Question O' the Day

If, in nature, there was a squirrel with a nut allergy, what would he/she eat?

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Copyright 2006 by Chetan Davé ©, All Rights Reserved.

G'day and G'bye

A list of things overheard following the end of the Australian Open:

1. "Well, now if anyone suffers heat exhaustion, it's not on our watch."
2. "I'd like to trade in my tennis racket for a boomerang."
3. "I really like that Roger Sampras guy."
4. "In a related story, 2 CIA agents were dispatched to the men's final to investigate the participant whose name contained the word Baghdad...or something like that...he wasn't a threat, it's just a reflex."
5. "I got 2 discount tickets for the mixed triples final."
6. "No, a kangaroo can't be part of the trophy presentation."
7. "Well, Belgium owed France a few favors anyway."
8. "Maybe we should close the roof BEFORE players succumb to the sweltering heat."
9. "Paul Hogan was NOT a former Australian tennis great."
10. "It's not over folks! We now commence the Australian squash, racquetball, and badminton Open!"

Thoughts? Comments?

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Copyright 2006 by Chetan Davé ©, All Rights Reserved.

Hair Day

Dude, whatchya doin'?
You cut my hair too short (that's putting it nicely)
I've called you my barber for a long time running
And now you make my head look like a fort

Are you losing your skills?
Or was it your desire?
To make me look ill
Or a drill sargeant instructor

I said haircut, not crew cut
You switched hair with crew
Maybe your ears were shut
And now I'm screwed

How'm I supposed to go out now?
When my head is as flat
As grazing land for a cow
How about that?

Sure everyone has their bad days
But yours came on my head
I don't blame you in any way
Stuff happens, nothing more to be said.

Sure it'll grow back
In 3 or 4 weeks
Your thorough job of hack
Will cause me to endure shrieks

And when I return
I hope you will sculpt for me
A nice moderate noggin of human fur
So that everyone will stop mocking me.

Thoughts? Comments?

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So, What Do You Do?

There are some occupations for which there seem to be no real names. Here are a few examples with an attempt at naming the job.

1. Person who works in a think tank - Think Tanker
2. Person who studies the archaeology of space - Sparkyologist
3. Someone who assembles hard drives - Hard Driver
4. A maritime meteorologist - Mr./Ms. Mariweather
5. A caver who explores caves alone - Cavone
6. Person who parks your car backwards for you - Ballet
7. A doctor who takes a special interest in cartoon teeth - Hentist
8. Person who vacuums your car and serves you drinks - Carmaid
9. A person who installs cable TV in horse barns - Stable Guy (distinct job function from Stable Boy)
10. A lowly internist at a tabloid newspaper - Tablet

Thoughts? Comments?

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Corporate Contradictions

Federal Express is not owned by the government.

Compaq makes some of the largest copy machines around.

Wal-Mart does not have any walls for sale.

Thrifty Car Rental is just as expensive as the others.

Target does not offer customers a courtesy shooting range.

Embassy Suites does not require a passport for entry.

It's perfectly safe to walk through the Gap without falling into a deep, dark, chasm.

I'm guessing Richard Branson is not a virgin.

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Copyright 2006 by Chetan Davé ©, All Rights Reserved.

Of Wood on Tongue

Of all the body parts that are talked about, I believe the tongue is not given enough credit. How would we talk, eat, and do some other things that we do which I cannot mention here as this is a family show (just for me, not for you, your comments can be as unbridled as you would like) What would we stick out to insult others? What would we blow bubble gum bubbles with? Chewbaca's career would eclipse that of Gene Simmons. All the health and fitness news and experts go on and on about all these other body parts. How about this? Exercise your tongue every day. And NO, sitting in a sofa eating is not tongue exercise. But it's not all fun and games...

...So you have the urge to eat that calzone or cheesesteak. Yeah it's bad for your arteries, but your tongue is pleased right? But you don't want poor health? Ah, let me ponder that. The mouth stands as the point of intake for foodstuffs. Therefore the tongue remains our dark dietary master. The sensory temple of culinary dreams! Who rules over you and everything you consume. But we must stand up to our decadent organ. So friends, conquer the tongue and you will conquer....(insert deep thinking music here)....you will conquer...your life! How profound huh? There you go, I figured out human health.

On a side note, when I was a kid and had to go to the doctor, I feared the tongue depressor a lot more than the needle. With the needle, I could continue to breathe while it was inserted into my body. With the tongue depressor, or used chocolate ice cream bar stick as I used to call it, I thought I was going to gag and die right there on the examining table every time.

And how about the throat culture? Have you had this? "We need to get a sample of your mucous so we can verify that the bubbly coughing that's causing you to keel over every 5 minutes is in fact caused by a cold and maybe, just maybe, we should give you medication to help clear this substance from your lungs. But we have to do the culture. Thanks for coming. Now here, gag on this lollipop kid."

Thoughts? Comments?

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Copyright 2006 by Chetan Davé ©, All Rights Reserved.

