Odds and Ends #2

Dogs against Piracy

Gone are the days when a dog jumping to sniff your crotch was simply discovering your family identity and kinship. First, canines were trained to ferret out your grass stash, and then taught to discover contraband you might have in your luggage, and now, man’s best friend has graduated to exposing your DVD theft - be forewarned and learn not to carry discs in your undies. Only a matter of time before your seemingly docile pet gathers evidence on all your nasty habits and finks on you to the authorities or the thought police.

Idiots up Front

For years I wondered why traffic heading in either direction over the Port Mann Bridge in the Lower Mainland suffered from the stop-and-go syndrome in the absence of any accidents or stalls. Once you’ve hit the initial slowdown, movement alternates between 70 KPH spurts, crawling forward in idle and complete stops. Craning your head to see the road ahead rarely reveals anything other than a long, long vista of slow moving vehicles; not the sight of flashing lights, overturned cars or emergency equipment to explain your lack of progress. However, as soon as the halfway point of the bridge is reached the flow immediately thins out and returns to highway speed. My suspicion always centered on the drivers who either could not handle the curves on the initial section of the bridge or were afraid to pass the semis on the bridge deck. This study pretty well confirms drivers with a ‘brake fetish’ are at fault.

Where are My Readers?

One more gathering of the literati lending credence to the urban rumor of bastions of higher learning morphing into diploma mills to fill the coffers. And in the wink of an eye, half of North America will wave the newly minted, creative writing sheepskin in the air and commence to chasing down their assigned reader from the uneducated half who will unfortunately turn out to be ileterite. Must be all the bloggers!

What’s Behind a Door?

Once I got into playing the game a few times, I realized I’d forgotten to mark down my totals for each try. So the explanations fell on deaf ears. Rationally, I am aware of my irrationality on many occasions, but often attempting to bang square pegs into round holes excites my endorphins, creating pleasure rather than distress – sort of a situation of going with the flow and learning from the experience. It ended up as just another excuse to wreck havoc on my mouse finger and send it into spasms.

The Golden Touch

Occasionally I’ve heard of using gold plated faucets to impress your guests with your wealth or lack of good taste, but a throne of precious metal speaks to a Midas complex. Besides the obvious initial expense there are other considerations:
• Scouring away your investment with abrasive cleansers
• Removing bite marks from the rim
• Removing stains or does gold not stain?
• Preventing reactions with hydrogen sulphide gas
• Does Miss Manners suggest a seat cover before use?
• Are guards necessary? Maybe a job for Oddjob?
• Does a green ring on the butt mean you’ve been ripped off with pyrite?
• Can ‘poochie’ still use it as a water bowl?

Before this water closet gets sent to the foundry for meltdown, I’ll bet the buyers are lined up at the door – not to use the facility – cash in hand to purchase this one of a kind, must have toilet unit for the castle or mansion. Almost guaranteed this prized loo ends up on the auction block where it will undoubtedly fetch many times its weight in gold.

I wonder if Goldfinger had a hand in its design.