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Wordsmithing for Fun and Profit

Michael 2 Comments

I just started a new book. Reading, not writing. As with many written offerings, before I turned to the first page of the story I was presented by the author an epigraph. A short Lackadaisicalexcerpt from I presume one of his favorite authors. I always read them. They often provide a glimpse into the authors mind at the time he or she was working on that piece. But it wasn’t until this time, this epigraph, that I really stopped to think about what I was reading. Not the metaphorical, the inside  glimpse, etc., etc., etc. The actual. Why that the epigraph, those borrowed words, are indeed an epigraph.

Why “epigraph” and not “group of words?” Who decided this group would be an epigraph. And how did that person come to that conclusion. We have too many words in our language. Just reading this post you’ll read and at least unconsciously recognize five groups of words: title, sentence, paragraph, post, and epigraph. You could throw in phrase and incomplete sentence. And now that I think about it, question. It actually goes on and on. And on.

Where do they all come from? Not the words. Not in English at least. We know where they come from. They come from every other language on earth. The English language is said to have close to a million words in it. I’m not sure who counted that but the most complete, or as they would put it unabridged dictionary of the English language, the Oxford English Dictionary, has about 620,000 words. But language doesn’t equal vocabulary. And vocabulary doesn’t equal language. The average educated English speaking person knows around 20,000 words and uses but about 2,000 words in a week of talking and writing. )I know, sometimes it seems that I try to cram all 2,000 into a single post but that’s a different post for a different day.)

GraphSo that brings me back, do we need all those words? If they made sense I’d be happy to learn all 600,000 words. But so many of them don’t make any sense. Look at two of the ones that I mentioned: epigraph and paragraph. Both have “graph” and both are similar in that they are a group of words. But when I think of graph I think of a picture.

Let’s concede that “graph” actually means “to write” and see how we’ve modified it with the prefixes “epi” and “para.” Neither really gives a clue as to what we are writing. “Epi” comes from ancient Greek meaning on or upon like the epidermis of your skin. “Para” is also borrowed from the old Greeks and means side by side, like the lines of a parallelogram. So an “epigraph” is actually a “picture on top” and when we call a group of words that come after each other “paragraphs” we are actually calling them “pictures that are side by side.”

TheCatsPajamasAnd if that’s not enough, then we have to use words that we know don’t fit a particular situation because that’s the in way to speak and Heaven forbid we aren’t trendy. For example good can’t be good. Since the time when I was torturing my parents with popular vocabulary “good” has been groovy, cool, bad, righteous, divine, outstanding (emphasis on the out), epic, excellent, rad, sick, and ridiculous. But what did they expect? They’re the generation that came up with cat’s pajamas and bee’s knees. Unfreakin’ believable.

No wonder I’ve been so misunderstood all my life.

That’s what I think. Really. How ’bout you?

 

The Hi Guys

Michael 6 Comments

“’S’up.” “Hey” A nod up. Then another. One went east, one west. And the world kept turning. Thanks in part to the Hi Guys.

The Hi Guys are those guys (generically speaking of course – guys, gals, hims, hers, undecideds, too young to tell, too old to matter, too desperate to care – all of those) those guys are the guys that nod a “hello” to a perfect stranger one meets walking down the road, crossing a lobby, waiting for an elevator, or standing in front of or behind in a really long, really slow line – or on the line if that’s your geographic preference.

HiGuys

Drawing by me. Can’t you tell?

It’s just a nod, a recognition that says “Hey, you too are human and we are all part of a team and I recognize your contribution even if I don’t know you, don’t care if I ever know you, might never see you again, and will be just as happy if I do or if I don’t.” Sometimes that’s really hard to do. It’s easy to give that little finger wave over the steering wheel when you see a neighbor taking the dog for a walk along your own street on your way to work in the morning. But to acknowledge a total stranger, no, more than that, to show value to a total stranger is quite another.

Think of the number of times you run across somebody you don’t know versus the number you do of the number you do. (It might be awkward but if you parse that sentence you’ll see it works. Just like the Hi Guys!) An Oxford University study (Oxford, really) confirmed that the human brain can manage only 150 friendships. A simple “Hey, how ya doin’?” can expand your circle to unknown numbers. And make you smile at the same time.

Remember when you were a baby – probably not but you probably have seen babies. When a baby smiles at someone and makes that baby gurgle that only babies can make, everybody smiles back. Even me, and I’m usually fairly grouchy. So if a baby, who probably doesn’t understand that the world needs a little help to keep turning, can make a total stranger smile and feel good even for just a second or two, you can do it also.

So, keep the world turning. Become a Hi Guy*!

That’s what I think. Really. How ’bout you?

*I thought of this a couple of days ago when I was running into the store and stopped at the entrance to let a fellow carrying a double armload of grocery bags come out of the doorway before I went in. I didn’t expect a thank you for anything since I didn’t do anything. The door was automatic and wide enough for both of us.  As I passed him on my way through I did my usual nod and said something like hi or h’lo (the local equivalent of hello). He paused and sort of half-turned and said back to me, “Hey. Thanks.” And smiled. A real smile. I thought to myself, wow, somebody really does pay attention to that half-grunt I make now and then. That could be blog-worthy. Well, after I wrote this I thought I’d do a quick search for “Hi Guy.” I don’t know why, I just did. Maybe because I’m getting sort of up there in years and things sometime mean different things now than then. And sure enough I found something. My go to for stuff like this, the Urban Dictionary, defines “Hi Guy” pretty succinctly as a salutation to a man or woman. Clean enough for my purpose. Then I went one step further and plugged it into Google. There I found a link to “Lingomash” pronouncing that my Hi Guy in slang means “(1)Excl. When something outrages (sic) or unusual occurs. (2)Excl. When you don’t agree with one’s actions.“ Well that’s not right at all. Since I don’t have anything else to write about I’m going to ask that if you know “Hi Guy” as this completely antithetical twist to what I just wrote, could you please not tell anybody else. Thanks.

Oh, and one more thing. Some of you might remember “Hi, guy!” from the Right Guard commercials of the 1970s when two guys share a medicine cabinet and every morning they “bump into” each other in the bathroom. They were great. One guy would open the cabinet on his side of the wall and the other would be there and he bursts out with “Hi, guy!” It went on for years and the actor (Chuck McCann, an already well established actor) became known as the Right Guard Hi Guy. Except that in the very first commercial of the series he never said “Hi, guy.” If you should be wondering, here’s a link to it. Hi Guy.  (by Genius via YouTube)

I just realized my “post script” is longer than “letter.” I should stop now. In fact, I will. Really.

What’s In a Name?

Michael 2 Comments

I once read that the two most common ways a person will select an alias are turning his first name into a last name while picking a very common first name (thus John Doe becomes Bob Johns) or picking a famous person’s name then shrugging off the similarity (“Well, this is the first time we’ve had Johnny Carson stay with us,” is replied to with HMNI2“Yeah, I get that a lot.”). The problem with these is that they don’t work well for women. While Peter can become Peters and Jeffrey turns into Jeffries, what’s Melissa supposed to become or who would believe Mary Catherine unless she was wearing a habit. Why I was researching aliases is the topic for a different post.

Well, have no fear. I have the perfect manner for a person of the female persuasion to disappear into the ephemera as easily as her male counterpoint. You probably have seen this since it has been floating about the Internet in one form or another since at least 2011. Everyone has six names. Those are:

  1. Your real name
  2. Your soap opera name: Your middle name + the street you live on
  3. Your Star Trek name: First three letter of your last name + first two of your middle name+ last 2 of your first name
  4. Your superhero name: The color of your shirt + the item to your right (or left if you prefer)
  5. Goth name: “Black” + the name of one of your pets
  6. Rapper name: “Lil” + the last thing you ate

Thus George Bush (one of my favorite aliases (aliai?) becomes:

Herbert Bizzell (of course I meant Daddy Bush (really),
Bushege,
Gold Shredder,
Black Millie (we may have to work on that one), or
Lil Peanut Butter depending on the  particular alias requiring circumstance

So you see, this is not only a terrific party game but also an amazing alias break for all opportunities. Going to a night club and don’t want your significant other to find out. Have no fear Melissa Elizabeth Mainlady of 123 Elm Street, Elizabeth Elms will be your wing woman. Gong to Comic con and prefer your law office buddies don’t find out. Maielmel will cover the registration fee. Yes, the possibilities may not be endless but they should cover almost any possible alias requirement.

So now, speaking of researching aliases…oh yes, that’s a topic for another post.

That’s what I think. Really. How ’bout you?

 

Name That Gadget

Michael 4 Comments

Dear followers, readers, friends (and who’s to say you might not be all of the above) and other people who have just wandered onto this but also might someday become follower, reader and/or friend, I need your help. But first, a story.

A few months ago a number of TV cooking shows that I watch and cooking magazines that I read featured bad gadgets. Everybody seemed to want to do their version of the Top Ten Worst Kitchen Gadgets. I didn’t get it. Why waste all that time and space on things that don’t work. It seems to me that most people with enough brains to operate a toaster oven can tell the worthwhile helpers from the culinary dreadfuls.

That being said, I indeed also have bought an occasional pig sticker in a poke. Usually they end up used once, uncovered for their uselessness, and then relegated to the “save for the next garage sale” box.

By the same token there are those gadgets that were once useful but now take up space in the drawer and have been made less useful to me because of changes in the things or way I cook or because new and improved really was. Every once in a while I take a turn through those cabinets and these items find themselves in that aforementioned box though not due to any fault of their own.

However (dramatic pause more than you might typically ascribe to a comma please), there is one gadget that I use with some regularity and I wonder why. No, it was never on any Worst Gadget List and it has never been supplanted by a better version. At least I don’t think so. You see, I don’t know what it is. I know what I use it for but I don’t know what it’s used for. Exactly.

And now, question time. What the heck is it?

thing

It’s about the size of a dinner fork, made of hard plastic, has no markings on it, and bears a familial resemblance to a crochet hook. I use it to clean the inside edges of the beaters from a hand mixer. It’s also handy for cleaning out the underside of a squeeze bottle cap and flicking open the battery compartment of thermometers, timers, and scales. It’s also good for digging small seeds out of small fruits and vegetables, and probably animals if you had that kind of mind. (Yes, there once was a time when my life wasn’t even quite this thrilling.) I would ask somebody around here but I’ve had it forever and nobody who was here then is still now, or anybody who is here now wasn’t there then.

If you know what it is, please help.  Otherwise I’m going to have to put it out at the next garage sale and wait for someone to pick it up and say, “Oh look, a whachamacallit like those people at the rare kitchen gadget store had on display for 43 billion dollars. And it’s only a quarter. Let’s offer him 20 cents.”

That’s what I think. Really. How ’bout you?

 

Luck O’ the Irish

Michael Leave a comment

FIFTY-FIFTY! GET YOUR FIFTY-FIFTY HERE! FIFTY-FIFTY! THE MORE YOU PLAY, THE MORE YOU WIN!

Anybody who has been to a high school football game, band festival, or cheerleading competition knows that call. The fifty-fifty raffle has long been a stalwart fund raiser for these and other family-supported extracurricular activities. I remember some years ago being on the calling end for my daughter’s high school band and color guard counting up $300, $400, sometimes $500 dollars in the Saturday competitions pots. But you don’t expect them at the professional levels.

Last Friday I was at the hockey game and thought about buying a fifty-fifty ticket orpot-of-gold eighty. Yes, at the hockey game. A professional, NHL type hockey game. Our local team’s affiliated foundation uses fifty-fifty raffles at all of the home games to help fund their philanthropic activities. To date they have raised over $3 million for local charities. That means over $3 million dollars have been awarded to lucky ticket winners. I wasn’t one on Friday even with the special Luck o’ the Irish promotion of 80 tickets for a $20 donation versus the routine 40 tickets.

As I saw the total pot announcement during the third period ($57,000+) I wondered what the odds were of hitting that. There were over 18,000 people in attendance. If 10% bought tickets and the average purchase was 20 tickets that would be 1:36,000 odds of hitting the jackpot. Not bad when you consider similar odds in the Powerball (1:36,525 last Saturday) will net you only $100. Actually that will gross you $100. You’ll need to spend two bucks on the ticket. Sometimes even I spend those two dollars. With winning jackpots averaging about 100 million dollars, why not. Well, the odds for one reason.

The odds of winning the Powerball jackpot change with how much is played but you can figure they’ll be around 1 in 290,000,000 (that’s million). The Mega Millions is about 1 in 250,000,000. The odds of winning the Publisher Clearing House $1 million a year for life jackpot are one in 1.3 billion (with a B), but at least you don’t have to pay for one of those chances. Long odds but for big winnings. Still, not something you want to bet the mortgage on.

I have nothing against betting. I’ve already documented my big winnings (Confessions of a Lottery Winner, July 5, 2014) and even helped out at our state lottery drawing (Pressing My Luck, September 22, 2016). But even with the unfathomable amounts that are possible out there I think I’ll stick with the local band fifty-fifties. And if I ever should win one of them, I’ll probably donate my winners back to the kids.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

Have you ever hit it big in the lottery? Sweepstakes? Basket raffle?

Five Letter Words

Michael 10 Comments

I was working on a crossword puzzle yesterday, had just started actually, when I was presented with a gift by the puzzle maker. A five letter word for “What you post on Pinterest.” You post pictures, a computerism for picture is image, I-M-A-G-E is five letters, write that puppy down! (OK, so I get a little excited when I’m puzzling.) From there I moved on. And on, and on. After the first pass through on the acrosses I had a handful of obvious answers, another handful that I had no idea where we were going wih, and most that could have been one of two or three choices and would have to wait for at least the first down trip through the grid to be clearer. Fairly normal for me.

CrosswordOn the first round through the down clues I came across another present from the riddler until I started filling in those squares. That’s when I ran smack dab into my Pinterest picture holder so to speak and discovered that one of those gifts was more fit for a Trojan. I left that one and moved over a space and found a similar misread. Hmmm, perhaps my image wasn’t the perfect picture. (Stop it!) It wouldn’t be the first time I encountered a gimme that was anything but. After all, if crossword puzzles were easy nobody outside of the Pyrenees would know what an ibex is.

So I worked my way around a time or two again and came back to the five letter word for a Pinterest post. Staring at me from those black and white squares was this.  _ H _ _ O.  I decided I needed a break. Actually by then I needed a bourbon but a coffee refill was closer so I took that road. And the caffeine was clearly what I needed to clear my cloudy brain. It’s amazing what you can come up when you stop thinking, in this case stop thinking about the Pinterest part of the problem and bring the real riddle into focus. As in a picture. As in a photograph. As in P-H-O-T-O.

And then I beat myself silly for being less than stellar with that one. But then I stopped and thought about this some more. We already have conceded that crossword puzzles are a bit of a challenge but the challenge should be challenging like “what a snake does to its skin,” (6 letters) or at least like “to hasten oneself,” (3 letters). Not a word nobody has used since Fotomat went out of business.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

PS. Who uses photo anymore. Pic. Image. GIF. Visual even. But photo? Sheesh!

PPS. If you’re wondering, the answers are “slough” and “hie.”

Desperately Seeking Closure

Michael 1 Comment

Did you draw your mother’s ire when as a kid you left (or if you still are a kid, leave) the door open when you came in from outside? Or let the refrigerator hang open? Or had an array of dresser draws intrude into your room, socks spilling onto the floor? Well, I didn’t. Not back then. Oh, I wasn’t perfect either. I probably had a door stay open to the elements on an urgent run from outdoor playing when all the trees were taken. (What can I say? The rest of the neighborhood kids weren’t perfect either.) But now I’ve turned into a man with seemingly not enough strength to get a cupboard door closed all the way.

If you were to look into my kitchen after I cooked up a good healthy breakfast you would find the refrigerator closed but not quite completely, the silverware drawer open, the cabinet where the oatmeal resides with its lid half-cocked not shut quite all the way, and the dishwasher where the used plates and tableware have been carefully placed quite uncarefully left ajar. Certainly the cabinets where the plates and glasses are stored would be similarly left agape except that those items are stored in racks on the counter. There are even times when the under-sink cabinet chemicals remain unshielded when I take the time to wipe down the counter after enjoying my healthy if a bit harried morning meal.Door

This carelessness isn’t restricted to the kitchen. In the bathroom drawers and doors are more likely to be open than closed upon entering. (I am good about lowering the toilet seat. Years of living in predominantly female households will do that.) In the bedroom the dresser drawers are almost always opened just a crack. Somehow even the roll top on the desk that now qualifies as my longest lasting relationship never quite makes it all the way to the writing surface, even with gravity helping along my now apparently feeble shutting action. The front door manages to get closed but on a nice day with the patio in use that door stands as great a chance of being as open during the night as it was during the day since I’ll often go to bed and simply forget there is a door there. (Note to potential local burglars, there’s nothing behind that unlatched entrance worth taking except perhaps the aforementioned rolltop desk which is much too heavy for one person to handle. Especially if that one person has a strong desire to maintain a certain level of stealth. And baby making ability.)

This failure to get doors, drawers, and other front pieces into their fully secure positions can’t be age related, can it? Certainly it’s not because I forget to secure the offending openings, patio access notwithstanding. I’d not think it’s a strength issue since I seem to do well enough with car doors which are certainly heavier than veneered particle board cabinet doors. I’d say perhaps it’s a laziness thing but does it really take any more effort to push a drawer that last quarter inch than not? Could it be that I’ve developed this propensity to leaving things standing open sometime after adolescence and just had a sufficiently active adulthood that I didn’t notice I was leaving doors and drawers open until recently now that I have more time to hang around the not closed openings? That seems doubtful in that you would imagine at some time I would walk into a hanging drawer front or notice the milk had soured from a refrigerator left open for an entire week’s worth of work days. No, age doesn’t seem to be a factor here other than one of coincidence.

I think the culprits are the house fairies that I had been hoping would have shown up during those years of weeks’ worth of work days to do things like clean the counters and match the socks tossed haphazardly into the dresser. They finally got around to me on their list of houses to work on and when they got here found that everything they had been dispatched to do is now being dealt with. Since house fairies are notoriously reticent to leave a place once they have been assigned, they are obviously looking for something to do, cook, eat, write, or wash, and they leave the room within which they are so searching somewhat hastily upon my entrance. The doors and drawers are left open just a smidge because, let’s be blunt about it, fairies don’t take up that much space and can get in and out of places through just a crack. That clearly explains the cabinets and dressers and even the desk doors and drawers that seem to never make it completely closed.

There. I feel better about it already. All except for that patio door business. I think I might have to take the blame for that one.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

Walk This Way…or That

Michael 6 Comments

I haven’t done a “Today is…” post yet this year. Well, I did Presidents Day which really isn’t but you already know that, and I alluded to Groundhog Day a day or two before. But those are real days especially the latter which is as real of a day as you can get. What I haven’t done a “Today is National Purple Plastic Paperclip Day” type post. Well today is the day. Today is…oh! I can’t decide!

I’ve been having a problem with indecision lately. If you’ve been reading for more than just a couple weeks you can tell. Having gotten through the first 4-1/2 years with one blog design and the second style making it almost 6 whole months, I’ve gone through three schemes in four weeks looking for my voice. It’s out there somewhere. This could be it. But even that uncertainty is nothing like the dithering I’ve gone through to pick out today’s day.HMNI

Economists call it “Consumer Glut” when you are faced with multiple choices of essentially the same item. According to an article I read recently, there are 30 varieties of Tide liquid laundry detergent. That’s among 25 different brands of detergents. All of them right there on your mega-mart shelves. All just waiting to be taken home to wash your clothes. No wonder you actually come across people in the supermarkets standing in aisles staring. Just staring.

I had the same problem today. No, I wasn’t staring at 700 soap bottles trying to pick one. I have been trying to decide between two very auspicious observances to hail in today’s post. I suppose you could say my problem is actually more akin to Buridan’s Donkey rather than Consumer Glut. After discounting such notable notables as Panic Day, Name Tag Day, and Get Over It Day, I still had to choose from two.

World Kidney Day should be a natural for me. I am one of the one in ten worldwide affected with kidney disease. Not only am I one of the 748+ million people with kidney disease, I also get to be one of the lucky 2 million to have reached End Stage Renal Disease (ESRD) requiring dialysis or a kidney transplant. It’s estimated that in the U.S. alone over $48 billion is spent on chronic renal disease. While 100,000 patients are on the kidney transplant waiting list only 20,000 kidney donations are made annually. Unfortunately for me and 747,999,999 or so others, kidney disease doesn’t go away. It can get better or it can get worse but it always is. So it would be in my best interest to publicize World Kidney Day.

But just as the donkey stood on that field I was trapped; trapped between the benevolence of World Kidney Day and the deliciousness of National Meatball Day. How can you not savor an entire day devoted to those scrumptious orbs of palatability? Whether beef or pork or chicken or lamb or all of the above, whether smothered in tomato sauce or sausage gravy, whether on a bun or nestled atop a mountain of spaghetti, there is nothing more mouthwatering than a piping hot ball of gastronomic love. Don’t let the name fool you. The best meatball emporiums will also serve those luscious little globes made of cod, shrimp, crab, rice, and beans and cauliflower. As one who spent years being told to get in shape I was delighted to have these flavorful rondures as my model when I proudly said “Round is a shape.”

So that’s the dilemma: to be kind to my kidneys or true to my tummy. I know what you’re going to say. Don’t panic. You’ll get over it.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

PS – Don’t forget to move your clocks ahead this weekend. If you do that sort of thing.

Spare Change

Michael Leave a comment

Saturday evening I was in the car and spun the dial on the radio. Figuratively, that is. What I really did was touch the SCAN button but how pretty of a picture does that paint. The dial landed on the beginning of “Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye.” The original.  steamBy Steam. From 1969. If you don’t know it or any of its copycatters, check it out here.

See, it’s a real song. A whole song. Not just a chorus you hear at baseball games after the pitcher is pulled.

I thought while listening (I can multitask) “God, I hated that song.” And then I went on to think more while listening more (still multitasking more) “Hey, hey, that’s not a bad song.”

I really did dislike it then and I even disliked more (or stronger) Banarama’s 1983 knock-off. But back to the sixties. I disliked Steam’s greatest hit though I shouldn’t have. If you’ve paused reading this post to check out the above noted video you’ll know why. That was me back then. Dressed and groomed pretty much in the form of… well, in the form of whoever they are. Steam wasn’t even a real group but one of those fake front bands to stick a name on a label when a bunch of studio musicians happen across a catchy little ditty some record producer thinks might make a few bucks. And that was me in high school. A fake front. Not quite nerd, not quite popular, not quite athletic, not quite stylish in my long collared, puffed sleeved, vested, flaired, and not quite straggly look. Somehow, like Na Na Etc Etc, I endured well into the 21st century.

Probably it was because of the changes that we made and/or were subjected to that we endured as well as we did. Na Na shifted from catchy little ditty requiring greedy producer to be popular to catchy little hook requiring bored baseball park organist to be popular. I’m now quite stylish.

The moral of the story is be true to what you are now, but be ready to change. Just in case.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

(Video by kenwaman via YouTube)

Euphemistically Yours

Michael 2 Comments

I was going to write a light, breezy post about something humorous that happened to me. But all of that changed when I saw what was on my coffee table. Let me start in the middle. (The beginning would make this just WAAAAYYYYYYYY too long.) A couple of weeks ago I bought a new television. Sometime over the weekend I read the instruction manual. At least I got around to it eventually. Actually I didn’t get around to it. It somehow ended up on the table instead of the recycling bin and as I was walking it over to said bin it fell out of my hands and broke open. And that’s when I started reading.

At first I wasn’t sure I was really reading it. I thought that maybe I was having a dream but one of those dreams that is so lifelike that you wake up thinking that you really did just have lunch with Aunt Ella even though she died 12 years ago and even more that you don’t have an Aunt Ella. Now that’s a dream. But I thought that maybe that’s exactly what I was having because no company on Earth could actually put into writing what I was reading right there in black and white.

About halfway through the “IMPORTANT NOTICES” was, in bold letters, “End of Life Directives.” This is why I at first thought that I was having and/or had had a dream. And probably a bad dream. To someone who spent 40 years in health care, “End of Life” has a very specific meaning. Usually, no, always, end of life means someone’s life has ended. Died. Checked out. Kicked the bucket. 86’d on out of here. Gone. Never to return. Dead.

On top of it, I’ve spent the last few years in and out of hospitals where the first thing anybody asks (after “are you bleeding?”) is, “Do you have a living will or advance directives?” And just last week the dialysis clinic social worker brought to me a stack of papers to be signed for this year and at the top of the stack was a pre-formatted form labeled “End of Life Directives.”

So you can see why when I saw that associated with an Open Box Internet Special yet still over-priced television set I thought I was hallucinating. Or at the very least way past my bedtime. We have enough things that are challenged, sufficient opportunities, plenty of stuff that is deprived, depressed or disadvantaged, that we don’t need to borrow an actual sentiment to be euphemistic for something that really doesn’t need to be spoken of gently.

Exactly what is this “end of life” that the manufacturers of electronic components are afraid to call a spade? Apparently, as I learned upon further reading, it’s when the TV has reached the end of its usefulness to me and the manufacturer wants to make me aware that there are environmentally responsible means of disposal that are at my umm, disposal.

I know it’s terribly politically incorrect to call a shovel a shovel but hasn’t the need to call everything anything but whatever thing it is gone too far now? We can’t even put in an instruction manual that this thing you just bought might break, fail, quit, or stop working. We have to speak gently so that if you actually paid full price for the item you won’t file an wrongful breakdown suit against the manufacturer. Bull shit. It will break and when it does either recycle it or throw it away. Those are your choices. Directives or not.

But if I should happen to outlive the newest electronic member of my family I will be certain to dispose of it in a responsible and thoughtful manner. I’ll hold a respectful gathering of its friends, we’ll have a non-denominational service with a few of the other appliances offering their thoughts and best wishes for the survivors and afterwards some light refreshments and fellowship. We will then gently load the life-challenged inanimate object into the back of my pre-hybrid automobile, drive several times around the county looking for a recycling center that accepts electronics, pay $1 per pound or $45 per dropoff whichever is less, and then hightail it back home. In air-conditioned comfort.

California will be proud.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?