DO I NEED TO THINK OF EVERYTHING?

The other day I was in a pet supply store and saw something interesting. They SELL mice there. This in spite of the fact that I set traps and other gadgets in a valiant attempt to rid in our garage of mice. We do have a small dog and, even though we had intended to adopt a cat, the dog’s utterly useless as a mouser.

But I did see something that gave me an idea and might possibly make me rich and famous. They have exercise wheels for these mice to entertain them and, well, exercise them. I’m a little unsure of just why a small mouse needs to be entertained or exercised but then I’m not a mouse person.

I noticed the mouse runs uphill causing the wheel to turn. Of course the mouse needs to keep moving, hence the exercise part. I wondered why no one had ever thought of a similar thing for small dogs. I need to take our dog for a walk regularly and having an automated device to do this would be great.

Then I noticed our clothes drier. It has a drum that rotates and the dog could just be popped in there and run to his little heart’s content. There are even heat settings so we could set it for low heat and get him to jump in there after his bath thereby killing two birds with one stone, so to speak.

The one drawback is that it’s dark in there. At least I assume it is. Now that I think of it, I don’t know. I don’t think anyone really knows for sure. Anyway, if it is dark it shouldn’t be too difficult to rig up a small miner’s lamp for him to wear on his head.

I realize this sounds too good and too obvious to be workable but remember Newton saw an apple fall to the ground and thereby figured out why we don’t all fly off the earth. How simple a thing is that?

The Old Professor
Carmel, CA
May 31, 2006

THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE

I noticed a huge copy of an unabridged English dictionary the other day. It was more than 4 inches thick of very thin paper with tiny print. I understand there are more than 500,000 words in the English language and more are added each day.

This made me wonder how this happened. It must have started with just one word and grew from there. Early Man probably started with the word, “Food”. It was then expanded when he said, “Get food”. That probably was it for many years until “Yourself” was added.

So most early English conversations were, “Get food” and “Get food yourself”. No doubt it was many years later that, “I’m not your maid” was created and we were well on our way to hitting the 500,000 mark.

It could have happened that way.

The Old Professor
Carmel, CA
May 28, 2006

OUR DOG UNDERSTANDS

As I reported here a few months ago, we adopted a small dog from the animal shelter.  He is a male Shiz-Tzu and we call him Jake.  One of the interesting things about Jake is that he understands English.  His one drawback is that he scratches himself constantly – I mean every part of his body and he does it all day.  His veterinary doctor gave up on fixing the scratching problem and kicked him up to an Animal Dermatologist.  

Now don’t laugh. This guy might be able to fix him. We even spoke with the Animal Dermatologist in the parking lot as he stood next to his Rolls Royce and he sounded confident though he said it might take some time. We feel he can’t do any worse than the Acupuncturist we had already taken Jake to.

I was explaining this in detail to Jake, more or less asking for his cooperation.  He looked as though he understood me but even I know that dogs lack our verbal skills to communicate. I told Jake I was aware that he was unable to respond but asked him to signal me if he understood.  I actually said, “If you understand this scratch yourself.”  He did!  I told him something else and he understood that too. I even read the front page of the newspaper to him and he understood all that, even though I didn’t understand most of it myself.

He is quite a dog and being able to communicate like that may well have saved Jake a trip back to the animal shelter.

The Old Professor
Carmel, CA
May 26, 2006

DO YOU CARE?

Just when I thought the government had peaked in idiotic actions I see the FBI is now digging up a horse farm in Michigan looking for the remains of Jimmy Hoffa. For those of you too young to remember, Jimmy Hoffa was a union leader who had just finished serving a 4-year prison term in 1975. He wanted to reassume the head of the Teamsters Union but one day he disappeared. Since then (31 years ago) there has been no evidence as to what ever happened to Jimmy Hoffa.

However, the FBI, ever alert, has a new clue and they suspect he might be buried on this horse farm. So they are digging it up and even taking the big barn down so they can dig under the cement slab, which is the barn’s foundation. I haven’t read any estimates of the cost of doing this but understand the FBI has agreed to rebuild the barn.

For what? I can’t imagine what value Jimmy Hoffa’s bones would have unless someone bought them on Ebay as a souvenir.

Of course, there is one benefit to the government. The search of Hoffa’s bones is getting more press coverage that the Iraq war. Maybe that’s the plan. (See the Old Professor’s blog 2 days ago -- May 23, 2006.) If that’s it, well done Karl.

The Old Professor
Carmel, CA
May 25, 2006

WHAT A COUNTRY

You no doubt are aware that many people in America are expressing their political opinions by making signs proclaiming their cause and standing beside the road. Some, as this little girl, ask you to honk you car horn if you agree. I never quite understood the logic behind this but no doubt this little girl has strong feelings about English being the official language of the country. And apparently the taller woman proclaims her God-given right to abuse the language in any manner she chooses.



What a country!

The Old Professor
Carmel, CA
May 24, 2006

THE OLD PROFESSOR RETURNS

It’s been over a month since I’ve blogged. There are two perfectly logical reasons for this. The past month has seen my spouse go through quite an experience involving having a Pacemaker implanted and finding many adjustments needed to be made. However, she is “over the hump” now and doing much better.
The second reason is that, for some mysterious reason, I ran out of things to say. I wondered if it’s possible to “use up” all of one’s opinions and viewpoints. I worried about that but now that Reason 1 is calming down I find I am beginning to see ridiculous things have not disappeared.
Here’s an example:
A short time back someone asked my why I thought there was this big thing about illegal aliens inasmuch as this has been going on for years. I offered an idea. I said to not overlook the possibility that the White House orchestrated this in order to distract attention from the Iraq war and the presidents sagging popularity. I felt Karl Rove could handle a thing like that easily.
I was only half-kidding but really had my eyes opened last week.
We have a pretty good local newspaper and even though it’s not on a par with a big city paper such as the Washington Post or the New York Times, it still does a pretty good job of covering news. Last week, Thursday to be specific, I read Section 1, which is 12 pages of National and International news.
There was not one word about the war in Iraq.
There were articles about illegal aliens, building fences at the border, making English the official language but nothing about Iraq. Not even the political cartoon or the Letters to the Editor.
Not one word.
Of course there was nothing in Section 2, which is the Local news, nor the Sports Section and, of course the Home and Garden section didn’t mention it either.
Mission accomplished.

The Old Professor
Carmel, CA
May 23, 2006