Merle Wayne Sneed loves it when the smart guys are wrong. And given that on any subject a lot of smart guys and gals will opine, there is lots of wrongness to go around. You may have heard that I've been in the market for a new car. So, I have been especially tuned in to all things automotive. One thing I read in the paper and heard on television was that the Cash for Clunkers program, designed to rid us of 250,000 gas guzzling cars and trucks, would be a failure. Specifically, I heard several smart guys say that people who own clunkers, cant afford new cars. I think that they define clunkers in too narrow a way. If you have a five-year-old truck getting 12 miles to the gallon, you will quickly find that no one wants it, at most any price. Anyway, the government announced today that they have reached the goal of the program in just 3 days. So much for the failure theory. The usual suspects and I played golf today at 7am. Some Guy Named Bob didn't show up until the Seafood King and I were on the third hole. His alarm didn't go off. Some Guy Named Bob is 71 or 72, and guys that old don't need no stinking alarm clock, so I don't know what the deal was. He's usually bothering the neighbors by 6. The deal for the new car is in place. All we need is the car. It is allegedly being delivered tomorrow, Monday at the latest. I feared the worst when we went over the financial details, but Keith the Car Guy was true to his word. But things could still go wrong, I suppose. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

Well, we made it to Phoenix and home safely. The Phillies beat the Diamondbacks 6-2, so it was a good evening all around. My blog friend Steve commented on yesterday's post that he didn't realize that the weather was so different between Hooterville and Phoenix. The first thing to understand about the two cities is that Hooterville is almost 1500 feet higher in elevation than is Armpit, er, Phoenix. In addition, the greater Phoenix area is around 9000 square miles in size, about 8900 of which are covered with concrete. It can never cool off in the summer. The high temperature in Phoenix yesterday was 114 degrees and the low was 92. That's right, the low was 92 fricking degrees. In contrast our high was a cool 105 and the low was 78. That 14 degree difference in the overnight lows makes a huge difference. Mrs. Sneed snapped this picture of the scoreboard at the ball park. You can click on it to enlarge it. When we walked out of the stadium at 9:30pm, it was like stepping into a furnace. Stupid people live in Hooterville, F-ing stupid people live in Phoenix. Just saying. And now, the moment you've been waiting for. The car update. I sent an email to the CarsDirect guy telling him that there was no chance that I was driving to Armpit, er, Phoenix to get a car. Keith, the car guy, came into the store today to ask if he could look at my truck. I suspect he has a buyer that he is not telling me about. All part of the drama. As we stand now, I'm getting a 2009 Honda Civic for about $1600 off the list price and should get about $500-$700 more for the Junkster than the guys in Phoenix wanted to give me. The latest plan is to sign the papers on Thursday after golf. But lots can still go wrong. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

Chase Field, home of the Arizona Diamondbacks, a woefully bad baseball team. This has been a strange Monday thus far. I'm totally out of my routine and I'm not that crazy about it. I had to go to work this morning for about 3 hours. The regular Monday guy is going to some training on Wednesday, his normal day off, so they gave him today off to avoid paying him overtime for the training. This is an interesting tactic that the owners and the manager use to avoid paying overtime. The full-time workers are scheduled 38 or 39 hours a week so that if they get stuck with a customer at quitting time, they can attend to them without running into overtime. So, since I only work 32 hours a week, it fell to me to go in for a few hours to cover the guy who is going to the training. I got home at 10ish and made a call to the CarsDirect guy. He has a car for me at an acceptable price, but it is in Phoenix, a 240 mile round trip from our house. I also talked to Keith the Car Guy and he said that he has a price for me too. He will call me back before 2pm. Keith seems to be bad at followup, so I'm not holding my breath. If he is within a few hundred bucks, I will probably take him up on the deal, rather than drive to Phoenix. And speaking of Phoenix, we are driving up to the miserable place today to attend the baseball game between the Phillies and the Diamondbacks this evening. Daughter Sneed and her husband are treating us to the game. Except for the 2-hour drive each way, it will be fun. Hopefully we will be home by 11pm. I need my sleep. If these car sales people weren't total screw ups I could have killed two birds with one trip to Phoenix. And believe me, one trip to Phoenix is all you want. The Phoenix high and low temperatures today are forecast to be 113 and 90. Hooterville, on the other hand expects a high of 108 and a low of 80. Much better. I hope the folks at Chase Field have the roof of the stadium closed and the air cranked up. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

