the sake of her life, couldn’t understand why her system would not turn on.
A deputy with the Dallas County Sheriffs office, no less.
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When my husband and I arrived at an automobile dealership to pick up our car, we were told the keys had been locked in it.
We went to the service department and found a mechanic working feverishly to unlock the driver side door.
As I watched from the passenger side, I instinctively tried the door handle and discovered that it was unlocked.
‘Hey,’ I announced to the technician, ‘Its open!’
His reply, ‘I know. I already got that side.’
This was at the Ford dealership in Canton , MS.
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And finally!!
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When I left Hawaii and was transferred to Florida I still had the Hawaiian plates on my car, as my car was shipped from Hawaii .
I was parking somewhere (I can’t remember) and a guy asked me “Wow, you drove from Hawaii to here?”
I looked at him and quickly said “Yep. I took the Hawaii/San Francisco Bridge”.
He nodded his head and said “Cool!”
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“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”
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Monday is usually the day for stupid quiz show answers. But this Olympic Monday here are a selection of stupid questions asked by some intellectually challenged members of the public in relation to past Olympic Games held in Vancouver, Canada (winter) and in Sydney, Australia.
I think it proves not only that dumb people don’t just give dumb answers, they ask dumb questions too; and that dumbness is a worldwide phenomenon (the nationality of the questioner is indicated after the question).
Enjoy.
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Questions About the 2010 Winter Olympics In Vancouver, Canada:
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Q: I have never seen it warm on Canadian TV, so how do the plants grow? (UK)
A. We import all plants fully grown and then just sit around and watch them die.
Q: Will I be able to see Polar Bears in the street? (USA)
A: Depends on how much you’ve been drinking.
Q: I want to walk from Vancouver to Toronto – can I follow the Railroad tracks? (Sweden)
A: Sure, it’s only Four thousand miles, take lots of water.
Q: Is it safe to run around in the bushes in Canada? (Sweden)
A: So it’s true what they say about Swedes.
Q: It is imperative that I find the names and addresses of places to contact for a stuffed Beaver. (Italy)
A: Let’s not touch this one.
Q: Are there any ATM’s (cash machines) in Canada? Can you send me a list of them in Toronto, Vancouver, Edmonton and Halifax? (UK)
A: What did your last slave die of?
Q: Can you give me some information about hippo racing in Canada? (USA)
A: A-fri-ca is the big triangle shaped continent south of Europe. Ca-na-da is that big country to your North…oh forget it. Sure, the hippo racing is every Tuesday night in Calgary. Come naked.
Q: Which direction is North in Canada? (USA)
A: Face south and then turn 180 degrees. Contact us when you get here and we’ll send the rest of the directions.
Q: Can I bring cutlery into Canada? (UK)
A: Why? Just use your fingers like we do.
Q: Do you have perfume in Canada? (Germany)
A: No, WE don’t stink.
Q: I have developed a new product that is the fountain of youth. Can you sell it in Canada? (USA)
A: Anywhere significant numbers of Americans gather.
Q: Can you tell me the regions in British Columbia where the female population is smaller than the male population? (Italy)
A: Yes, gay nightclubs.
Q: Do you celebrate Thanksgiving in Canada? (USA)
A: Only at Thanksgiving.
Q: Are there supermarkets in Toronto and is milk available all year round? (Germany)
A: No, we are a peaceful civilization of Vegan hunter/gathers. Milk is illegal.
Q: I have a question about a famous animal in Canada, but I forget its name. It’s a kind of big horse with horns. (USA)
A: It’s called a Moose. They are tall and very violent, eating the brains of anyone walking close to them. You can scare them off by spraying yourself with human urine before you go out walking.
Q: Will I be able to speak English most places I go? (USA)
A: Yes, but you will have to learn it first.
And questions asked during the Olympics in Australia. The Sydney Olympic Committee via their Web site, supplied the answers.
Q: Which direction should I drive – Perth to Darwin or Darwin to Perth – to avoid driving with the sun in my eyes? (Germany)
A: Excellent question, considering that the Olympics are being held in Sydney.
Q: My client wants to take a steel pooper-scooper into Australia. Will you let her in? (South Africa)
A: Why? We do have toilet paper here …
Q: Where can I learn underwater welding in Australia? (Portugal)
A: Under water?
