Columns

Chronic Puns

The San Francisco Chronicle got 2022 off to a snappy start with one of its classic headline puns. The January 2 edition included a page-one report on how COVID masking conflicts were exercising exercise emporiums. The headline read: "Gyms worry masks won't work out."

Fashion Plates

If Harry Potter owned a car, it would probably be a Tesla. With that in mind, I was entranced to encounter a parked Tesla sporting a license plate that read: DSAPAR8.

It took some Googling to sleuth-out the hidden message but I finally discovered that "disapparate" is a word created by J. K. Rowling to signify teleportation. According to the Wiktionary website, "in derived usage, it often means just to disappear completely"—usually with the wave of a wand. Which is pretty close to what would happen if you floored a Tesla's electron-pedal and bolted from zero to 60 mph in less than two seconds. 

End-of-the-Year Fund-raising Hype 

In late December 2021, Win Without War, a US-based peace organization, sent out a year-end message that may have overstated its accomplishments just a wee bit. Especially with the following: 

"[W]e’re proud of the victories we won together this year: putting the brakes on out-of-control Pentagon spending, limiting US complicity in Yemen, reining in out-of-control war powers, and ending the US war in Afghanistan." 

Stepping Up to Defend the Country 

While the Pentagon is trying (and failing) to portray compulsory military recruiting of both men and women as a step forward for "feminism," military leaders in Ukraine seemed to take a step backwards by ordering female recruits to wear high-heeled shoes while marching in parades. When the practice was introduced last July during 30^th anniversary of the country's independence, critics refused to toe the line, calling the footwear orders "sexist." 

Ukrainian Vice Prime Minister Olga Stefanishina issued a statement noting that "shoes with heels are incompatible with the combat capability of soldiers, and a 'Prussian' step on a parade in such shoes is a deliberate harm to the health of soldiers." 

A number of NATO nations require female soldiers to wear heels—in noncombat situations, of course. In the US, many female soldiers are expected to wear low-heel footwear and, for special formal occasions, floor-length gowns referred to as a "mess dress." Official Pentagon regulations call for "black pumps … with a raised heel no higher than 2-1/2 inches." 

So far, there are no plans to order female recruits to defend the Homeland while wearing "strapless combat gowns," "slit-skirt lace fatigues," or "camouflage jungle bikinis." 

In a relaxation of male-imposed dress codes, America's female soldiers are now allowed to wear ponytails and braids. (The previous mandate that dictated "buns only" proved incompatible with the wearing of helmets.) 

Ironically, high-heel military footwear was pioneered in tenth-century Persia when male soldiers needed to steady their feet while firing arrows from horseback. High-heeled boots also made Persia's soldiers look taller and more threatening. 

With that same dynamic in mind, North Korea has taken to demonstrating its heightened militant resolve by parading hundred of female soldiers strutting proudly atop four-inch heels. 

Karmic Strips 

Sherman's Lagoon—a syndicated comic strip featuring talking sharks, sea turtles and crabs—recently exposed a well-kept Pentagon secret: The UN Navy has been testing ocean-going submarines in a "mysterious lake" deep in the land-locked state of Idaho. No joke, I looked it up: here's a link! 

Great Scott! A Comic Strip Revives a Musical Legend 

Meanwhile, Darrin Bell's Candorville devoted the first week of the New Year to Lemont Brown's reminiscence of discovering a piano hidden in his mother's basement. It wasn't just any piano, we learn. It was a piano that once belonged to Hazel Scott. At this point, I'll let Lemont tell the story: 

"You've heard of Lena Horne. You've heard of Billie Holiday. But I bet you've never heard of Hazel Scott. She was one of the most talented and famous performers in the world for decades. She refused to play in segregated clubs. She was a big-time civil rights activist. And she even testified in Congress and told Joe McCarthy's communist witch-hunt committee they were immoral. America was a lot like Fox News back then." 

Lemont wrapped up the story in the January 7 strip: 

"I asked momma why she has Hazel Scott's piano in her basement. She said back in the 1930s, my grandma played in an all-women's band with Hazel Scott in New York. She wouldn't tell me how she got the piano, but she said it involved a poker game, a bottle of scotch and Eleanor Roosevelt." 

Lemont's girlfriend, Susan Garcia, asks: "You ever get the impression the older folks had more interesting lives than we do?" 

Lemont agrees and offers an explanation: "They had no Twitter. So they had to go do stuff." 

And now, here's a clip of Hazel Scott doing her stuff! 

Crash Test Dummies and Gender Disparity 

That's the title of one of the oddest campaigns being promoted by the Care2 Petitions Team. But they've got the evidence that, when it comes to auto-safety, there's a blindspot the industry and regulators need to address. To wit: "A whopping 38,000 Americans die in car accidents each year [and] the US has more road accidents than any other nation in the world." But these motorized mortalities are "disproportionately high" because there are no "crash dummies" for "women, trans and non-binary folks."  

Turns out, all auto-crash risks are factored on the basis of a single narrow 50-year-old standard known as the "50th percentile male." This explains why all crash dummies resemble 171-pound, 5'9" men. According to the campaign petition: "Research shows that people who are not cis men are more than 17% more likely to be killed in traffic accidents, and have 73% greater odds of being seriously injured."  

The petition spells out the remedy: "The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration could easily change this by requiring crash test dummies to represent all bodies … not just male ones." 

Can't We Be a Bit More Civil? 

Rightwing social media is filled with racist screed and partisan insults, but name-calling is not journalism. Unfortunately this Alex-Jonesing of political debate is not confined to the sound-booth vibes of InfoWars. Leftist commentators (under the spell of social media hyperbola) have also allowed their commentary to coarsen and curdle. An example? The Daily Kos (an otherwise good source of cutting-edge political criticism) dispatched the following hate-bait provocations on January 3, 2022. 

• Florida and its residents for the most part are selfish jerks  

• Pro-COVID pervert Jim Jordan and his GOP Judiciary jackasses throw toxic Twitter tantrum 

Homer Simpson and the Economy 

The question has been raised: "How is it that Homer Simpson manages to own a home and two cars and feed a family of five with a single job that pays only $50,000 a year?" The challenge comes from a working-class organization called More Perfect Union, self-described as "a new nonprofit media org with a mission to empower working people." And here's MPU's video on what they heard from "The REAL Homer Simpsons Of Today." 

Abbott's Habits: A Sack of Grab-its  

Looking for proof that Gov. Greg Abbott is sabotaging democracy in the nation's biggest state? Here's online commentator Steve Hofstetter gleefully explaining—in gritty and grinding detail—how a single Texas governor has been able to accomplish so much—for so few. 

Clearing the House 

Publishers Clearing House persists in sending me their signature oversized/overstuffed envelopes offering scores of consumer kitsch and promising humongous prize-winning payouts. The late December mailers were covered with the usual hyper-tantalizing come-ons. The outside front of a single envelope contained the following alerts: "Final Days to Win It All!" "Only Available Here." "Urgent: Deadline Restrictions in Effect." "Official Triple Upgrade: $1,000,000,000 at Once plus $15,00 a Week for Life plus Maximum Prize Numbers plus a Brand-new Ford Explorer Hybrid." 

Inside, there are a half-dozen documents that are personalized, including a triple-folded sheet designed to look like a green leather certificate holder that displayed my name below a header that read: "Portfolio of Triple Upgrades Prepared For…." The Portfolio explained how receiving a million dollars plus $15,000 per week would grow to "almost $5 million in just 5 years." A nearby bar chart shows how the windfall could swell to more than $32 million over the next four decades "and it keeps on growing." 

Also inside: nearly 40 mini-fliers promoting more than 80 items ranging from kitchen gear to workshop tools to bed sheets, wall hangings, bathrobes, table snacks and holiday toys. Among the offerings that caught my eye:
A Money Machine — a battery-powered jar that automatically tabulates the accrued value of the coins dropped into it ("Up to $999.99").
A Cuddler Cave — essentially a sleeping bag for household pets.
Stuffing-Free Monster Dog Toys — "Squeaker inside for added fun."
Glow-in-the-Dark Tape — A safety tool for stairs and bicycle wheels comes with a catch: it only works when "recharged by a light source."
A Telescopic 6-ft Jumbo Microfiber Duster — a rainbow-colored dust-mop on the tip of a really long handle. 

A 30-Pair Shoe Tower — For individuals with too many shoes or families with too many feet.
A Southwest Style Wall Cross — Cultural appropriation in the wake of Western conquest, a foot-tall Christian crucifix that incorporates an "intricately detailed carved feather design" that, as PCH sees it, evokes not the history of the Native American genocide but a "Beautiful Symbol of Faith."
And, finally, a DVD entitled "Erotic Nude Yoga: Intimate Routines for Great Sex." Kinda shocking, coming from PCH (who knew the kitsch-master was also a kink-meister?) An advisory in small type promises discrete shipping and suggests consulting a doctor before attempting some of the pornish postures. "Results may vary." 

Dear PCH 

In related news, PCH surprised me with an unexpected announcement—an invoice for nearly $40 in goods and services I never requested. That prompted the following note: 

"I did not place an order for four AA and four AAA batteries. And how do you justify charging folks a $5.99 'shipping-and-handling fee' for including a 'free gift' that was never ordered?" 

On the plus side: PCH responded quickly with an apology and a suggestion that, if the order was already on its way, I should simply toss the contents and forget this ever happened. 

Abhor-Rent: 525,600 Minutes Since The Trump Insurrection 

Stephen Colbert's The Late Show