Will Unwound

Happy New Years Eve,  Unwinders!

We’ve hit the daily double.  It’s also Fantasy Friday.

WhooooHoooooo!  The drinks are flowing here at the Tavern and the Unwinders are glowing.  It’s party time with champagne, funny hats, and noise-makers.  Since it’s Fantasy Friday, the dom Perignon vintage 1921 is on the house.  This is going to set the genie back mucho dinero.  For snacks, forget the bourbon balls.  Today we’re snacking on Beluga caviar on Ritz crackers.  Speaking of putting on the Ritz check out this very ritzy video…perfect for the eve of the new year.

The talk all over the tavern today is all about what everyone got for Christmas.  I did really, really well this year.  Here’s my loot list:

• No ithingys!!!!!!!
• Nothing needing to be plugged in and nothing needing batteries!!!!!!
• A cereal box with poems all over it. 
• A handmade book about a Grandpa who gives bikes to his grandkids for Christmas (could be a definite Caldecott winner.)
• A calendar filled with all kinds of fun trivia (eg. the date Will Unwound was launched).
• A gift card to Las Positas Golf Course that will cover a month and a half of M thru F golf.
• And the surprise gift of the year – A Smash Bag golf impact trainer.

Not only does the Smash Bag help you iron out your hooks and slices, it’s a great stress reliever.  In the short time I have had it, it has lowered my golf score by 3 strokes and lowered my blood pressure 3 points.  Yesterday I beat both Harold the Chiropractor and Roy the Insurance Guy by 7 strokes.  It was a real holiday beatdown!

Yes, the Smash Bag is essentially a punching bag for golfers wielding five irons.  In the week I’ve had it,  I have pretended that the target on the bag is the funny face of a not so funny and very grumpy blogger who loves to take cheap shots at other bloggers (especially this one) but who goes into an emotional melt-down whenever anyone reciprocates in kind.  After a week of this I realized this was not healthy.  Better to just tune this eternally ill tempered blogger out for well, eternity or longer if necessary. Poof…you’re gone for good Mr. Grump.

Today, your genie is offering you a New Year special.  In addition to your dom Perignon and Beluga caviar,  your genie  is giving you the opportunity to poof away up to 10 beings in your life who have become a mental annoyance.   No one wants these beings to be harmed in any way.  The trick is to get them effectively and completely exorcised from your cranial control tower.  Let them bother someone else.

The genie’s genie will poof away the following 10 beings from the genie’s mind:

1. Bloggers who dish it out but can’t take it.
2. The barking dog next door.
3. The 3 raccoons living in the crawl space under my “new” 100 year old dump.
4. The feral cat who lives in the garage of my dump.
5. The large, round, and hairy spiders who co-exist with the feral cat.
6. The underpants bomber and his distant cousin the shoe bomber.
7. Keith Olbermann except when he is reading Thurber.
8. Glen Beck whenever he mentions Nazis which is basically all the time.
9. The folks at NBC who canned Conan and the woman at NPR who canned Juan.
10. The human chameleon known as LindsayLohanBrittanySpearsParisHiltonJessicaSimpson

Okay, Unwinders.  If you’re not too spirited with the champagne, it’s your turn.  The genie needs 2 things from you on this festive Fantasy Friday:

• Your Christmas loot list.
•  Your Poof List: the 10 beings you would like to go poof out of your mind for 2011.

Cheers!!!!!

The good, the bad, and the ugly.  Not a bad western movie.  Also not a bad philosophy of life.  Life has elements of all three.

Here at the Unwinders Tavern we reserve Wednesday for rants about the bad and the ugly.  I personally think rants are good to get off your chest for a couple of reasons: 1) it’s not healthy to keep things inside to fester  and obsess, and 2) when you rant in mixed company, you are bound to get reactions, some supportive and some dissenting.  The supportive comments are good because they validate your rant.  What’s the expression?  Misery loves company.  It’s good to know you are not alone.  But the dissenting comments are also valuable because they present a perspective that you may never have considered and that you need to consider.

One comment, in particular, stuck with me from yesterday’s rant post.  Here it is:

I wanted to say that rants must be used judiciously or they can lead to negative thinking. And what’s the opposite of a rant–a rapture? What if we had rapture Thursdays to post about things that delight us–would that make us think more positively in general? Three things that delight me are: Children singing, a snowy day when I can stay indoors, and a good cup of coffee (preferably on a snowy day when I can stay indoors).

I love this comment with one little tweak: the word “rapture.”   Rapture is a pretty strong word that we generally reserve for life’s special moments of ecstasy like the time in 1962 when in the bottom half of the last inning I scored the winning run in the Little League World Series.   

I think the word “rave” is actually the more appropriate counterbalance  to “rant.”  Life has much to rave about.  So in the spirit of the comment given above,  can we all agree that when we have a “Rant Wednesday” that it must be followed by a “Rave Thursday?”  I think it will be good for everybody’s mental health to shout from the rooftops what we love about life.  Don’t you agree?

As lead lab rat, I will lift my glass of barrel brewed birch beer and start the raving.  Here goes:  in my church there is a large but beautiful nativity set.  Until this morning at Mass I never really looked at it.  I suppose I’ve been a bit inured to creche sets because so many of them are so pathetically plastic.  But today I noticed that the figures in this church nativity scene bordered on sculptural.  That’s how well crafted they are.

I took a closer look .  Joseph was standing and holding a lantern over the babe.  The Magi had looks of solemnity.  The shepherds were in a state of wonder.  Everyone’s face was beautifully expressive of the full range of emotions you would expect in the presence of the Word made incarnate.  The Mary figure was the most interesting.  You could barely see her face because she was kneeling and looking down at her son.

What a wonderful image of motherhood this is – a posture of sacrifice, admiration, and worship for the newborn.   Our mothers are the central figures in our lives, but often hidden from view.  When you really think about life is there any greater miracle than motherhood?

When I look at the good in my life I always, always, always start at the beginning.  I won life’s biggest lottery by getting the Mom I got.  I was blessed with the best.

Maybe rapture is the right word after all.

Unwinders, what things are on your rave list today?

What if “Rant Wednesday” rolled along and I had nothing to rant about?

That would make for a pretty bland blog.  Well, I guess the advantage to that is that it would give all of you something to rant about. 

In the absence of a worthy rant this week, I was going to discuss the therapeutic value of ranting in general.  Here’s what one Unwinder had to say about the subject of rants in a comment last week:

“Rants are a way of blowing off steam about the stresses and strains of living, and most of them relate to the stresses and strains of having to share space, frequently very crowded space, with other people who are similarly stressed and strained. We all need relief, and as long as it doesn’t turn hostile, it is probably therapeutic.”

Good.  That proves it.  An Unwinder said it so it must be true.  Rants are good for you.  It’s one of the main reasons why we enjoy Wednesday Happy Hour at our tavern. So rant away.  What are your rants this week, or are you like me – so mellowed out by the tidings of great joy in this Christmas season…that you have nothing to rant about?

Well, nix that sentiment.  I just went over to the tea pot to warm up my cup of green tea here at the Tavern, and I happened to read this comment from yesterday’s blog post about the young man I helped “author” the love poem which he parlayed into a successful marriage proposal:

“What I want to know is, Will, did you go to the wedding? The service you provided must have stuck in his head if he invited you to the wedding! What an opportunity for a truly unique toast!”

Okay, I am now officially in the ranting mood.  I avoid weddings and funerals at all costs.  Why?  Three little words: power point presentations.

Have you ever noticed that trends and fads always go away?  Well, I’ve been waiting many years for two wretched fads to fade away, but they hang on with the tenacity of gorilla glue: baggy pants that hang down to the ground and reveal way too much skin and underwear (yuck) and power point presentations (double yuck).  Of the two revolting fads, I actually favor the baggy pants!  That’s how annoying power points have become.

You can go to a wedding and a funeral and not see baggy pants but you will always see the dreaded power point.  You can go a library conference and not see baggy pants but you will see power point after power point after power point.  The first thing I am going to do when I am elected ALA President is ban power points from all ALA functions.

Everyone complains about the boring librarian image.  Well, folks, I hate to tell you this, but we deserve it.  Let’s be honest –  most library conference presentations are boring, boring, boring.  So how do you make them more boring?  You present them with a power point.  Oh, dear God, don’t get me started about the library all star who spent his entire presentation with his back to his audience while he read his power point!  Boring is not the word.  How about soporific?  How about mind numbing?  How about the rhetorical equivalent of a glass of Coke left out overnight on the kitchen sink?  This man should have been tried, convicted, and jailed for inflicting cruel and unusual punishment upon his audience.

It’s your turn, Unwinders.

• Are rants (every Wednesday) good for your mental health?
• Any good or even bad rants today?
• Any feelings about Power Points?

Yesterday’s post about a young newlywed man in the marital doghouse over an errant Christmas surprise made me think of another young newlywed with whom I had a peculiar reference encounter many years ago.

“It’s an emergency,” he said in a huff.  “I need a love poem immediately if not sooner!”

“Our library is filled with beautiful romantic poetry,” I replied.  “Personally, I don’t think you could beat the love sonnets of William Shakespeare.  I’ll get one for you.”

“Fine,” he replied, “but please do it quickly.  The clock is ticking for me.”  I figured he was working on a last minute English Lit assignment, and so with all the quickness I could muster I retrieved Sonnet 18 – “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”

“Here,” I said. “This is one of the greatest pieces of poetry in the English language.”

“Great,” he responded with relief, “let me see it.”  The young man’s face turned from relief to confusion when he read Shakespeare’s lovely iambic pentameter.  “I don’t understand it and the words are spelled funny.  It seems real old.”

Trying to be understanding, I retorted, “Yes, Shakespeare’s imagery is a bit symbolic and yes, the poem is almost 400 years old, but if you’d prefer something a bit more literal, let’s try some Elizabeth Barrett Browning.  I’m thinking in particular of a poem that she wrote for her husband: “How do I love thee?  Let me count the ways…”  Again, I fetched the poem and again he was not happy.

“Look,” he said, “this poem is beautiful and everything, but my girlfriend will never believe that I wrote it.  It also seems too old.”

Now it was my turn to show frustration: “Let me get this straight.  You want a beautiful love poem, you don’t want it to be too symbolic, you need it right away, it has to be recently written, and it has to be something that your girlfriend will believe came from your hand.  Is there anything else?”

“No,” he answered.

Since resourceful is the reference librarian’s middle name, I thought of the perfect solution – an anniversary card that was sitting on a colleague’s desk.  I grabbed it and did a little paraphrase:

We were made for each other…forever,

We will celebrate our lives together…forever.

We will cherish the miracle of our love …forever,

We will share our miracle with the world…forever.

“Yes, this is perfect!” he exclaimed.

Three months later I received a letter from the young man.  It was an invitation to his wedding.  If the girl said “yes” on the basis of a forged poem, how long would the marriage last, and would I be partly to blame for its early demise? 

Then again, it might last …forever.

Unwinders, I have always felt guilty about how I handled that reference question.  In your opinion did I handle the reference request ethically?  What would you have done?

Dear Unwinders,

Call me double crazy.

Not only did I venture forth into Best Buy at high noon on the Sunday before Christmas to buy the last cassette tape recorder in the Western Hemisphere, but I returned to the funnel of the Best Buy tornado today, the Sunday after Christmas, to return the tape recorder because it didn’t work. 

It took a full hour and I wasn’t exactly amused when the guy at the returns desk said, “Dude, this is an obsolete technology.  Why don’t you just get an MP3 player or an ipod?”   I hate electronics stores because the retail people always make me feel ancient.  You know…like 60 is the new 80.

But that’s not the heart of today’s little vignette.  No, today’s story is actually quite poignant.  There was a young man (28,  perhaps 30)  behind me lugging one of those huge, wide screen plasma television sets through the line.  “Wow,” I said to him.  “That looks like an absolutely gorgeous television set.” 

He grimaced at me and said, “Tell that to my wife!” 

“A problem?” I queried.

“This is the best, most expensive television on the market.  It’s even better than the one in our family room.  This one was supposed to be her surprise Christmas present.  While she was out shopping on Christmas Eve, I rigged it up in our bedroom to surprise her.  When she got back from the grocery store, she had an absolute melt down as soon as she spotted it. She started crying, retreated to the bathroom, sulked there for an hour, emerged, and told me that if this weren’t out of the house by Sunday noon, she would be gone for good.”

“How long have you been married?”

“6 months.  I thought I knew her.  I thought she would love this.”

“Do you have any idea why she doesn’t like it?”

“No, that’s the maddening thing.  Every time I ask her why she doesn’t like it she gets even madder and says that the fact that I don’t know why she doesn’t like it makes her angrier and more depressed.  Now I’m really on the hot seat.  After I get my money back I have to get her the absolutely perfect gift to redeem myself, but I have no idea what that would be.”

“Have you tried the dumb man theory on her?”

“What’s that?”

“That as a man you are genetically stupid and prone to make bonehead gift decisions.”

“Didn’t work.  She said if she knew I was this dumb and insensitive she would have never married me.”

“So…does she even like television?”

“Oh, yes.  We watch a lot of sports together.  I must have married the only woman in the world who loves ESPN.  She’s a keeper!  That’s why this is tearing me up emotionally.  There’s not another woman in the world like her.”

“Wow.  I see your dilemma.  Most women absolutely hate sports.”

“If you were me what you buy her – some bling, perfume, or some sexy lingerie?”

Fortunately, my number was called at that very instant and I didn’t have to answer him.  There is no way I would want to be responsible for the demise of his marriage by giving him bad advice.  After all, I too am a dumb man.

But I can’t get that poor guy out of my mind.  If pinned down, as a librarian I probably would have advised him to get her a book of love poems…maybe  something by Elizabeth Barrett Browning.  “How do I love thee…Let me count the ways” might be just the poem to get him out of the doghouse.

What do you think, Unwinders?  What would you have advised this young man?

Your blogmaster,

Will

The thing I love most about doing this blog everyday is reading the many comments that follow. 

Consistently they shake me up and challenge me to rethink all the “thinks” I thought were true.  I can’t remember who made this comment, but it really stuck in my brain.  It was made in response to one of my many Christmas rants.  The commenting Unwinder wrote something to the effect, that hey, Will, you really need to chill out because there’s a good chance Jesus gets a kick out of the excessive and outrageous ways in which we celebrate His birthday.

I simply can’t get that comment out of my cranial control tower.  Here’s what it’s saying to me: Will, dude, don’t be so sanctimonious about Christmas hoopla. Who are you to get self righteous about the sanctity of the nativity?  Who made you the guardian of holiday orthodoxy? 

The commenter may very well be right.  How do any of us know for sure what makes Jesus happy?  Yes, he has told us that the way to happiness is to follow His teachings.  And for those of us who are sinners he offers nothing but love, mercy, and the road to redemption.   Most telling, however, are the ones  for whom He  has the least tolerance – those nit picky, legalistic, and self righteous Pharisees who put the law above the spirit and who valued piety over joy.   

What I’ve discovered this year from you Unwinders is that, irrespective of one’s cosmic belief system, joy is essentially the reason for the season.  Joy for the Word made incarnate.  Joy for having families and friends.  Joy for grandchildren.  Joy for books.  Joy for libraries. Joy for librarians. Joy for the planet.  Joy for the universe.  Take your pick. Once you get joyous, it’s hard to stop the litany.

So maybe Jesus *is* enjoying all the hoopla…the lights, the wrapping paper,  the good and bad Santas, the blue light specials, the Hollywood movies, the plastic reindeer mounted on the rooftops, the tacky songs, the bottle of Aqua Velva in the stocking, and, God forbid, even the glitter.  I mean aren’t all of these things in their weird ways expressions of joy?  But the joy of what?  

The joy of being alive.

Happy 2,010th birthday, Jesus!

Note from Will: For Christmas we have a special post from our resident Musician/Librarian Elizabeth.  Enjoy.

Christmas is a celebration of tenderness of heart, of hope, of dreams—a celebration that takes place every minute of every day in this great big world, for lo, a blessed babe is born.  What a wondrous moment it is for the family full of hopes and dreams as they welcome the newest addition into their fold.  It is a story as simple as it is timeless.  It is the story of life.

When it comes to Christmas, I am an unabashed, old-fashioned traditionalist.  Visions of Norman Rockwell scenes, of Currier & Ives prints, and of snow-laden farms with bright red barns dance through my head.  Nativities are lovingly put on the mantle, an angel-topped tree sits covered with lights and decorations, there is great anticipation (and consumption!) of favorite treats to satisfy every taste bud, there is beautiful music, sacred and secular, and there are books to read and stories to tell. 

It’s a week before Christmas Eve as I write this, and I am reminded of a very fond memory of my daughter from when she was about three or four years old.  Shopping one December morning, she was lying on her back in the cart singing Christmas carols.  Completely in her own world, oblivious to her surroundings, and enjoying the scenery hanging from the ceiling, she became increasingly ‘merry and bright’ with her voice.  I was just about to ask her to tone it down a bit when I noticed that as we were passing by, people were pausing and looking into the basket—beaming smiles were breaking upon faces everywhere.  I didn’t say anything, continued pushing the cart, and watched as a little more joy entered the world that day.  It is ironic that with all the hustle and bustle of the season, the sweet, unexpected act of a child singing brought such delight to those nearby.

In closing, I’d like to share a newer tradition with you.  In recent years I’ve shared a recipe with family and friends.  Here is this year’s:

Recipe for A Joyful Noise

Usually saved for December, this recipe is suitable for all occasions throughout the year.

T  A handful of children

T  A dash of song

T  A pinch of laughter

Gently stir together until well-combined.  Serve immediately.

Yield:  Infinite Smiles

Happy Christmas to you & yours, and may this day be full of laughter & love and carry you into the New Year!

With much affection always, elizabeth

It’s Christmas Eve and the Unwinders Tavern is bouncing merrily to the beat of Bob Dylan.  Click on this link: It Must be Santa,  and you will get a good look at how the joint is jumping tonight.  Look closely and see if you can spot your favorite Unwinders.

On a more serious note I do have a question for all of you?  It’s the whole books for presents thingy.  I have a theory that the last thing you should give a librarian for Christmas is a book.  At best it’s risky business for several reasons: 1) there’s a good chance the librarian has read the book, 2) there’s an equally good chance that the librarian will be offended that you think she/he would enjoy the book you picked out, 3) there’s a good chance the librarian will hate you because he/she will feel obligated to waste time reading an undesirable book just to be conversant about it if you are tacky enough to bring the subject up in the future, and 4) who are you to pick out a book for someone whose business is books?  Would you give a carburetor to an auto mechanic, a garbage disposal to a plumber, or a brush set to a barber?

For all those reasons I would never give a librarian a book for Christmas.  I would, however, be the first to give a librarian a gift certificate to an on-line or in-person bookstore.  I would preferably make that gift certificate to an independent book store because they are in worse shape these days than libraries.

I have two questions for you: 1) Out of curiosity what three books would you most want for Christmas this year, and 2) which would you rather have as a Christmas gift: a new e-reader or a gift certificate for old fashioned books?

I’ll go first:  The three books I want for Christmas:  a) California Romantica: Spanish Colonial and Mission Style Houses, b) 1890-1920: Mission Revival House Style, and c) Xeriscape Handbook: A How to Guide to Natural Resource-Wise Gardening. 

Would I want an e-reader or a gift certificate for physical books?  That’s a no-brainer.  I love real books!

Of all the rants, that you guys raged about yesterday, the rant that really resonated with riveting reverberations of rancor with me was the rant of our resident humorist/philosopher Wynette.  Here is the part of the rant that remains with me today as I rite my post:

• “I am not a huge fan of the Christmas letter. I won’t dwell on it—because I know many librarians who do write the Christmas letter. And I DO realize it is a nice way to keep up. But one year when I had one damned thing after another unfold in my life—-I received a Christmas letter from an old college chum—–who was now married and living happily on one of the more posh islands off the coast of Georgia. I have to add here that the “letter” was festooned with photographs to illustrate every story. Career on high—-museum curator just as she had planned AND was appointed to a special committee to plan the renovation of the state Capitol Building (photo of her and committee WITH Hillary Clinton–this happened during her first lady years!), my friend and family had visited the Taj Mahal, her husband coached all the kids little league sports teams (of which there were about 77), and I don’t remember the rest—think was academic and musical achievements of the kids. Do you know that I sat and CRIED after reading that letter. I felt like I had just been sorting my sock drawer for a year and here she was on the fast track. Well and worse than that I was trying to raise 2 teenagers one of whom went badly off track for a spell. Anyway, my friend is a lovely lady and I really don’t begrudge her ANY of that, but that year I just couldn’t assimilate that much picture perfect news.”

Here is my Christmas letter (designed specifically to make Wynette feel better).

Merry Christmas everybody,

Where do I start?  Well let’s start with the medical operations.  The year started with my very first operation: a hemorrhoidectomy.  The only thing more painful than hemorrhoids is a hemorrhoidectomy and the only thing more painful than a hemorrhoidectomy is trying to spell it.  It was a half hour surgery.  My wife and two of my grandkids came to pick me up.  Little Connor asked, “Grandpa, what are you doing in that bed?”  Try explaining a hemorrhoidectomy to a 4 year old.  Then the pain started.  It lasted about nine months.  It got so bad that I actually joined a hemorrhoidectomy chat club.  We’re having a convention outside of Detroit in February.  I’m the guest speaker. My topic is “Don’t Trust Google: Diagnosing Your Hemorrhoid Issues in the Medical Reference Section of Your Public Library.”

Well, when the pain from the hemorrhoidectomy, subsided, I woke up one morning and  I could not, let’s see what’s the medical term, oh yeah, I could not void my bladder.  I ended up in the emergency room of a hospital 3,000 miles from home.  They put a catheter on me.  Think of a hundred root canal procedures concentrated into 20 seconds.  That’s what the insertion of the catheter felt like.  Anyway, I wore the catheter for a month and then I ended up in the hospital for another ectomy – a radical prostatectomy.  This time I got to lounge in the hospital for 3 days with a roommate with a spinal fusion.  One of his spinal staples ended up in his ass and his pain index went from 8 to 10.  We didn’t let the grandkids in this time.  It was just too gross.  Anyway, I’m feeling better now and am back on the golf course.

My golf game is as dysfunctional as ever.  A 78 one day and a 98 the next day.  Yesterday I took a 13 on a par 3 where you hit over the water.  I lost 6 golf balls in the drink.  Oh well, there goes Connor’s Christmas present.

Library-wise, I tried to revive my career.  I applied to get on the Livermore Public Library Board of Trustees and thought I had a good interview, but I didn’t get selected.  It’s the first time I ever interviewed for a position and did not get it.  That says something about life.  Just keep living and there will always be new opportunities to experience new and innovative moments of humiliation.

Finally, to top off the year, I recently on a whim bought two adjoining properties in the historic district of Livermore.  There are 3 ramshackle buildings with a family of raccoons living in them on this lot.  Remember the television program Sanford and Sons?  Well these buildings make his house look like the Trump Towers.  Everyone I know in Livermore says the same thing to me…”You put your life savings into THAT!?”

But life isn’t all bad.  Yesterday I saw a middle-aged man fall off a stepladder perched on his roof.  He was repairing a string of Christmas lights at the urging of his family below.  That could have been me, but because of my radical prostatectomy, the doctor advised me to stay off the ladder this year.  So you see…every cloud has a silver lining.

Yours truly,

Will

PS…it would be fun if all of you could tell us your worst moments of 2010 just to make Wynette feel better.

I did really well for three days.  No Christmas complaints. Zero. Nada. Zilch.

Then the mail arrived.  Well we’ll get to that later.  For the time being let’s just say the mail got me ranting again about the Christmas season.  By the way, Merry Christmas everyone.  My gifts to you today are three rants.  Oh, and I’ve switched from birch beer to Absolute.  Hope this rant post isn’t too disjointed!!!  I know, I know… multiple exclamation points was someone’s rant last week.  Too bad.  It’s how I’m feeling.

Rant #1 is me.  I’m the culprit.  I’m in Best Buy at high noon on Sunday.  I know I should be committed.  That’s like being in Death Valley in July.  The Baffin Islands in January. Ground Zero.  The middle of the bullseye.  The eye of the hurricane. The absolute epicenter.   Best Buy is not a store I frequent.  But someone I love needed a cassette recorder and they just are not all that easy to find.  Actually Best Buy had one (probably the last one to be found in the Western Hemisphere) and I grabbed it.  Someone else tried to grab it after I did but apparently she thought is was an MP3 player.  When she realized it was a cassette player she frowned at me like I was a dinosaur and said, “Please, it’s yours, all yours.”  The store was absolutely packed.  I did an end run around the ithingys  where a scrum of shoppers were in various stages of combat and headed right for cash register 3 which was lit up and empty.  Then almost in unison three shoppers verbally assaulted me with the same words: HEY ASSHOLE GET IN LINE.  Good grief was I embarrassed.  No mortified would be more like it.  Actually I was completely and thoroughly humiliated.  The line basically constituted two concentric circles around the inside of the store.  I had to endure angry stares for oh, forty-five minutes.  So rant number one is reserved for those morons who try to jump the line!  What idiots!

Rant #2 is about people who persist on perching stepladders on top of sloped roofs.  Here in Northern California it has been very wet and chilly.  In fact if you wake up early enough you can see frost on the rooftops.  Today I’m driving through my son’s neighborhood and a middle aged man is up on an 8 foot step ladder.  The ladder is on top of his porch roof.  It’s tilted high against his two story house and he’s repairing a string of Christmas lights.  His family is on the ground looking up at him giving him guidance (“Hey, Dad, the third bulb from the left is still out”).  I slow down to watch the inevitable.  Sure enough the ladder slips, and the middle aged man goes rolling, rolling, rolling down the rooftop, tries to cling on to the rain gutter but it breaks, and he lands somewhere in the middle of his family of supervisors.  PEOPLE PLEASE DO NOT PLOP STEPLADDERS UP ON TOP OF PORCH ROOFS…THE EMERGENCY ROOM SHOULD CATER TO PHYSICAL INJURIES NOT STUPIDITY.

Actually, rant #3 is more of a rage.  I go out and get the mail today and there are three Christmas cards.  Fine and dandy.  I’m still in the Christmas spirit.  I open them and each one is laced with glitter.  Two of them are signed with glitter pens.  PEOPLE…GLITTER DOES NOT STICK TO CARDS.  IT GETS INTO THE PORES OF YOUR SKIN, YOUR HAIR, YOUR EYES, YOUR MOUTH, YOUR RUG, YOUR KITCHEN TABLE, YOUR FOOD, AND YOUR PETS.  GLITTER IS AN ORGANIC SUBSTANCE THAT MULTIPLIES.  GLITTER PRODUCES MORE GLITTER.  FROM THESE THREE CARDS I WILL BE CLEANING UP GLITTER FOR A MONTH.  IT IS WORSE THAN THE NEEDLES FROM YOUR CHRISTMAS TREE.  PEOPLE WHO USE GLITTER OR SEND GLITTERY CHRISTMAS CARDS SHOULD BE PROSECUTED FOR VIOLATING THE ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION LAWS.  INHALING GLITTER IS WORSE THAN SMOKING.

There I feel better.  Now it’s your turn.  Got any rants?