The show starts in the foyer.
Guests are greeted there by women in dark red togas wearing gilded arm cuffs, looking like they just walked off the set of “Ben-Hur,” the 1959 Hollywood epic about the Roman empire and chariot races. The women are here to take your coat, then hand you off to a colleague who appears to be dressed as an extra from the same movie, who will whisk you through the door and into the theater.
Strike that. It’s a dining room, albeit one so eager to project theatrical opulence, and so crammed with color and lush fabrics, that it seems to belong on a stage.
ATLANTA — Two days after a gunman killed 10 people at a Colorado grocery store, leaving many Americans on high alert, