Wednesday, July 24, 2019

Dateline: Paris, France

News That You Can Use (Vol. 5)
Daily Paper, Newspaper, Daily News, Publication, Media
pixabay

If you're new here, this is a weekly column consisting of letters written to my (eventual) grandchildren (who exist) and my great-grandchildren (who don't, yet) -- the Stickies -- to haunt them after they become grups and/or I'm dead.

[The following column is rated SSC (Sexy Seasoned Citizens). If read by grups or callowyutes it may result in psychological/emotional/etceteralogical triggering.]


                                                 Glossary  

                                         Just who IS this guy?


Irregularly Appearing Imaginary Guest Star: Dana -- A gentlereader

"The truthiness is, anyone can read the news to you. I promise to feel the news 'at' you." -Stephen Colbert 


Dear (eventual) Grandstickies & Great-grandstickies (& gentlereaders),

Marie-Louise and Iggy came to me in a dream recently to inform me that Iggy has been selected by a rich, powerful, low profile polymath to live with him on his secret island and be his protege/heir/student (he and his wife are childless).

All the result of a random encounter at the Louvre when he and his wife overheard Marie-Louise and Iggy having a friendly argument about I.M. Pei's pyramid and joined in the discussion. I guess the controversy still simmers.

Well, I didn't see that coming! Although I'll miss the Iggmeister, plans have already been made for me to visit next Christmas. Anyways, I've no right to interfere in this once in a lifetime opportunity.

Iggy will get to finish growing up and have a life like the one I might've had if my family of dissolute European aristocrats had not sold me to Gypsies.

This, as you know, was the first link in a chain of events that led eventually to my "father" winning me in a poker game at the Gem Saloon in Deadwood, South Dakota.

Marie-Louise will stay with him for the foreseeable future but continue to inspire me from afar. As to...

[Cough, cough. What happened to news that they can use?]

I'm just taking care of some necessary column housekeeping, Dana. Besides, I do have a couple of fans that will regard the above as news they can use.


News That You Can Use (No 4), I recently discovered, was published back in March. Speaking of housekeeping, having recently turned three (the column, not me) I've been cleaning/updating/reorganizing/etceterizing. I found N.T.Y.C.U. (No. 4) being used to level a wobbly table in the armory.

Methinks it's time for a new column.

Dateline, France: France turns down citizenship for immigrant nurse because 'she works too much' 

Summary of the article linked to above: the nurse in question has to wait for two extra years to become a citizen of France because she has flaunted French law. She has regularly and routinely ignored the statute that makes it illegal to work more than 48 hours a week (including overtime, which apparently starts after 35 hours).

This unscrupulous, villainous healthcare professional has three jobs and averages a total of 59 hours a week taking care of patients.


Technically, the following news is olds because it's been true for quite some time. Still, it's good to know that the region -- world-famous manufacturing, hi-technology, and health care hub -- continues to thrive. 

Dateline: The Swamp. The 5 Counties with the Highest Median Household Income All Reside in the D.C. Area

Summary of the article linked to above: as the article's title indicates, the five
counties bordering the Swamp have the highest median household income in the United States of America... And that's all I have to say about that.


Dateline: Berkely, People's Republic of California. The City Council of Berkeley governs at the bleeding edge of Wokeness. Recently, in the course of the same week, they passed two laws. One to promote social justice and one to save the environment.

Never let it be said that the taxpayers of Berkely ain't gettin' their money's worth.
Gendered language like 'manhole' will soon be banned from Berkley's civil codes

As to the Nat gas ban, starting on the first day of next year the new law "requires all new single-family homes, townhomes and small apartment buildings to have electric infrastructure."

The council plans to eventually expand the law to cover all new buildings and have created a new, full-time gummit job for someone to make sure that nobody tries to put up a new building that uses natural gas. 

The job will pay $273,341 per year.

[Wanting to do my bit to save the planet, I hereby volunteer to do the job for only $270,341 per year -- if I get paid by the hour.] 

As to gendered language in general, manhole in particular, I probably should resist the temptation to repeat a very old joke that could possibly trigger all sorts of marginalized victims of this, that, and that other thing. 

[Are you referring to -- What's another name for sanitary napkins? manhole covers? -- you're right, you probably shouldn't mention it.] 

I just thought of something, I wonder what they're going to do about the obviously cisgendered/patriarchal/sexist/etceterist practice of referring to the two halves of various connectors as male and female?

Innies and outies? Anyways... 


Dateline: Paris, France. The Shift Project a...

[Wait-wait-wait. Everyone knows that Paris is in France. Who are you trying to impress? Geez, ain't it bad enough this thing started with a mention of the Lourve?]

Asamatterafact, I have a nephew who lives in Paris. Paris, Pennsylvania. Asamatterafact there are 23 cities in the USA called Paris. So why don't you just...

[Fine, let's just move on.]

Harrumph. The Shift Project, "...a French think tank advocating the shift to a post-carbon economy" has completed a study and discovered that "Digital technologies now emit 4% of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, that is to say, more than civil aviation" (my comma after say, their emboldeninization).

That is also to say, they say, that online video alone is responsible for 1% of global GHG emissions. Binge-watching is destroying the planet!

Solution?

The imposition of "Digital Sobriety" by legislation before it's too late. I can't recommend reading the Key Takeaways portion of the study (it's at the very beginning) enough.

And just because I can, I wish to point out that study somehow figured out that watching porn is responsible for almost .2% of GHG emissions. 

Poppa loves you, 
Have an OK day 

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©2019 Mark Mehlmauer As long as you agree to supply my name and URL (Creative Commons license at the top and bottom of my website) you may republish this anywhere that you please. Light editing that doesn't alter the content is acceptable. You don't have to include any of the folderol before the greeting or after the closing (Have an OK day) except for the title.      







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