Stupid Shit

In spite of all the media attention and numerous newly launched investigations, we don't know the answer to the two most important and interesting questions concerning the Volkswagen scandal - Who did it and Why.

A person, or persons, unknown (can't you hear a newscaster or somebody's spokesperson voice?), via software, enabled diesel powered VW's to turn on pollution control technology during emission testing to achieve desired and/or legally mandated results. These controls didn't actually function during everyday driving. Thus, VW owners could enjoy better mileage, performance and engine life than would've been possible if the controls were turned on.

You get a cool comfortable cruise and a self-righteous, saving the planet buzz.

Well duh! exclaims certain gentlereaders, the Why is self-evident, it's stated in the last sentence of the first paragraph. But I'm after a different Why. I want to know Why the Who (or more likely,They) did it considering that it must have occurred to the Who/They that if they got caught it could result in not only getting canned but also having to learn how to successfully take a shower in certain institutions (rule #1, if you drop the soap, leave it).

Then, just as he, she, ze (see previous post) or they were falling asleep on the night of the day he, she, ze or they came up with the idea, wouldn't you think that it occurred to, um...someone, that if the plot were to be revealed it could bring the whole company down?

I'll be following this story closely because I want to know if this was someone's carefully crafted plan, that if they carefully calculated the risk of getting caught and concluded it was worth it. Or, did somebody, perhaps a whole chain of somebodies, just do something stupid without thinking things through.

Which brings us to the folks that recently replaced the transmission in my van, Betty.

Huh?

Bear with me, all will soon become clear.


One morning I was on my way to work. I stopped at a red light and was waiting to turn left. I was the first person in the left turn lane and there were two or three cars waiting patiently behind me. When the light turned green I removed my foot from the brake and pushed on the gas pedal. Nothing happened. Or rather, my engine gently roared, as if I had placed the transmission in neutral, which I hadn't.

Long story short, my tranny (and I'm not referring to my friend Roscoe) had passed away quietly and without complaint. If Betty had been aware that this crucial member of the team had been manifesting any symptoms she had chosen to keep this knowledge to herself. Sweet, and what fresh hell is this?

Hilarity ensued. The story ends with yours truly being given a ride to work in the back of a police car ("...sorry sir, it's policy."), The best part was when we pulled up to the main entrance (I admit, it was my idea) and my uniformed chauffeur got out to open the car door for me.


Yet another long story short, the van was repaired at Porter's Auto Wrecking and Service, 1793 N.Main St., Niles, Ohio, 44446  a local facility. When my son-in-law picked it up he pointed out that someone had apparently hit the driver's side of the front end, causing what looked to be relatively minor damage.

Oh, yeah...uh, well, the a guy that drives the Toms Tools Truck  a truck for one of our vendors accidently backed into your van. He's died since, but I'm sure his son will take care of it, here's his number. If he won't do right by you, we'll take care of it, and then sue the estate to recover the money.

Yup, he really did die. Yup, they didn't feel any need to mention the accident before being prompted. And yup, the son told us to go pound salt since we were clearly making the whole thing up and just trying to rip off his dead father.

And yup, Porter's, upon being informed of this and the fact that I had to spend $200 bucks at another facility (over and above the $1400 bucks I had already paid them) to get a headlight, left front turn signal assembly (used) and a battery (new). so I could actually use the vehicle, never mind the body damage -- saw an opening and decided that the issue was between me and the dead guy, and also declared that I should go pound salt.

They didn't put it that crudely, I confess I was the one that got a little crude.

They were somewhat preoccupied with trying to not look directly at me while keeping an eye on the frightened looking customer standing nearby, who was keeping an eye on me. Now, while I know the who, what, when (more or less) and where, why is a mystery.

Having endured a somewhat unpleasant decade that began in the spring of 2005, I'm in denial in that I refuse to believe that God/the cosmos/bad karma/etc. are responsible because that might mean I've begun another decade that's going to suck sweaty socks.

As to why the dead guys son chooses to dishonor his father's memory, or why the repair shop took the high road at first, or why they don't split the difference and craft an honorable compromise -- who knows? People do stupid shit when money is involved, even relatively trivial sums.You can take that to the bank.

The name of the repair shop and the tool vendor has been crossed out so that I can avoid being on the receiving end of a lawsuit. My lawyer says I'm on the side of the angels; he's urging me to report the non-reported accident to the local police. I'm going to see my car insurance guy this week and get his opinion. I haven't made a claim in a decade, so I'm hoping that if I do I won't have a rate increase or be canceled. I figure that if he leaves me holding the bag at least I'll be forewarned that I may have indeed begun another decade of sweaty sock sucking.

Since the above is about a thousand words, my unofficial limit, I won't mention that I paid extra to have my power steering pump replaced, along with the tranny, and that the unnamed facility forgot to top off the power steering reservoir. Anyway, it was only short about half a quart. If you had the radio turned up you could hardly hear the pump gasping for more fluid on turns.

Have an OK day.


[P.S. Gentlereaders, for 25¢ a week, no, seriously, for 25¢ a week you can become a Patron of this weekly column and help to prevent an old crank from running the streets at night in search of cheap thrills and ill-gotten gains.

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©2015 Mark Mehlmauer   (The Flyoverland Crank)

If you're reading this on my website (where there are tons of older columns, a glossary, and other goodies) and if you wish to react (way cooler than liking) -- please scroll down.

Political Tidbits

Depending on whose numbers you trust, somewhere between a quarter and a third of Republicrats would like to see the Donald become our next president. This is in spite of the fact the King of Combovers publicly disparaged one of his (zir) rivals, the formidable Carly Fiorina (in this day and age!) based on her (hir) looks. "Look at that face. Would anyone vote for that?"

Were I not as high-minded as I am I would urge my tens of readers to search the web for easily available pictures of the Donald's combover caught by the wind, but I'm above that sort of thing.

Also, somewhere between a quarter and a third of Depublicans would like Bernie Sanders to be the nation's next CEO. The 74-year-old Mr. Sanders, a left-wing activist and politician for most of his (zirs) adult life, has more executive experience than Mr. Obama (who became president, twice, without having any). He (ze) ran the sprawling metropolis of Burlington, Vermont, currently the 870'th largest metropolitan area in the US, as mayor, for eight years in the eighties.

He (ze) taught political science for a minute and then landed in Congress in 1991, where he's (ze's) been ever since. Even the mathematically challenged, a group that includes me, can deduce that Mr. Sanders has been a proud member of The Gubmint (aka The Leviathan) for 24 years.

The Wall Street Journal recently estimated that Mr. Sanders spending proposals have a tab of $18,000,000, approximately the same amount as our ever-expanding national debt. Of course, you have to take the estimate with a grain of salt considering what a sleazy tabloid the WSJ is. I'll wager he (ze) doesn't want to spend more than 10 or 12 trillion dollars of other people's money to turn the US into a socialist paradise.


- I'll bet that Donna Braquet won't be supporting the Donald. She's (ze's) the director of The Pride Center at the University of Tennessee. The Pride Center "...provides support, resources, and a community space for UT's LGBTQQIA and ally students, faculty, and staff...".

Ms. Braquet has come up with a way to spare us all the indignity of being tagged with offensive and potentially inaccurate gender-specific pronouns. Being a public-spirited blogger, it was my intention to delve into the many creative pronouns Ms. Braquet has cleverly coined (out of some very thin air) to deal with this problem. However, it seems that even my 39 college credits are not enough of a foundation to grasp the many subtleties involved.

I'm going to have to travel to Knoxville and attend a seminar or two before I feel comfortable expounding on, and being able to use with confidence, newly minted pronouns such as ze, zir and of course, xyr.


- Wayne Crews, who turned in his (zirs) report (Ten Thousand Commandments) for the Competitive Enterprise Institute a few months ago (and reportedly got an A) writes that "If it were a country, U.S. regulation would be the world's tenth-largest economy." Mr. Crews estimates that the total cost of complying with all the Rules & Regs is not quite $1,900,000,000,000 per year.

Seems like a lot but he (ze) says that The Gubmint only spends a paltry $60,000,000,000 a year to make sure we're following the rules, so we must be getting away with murder. While I'm in Knoxville learning to master politically correct personal pronouns I'm going visit the economics and political science departments to see if anyone can explain to me who is paying for the cost of complying with all those Rules & Regs. Personal federal income tax revenues only amount to a paltry $1,400,000,000,000,per year; I'm starting to think that someone, perhaps a lot of someones out there, is/are getting royally screwed.


- Since The Gubmint only spends $60 ,000,000,000 a year to see if we're in compliance with The Gubmint's rules it's probably occurred to some of you that __________ (please feel free to write in the name of anyone that's on your Too Stupid to Live list) is probably getting away with something and that perhaps you could be the one to bring them to justice. Hmmm, if only you had access to all those Rules & Regs.

Well, you do! Just head on over to federalregister.gov and dive in. Anyone can easily access the first million rules, a 2010 milestone, and, however many have been added since. Happy hunting!


- Finally, an apology and some giving credit where credit is due. First, the credit. The concept behind a Too Stupid to Live list was not developed by me, but rather by an ex-friend of mine, Mike R. I can't emphasize the following enough: It's a joke.  Neither one of us maintains such a list and I hope you don't either.

That said, though Mike and I are no longer friends he (ze) deserves credit for the joke, and if by some miracle I should ever make any money off of this particular post, I will track him (zir) down and give it to him (zir). I miss you Mikey, but it's just too hard to be your friend.

As for the apology, I wish to apologize to anyone in the LGBTQQIA community that I have inadvertently offended via the gender-specific pronouns used in any of my columns as well as my great not too shabby American novel that I swear I'll finish if my column ever starts making money.

I've attempted to atone for my sins by placing what I think is the pronoun Ms. Braquet would approve of in parentheses next to the offensive ones in this column. Also, note that I've turned gentle reader into gentlereader in spite of the fact there is no such word as gentlereader. My only justification is that I want to, but I think Ms. Braquet should inspire us all to get creative and update our worn out old language.

Oh poop, I just realized that (the?) Braquet might be offended by my use of Ms. and Donna. After all they both, it would seem, unfairly assume femaleness. I also used Mr. a couple of times, I gotta get my ass to Knoxville...

Have an OK day.


[P.S. Gentlereaders, for 25¢ a week, no, seriously, for 25¢ a week you can become a Patron of this weekly column and help to prevent an old crank from running the streets at night in search of cheap thrills and ill-gotten gains.

If there are some readers out there that think my shtuff is worth a buck or three a month, color me honored, and grateful. Regardless, if you like it, could you please share it? There are buttons at the end of every column.]


©2015 Mark Mehlmauer   (The Flyoverland Crank)

If you're reading this on my website (where there are tons of older columns, a glossary, and other goodies) and if you wish to react (way cooler than liking) -- please scroll down.

When I'm the King of America

When I'm king, the insipid phrase have a nice day will officially be changed to — have an OK day. Hang in there (no exclamation point please) will also be acceptable, but have an OK day has a certain ring to it. Life is sometimes brutal, sometimes nice, but mostly, it's just SBDD (same bonkercockie, different day). So, Omar, how was your day? Well, some of it was nice, some of it was brutal, mostly it was somewhere in between. It was OK. I didn't win the lottery, but I wasn't tortured and killed. I hung in there.

"Have a nice day!," saith the fast-food worker as she shoves the bag containing my (often jacked up) order in my general direction while not making eye contact because her focus has already shifted to the next customer and she's hoping to get the drive-thru window closed before I ask for salt, a bunch of it. 

I always ask for a bunch, so that if I get lucky, I may get two or even three packets instead of one before she snatches her hand away and the window slides shut. Now, if I'm in a reckless mood, or I'm feeling annoyed because I've tapped on the window and received a what are you still doing here glare before she reluctantly slides the window back open, I may exercise the nuclear option. 

As she reluctantly hands me my salt packets (apparently salt volume is the key determinant of profit or loss in the fast-food industry) I'll call up the warmest smile I can muster and say, "I'm sorry, may I have a few more, please? I define food as a salt delivery mechanism" in a charmingly self-effacing tone. I've even been known to chuckle. From the look on her face, I'd have to say that having to hand me salt (again!) has ruined her perfectly nice day.  

This is the second most effective way I know of to gently remind a fast-food employee associate (though chances are it will, at best, be a subliminal reminder) that there's a customer — the source of all revenue  — right here, right now, and in spite of the odds, seeking satisfaction. 