Things usually go wrong when we try too hard to make them happen.--J. Luther Sneed, American Philosopher and Blacksmith (1881-1949). The photo is of J. Luther Sneed, my actual grandfather with one of his actual wives. He was not a polygamist, he just had a lot of wives in his lifetime. They appear to be waiting for a bus. I have always tried to live according to Mr. Sneed's wise admonition, and it has served me well. So, I am not taking this car business completely seriously. Keith the car guy, promised to get back to me by "the end of the day" on Thursday about a 2004 Honda Accord that he was negotiating to buy from an old lady in Green Valley, AZ. Green Valley is primarily a retirement community, located 25 miles south of Hooterville. The old people there have nowhere to drive and plenty of time to do it, so good buys can be had. Keith was talking to an old lady in Green Valley about buying her Accord. Despite being several years old the car only has 13,000 miles on it. Needless to say, I didn't hear a word from old Keith Thursday or Friday, so this morning on a break at work I gave him a jingle. The old lady has decided to sell her car to someone in Green Valley. Keith said that he was working on getting me a price on a new Honda Civic and would get back to me at noon today, one o'clock at the latest. Of course, he hasn't called. As far as the CarsDirect.com guy goes, he periodically leaves me a message to call him back, but he is never there when I do. So, I am waiting for just the right deal to fall into my lap, which I sure it will eventually. But if it doesn't then the Junkster and I will soldier on. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

If you want to read an exercise in bullshit read the police report written by the cop who arrest Professor Gates the other day. His justification for the arrest is nonsense. The officer says that Gates ignored his warning to stop yelling and "...drew the attention of the police officers and citizens, who appeared to be surprised and alarmed..." So that's his rationale. Gates was alarming the neighbors by yelling at the cop. My hurt feeling theory seems even more likely to me. Gates was wrong here, but the officer was wronger. And speaking of wronger, if you believe that now is a good time to buy a car, you are wronger than wrong. It is the same old crappy time it always is. Car dealers and their sales people are skunks and the recession has not made them smell any less skunky. Keith the car guy left me a message to call him. When I finally reached him this morning, he told me that the used low-mileage Honda Accord that we have been pursuing has not materialized. But it still might. I mentioned to Keith that Honda is having some dealer incentives currently and that I would like him to get me a quote on an new Honda. Dealer incentives are when the manufacturer gives the dealer some extra money to help clear out the inventory. Keith sort of ridiculed my suggestion of dealer incentives with the statement, "There are always incentives, this is the car business." I interpret that to mean, "Don't expect a deal from me", but then I tend to be a bit cynical. I also checked out an online site carsdirect.com. for their best price on a new Honda. It was better than anything I've seen, so I fired off an email to them. A guy called me back right away. He said he could get me a new Honda for the price they advertised and said he would find a local dealer to deliver it. Then he dropped the "but". "But", he tells me, "the dealers often put tinting or pin striping on the cars when they get them and you will have to pay for that." Around here they also slap on $50 worth of sealant and call it the "Desert Protection Package", which they try to get the unsuspecting to pay $1000 for. It is just bullshit dealer profit. If you saw Fargo, you might remember the scene where William Macy is being yelled at by a guy who is being snookered into buying something called Truecoat for his new car. Same deal. I told the CarsDirect guy that it was a deal breaker for me and that if he couldn't deliver at the price he quoted, all bets were off. So, the whole deal is hanging by a thread as far as I'm concerned. I hate this stuff and the Junkster looks better with each passing hour. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

