Blog #320                                April 27, 2023

 

You have all heard tales of the new wonders of A.I. (Artificial Intelligence).  A.I. can imitate anyone’s voice perfectly and can make all-but-real videos showing anyone at all saying anything at all.  It can, for instance, concoct a video of you confessing to hiding Jimmy Hoffa’s body in the trunk of Joe Biden’s Corvette and the video will be indistinguishable from reality.  If Artificial Intelligence can imitate your voice and your appearance, then it can build a robot that looks and sounds exactly like you.  Pretty soon that robot will learn how to think like you and laugh like you and gossip like you and write limericks like you and make love like you.  And then the robot will be you and there won’t be any need for you whatsoever and you can kiss your ass goodbye.  So enjoy yourself now, because the future will have no use for you.

 

Message from Shakespeare:  Lord, what fools these mortals be! (A Midsummer Night’s Dream).  Robots and A.I. will never replace cats.  Anybody who tried to make a machine that could purr and snuggle better than me would be guilty of A.S. – Artificial Stupidity.  Purr.

 

Hi there and welcome back.  I hope you are feeling well and getting ready for May Day.  May Day, historically a European holiday celebrating the beginning of summer, has now become International Workers’ Day which commemorates the struggles and gains made by workers and the labor movement.  Every May Day, the Communists march and the labor unions march and people celebrating Springtime march and women march and high-school students march and teachers march and there are so many marches that it should have been called March Day and held in March.  But it’s not.

 

I’ll tell you who else is marching.  Apparently, people from California and New York are marching out of those states to other states where it is cheaper to live.  They’re not actually marching; they’re driving and most of them are using a new brand of car called a Drove.  At least that’s what the news article said: People are leaving California and New York in Droves.  Must be some kind of new electric car.

 

Last Saturday, my grandson Austin was Bar Mitzvah’d.  Of course they don’t call it Bar or Bat Mitzvah anymore.  They call it B-Mitzvah.  Bar means son in Hebrew, bat means daughter, but the temple has decided to be gender-nonspecific and chosen to use only B, which stands for bullshit.  Anyway, he was great and it was a lovely weekend.  When Austin was little and wanted a story, he would sit on my lap and say, “Poppy, say a onceuponatime.”  So today I have a onceuponatime for you.  A guest at the Bar Mitzvah reminded me of something that happened when I was a Junior at Washington University – 1966 it was.  One of the local radio stations, KSHE, had a Valentine’s Day contest to pick the best original Valentine’s Day card.  The station would pay to have the winner’s girlfriend flown in for a weekend.  A small group of my fraternity brothers decided we should pool our various talents and submit an entry, just for fun.  We had a guy who was good at art and another who was good at poetry and so on, but none of us had an out-of-town girlfriend.  One brother remembered he had met a girl in Florida on Spring Break the year before and remembered her name, so we submitted the card on behalf of him.  We won!  Amazing!  Jay, the guy, somehow got in touch with Bonnie, the girl, and she agreed to accept the free airplane ticket and fly to St. Louis to be with a guy she barely knew.  I can’t image how her mother allowed her to do it, but we were innocent back then.  The era of Sex, Drugs and Rock ‘n Roll hadn’t fully matured by then.  Hell, we were barely out of the Holding Hands, Milk Shakes and Patti Page era.

 

Bonnie flew into town and stayed at the house of my girlfriend, the reigning Sweetheart of Sigma Alpha Mu and the future Mrs. M. Fox, our ubiquitous Carol.  And we all had a very nice weekend.  End of story?  No.  Jay and Bonnie have been married for over 50 years and live in upstate New York.  True story.

 

I had a physical last week, just a normal yearly visit and a blood test.  Among the results was an increased level of something or other that encouraged Dr. Doctor to recommend a nuclear scan.  Ok, so I went.  A nice young man began by injecting me with a radioactive substance.  That’s what “nuclear” means.  I asked if it was iodine, and he said no, it was technetium.  I knew, of course, that technetium was element #43 on the Periodic Table with an isotope of atomic weight 99 which is radioactive.  I learned all that from Mr. Hale in high school chemistry class.  Hey, I’m not ashamed of being a nerd. After the injection, we waited a few minutes for the nuclear cocktail to find its way and then we began.  He asked me if I was claustrophobic.  I said no.  I was wrong.  I lay on my back on a table and he put straps over me so I could not move my arms.  I asked what happens if I get an itch.  He said scratch it now.  Uh-oh!  Then they inserted me into a tube like – well, create your own inappropriate metaphor.  The results were negative, so the doctor ordered more tests and scans and bloodwork, all of which showed absolutely nothing wrong with me.  But he appears to be on a quixotic quest and determined to find something – anything – wrong with me.  He’ll only stop when I’ve either died or run out of money.

 

We’ve x-rayed his heart and his head

Let’s try a few bone tests instead

We’re doing our best

To employ every test

Until he is broke or he’s dead.

 

The Weekly Word is quixotic, which describes an endeavor that is idealistic, unrealistic and impractical – the impossible dream of Don Quixote.

 

I’d better go now; I’m going to buy a Drove, but be sure to come back next week.  If you do, I’ll say a onceuponatime, and make you giggle.  Stay well and count your blessings.

 

Michael                                    Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com

 

 

 

Blog #319                                         April 20, 2023

 

Cue the marching bands, alert the international news media, launch the fireworks.  A new bagel store has opened in St. Louis County!   It opened last Saturday, and my wife let it be known that she wanted some of those bagels as soon as physically possible.  So I was there at 8:00.  And there was the owner, standing outside, apologizing to everyone that the bagel machine had broken down.  Somehow, that reminded me of the joke about the guy who comes home and tells his wife he was fired from the pickle factory for sticking his penis in the pickle-slicer.  Are you hurt, asked the wife?  No.  What happened to the pickle slicer, she asked?  They fired her too.

 

Sorry!  Anyway, the owner was giving everyone a free bagel from the few he still had.  I brought it home and Carol liked it.  Try again, she exhorted, so Sunday I was there at 8:00 once more.  The line out the door was 40 people long on a cold and windy morning.  I went to McDonald’s instead, got my soda, did the wordle – DWELT.  Then I drove back to the store.  There were only six people waiting outside, so I got out and joined the line.  In about ten minutes, I made it to the door and walked inside where I was amazed to see a line of 75 people snaking back and forth from wall to wall waiting for a stupid bagel.  It’s a bagel, People, not a Taylor Swift ticket!  I used my extensive mathematical training and quickly calculated that, with 75 people ahead of me, the ETB (estimated time of bagel) was way beyond my LAP (limited amount of patience) and I left.  It’s a bagel!

 

It’s a boy!  That’s what Charley, my 15-year-old granddaughter texted me last Friday.  Charley has received an electronic doll (automated infant simulator) that she has to take care of all weekend as part of her Domestic Science Class, which we, in the Dark Ages, used to call Home Economics.  If she ignores the little brat, it will report her to the teacher.  If she doesn’t feed it on time or change its diaper or swaddle the thing properly, it will rat on her faster than Michael Cohen. I’m not sure whether the purpose of this childcare exercise is to give the high-schoolers experience in childcare, or to discourage them from ever considering giving birth to a whining, screaming, peeing little monster in the first place.

 

It stayed up all night whimpering

And threw up when I tried to sing

All day it would cry

And it peed in my eye

Whoever would want such a thing?

 

I think the whole exercise will eliminate more children than the abortion pill.  Last Sunday was Easter, the day when all Christians celebrate the resurrection of a Jewish carpenter whose message was eternal peace and love and, in whose name, Christians have slaughtered every Jew they could find for twenty centuries.  Go figure.  Between Passover and Easter, I hope that all of you Christians and Jews had a wonderful holiday weekend.  And for those of you whose religions I have not yet insulted, there’s always next week.

 

Hi there and welcome back.  I hope you’re feeling fit as Jack LaLanne in his prime.  We went out to dinner last week, ten of us, to celebrate a birthday.  Do you realize how hard it is to find an acceptable table for ten?  It can’t be too close to the front door (too cold) or the kitchen door (too noisy).  And this guy can’t hear out of his left ear so he can’t sit to the right of that girl who talks softly.  And the table has to be round.  And no-one wants to face the wall, so all the girls have to move to one side and all the guys to the other.  And he cannot sit next to her because they sat next to each other last week.  I’m telling you, it’s no wonder the Jews spent forty years wandering in the desert.  The Gentiles would have made it out in a week, but the Hebrews were busy figuring out should I go to the right.  No, you go the right.  I’ll go the left and meet you under the cactus, but not before we eat lunch.  And I don’t want to sit too close to the manna.

 

Message from Shakespeare:  I drink to the general joy of the whole table (Macbeth).  I don’t know exactly when I was born and I don’t remember my Mama Cat, but Pops decided I should have the same birthday as the Shakespeare guy who uses my name.  So next Saturday will be my 4^th birthday.  I’ll bet Pops gets me a cookie or something.  He’s so predictable.  Purr.

 

You know by now that I am a sesquipedalianist, so you are expecting a Weekly Word.  Let’s just make it sesquipedalianist which means a person who uses big words.  I guess it’s the only word that just by saying it makes you one.

 

I read recently that the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris is set to re-open in December after the cataclysmic fire that occurred four years ago this week.  Notre Dame is one of the most meaningful places I have ever experienced.  Carol and I went to Paris several years ago and visited Notre Dame.  I was so affected by its majesty that I went back the next day alone, except for a few dozen penitents, worshippers and tourists.  There was some kind of old music softly playing somewhere, the kind of music you would expect in such a place of unbounded reverence.  I looked up into the vacant vastness of the cathedral expecting somehow to see the face of Quasimodo peeking from behind the ornate stonework.  I stayed for 45 minutes.  I am not a Catholic, but it was a moment full of history and Godliness for me.  I never saw the Hunchback, but I believe to this day that he saw me.  I hope they can restore Notre Dame to the center of awe and worship it has been for centuries.

 

And I hope you will return next week to this center of foolishness and fun.  At least it’s fun for me.  Stay well and count your blessings.  See you next week.

 

Michael                                    Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com

 

 

 

 

 

Blog #318                                April 13, 2023

 

I was very busy this week.  On three different days, I went to lunch with some friends.  I like my friends, but I also have this desire to be alone sometimes.  Three lunches with friends in one week – I might lose my Hermit License:

 

I hate being out in a crowd

They’re pushy and smelly and loud

So I got a permit

For being a hermit

And now I am lonely – and proud.   

 

Besides, the prices at restaurants are unbelievable.  The prices of everything now are outrageous.  Kite prices are soaring; firework prices are skyrocketing; prices for telescopes are astronomical; camouflage clothing is out of sight and shingles are through the roof.  But do not be alarmed.  The President tells us that inflation is under control.  After all, Core Inflation is only 5.54%, slightly less than last year.  Do you feel comforted?  You shouldn’t.  Core Inflation excludes energy and food.  What?  How can you evaluate inflation by excluding the two things we buy every day – gasoline and groceries?  How ridiculous is that!  Especially since gas prices are climbing and grocery prices are exploding.  It’s like buying a dress without looking at the size or the color.  How stupid do these con-artists think we are?  The truth is – I always tell you the truth – if you buy a tractor or some asphalt, maybe the sticker shock isn’t so awful, but the price of asphalt is nugatory.  What we buy every day are groceries and gasoline, and if you want to drive your car or eat, you are royally screwed.  Why can’t they just tell us the truth?  Tell us the damn truth and shove that Core Inflation concept up their asphalt!

 

Ok, I’m taking a deep breath and counting to a hundred.  There, that’s better.  Nugatory, by the way, means inconsequential and of little importance.  That’s our Weekly Word.  Your taxes, however, are important.  Have you done them yet?  They’re due April 15^th, you know.  Well, not really, because April 15^th is Saturday.  Then the 16^th is Sunday, so the due date will be pushed to Monday, April 17^th.  But wait, April 16^th is also Emancipation Day.  Emancipation Day celebrates the day when Lincoln freed 3,100 slaves living in the District of Columbia.  Remember Lincoln?  He’s on the penny.  All the Federal workers in DC will be off on Monday, so I guess your taxes are due Tuesday.  No, no, hold on – Tuesday is National Animal Crackers Day, and no-one who celebrated Emancipation Day is going to file their taxes on a day dedicated to Crackers.  Well, shoot!  Don’t file your taxes at all.  Nobody cares about your damn taxes anyway.  Certainly not your politicians.

 

And speaking of politicians, here’s one of my Rock ‘n Roll quizzes.  Name the songs that include these lyrics about politicians:

 

1.     It ain’t me.  It ain’t me.  I’m no Senator’s son.

2.     I called my Congressman and he said, quote – “I’d like to help you, Son, but you’re too young to vote.”

3.     In Birmingham they love the Governor.

4.     To voice their discontent unto the President about the burning question what has swept this continent.

5.     Sheriff John Brown always hated me

 

Hi there and welcome back.  Are you feeling well?  I hope so.  I, personally, am confused.  I just can’t seem to get all the gender-neutral words straight.   No more can I say Congressman – now it’s Member of Congress.  And Fireman is Fire Fighter and Mailman is Letter Carrier and Policeman is Police Officer.  And is the Boogeyman now a BoogeyPerson? 

 

It’s impossible nowadays to keep up with woke speech.  I have two lovable and adorable grandchildren in California.  Being from California makes them extra-sensitive to every social issue.  They like bedtime stories, but it’s hard to find one that passes the test.

 

Poppy’s going to tell you a story about Hansel and Gretel.

No, Poppy, that one’s all about income inequality. Hansel and Gretel’s parents were too poor to feed their children, whom they had wanted to abort but the laws were too repressive. 

Ok, how about Jack and the Beanstalk?  Once upon a time . . .

Stop, Poppy, that’s no good.  Those beans were genetically engineered and probably treated with Roundup.  And besides, the story is anti-giant. 

How about Little Black Sambo?

Racist!

Cinderella?

Sexist!

Snow White?

Dwarf discrimination and Snow-White Privilege.

How about The Big Orange-Haired Monster Who Finds a Woman Named Stormy on the Beach Holding a Magic Lamp.  He Rubs It and Out Pops Michael Cohen.

They liked that one and kept chanting, “Lock him up!”  Like I said, they’re from California.

 

Message from Shakespeare:  An honest tale speeds best being plainly told (Richard III).  Pops tells me stories once in a while like The Owl and the Pussycat or Goldilocks and the Three Legs.  Purr.

 

Last week, I listed four movies featuring very handsome men.  I promised that this week I would list four jaw-droppingly stunning women in their roles.  Here are the roles played and the actresses.  You need to come up with the movies.

 

·        Audrey Hepburn as Regina Lampert

·        Alicia Silverstone as Cher Horowitz

·        Lee Remick as Eula Varner

·        Michelle Monaghan as Angela Gennaro

 

Don’t forget the Hockey playoffs start Monday and will end three years from Tuesday.  Well, they just seem interminable to me.  After the playoffs, the NHL will award the Lady Byng Trophy to the “hockey player adjudged to have exhibited the best gentlemanly conduct”.  Have you ever watched a Hockey Game?  The guy who sells popcorn doesn’t even exhibit gentlemanly conduct.  The ticket-taker will cross-check you if you don’t move fast enough and each player has a Go-Fund-Me page to pay for new teeth.  Hockey is like watching 12 Kardashians fighting over one TV camera!  The only thing rougher than a hockey game is the Tennessee Legislature.

 

Here are the Rock ‘n Roll Answers:

 

1.     Fortunate Son - Credence Clearwater Revival (1969)

2.     Summertime Blues – Eddie Cochran (1958)

3.     Sweet Home Alabama-Lynyrd Skynyrd (1973)

4.     Does Your Chewing Gum Lose Its Flavor-Lonnie Donegan (1959)

5.     I Shot the Sheriff-Bob Marley (1973), Eric Clapton (1974)

 

And the movie answers:  Charade, Clueless, The Long Hot Summer, Gone Baby Gone.  Did I make you work too hard this week with all that thinking?  Sorry.  Come back next week anyway.  Stay well and count your blessings.

 

Michael                                    Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Blog #317                                April 6, 2023

 

Fear not, my Oysters.  Democracy is safe.  Your humble reporter and his noble wife have personally sacrificed an entire day to ensure that Truth, Justice and the American Way will triumph.  No thanks are necessary.  Our civic duty called.

 

It was Election Day, and Carol and I worked as Election Judges checking in the voters and issuing the ballots.  We arose at 3:30, arrived at the polling place at 5:00 and returned home around 8:00 at night.  Each voting area has its own issues – school boards, city councils, sales tax increases.  Did you notice that we never get to vote on sales tax decreases?  April elections are never highly attended, but Wonder Woman and her loyal, obedient serf processed 440 voters and survived a very tiring day.

 

There are some movies I like to watch just because the actor or actress is deliciously attractive.  I have chosen four men and four women that I particularly think are stunning in their roles.  I’ll give you the role, then the actor and you can guess the movie.  We’ll do the men this week and the women next week.

 

Here are the four fictional roles:  Lucas Jackson -- Achilles -- Sgt. Archibald Cutter -- Captain Vallo.  Do any of those ring a bell?  No?  Well, here are the handsome actors who played those roles:

 

·        Lucas Jackson was played by Paul Newman

·        Achilles was played by Brad Pitt

·        Sgt. Archibald Cutter was played by Cary Grant

·        Captain Vallo was played by Burt Lancaster

 

All you have to do is guess the movies.  I’ll give you the answers later.

 

Message from Shakespeare:  Hark! Apollo plays, and twenty caged nightingales do sing (Taming of the Shrew).  The only movies I get to watch are the bird movies on Pop’s computer.  There’s Citizen Crane, Raiders of the Lost Lark, A Starling is Born and Dove Story.  Purr.

 

I told you last week about how the police warned everybody about coming to a Cardinal baseball game.  Well, I asked a friend of mine how she liked the Home Opener.  Here’s what she said:

 

The baseball game could have been worse

I’ll describe it to you in this verse

Someone stole second base

But I came with my Mace

To make sure they don’t steal my purse.

 

In other sporting news, Carol and I enjoyed the NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament last weekend.  I have three daughters, and they all played high school sports, so I’m a big fan of women’s athletics.  What confuses me is the Women’s US Chess Championship.  This year it will be in Las Vegas.  Last year it was here in St. Louis.  Chess is a game of brains.  I understand that men are generally larger and stronger than women and gender-specific sporting competitions are appropriate.  But do women need a special event because they cannot compete with men in the brain department?  There’s no special Women’s Jeopardy or Women’s Bridge Championship.  So why a separate Women’s Chess Championship?  I guess I’ll just add that to my growing list of things I don’t understand, like why an audience would give Stevie Wonder a standing ovation.

 

Hi there and welcome back.  I hope you’re feeling well.  Do you use marijuana?  It appears that our country is lurching toward making marijuana legal everywhere.  Which means it won’t be long until all drugs will be legalized.  Soon, mothers will be feeding their toddlers a well-balanced breakfast consisting of Cocaine Puffs, and Pot-Tarts.  America’s favorite cereal will be Smack, Crack and Pot.  Lunch will be Corned Beef Hashish with a Diet Cocaine.  And for dessert – a Pineapple Upper-Side-Downer Cake.  A fellow poll-worker on Tuesday offered us a cannabis and chocolate-chip cookie in a bag.   I’m totally serious.  It was called Trips Ahoy!  I wish I had thought of that. 

 

About twice a month, Carol goes out to dinner with the “Goils”.  At least that’s what she tells me.  Who knows?  She could be giving Princess Lessons to Meghan.  Or letting Joe Biden sniff her hair.  Or teaching Gwyneth Paltrow how to ski.  Maybe she’s colluding with the Russians!  How would I know?  So that leaves me at home, lonely as Will Smith’s agent, useless as a mermaid’s podiatrist.  Except, sometimes it’s nice to be alone in the house, and when she is out, surreptitiously pursuing her nefarious activities, I order Chicken Egg Foo Yung.  No, that’s not a hit-man from the Taiwanese Mafia; that’s my dinner.  I pick it up, bring it home and enjoy a quiet dinner with no television or music.

 

When she comes home, she kisses me hello like she’s running for office.  Maybe she’s running for President.  If she were President, I guarantee no Congressman would have a closet.  If she were President, the morning briefing would be about whether there’s a chance of rain.  If she were President, she’d get driven everywhere and dropped off right at the front door by her Russian chauffer, Picup Andropov.   

 

I have a political proposal to strengthen our Immigration Policy.  I think we should deport all Members of Congress to Venezuela.  They can’t screw up that country any worse than it already is, and it will certainly make our lives better.

 

Weekly Word:  Surreptitiously means done in secret.  For instance, I write my blogs surreptitiously so that no-one can see how I do it.

 

Ok, here are my picks for the four most handsome actors in their most handsome roles;

 

·        Paul Newman in Cool Hand Luke

·        Brad Pitt in Troy

·        Cary Grant in Gunga Din

·        Burt Lancaster in The Crimson Pirate

 

And then there’s me.  I’m not exactly Brad Pitt.  More like ZaSu Pitts.  But at least I’m loyal and obedient, like a Shar Pei.  Come back next week -- I won’t bite.  And I’ll tell you who I think were the four most gorgeous movie actresses in their most beautiful roles.

 

For those of you who celebrate Passover, I hope you had a delicious Seder.  May all the plagues of the world pass you over.  Trump had a Seder at Jared Kushner’s house, but when they asked the four questions, he refused to answer and called his attorneys.  For those of you who celebrate Christ, may you have a lovely Easter holiday and may all of us have peace.  Don’t forget to stay well and count your blessings.  See you next week.

 

ZaSu                                                 Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com