Sometimes, you have to look for it, you'll get an almost startled reaction. Wow, it's one of those sources of all revenue! I've heard stories, but I never thought I'd actually have to do more than toss the bag at them and chirp, Have a nice day!  

I know, I know, she works hard for the money and is definitely not being overpaid. I have a similar problem. However, no customers = no pay. If you want me to have a nice day, gimmiesumsalt, and don't jack up my order. Say thank you and I'll dance at your wedding (or divorce). 

What's the number one most effective way to gently nudge an FFA onto the same level of reality as oneself? Order a sundae, and ask them to make it with half strawberry and half chocolate syrup. Awkward pause. But...but there's no button for that! Hilarity ensues. You may get to meet the manager on duty.

Now, if I manage to get more than one salt packet, with a minimum of hassle, this will indeed be, at the very least, a nice moment. If I get a thank you (for giving up some of my hard-earned money), I'll know it's a sign from God and buy some scratch-off lottery tickets. Maybe I'll win big and man, wouldn't that be a nice day? 

Alternatively, it could turn ugly and snowball downhill into a brutal day via not enough salt, a jacked-up order, flat soda pop, stale buns, fries that have cooled off and reverted to their natural state (plastic), etc. And, of course, having to deal with me could nudge her day in a brutal direction.

The point is... There's a point? Yes, smartypants, there's a point. Me and Destiny (I feel as if I've come to know her) have fairly limited control over whom or what wanders into our personal reality zones and sparks a nice or brutal moment or day. Also, nice or brutal can easily morph into their opposites. 

If I win big in the lottery it might ultimately result in my degeneration into a perverted libertine and slobbering drug addict, which would be (mostly) a bad thing. If I were to be kidnaped by ISIS operatives and tortured for information because they've mistaken me for the head of the drone pilot training program but I was rescued by Leroy Jethro Gibbs and his team, that would be a nice thing and me and my work might go viral.

However, Destiny and I (who, for the record, is 76, and will be introducing me to her friends and parents when we go mall walking tomorrow), having rejected society's misguided embrace of the elusive and capricious nice day concept, choose to embrace having an OK day, and hope you do as well. 

Brutal days are going to happen to you in spite of lucky charms, prayers, and positive affirmations. Nice days are going to happen to you in spite of curses, your boss, The Fedrl Gummit, or the gummits. As long as you're not dead, no matter what happens it could always be worse, and it might even get better. But there's only so much you can do about it, so why not split the difference and strive for an OK day? OK blunts the brutal and nurtures the nice.

On a personal note, Destiny and I have decided to get married, probably next June. All of my readers are invited but please RSVP and be aware that no one will be admitted without a gift. Hang in there.

 

Round and Round and Round We Go

I'm a tweaker. No, not that kind of tweaker, I'm a post tweaker, by which I mean that I tweak my posts, not that I'm a consumer of recreational stimulants. I'm sorry to bother you with this but due to the fact my readership has snowballed (there are literally tens of people reading my work) I feel that I must be transparent about how I do things so as not to violate the trust of my readers. The fact is, I don't hesitate to make changes to anything you'll find written here.

Why? Kaizen. No, that's not a battle cry (KAI-ZEN!) it's a philosophy, and an attitude of sorts. I define it as continuous tweaking, the purpose of which is continuous improvement. I'll spare you a lecture on the who/what/when/where/why of the word because it would be boring and besides, I'm eminently unqualified to do so.

Let's just define it as a Japanese business philosophy that posits that continuous improvements (tweaking) are one of the best ways to deal with one of life's immutable laws, rust never sleeps. Toyota is really good at this sort of thing, I try to be. I don't think twice about changing my words around if I think that a given change enhances clarity or meaning, or might be funnier. So if you should have occasion to reread something you found here and it's different, well, don't be alarmed, it's me, not you.

Finally, it may be worth your while to reread anything you happened to have liked in the past, it might be better. It might not, but then you can rant about what a hoople-head I am. Kick me, spare your dog.