Q: Do the camels in Australia have one hump or two? (UK)
A: What’s the time frame?
Q: Do tents exist in Australia? (Germany)
A: Yes, but only in sporting supply stores, peoples’ garages, and most national parks …
Q: Can I wear high heels in Australia? (UK)
A: This HAS to have been asked by a blonde …
Q: Can I drive to the Great Barrier Reef? (Germany)
A: Sure, if your vehicle is amphibious.
Q: Are there killer bees in Australia? (Germany)
A: Not yet, but we’ll see what we can do when you get here.
Q: Please send a list of all doctors in Australia who can dispense rattlesnake serum. (USA)
A: I love this one … there are no rattlesnakes in Australia.
Q: Can you send me the Vienna Boys’ Choir schedule? (USA)
A: Americans have long had considerable trouble distinguishing between Austria and Australia.
Q: I have a question about a famous animal in Australia, but I forget its name. It’s a kind of bear and lives in trees. (USA)
A: Would you believe the Panda?
Q: Are there places in Australia where you can make love outdoors? (Italy)
A: Yes. Outdoors.
Q: I was in Australia in 1969 on R+R, and I want to contact the girl I dated while I was staying in Kings Cross. Can you help? (USA)
A: No. And even if I could …
“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”
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No, it’s not another quiz. I think you could categorize it as one of those “it seemed a good idea at the time” stories. This is the story of an idiot whose stupidity and a fast car brought him to a premature end.
The Arizona Highway Patrol came upon a pile of smoldering wreckage embedded in the side of a cliff rising above the road at the apex of a curve. They were mystified.
The metal debris resembled the site of an airplane crash, but it turned out to be the vaporized remains of an automobile. The make of the vehicle was unidentifiable at the scene.
It took the CSI type people in the lab to finally figure out what it was, and pieced together the events that led up to its demise.
It seems that a former Air Force sergeant had somehow got hold of a JATO (Jet Assisted Take-Off) unit. JATO units are solid fuel rockets used to give heavy military transport airplanes an extra push for take-off from short airfields.
Dried desert lakebeds are the location of choice for breaking the world ground vehicle speed record. So the sergeant took the JATO unit into the Arizona desert and found a long, straight stretch of road. He attached the JATO unit to his car, jumped in, accelerated to a high speed, and fired off the rocket.
The facts, as best as could be determined, are as follows:
The operator was driving a 1967 Chevy Impala. He ignited the JATO unit approximately 3.9 miles from the crash site. This was established by the location of a prominently scorched and melted strip of asphalt.
The vehicle quickly reached a speed of between 250 and 300 mph and continued at that speed, under full power, for an additional 20-25 seconds.
The soon-to-be pilot experienced G-forces usually reserved for dog-fighting F-14 jocks under full afterburners.
The Chevy remained on the straight highway for approximately 2.6 miles (15-20 seconds) before the driver applied the brakes, completely melting them, blowing the tires, and leaving thick rubber marks on the road surface.
The vehicle then became airborne for an additional 1.3 miles, impacted the cliff face at a height of 125 feet, and left a blackened crater 3 feet deep in the rock.
Most of the driver’s remains were not recovered; however, small fragments of bone, teeth, and hair were extracted from the crater, and fingernail and bone shards were removed from a piece of debris believed to be a portion of the steering wheel.
Ironically a still-legible bumper sticker was found, reading “How do you like my driving? Dial 1-800-EAT-SHIT.”
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“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”
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I’m sure you have never heard of Col Dan Raschen. I would guess that very few have. I only found out about him and his series of autobiographical works thanks to a mention by Mr Stephen Pile in his Heroic Failures book. Born in 1925, Raschen was in the British Army for thirty-three years and retired with the rank of Colonel.
Whilst Col Raschen cannot be classed as either stupid or a failure, he does nevertheless rate a mention in the fasab blog because his journey through the military ranks was not without a few bumps and bruises.
His four books of autobiography are written with a self-effacing modest humour and if you are interested in that kind of work, well worth a read.
They include adventures such as…..
After Wellington College and Peterhouse, Cambridge his service in the Royal Engineers took him, at the end of World War II, first to a new campaign in the East Indies then back to India for the country’s partition from Pakistan (Book, “Wrong Again Dan!”).