And the Award Goes To...

It seems this time of year is the kickoff to the awards show season. Golden Globes, Oscars, Schmoscars, Schcreen (intentional misspelling of screen) Actors Guild etc. Well, here is a list of award shows that you unfortunately won't be seeing on TV in the coming weeks (although they would have been fun to witness!):

1. The Hollywood Family Planning Awards
2. The Capitol Hill Political Correctness Awards
3. California Bar Association's Lifetime Achievement Award: Michael Jackson
4. The Classical Music Awards
5. The Terror Alert Reason Awards
6. The Afterparty Blood Alcohol Level Awards
7. The Paparazzi Avoidance Technique Awards
8. The Gas Station Price Markup Awards
9. The Employer Dissatisfaction Awards
10. The Cell Phone Service Awards

Did I forget any? Comments welcome!

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Bar None

Slippery bar of soap
More so with added water from shower
How do I cope?
Keeping my balance or...

...Juggling you like a clown
Cause I don't want you to
Hit the ground
And collect filth anew

If you shall fall
Do I pick you up and hold you again?
Gross shower floor and all
I wish to part ways, what say you then?

For contacting my body once more
With your newly accumulated ground waste
Leaves vulnerable my core
To the guilt of my neuroses and their distaste

For all things septic
All things unsanitized
Bathing grows hectic
Like being left in the ocean capsized

I wish you all the best
As you lay in the garbage
Wrapped in paper towel peacefully at rest
And await the refuse carriage

You served with valor in bathing sorties night and day
Beyond duty's call
Until your restless ways
Became your downfall.

"Fresh" comments anyone?

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At Your Convenience

Convenience stores are great because you can pick up necessary food items such as chips, cookies, soda, milk etc. when you're in a hurry. But one thing they lack is a good produce section. If someone wants to eat healthy there is a little basket located directly below the cash register with one banana, a solitary apple, and a single orange to choose from. And yeah these are left touching the wrapped chocolate or bran (depending on the strength of your eyesight) muffins which are about a month old. I was about to pick up the orange when I thought, "Wait a minute how come none of the customers before me bothered to touch these?"

Convenient comments anyone?

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Copyright 2006 by Chetan Davé ©, All Rights Reserved.

Hotel vs. Motel

I'm not sure who came up with the concept of differentiating temporary overnight housing into hotels and motels. It was probably created when humans were fixated on establishing class systems for everything.

You get the feeling that motels are college students hanging around studying how to become hotels. What does a 'tel' have to do to go from from a 'Mo' to a 'Ho'? Is there a hazing/initiation period where your motel is egged and sprayed with whipped cream? Is there a certification exam, maybe a semantics test of some sort (because that what it's all about anyway) that a motel is required to pass before being accepted as a hotel?

Is it size? I've seen motels that are larger than hotels...with larger lobbies, thank you very much. I mean we're just talking about a room with a bed, bathroom, and cable TV. In both venues, the comforters are tucked so tight you pull a hamstring by the time you wake up. Is it the smell? Ah, I think I've hit on something! Motels have a stronger room cleaning detergent smell than hotels. Hotels have the odor of cooked food since the hallways are lined with finished room service trays. Maybe spraying more cleaning detergent is a way for motel owners to let out their frustration on not receiving hotel status. Something about pressing one's index finger down on a nozzle and seeing foam shoot out, I don't know.

Can you hold weddings in motels? I'm sure there's good food in motel restaurants as well, just not as expensive. Okay so motel pools are outdoors while hotels have indoor ones. Big deal. Cold water is better for circulation. There aren't many hotels offering free continental breakfasts. Hey, hot orange juice and cold bagels never hurt anyone. Yes, hotels have nicer wallpaper than the bare white stucco walls of the motels. Oh yes, motels are the only place you see stucco on the INSIDE of a building. But don't hold that against them.

Well, Mr. Hotel/Motel differentiator person, you've really created a bad inferiority complex this time, haven't you?

Thoughts and comments are welcome!

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Copyright 2006 by Chetan Davé ©, All Rights Reserved.

Hello?

Each geographic region has its own language, its own way of doing things. In a world so rich with diversity, it's hard to find phrases that are used by most everyone in the world. An example of such a practice is saying "hello" to answer the phone. Even if I call a non-English speaking country, people answer with "hello". In India, which has a different language for every state, phone rings and they ask "hello?". Why is that? Is it because Alexander Graham Bell was from America? Or do we just like the way the double 'L' and long 'O' roll off our tongue?

Even if people are mad as hell the second before they pick up the phone, in that instant after picking up the receiver, all you hear is a polite "hello" with no trace of the person's previous mood or mindset. Maybe hello is therapeutic; maybe it helps us change gears, to stabilize our mind from whatever rut we were stuck in prior to the phone ringing.

Now I realize that there may be countries or regions where this is not the case, and I would like to learn about their phone M.O. so feel free to educate me. Can we possibly start a trend by maybe saying "Hi!, "Make noise with your mouth", "Speak", or some alternate to the accepted norm?

Until then, all hail hello!

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Copyright 2006 by Chetan Davé ©, All Rights Reserved.

Vroom Vroom

If you have a car, you're bound to have problems. The key is how we react to those problems and forge ahead. Mechanics sometimes feel the brunt of the complaints, but it's important to keep in mind who will be taking a wrench under your hood in a few minutes. Here is a list of quotes from mechanics that were NOT overheard at the autoshop recently:

1. "Your car will receive expedited service."
2. "We don't believe in overcharging."
3. "I like it when customers scream at me."
4. "The screws on your wheels will hold at least for a couple days."
5. "You need to take an auto mechanics class."
6. "The black smoke will stop once the gas tank is empty."
7. "It's good for another 50,000 miles easily."
8. "The warranty doesn't cover that."
9. "It's OK if I smoke in here, cigarettes aren't flammable."
10. "Hey Joe, how much do we charge for labor?"

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Nickel N. Dimer

Meet Mr. Nickel N. Dimer
Friends call him Nick
Living off the inheritance of his Old Timer
Pinching pennies is his trick

In his old car and old house
No AC use in either
Why buy bug spray when you have a mouse?
No heat use in winter, just an extra comforter

No showering daily
Skip a day or two or three in between
To shrink his bill utility
His vocabulary forgets the word clean

Income is good
But who wants to spend?
Grows his own food
The piggy bank is his best friend

With pockets shallow
Of pants worn years on end
Count on Nick, shrewd fellow
To leave you hanging with the bill and a pen.

Know anyone like this?? (We all do.) Feel free to comment.

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Copyright 2006 by Chetan Davé ©, All Rights Reserved.

We Used To Be Prey

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - The answer to a scientific "who-done-it?" has revealed a chilling fact: We used to be bird food.

Scientists announced on Thursday they had definitive proof that the "Taung child", a 2-million year old apeman skull famed as one of the most dramatic human evolutionary finds, was killed and eaten by an eagle.

"Birds used to eat us and in doing so they shaped our behaviour," said Dr Lee Berger, a palaeoanthropologist at Johannesburg's University of the Witwatersrand.

"Birds of prey are one of the few things that some modern primates have special calls or alarms for," he told Reuters.

Berger said the child had probably been scooped up by an eagle and taken to its nest, where its eyes were ripped out for dinner. The child's skull eventually fell out of the nest, only to be found almost 2 million years later.

Placing us on the eagle's menu may also explain other aspects of human evolution, from walking upright, which could present a smaller target to an aerial attacker, to our tendency to live in groups.

"These birds would have been after the most vulnerable members of the group," Berger said, a scenario which may have triggered collective measures of protection.

This murder most foul occurred 2 million years ago but the culprit, an African crowned eagle -- also known as the crowned hawk-eagle -- still circles the skies and large eagles still prey on small primates in Africa.

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Shampoo Pooh

What is the best number of times to shampoo per week? Are there any guidelines for this? Shampoo too frequently and your hair turns gray or falls out. Not frequently enough and your friends (and others who can smell you or see the snowstorm on the top of your head) suddenly don't want anything to do with you. Much like shaving cream for men, shampoo is another synthetic substance that blackmails us on a daily (or weekly) basis. (Please don't say monthly).

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Copyright 2006 by Chetan Davé ©, All Rights Reserved.

A Horse Of Course

Horses are underutilized in our society as a means of transport. They would be safer than cars because they are smart enough not to bump into each other. It would solve our pertoleum problems as the alternate energy source we crave would be the readily available hay. It would force us to be more active and cowboy hats would come back into style outside of the American South. Horse drawn carriages would move people who were physically unable to sit on a saddle or those too lazy to do so. Forget parking lots, there would just be hay stations serving two purposes at once. The postman would deliver the mail before 5pm. The only problem I forsee is the littering of streets with unwanted fertilizer produced by the equine GI tract. Oh well, goodbye cement roads, hello grassy paths.

On a side note, I have yet to come across a convincing impersonation of a horse neighing. Personally, I have been trying for years but I always end up sounding like Scooby Doo laughing instead.

Thoughts? Comments?

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Copyright 2006 by Chetan Davé ©, All Rights Reserved.

Fly Trap

Had a great trip, but airport delays on the return leg led to a journey of 25 sleepless hours. That was a lot of fun. At least it gave me enough time to compile a list of quotes overheard on the plane after countless hours in the air:

1. "Are we there yet?"
2. "I can hold it until we land."
3. "What's that high pitched humming noise coming from the wing area?"
4. "I thought YOU had the passports."
5. "Great, another frozen croissant for breakfast."
6. "A bed right about now would be great."
7. "A toothbrush right about now would be great."
8. "I got no elbow room."
9. "What time is it?"
10. "Tomato juice and ginger ale, please."
11. "That guy has been sleeping the whole flight. I can never sleep on the plane."

Glad to be back.

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