In my personal version of Kaizen, facts are very important. Sometimes, what is written in stone may turn out to be false and may require the services of your stone carver of choice for updates. However inconvenient this may be there's no way around it, not if you believe, as I do, that continually tweaking facts to reflect reality as it is, not as what we'd like it to be, is of the utmost importance.

I would like to rent a larger, nicer house than the one I do but if I refuse to acknowledge that I'm living in the best house I can currently afford, I risk creating a downward spiral that could end with me living in the back of my van. Though the van is paid for, my house is more comfortable and has a bathroom.

Now, when I, my snifficant others and/or the other kids on the playground have to hammer out how we're going to solve a given problem or deal with a given phenomenon, trying to agree on the facts of the matter is the place to start. If we can't agree on what's actually going on, we can't agree on a rational course of action or a solution.

The Donald, the preferred presidential candidate of wrestling and reality show fans everywhere, has assured himself, at the very least, a place in American history in part by exploiting recent violent tragedies perpetrated by illegal immigrants. He, along with our who needs context when there's blood in the water media, often ignore one inconvenient fact.

Multiple studies (feel free to google among yourselves) have come to the conclusion that immigrants, legal or not, are less likely to commit crimes of all sorts, than the natives. Round and Round and Round we go.

So, are cops deliberately killing African Americans? Is the Black Lives Matter movement correct in asserting that they are and that this justifies people chanting, "Pigs in a blanket, fry 'em like bacon," during protest marches? We don't know.

There are no legally mandated national reporting requirements for the FBI to create a database to try and answer the question. This doesn't prevent people on either side of the question from quoting from what statistics there are in order to promote their cause. But not only do we not truly know, there's no objective effort underway to find out, at least that I'm aware of. Round and Round and Round we go.

We do know that African-Americans, roughly 13% of the population of the US, commit slightly more than half of all murders and that they are mostly killing other black folks. More than 90% of murdered African-Americans are killed by other African-Americans.

Obviously, the average black citizen is just as unlikely to be a killer as the average white citizen, considerably less than 1% of the 13% I would think. Finding a solution to this factual problem would seem to be of benefit to both blacks and whites. So what. If you bring it up you're a racist if you're white, and if you're black, an uncle Tom. Round and Round and Round we go, where we stop, nobody knows.

"Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence." John Adams

Have an OK day.


[P.S. Gentlereaders, for 25¢ a week, no, seriously, for 25¢ a week you can become a Patron of this weekly column and help to prevent an old crank from running the streets at night in search of cheap thrills and ill-gotten gains.

If there are some readers out there that think my shtuff is worth a buck or three a month, color me honored, and grateful. Regardless, if you like it, could you please share it? There are buttons at the end of every column.]


©2015 Mark Mehlmauer   (The Flyoverland Crank)

If you're reading this on my website (where there are tons of older columns, a glossary, and other goodies) and if you wish to react (way cooler than liking) -- please scroll down.

      

The Denali/McKinley Controversy

There has been much passionate debate, wailing, teeth gnashing, rending of garments and the like over a seemingly endless controversy that has divided the nation since 1975.

The denizens of King Crank's Lair -- myself and my cadre of semi-loyal followers (you are no doubt familiar with the phrase, ...like herding cats) -- being residents of Mr. McKinleys Ohio (well, technically) are no exception. Personally, my unwavering position is written in stone -- one way or another, I don't care. I've maintained this position consistently since I first became aware there was a controversy, a few hours ago.

Being a self-identified current events junkie (see Introduction) I've been aware of the impending name change for a couple of days or so. I realize, however, that many of you, having an actual life, may be completely unaware of not only the name change but the controversy behind it as well.

Not to worry. In keeping with this blog's theoretical mission statement (by which I mean there is no actual mission statement but hey, it could happen) I present the following in the spirit of public service.

The Mount McKinley moniker was chosen by William Dickey, an explorer from Seattle who was leading some gold prospectors around and "discovered" a huge mountain. When Mr. Dickey and his buds returned to the lower 48 (do you suppose that the Hawaiians ever refer to the mainland as the eastern 48? I'm just askin'...) he wrote an article for the New York Sun newspaper about his adventures in the Klondike gold rush.

He states in his article that the first news he heard on the way out of the wilderness was that William McKinley had been nominated by the Republicrats to be president. He states that "we" decided to name the mountain after the nominee, meaning that he and his buds, based on no authority that I can find, took it upon themselves to re-name the largest mountain in North America.