No word today from either Keith the car guy or the Honda Fit weasel. Luckily, I am in no hurry over this car business. I may not even do it, who knows? Perhaps you've been following the story in the news about the arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates, by the Cambridge, MA. police. Police arrested Professor Gates after they received a report of a man trying to pry the front door of Gates' home open. Gates said he returned home to find his front door stuck. A neighbor reported Gates to the police, as a possible intruder. What followed is the basis of the controversy that has arisen. Professor Gates was either arrested for not cooperating with the police or the police are racist thugs who automatically assumed that a report of a prowler and the presence of a black man constitute a crime. I suspect that the truth is in the middle somewhere. Cops always show up assuming the worst and black men assume the worst when the cops show up. Many times the police don't handle their power well. They often overstep their authority, simply because they can and that's before race enters into things. Over the past weekend, the Hooterville police raided a nudie bar and cited all the nudie dancers for not having a permit to dance nudily. I think they busted about 25 women. Unfortunately, the police were wrong in their interpretation of the law and all the charges are being dismissed. You think that they could get it straight beforehand. Hopefully, someone is asking how they screwed up so badly. What got Professor Gates arrested was yelling at a policeman. The copper arrested him for being disorderly, which is the catchall for when the police get their feeling hurt and can't figure out anything else to arrest you for. It seems to me that if the police are on my property and have dertermined that no crime has occurred, they are fair game for being told to hit the raod and stay gone until they have a legitimate reason to be there. In the Cambridge Police Department I'm quite certain that they are telling one another that they followed procedure and did nothing wrong. I'm positive that they are reassuring one another that they are not racists. If you arrest an older, well-respected black man on the front porch of his own home you have to examine your beliefs and actions, not hide behind your authority. At least it seems that way to me. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

You know, no matter how you slice it, buying a car sucks. Having a new car is good, but buying a new car sucks. Longtime readers know that Merle Wayne Sneed has been driving the Sneed Family Junkster for coming up on nine years. It has served me well, but frankly, I'm sick of it. At least at the moment, I feel like I'm sick of it. You might recall that a few weeks ago I was toying with the idea of buying a Miata convertible. They sold it while I dawdled, so that is off the table. Especially since I refuse to shell out for a brand new one. One of my fallback positions is to buy myself a Honda Fit. The Fit is stylish in a quirky way, it gets good mileage and it has the Honda reliability. I even sent a email to a guy asking him to give me a no bullshit price for a Fit. I haven't heard back yet. Had I said give me your best total bullshit offer, he would have probably responded by now. Over the weekend I noticed a 2008 Honda CRV at the place where we bought Mrs. Sneed's Honda in 2005. It looked real nice, so this morning I popped over there to have a look see. This is where things always begin to suck. You meet the salesman. As I looked int he window of the CRV, a salesman came over to greet me. The first question out of his mouth was, "Are you here to see anyone?" He meant was I meeting any other salesman. I said no. At this car lot, they seem to have the attitude that once you have purchased a car from a salesman, you are his customer for life. For example, when I first saw the Miata I called the place and asked about it. The guy who answered the phone chatted me up a bit, asking among other things if I had bought there before? I told him I had some years before from a guy named Pat. Later that afternoon, Pat called me at home wanting me to come in for a test drive of the Miata. I told him I was thinking it over and might come in. The other guy must have turned my show-of-interest over to Pat. Today, I guess I was supposed to say, "Why yes, is Pat, the guy who sold me a car 4 years ago, around?" Instead I said I was not there to see anyone in particular. Maybe I'm not being fair to old Pat, but I don't feel obligated to do a whole dance over who waits on me or ultimately sells me a car. If the salesmen call dibs on me for life, that's not my problem, it's theirs. Anyway, this guy Keith takes me into his office and we chat for awhile. No pressure, just talking through the possibilities. Keith realized pretty quickly that I am a cheapskate and slow to action. Not exactly a salesman's dream. Keith has a line on a one-owner Honda Accord that he is supposed to call me about tomorrow. The other guy Pat came into Keith's office while I was there, but he didn't seem to recognize me. After all, it has been over four years. I did finally mention to Keith that I bought a car from old Pat years ago and asked him if he was okay with that? He said that he had no choice but to be okay with it since he had devoted an hour to me already. I could tell he was a bit conflicted. What do you think? Am I bound by some kind of code to deal with Pat now and forever? Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

You may have noticed that my posts are less frequent than has been my habit. I'm on my summer schedule. You're welcome. I don't like to brag, but I got my annual evaluation at the store yesterday and I am fabulous according to the boss. Plus, I got a sweet 6% raise, which means that I can call the guy and tell him to include the leather package with the Mercedes. All kidding aside, getting a 6% raise these days is nothing to sneeze at. Many folks are suffering a 100% cut in their pay, so I am very fortunate. Here's a little video of Miss Riley. She is becoming mobile. You will notice that at one point in her trek, she turns at looks at the television. The British Open golf tournament was wrapping up and she had a bet down on it. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

We will find you cowardly iPhone internet people and run you over with our special police scooters. Regular readers of the Merle Wayne Sneed blog, and there are a few, know that Merle Wayne hates the traffic cameras. Not because I fear being caught by one, because I don't. It has been many, many years since my last moving violation. The problem with law enforcement is that they think they are operating in our best interest and mostly they are. But, and this is a big but, they believe that if a little enforcement is good, a lot of enforcement is better. I was amused to see that Washington, D.C. police chief, Cathy Lanier is pissing and moaning that some people are using their iPhone and some internet application to either avoid the areas where traffic cameras are in the D.C. area or adjusting their behavior to avoid being caught in the speed traps. She called these iPhone people cowardly. That sounds a bit like a tantrum to me. Imagine this. Some people slow down when they know there are speed traps around. Isn't that the idea? Instead of cowards, these folks sound like the sort of drivers Washington, D.C. needs more of. Unless it is really the money you need. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

Fellow blogger Mr. Kurt, is doing a series of posts on the life and times of Mr. Ringo Starr. Not many people know that Mr. Lorne Greene chronicled his own struggles with the wily drummer and sometimes outlaw. Greene indicates that he witnessed the killing of Ringo, but like Paul, mystery surrounds that claim. Is the man presenting himself as Ringo the real Richard Starkey? Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

I spent the day with both of my little hooligans. Bowling, lunch, Dairy Queen, the usual stuff. My failings in grandparenting included a lack of video game playing and an unwillingness to take them to play basketball at a nearby gym. Here's a tip for better living. Buying kids ice cream when it is 107 is not the best idea. I had to make an emergency stop at a convenience store to get a cup to hold a rapidly deteriorating cone. Aiden has been staying with me these past few Mondays. He goes to a school district that is year around, with short breaks from time to time. He starts the first grade next Monday. He is lucky to be in a good school district, rather than the abysmal Hooterville Unified School District (HUSD). Noah will be starting kindergarten on August 17th, I think. He will be attending a HUSD elementary school, but it is one of the good ones, on the fringe of the district. By the time he gets to middle school, his folks will have to get him out of the district, too. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

I'm not kidding. Frickin' 108.5 was the high today at our house. This picture of my digital thermometer was taken after it cooled off to 108 even. Someday in the not too distant future, I intend to spend the summer somewhere cool. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

If by hot you mean 105, then yes, it was hot today. It was not nearly as hot as the forecast issued a day or two ago. I heard one of the local weather guys talking about 112 today, and the paper was predicting 110. Have you ever noticed that you only really hear a couple of parts of the weather report, even though the weather guys drone on and on? "Blah, blah, blah, 110 Saturday, blah, blah, blah, 10 percent chance of rain, blah, blah, blah..." I occasionally hear something about high or low pressure and clockwise or counter clockwise, but what that has to do with our weather I neither care about nor understand. So maybe our high pressure was lower than expected or vice-versa, or something. All I know is that it wasn't 110 or 112, which is good enough for me. Young Noah has returned from his tour of the national parks for the West. He was gone two weeks and a day. He said he had a good time, but the trip was too short. His poor dad broke two ribs in a fall, but will be okay. This afternoon, Mrs. Sneed, Noah and I went to see ICE AGE: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS, the latest and greatest in kids movies. Did I mention that it was in 3D? Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

Speaking of ghosts, the Hooterville SWAT team was summoned to a house on the far East side yesterday. A concerned citizen reported that a possibly armed, but definitely disturbed person was inside. For four hours there was a tense standoff. Repeated attempts to make contact with the occupant of the house were unsuccessful. Finally, around noon, the police stormed the premises and discovered that the house was unoccupied. Ghost? Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

We all have things that we believe in or don't believe in. My dermatologist, Dr. Smartypants for instance, doesn't believe in cortisone flare. What is cortisone flare, you might ask? It is a temporary inflammation, of a joint following a cortisone injection. Google "cortisone flare" and you get over 43,000 hits, many by actual licensed doctors. Evidently, Dr. Smartypants doesn't do Google. I suffer from a skin condition called Prurigo Nodularis, or PN for short. Basically, I get small itchy nodules on my arms and hands. Believe you me when I tell you it is every bit as sexy as it sounds. In fact, young women will frequently come into the store and ask to see the PN dude. Then, I'm forced to try to do my work with a bevy of giggling admirers following me around. This is not my actual arm, but is a good representation of a PN nodule. But back to Dr. Smartypants, Cortisone Flare Denier, M.D. Once a month, I go in to see Dr. Smartypants and receive a bunch of cortisone injections. If you have never had shots in you hands, you don't know what you are missing. The shots in the arms are not so bad, but the hands, jeezaloo, they hurt. Anyway, most months I get the cortisone reaction to the shots in the form of swelling and pain, in or near a joint. A week ago I got a shot in my right index finger's knuckle and it has swelled up like a sumabitch. A week later, it is still painful and swollen. As Humphrey Bogart might have said, had he suffered from a condition requiring cortisone injections, "Of all the shots, in all the joints, in all my life, this one was the worst." Of course, it is all in my mind. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

I hope your long weekend was fun. You may recall, I was working on the 4th at the hardware store. We did close at 4pm, rather than the usual 6. I normally work until 1pm on Saturdays, but the boss and another full-time guy decided to use vacation time to get the 4th off, so the poor part-time schmuck was stuck until 4. Some might say I brought it on myself, so what can do? A reasonable person might ask why we didn't just close, since business is always slower than slow on the holidays? Lots of customers mentioned it on Saturday. The fact is that it is cheaper to stay open than to close. Close and everyone get a paid holiday. Stay open and the paltry trickle of business at least pays the payroll. If you live in New York or Washington or L.A., you are probably accustomed to meeting the rich and famous. Maybe, you are walking down the street in Santa Monica and recognize a guy headed your way. You pass and give him a "Hey Brad, how are the kids?" Or maybe you are picking up a few items at the grocery and the President is in line behind you. That sort of thing. Here in Hooterville, it doesn't happen that much. A guy at a hardware store on the far east side of town claims to have sold some nuts and bolts to Paul McCartney. Paul used to and may still have a mansion out that way, so I suppose it could be true. Linda Rondstat used to live in a big old swanky joint in midtown, but she got pissed about something and move to SF. She grew up here and went to Catalina H.S. Diana Ross famously and inexplicably got busted for DUI just a couple of miles from Casa Sneed. Johnny Lee, who played the character Algonquin J. Calhoun on the old Amos and Andy show, came to my house with my dad when I was about 13. Don't ask me why. One time I gave Father Daniel Berrigan a ride to the airport. If you are old enough you will remember that Frs. Daniel and Phillip Berrigan were on the FBI Ten Most Wanted List in 1970, for their anti-Vietnam activities. We just chatted and talked about Hooterville. Father Daniel's major comment was about the local power plant. He was concerned that it might be nuclear powered. It isn't. Lee Marvin used to live here, before his unfortunate death. I was stopped at a traffic light one day and he rolled up next to me in an old pick up. He looked at me and I at him. We each gave a knowing nod and off he went. Except for the part where I stuck my head out the window and yelled, "Hey! It's Lee Marvin!" Then the was the time that the lovely Mrs. Sneed and I met Kris Kristofferson at the MDA telethon. That was in the days before we came to hate Jerry and his kids. Jerry more so than the kids. We were manning the phones and Mrs. Sneed got Kristofferson's attention by melodically blurting out, "Yoo Hoo, oh, Kris Kristofferson." Someone on the phone was willing to pledge if Kris would say hello to him. Yes, when it comes to celebrity sightings, the Sneeds are old hands. Over the weekend, a somewhat famous former professional athlete came in to the store. I wasn't quite sure if he was the famous former professional athlete or just some other muscular, handsome guy. The somewhat famous former professional athlete is not Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods or A-Rod famous. Just say he had a decade-long career with a famous American professional athletic team. It finally dawned on me that this customer was the somewhat famous former professional athlete. So, I asked him about it. What a smart guy would have said was, "Aren't you XXXX?" What I did say was, "Should I know who you are?" He said, "I don't know, should you?" We finally got around to the part where he said he was him, but it took more back and forth than it should have. He left me with the impression that I should have minded my own business. Guess so. But then, I've made an ass of myself in front of bigger guys than that. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