When he was on his way to India to join his regiment he lost all his underwear and his only pair of pyjamas while washing them out of a porthole. All the ship’s cutlery went the same way when he threw out a basin of dishwater. The troops had to eat with their fingers for the rest of the voyage.
On arrival he was instantly accused of murder. The case only foundered when he pointed at his supposed victim grinning cheerfully in the growing crowd of onlookers.
So enthusiastic was his performance during tests for a commission that after the obstacle course he had to wait for other less interesting candidates to finish so they could come back and rescue him from beneath a railway sleeper.
Whilst in charge of three amphibious tanks, he lost all them in one week. Two got stuck in a pond and one went through the wall of his own accommodation.
After completing his degree at Cambridge, Dan volunteered for the Korean War, where the pheasant shooting was of high repute. Because the pheasants lived in or near minefields, which were Dan’s particular concern, he managed to combine pleasure with eighteen months of war (Book, “Send Port & Pyjamas!”).
For one so exquisitely disaster prone a career in explosives was the inevitable course.
Back in England efforts were made to train Dan in military technology, and his subsequent soldiering was unusually varied in scope. After a spell in a weapons design team, he went to the Central Pacific to command an independent unit and to advise on coral blasting (Book, “Don’t Step on a Stonefish!”).
After an intense period of training he arrived at the South Pacific to blow up some coral reef, never having attempted it before. His finest hour came when he moored his own boat to the very bit of reef that was receiving his closest attention.
In his own words he says, ‘One likes to think that there have been people who have been worse, but admittedly it does seem unlikely’.
Home again, Dan was an ammunition instructor before returning to Cambridge to command the University Officers Training Corps. His second command was of a Royal Engineers regiment in Germany. Then he and his wife, Judy, were delighted to spend three years in Sweden with Dan being the British Military Attaché (Book, “Diplomatic Dan”).
On his return to England Dan was Project Manager for Infantry Weapons, and then a Colonel at the Royal Military College of Science, Shrivenham, Oxfordshire. After retiring from the army in 1979, he continued to work at the College as a scientific civil servant for a further twelve years. While there he invented “Raschen Bags”, an indestructible cushion for use under mortars.
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“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”
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Yesterday the subject of my blog post was a rather nice story about a farmer in England who had put a lot of thought, time and effort into creating a memorial tribute to his late wife. I called it “Well done Winston Howes, Who Says Romance Is Dead?”.
A bit out of character for this blog perhaps, but I admire people who do things that are just that little bit above and beyond the call of duty.
Today, however, you could say that “normal service” has been resumed. You could probably tell from the title, “Hard Luck Mr Scott, The Romance May Dead But Your Wife Isn’t!“.
This is a story about another Englishman. This time a Mr Peter Scott from Southsea who has gone down in history as the least successful husband at trying to murder his wife!
All in all Mr Scott made seven attempts to kill his wife.
And the strangest thing of all was that she never once noticed that anything was wrong.
It all started in 1980 when he took out an insurance policy on his good lady that would pay out a quarter of a million British pounds in the event of her accidental death.
Shortly afterward, he made his first attempt to cash in when he placed a lethal dose of mercury in her strawberry flan. Unfortunately for Mr Scott the heavy mercury all rolled out.
Strike attempt # 1.
However, not wishing to waste this deadly substance, he next stuffed a mackerel with the entire contents of the bottle. This time, to his delight, his wife ate it, but, to his dismay, with no side effects whatsoever.
Strike attempt # 2.
Warming to the task, he then took his better half on holiday to Yugoslavia. Recommending the panoramic views, he invited her to sit on the edge of a cliff, but she declined to do so, prompted by what she later described as some “sixth sense.”
Strike attempt # 3.
He tried the same type of thing a few weeks later when he urged her to enjoy the view from Beachy Head, the famous 500 feet high chalk headland in the south of England.
Strike attempt # 4.
Then, when his spouse was in bed with chicken-pox he started a fire outside her bedroom door, but some interfering busybody put it out.
Strike attempt # 5.
Undeterred, Mr Scott started another fire but only succeeded in burning down the entire apartment. The target of his arsonist adventures escaped uninjured.
Strike attempt # 6.
On yet another occasion he asked her to stand in the middle of the road so that he could drive toward her and check if his brakes were working.
Strike attempt # 7.
Unbelievably, at no time did Mrs. Scott feel that the magic had gone out of their marriage. She must have been sooooo dumb!
Finally, since it appeared that nothing short of a small nuclear bomb would have alerted this good woman to her husband’s intentions, he eventually gave up and confessed everything to the police.
After the case, a detective said Mrs. Scott had been “absolutely shattered” when told of her husband’s plot to kill her.
”Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”
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As I’ve said before on this blog, I’m a doggie person, but I know that there are a lot of people out there who like cats. However, I don’t think any of them could have liked the cat that is the subject of this post.
It happed a few years ago when a colleague and myself were on a business trip that included a visit to a small town in West Virginia. It was a lovely little town, called Rednecksville (I won’t tell you it’s real name so as to protect the guilty), full of lovely, very friendly and hospitable people.
During the time we happened to be there they held a local fair come flea market where people from the town and the surrounding countryside would gather. Some set up stalls to sell their home crafted goods, others, like myself just went along to see what was on offer and perhaps buy a few trinkets as gifts.
But, whilst the experience itself was enjoyable, the items that were on sale left a whole lot to be desired. They were quite unbelievably crudely made.
There was a guy with what I think were supposed to bird nesting boxes and/or feeders, but they looked more like an old plank of wood with a bit of drain pipe nailed to it. (It looked like that because that’s what it was, lol)
Other stalls were selling home made jewelry in what you could only call primitive style.
And yet more had bits of metal junk.
Surprisingly one of the junk stalls seemed to be doing good business, selling big rusty nuts and bolts and bits of chain and so forth. On second thoughts perhaps not so surprisingly since this was a largely rural community and new uses can always be found for stuff like that.
I smiled quietly to myself as I wondered if the bird box guy had been a customer of this stall the last time they had the fair.
At another stall a woman was selling some stuffed toys/animals she had very obviously made herself. None of them were good, but some were just downright awful.
For some reason best known to himself my colleague chose to buy a stuffed cat for his wife. He was getting on in years and had been married a long time, but in all those years he never had any idea about women or what they would like – and that was especially so in regard to his wife, although in his defense I have to say that she didn’t seem to like anything he did very much.
To my utter amazement he choose the most unusual stuffed cat I have ever seen. It wasn’t that it looked ugly as such, or that it was badly made. This thing looked pure evil. And no matter where you would be standing it always seemed to be looking right at you, or through you.
It was terrible, horrendous, occultish. If Steven King had been there he’d have written a book about it for sure. If Vincent Price had been holding it in some horror movie set it might have looked more acceptable. Or if we had been in Haiti, I could have understood it if it was supposed to be some voodoo ritual piece. But this was right in the middle of good old evangelical Christian Bible Belt America. This was no place for the cat from hell.
“What do you think?” he asked, proudly showing me his new purchase.
“I hate it!” I told him in no uncertain terms. “What the hell did you buy that thing for?”
He seemed rather miffed.
He must have been more miffed when he got it home. Needless to say his wife hated it. Wouldn’t give it house room at all. And I’m sure she made her feelings very clear to him, as she usually did about almost everything.
So he gave it to his daughter.
She hated it. Didn’t want it near her house either.
So he gave it to his daughter-in-law.
She hated it. She was actually scared out of her wits by it.
So he gave it to his grand-daughter.
She hated it. Started to cry, I believe.
So he put in the trunk of the car and brought it to his office the next day.
His secretary hated it, too. Wouldn’t have it near the office.
So back in the trunk it went.
Eventually he must have got to hate it too because it disappeared never to be seen again.
And the weirdest bit of all….
I photographed him with it when he bought it and I would have attached it to this blog post except for one thing – the photo is nowhere to be found!
That was one weird cat!
“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”
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When this blog post came into my head I was reminded of an old Stealers Wheel hit of the 1970s called “Stuck In The Middle With You”, which incidentally also featured as the soundtrack for the hit movie “Reservoir Dogs”. It seemed appropriate. For those of you who don’t know it, or would like to hear it again, I have attached a video at the end of the post.
As you are no doubt well aware if you have read even a little of this blog, I am fond of humor. I like to try to see the funny side of things, no matter how serious or frustrating. It usually comes quite easily to me, sometimes too easily. All in all, this gift has served me well over the years, but now and again it has caused a little bit of bother.
This story starts off rather sadly. A friend of the family had been killed in a car accident. Not his fault, the moron in the car who hit him was going too far too fast, but that didn’t do my friend any good. He left behind a widow and two children.
A Church Service was held before the interment at the local graveyard and we all filed into the Church and tried to fine a space in one of the pews. The Church was small and the number of people attending the funeral was large. As a consequence we were packed into the seats like the proverbial sardines. But there was nothing else we could do.
I found myself between two guys whom I did not know, so there wasn’t much in the way of conversation before the service started. I didn’t even know their names.
The Minister took his place in the pulpit and began the Service.
Everything went smoothly.
For a while.
Then the guy to my left decided he would take the hiccoughs. Well I think the hiccoughs made the decision to take him and there was little he could do about it. That became mildly amusing in itself. It reminded me of my days at school where one of my classmates was often similarly afflicted.
Trying to suppress hiccoughs only makes things worse and I remember at school there would be a series of rather quiet ones and then one would strike simultaneously with an intake of breath making an elongated and rather loud and unusual noise. It always made us laugh and frequently got us into trouble when we were in school.
That’s the one I was waiting for in the Church, the big noisy one. The anticipation was almost unbearable. Would it happen during a Hymn? Or when the Minister was speaking? Or worst of all, at a moment of silence in the proceedings drawing everyone’s attention in our direction?
When it came, thankfully, we were in the middle of the first Hymn. A few people noticed, but not many. I just held my Hymn Book in front of my face and giggled, more with relief that it had happened rather than at the act itself.
I was just preparing to steel myself for the next big one when all of a sudden the man to my right started to sway backwards and forwards and wriggle from side to side, his hands moving quickly up and down his legs and up to his sides. His left elbow hitting my right arm on a number of occasions. His face was twitching too.
“Oh FFS, what now?” I said to myself, very inappropriately for a Church Service I admit.
“This other idiot is taking some sort of a fit,” I thought. “And I’m stuck here in the middle, between him and the hiccough king, and there’s no way out.”
What was I to do?
Then things got better.
Then things got worse.
To my momentary relief, it turned out the bloke on my right wasn’t taking some kind of a fit after all. Apparently he felt he was about to sneeze and was frantically trying to get into one of his trouser pockets for a handkerchief.
His problems were two-fold. One, the sneeze was imminent, and, two, we were all so tightly packed into the Church pews that he couldn’t get enough room to get his hand into his trouser pocket, hence the frantic movements of his arms. The man wasn’t having a fit, he was just in a mild state of panic looking for his hankie.
If there isn’t a saying, “a sneeze waits for no man”, there should be because they don’t. And sneeze he did. A great big one. That was bad enough, but unfortunately he must have had a cold or something because when he sneezed at least six inches of rather unpleasant stuff made its way out of his nose and just hung there like an icicle in winter. He quickly did the only thing he could and put his hand up to his nose capturing the offending article.
My next worry was where was he going to put it? If I was keeping an eye on him before when I thought he was about to have a fit, I was keeping an even tighter eye on him now.
And then to my surprise he stood up, reached into his pocket and retrieved his handkerchief. I thought him standing up was a bit odd, yet I admired him for having the courage to do it in front of all these people.
Satisfied that he was now under control I turned back to my left to the guy with the hiccoughs. To my equal surprise he was on his feet as well. I’d heard that standing on your head and trying to drink a glass of water would cure the hiccoughs, but never just standing up on your feet in Church. This guy had got it all wrong.
But actually he hadn’t. When I looked round the Church everybody was on their feet. And when I looked up at the pulpit and made eye contact with the Minister he stared down at me expectantly.
I had been so caught up on the events at either side of me and at the same time trying to hold in my laughter that I had completely tuned out of the Church Service. Now we were going to sing another Hymn – if I would just get on to my feet that is. I was holding up the whole Service!!
I did. Immediately. The organist started to play and everybody began to sing the Hymn. I took out my handkerchief this time, not because I was in the same predicament as the other bloke, but just to mask more laughter.
When it was all over we walked out to the graveyard, much to my relief. After the interment I met a friend. Apparently he had been watching the happenings in the Church.
“Man, I didn’t know you were so fond of the deceased,” he said. “You looked terribly upset in Church.”
“Oh yes, we go back a long way,” I said. ‘You know how it is.”
I got away with that one, I think.
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fasab 