Rename? Yup. According to Wikipedia, the Indians that lived there called it Denali. A German, Ferdinand von Wrangel, who ran things in Alaska for the Russians for a minute named it Tenada. The commonly used name, by the Russians, was Bolshaya Gora (big mountain). The first English name was Densmore's Mountain, Mr. Densmore being a local gold prospector. There are even more names available, but we'll stick with the more commonly used ones.

There's even an unconfirmable, but generally accepted story, that Mr. Dickey, an advocate of a gold monetary standard, named the mountain after McKinley (also a supporter of the gold standard) to mess with the heads of a bunch of prospectors he knew that supported McKinley's Depublican opponent and famous proponent of a silver standard, William Jennings Bryan.

A couple of US Geological Service reports in the early 1900s used the name Mount McKinley and when President Mckinley was assassinated in 1901, to honor him, Congress officially named the mountain after him -- 16 years later.

If the Depublicans had put that much work into Obamacare we'd have a system like Singapore's. That's how things stood until all hell broke loose in 1975. Well, maybe only a suburb of hell, certainly not center city hell.

The local Alaskan officials in charge of such things petitioned the federal officials in charge of such things to change the name back to what the Indians, who were there first after all, called the mountain -- Denali.

Into the breach stepped Ralph Straus Regula. Mr. Regula was a congressperson that proudly represented the people of Canton, Ohio from 1973 to 2009. President McKinley, though born in Niles, Ohio moved to Canton after the Civil War and the rest is, well, history.

Oh, before I forget, there's a very nice memorial in Niles that's well worth a visit if you're into that sort of thing. Also, you can visit his restored childhood home that's on the main street of town, just a few blocks from the memorial.

I just spent an all-nighter trying to find out why no one seems to care that apparently the McKinleys were the first people in the world to have a house covered with vinyl siding but I can find no mention of this fact anywhere. Rest assured I will not rest until I get to the bottom of this.

Sorry...where was I? Oh yeah, Mr. Regula. The congressperson, despite having a productive career in Congress, managed to find the time to block the name change by a series of procedural maneuvers over the years. Personally, I think a more productive use of his time would've been finding a way to change the official spelling of the word maneuvers; but you have to choose your battles and Mr. Regula was determined that President McKinley should retain the honor bestowed by Congress and fought valiantly to prevent the denaming of the mountain.

He persevered in spite of the fact Mr. McKinley had never visited Alaska or is even linked to the state or it's majestic mountain in any particular way. Well, he was the president of the country it was part of. At the time of his death, there were about 60,000 souls living in the Last Frontier, that's about the size of The Jewel of the Midwest -- Warren, Ohio (right up the road from Niles), before the local economy collapsed and they lost a few folks (20,000, more or less).

The Gubmint never sleeps. President Obama, consistent in his policy to ignore Congress whenever he knows he's right, engineered the denaming to create a sort of commercial for a three-day global warming road show in Alaska; Rob Portman, Senator (R.-OH), has reportedly issued no less than five tweets in protest.

Keep up the good work guys. Incidentally, denaming is the official technical term for changing the name of a national landmark back to one of the names it had before it had an official US Gubmint name.

By the way, it's Denali, not Mount Denali because Denali translates as, "The Big One" or "The High One" so it would be like calling it Mount The Big One or Mount The High One. Apparently, the local Indians weren't particularly creative when it came to naming things. But considering that Alaska was one of the first states to decriminalize weed, they may have been somewhat prescient.

 Have an OK day.


[P.S. Gentlereaders, for 25¢ a week, no, seriously, for 25¢ a week you can become a Patron of this weekly column and help to prevent an old crank from running the streets at night in search of cheap thrills and ill-gotten gains.

If there are some readers out there that think my shtuff is worth a buck or three a month, color me honored, and grateful. Regardless, if you like it, could you please share it? There are buttons at the end of every column.]


©2017 Mark Mehlmauer   (The Flyoverland Crank)

If you're reading this on my website (where there are tons of older columns, a glossary, and other goodies) and if you wish to react (way cooler than liking) -- please scroll down.