Chesapeake
Meanderings (formerly The Fisherfolk Philosopher)
Vol. 1, No. 5 --
January 5, 2004
Random
Baitings: GETTING BACK TO THE PEN AS PUNCTURE TOOL
Nothing like a Nobel
prize to pinpoint turmoil
By Allan Roy Andrews
ANNAPOLIS, Md.
-- The new year brings these random lines to my consciousness:
The Nobel Prize for Literature went to a South African; the Nobel Peace
Prize went to an Iranian woman. One suspects national turmoil is
a criteria for judging Nobel winners. That’s dynamite!
Is there any possibility a heterosexual candidate who questions
ordination of gays will be ordained a priest any time soon in the
Episcopal Diocese of New Hampshire?
Polls show McDonald’s slipped in customer satisfaction, and one of the
critics’ biggest complaints concerns dirty rest rooms. What does
this tell us about employees’ hand-washing practices?
Since Arnold Schwarzenegger won election as governor of California,
many have proposed doing away with the constitutional requirement that
a presidential candidate be native born. The power of Hollywood
shows again. How come no one ever made this suggestion while
Henry Kissinger was Secretary of State?
Does anyone else find
it puzzling that the United States Postal Service sponsors a team in
the Tour de France?
It now appears that the educational reform known as “No Child Left
Behind” will result in programs that guarantee “Every Child Left
Behind.” Is this some kind of educational "Rapture" debate?
Isn’t it curious to hear talk-radio warnings about the risks of talking
on a cell-phone while driving? How come we’re encouraged to
listen to the radio while driving?
If the United States remains in “Code Orange” alert on St. Patrick’s
Day, will that constitute a violation of the First Amendment regarding
the establishment of religion?
I knew I had become an old man as I watched Dick Clark hosting the New
Year’s Eve celebration from Times Square because I kept wondering,
“Whatever happened to Guy Lombardo?”
(Note:
Lombardo died in 1977; his brother-in-law and lead singer,
Kenny Gardner, the voice I remember, died in 2002.)
An expert
explained during a radio interview that the brains of young people are
changing so that today’s youths are much better at “multi-tasking”;
that is, for one thing, why so many teenagers can do homework while
listening to music. I’ve noticed, however, that picking up dirty
laundry or dirty dishes and taking trash to the trash barrel are tasks
that leave my teenagers brain dead.
As a nation that prides itself on our concept of “freedom,” we should
find it downright shameful how often we’re lied to about receiving
something “free.”
If you don’t believe the pen is mightier than the sword, ask yourself
this question: “Who carries a sword these days?”
Of course, given the growth of cell phone technology and PDA’s, the day
may be coming when we’ll be asking, “Who carries a pen these days?”
As if it weren’t bad enough already, an even more distasteful
reputation for a unique food has been generated by the Internet use of
the word Spam.
Which reminds me, I’ve
been wondering if there is something in the digital world that goes by
the title of Scrapple?
One of my great disappointments of the New Year is that I can’t find a
definition in Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary for the word bling-bling, and
I’ll bet many, if not all, college students today could define the word
for us. A bank teller recently delighted in showing off for the
customer in line just before me her new diamond “bling-bling.”
(Note:
A columnist for Wayne State University’s newspaper last year reported
that “bling bling” had been added to the Oxford Dictionary.)
If Howard Dean of Vermont becomes president, will Vermont’s Ben &
Jerry’s name an ice cream after him?
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Allan Roy Andrews
is a former editor and prize-winning columnist for Pacific Stars and Stripes in Tokyo, Japan, and a
former reporter and copyeditor with The Boston Globe. He can be
contacted at allan.andrews@reporters.net