Silly Ramblings to Distract Me From All the Sad News on TV

I went to a different post office today. The workers in our town seem pretty unhappy to be there. I am sure they are nice people if you know them outside of work but I would love to have a Cliff Claven there to liven things up. Or even if they were just drinking beer, that might make things more interesting, instead of the funeral home atmosphere. Today, I went to one just as close to our home, but in a different town. It has the tiniest parking space I have ever seen. You can fit 4-5 cars or 13 mopeds or maybe 15 bicycles. Since we don't live in Italy or India, it is hard to manage.

I love Staples. I love buying office supplies. I could spend hours in a office supply store looking at all the planners and such. I don't know why or where that comes from. Maybe from the back to school days of buying notebooks and a new backpack. Next to a book store, Staples is my second choice to browse in. Or Wal-Mart, of course, which has some books, some office supplies and a lot more.

I learned something at the grocery store (besides the latest details about Tom and Katie while standing in the check-out line): I buy milk based on color. I buy the green milk. At Wal-Mart, it is 2% but at our normal grocery, green is 1%. I never pay attention to the numbers on the label. I am just conditioned to buy whichever has a green cap and label. At least they are both healthy. Can someone explain this?

A veteran was collecting money outside. I felt guilty for being annoyed because various veterans groups call on a regular basis asking for money. So, I took out my checkbook and asked how much it would take to stop the phone calls. I do appreciate what they have done and support our troops, but what a sad world we live in where we have to make the hard choice between Nazism, Fascism, Communism, and Terroism on one side, and telemarketers on the other. Some questions are just too philosophical to spend much time on.

Between various veteran groups, cancer groups, and the Police athletic leagues, we get a lot of calls. Like you, sometimes we give, sometimes we don't. Some of these people make you feel guilty for not giving the minimum of $10 dollars to their cause. I am always tempted to share details of our budget and explain who and where we do give money so they won't think we are uncaring, cold-hearted, and evil. But sometimes, I would like to say, "Sorry, I am a tight-fisted, hard-hearted jerk," which isn't true, but might stop all the calls.

They call every couple of months. Since we didn't sign up for the "do not call" list, there are probably 10-15 of us left in America that all these groups are allowed to call.

I have begun to recognize a voice who always says, "sorry, wrong number." I am starting to think it is one of them who called three times one day asking for Marisa. She was painting, so I kept saying that she was busy. "It's just a courtesy call," they say. What does that mean? I wonder if they assume she might be the nice one and I am not allowing her to talk. See that, paranoia is a normal consequence of telemarketers. Did Hitler ever cause paranoia?