Perhaps you've heard of Pei Wei Asian Diner. It is owned by the PF Chang China Bistro people. Both companies are headquartered in Scottsdale, AZ., which I think we can all agree is the hotbed for Asian cuisine. If you never heard of either, it doesn't matter because they are incidental to this story. I love to say ridiculous things, just to see what people will say. I especially love it when they take me seriously. For instance, I used to work with a woman named Marie, who was one of the most earnest people I've ever met. She was as serious as a heart attack about life in general and her job in particular. Things were made better, because she was bitter that she was toiling her life away with losers like me, rather than being the titan of industry that she thought she deserved. When I worked with Marie at Tedious Systems, I got a project to work on, for a new Pei Wei (pronounced Pay Way) location. I had never heard of Pei Wei before that. I happened to mention to someone that I had this job to do and I mispronounced the name as Pee Wee, or something. Poor Marie came into my cubicle and solemnly told me that it was pronouncedPay Way's Asian Diner, not Pee Wee. Marie was forever trying to save me from my ignorant hill billy roots and didn't want me embarrassing myself or Tedious. Why, I can't imagine. From that day forward, at least until she gave me up as hopeless, I made it a point to mangle the name at every opportunity. I manufactured opportunities to do it. Pee Wee's Oriental Grill was my favorite mangle. For about the first twenty-five times Marie patiently corrected me, though. Two bits of hardware news. One, my arch nemesis, "Double Starbucks Mocha, Don't F*ck with My Break", quit today. She is moving to a state far, far away to get married. Her marriage gives hope to bridge trolls everywhere. Secondly, a guy called the store this morning to complain that we had overcharged him for something. I took the call. He told me that he was reconciling his receipts this morning and he noticed that we charged him $1.99 for a irrigation part. As a side note, if you sit at home, gathering all your receipts together, in order to check them for errors, you need a hobby. Anyway, the guy wanted me to double check the price he paid. I did and told him it was right. This is what followed. Him: $1.99? That's almost twice what I paid for the same thing at Home Depot yesterday. Me: Yeah, probably so. Him: That's too much. Me: Bring them back and we'll refund your money. Him: I already used one. Me: Too late now then. Him: What are you going to do about it? Me: Not much. Want to talk to the manager? Him: No, but I'll never shop with you again. Me: I'm sorry about that. Him: Here's a joke. What's the difference between an Ace Hardware store and a Home Depot? At Ace, there's no place for the employees to hide. You can have the lowest price or the best service. You can't have both. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

Thursday is golf day, as readers know. We were out early this morning. In addition to the usual suspects, Aiden came along. The weather was hot and really humid. We've had rain the past few evenings and heat and wet grass make an uncomfortable combination. Aiden was a trooper though. We called his dad on the 16th hole to give a progress report and his dad asked if he was getting tired of golf yet? The kid said, and I am not making this up, "I was tired of it a long time ago." And yet, when we were done, he asked if we could play some more. We had lunch with the Seafood King and Some Guy Named Bob and then came home and watched the movie The Sandlot. One of us tried to take a nap on the couch and the other kept saying, "Grandpa, wake up." A fun time was had by all, though. While were having a bite to eat tonight, I was noticing the large number of people at the bus stop in front of the restaurant. It was raining. Public transportation in Hooterville is not like the places you all live. People who ride the bus in Hooterville do it as a last resort. Poor people ride the bus and that is about it. I'm always amazed by the general public's grumbling about operating the bus system. For the people who ride the bus here, it is a life-saver. Our civic duty is to provide a minimal level of support to everyone and the bus is a part of that. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky

My former employer, Tedious Systems provides medical coverage for retirees like me. They are not obliged to and they can choose to stop anytime they see fit. Each month I pay $193 and Tedious pays $535. That's $6420 that Tedious pays each year on behalf of me. Back to me in a minute. The dunderheads in Congress are trying to come up with a plan to make sure everyone in the good old US of A has health coverage. You no doubt already know that. They are arguing, the Dems and Repubs over something called the public option. Dems love it, Repubs, not so much. I think that public option means they want to make something like Medicare an option for all Americans. An alternative to the coverage we have now. That is a fine and noble goal. Who isn't in favor of health care for all? Okay a mess of far right-wingers, but what normal people? Unfortunately, the plan is being crafted by the staffs of 535 of the dumbest bastards on the planet. So, expect calamity. The latest and greatest from their planning is an annual fee to be paid by companies not providing health insurance to their employees. The plan calls for $750 annually for each full-timer not covered and $375 per part-timer. If you have 100 folks, you can either subsidize their health coverage or pay the Feds $75,000 per year. If I'm Tedious Systems, I'm dropping old Merle on day one. $750 per year is way less that $6420 per year, if I do the math correctly. Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky