Emptying Out the Dustbin of My Mind

Howdy folks, sorry I went away for a little while, but I’ve got an excuse. Does anybody remember when President Clinton announced the internet as the “Information Superhighway?” That was back in 1990-something-or-other, not very long after his vice president invented it. Well, crazy as it sounds, it really is a superhighway, and while driving on it a few weeks back I missed my exit because I was paying more attention to the audiobook I was listening to than to where I was going. Has that ever happened to you? So anyway, I finally realize my mistake about 100 miles too late and take the next available exit, only it dumps me off in this really weird town populated by bloggers with names that kind of sound familiar but not quite right, like trinkamick, condom-squeegee, njpinta, Skott, and other blogger names you ought to know. So I stop off at this diner to grab a bite to eat and ask the locals how to get back on the internet-interstate when this one guy sitting on a stool near me yells out, “Schpreck!” and then everyone else joins in on a chorus of “Schpreck!” like they used to do with Norm on that old sitcom, Cheers. So I tell them, “I’m not Schpreck, I’m Schprock,” and they’re all, “aw, come on, Schpreck, you tried that last week,” and I’m all, “no, really, my name is Schprock, not Schpreck,” and then I start to wonder if this is some kind of weird, bizarro-world, parallel-universe thing, and then they, um . . . they . . . they . . . you aren’t buying any of this, are you?

Hmmmm.

Okay, moving right along…

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Why don’t we call countries by the names their inhabitants use? Seriously. How did we ever come up with “Germany,” when everyone in Germany calls their country “Deutschland”? The two aren’t even close.

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Speaking of things German, ever notice you never meet anyone named “Hitler”? Did everybody named Hitler change their name to avoid association with the guy? Good thing he wasn’t Adolph Schmidt.

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Lou Gehrig is another German name — which, I might add, is not terribly common. So consider the freakish coincidence of someone famous named Lou Gehrig actually contracting Lou Gehrig’s Disease. What were the odds? That’s nearly as weird as all those legionnaires coming down with Legionnaire’s Disease.

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Guys, do you get a lot of “male enhancement” and viagra spam email? Pretty frustrating, right? Now imagine they’ve all been forwarded to you from your wife. Not that that’s the case with me, of course…

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I think physicists everywhere are thankful it was only an apple that fell on Sir Isaac Newton’s head, and not a 50 pound cinderblock.

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If whoever said “Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it” is right, then I’ll take ginkgo biloba till my last dying breath just to remember the Disco Era and the brutal devastation it wrought upon this country.

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If I were to choose a religion, I think I’d pick Greek or Roman mythology. Those were some interesting gods, weren’t they? Jealousy, intrigue, politics, power plays, sex, scandal, betrayal . . . Mount Olympus was like a Spanish novela. No offense to Buddha or Mohammed or Jesus or anybody, but a bible that reads like a supermarket tabloid sure beats the hell out of what Pastor Malmberg used to put me to sleep with every Sunday morning.

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Wouldn’t you like to see Jimmy Carter work a little Camp David magic on Rosie O’Donnell and Donald Trump? What is it with those two? Maybe he can convince Rosie to lighten up a bit, and talk The Donald into releasing that poor chinchilla from his head.

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Do Christian athletes really think God cares who wins a big play-off game?

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Lately, Daughter Number 2 and I have been doing this little routine around the house where one of us will greet the other by saying, “What up, my nigga?” or “What’s happenin’, negro?” or “Are you gonna be my negro, or are you gonna be my nigga?” (all gotten from movies). Now, DN2 and I are white, and we know we can only say stuff like that (which is meant strictly in fun) around the house. Trying that on a city bus probably wouldn’t go over too well, because, technically, words like “nigga” and “negro” can only be said by black people without being offensive. So here’s the question: what “racial slurs” can’t black people say to white people? Because everything sounds funny and, therefore, inoffensive. Whitey? Vanilla-face? Honky? Cracker? For some reason, I think a good name for white people ought to be “starbucks.” White people should address each other by saying, “Hey, starbucks, that’s so Disney,” or “Yo, starbucks, slip me some Velveeta,” or “Check out starbucks over there — the brother cleared the curb in one jump.”

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Speaking of sensitivity to ethnic differences, some of my best friends are Sino-Tibetan Tibeto-Burman ethno linguistic albino yak-trading mountain people, and I’ll thank you to watch your comments about them.

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A brainteaser a 10-year-old I know figured out in under 15 minutes:

“On a wall are 3 standard on/off switches. One (and only one) controls a light bulb inside a light-tight, well-insulated closet. The other two switches do nothing. You can only open the closet door once, and cannot touch/change any switches after the door is open (or re-closed, for that matter). Damaging or disassembling the door, walls, or switches is against the rules.

“Within these constraints, can you determine with certainty which switch controls the light bulb?”

Can you do it? Write your answer in the comment section and tell me how long it took you to figure it out.

For those who give up, here’s the answer.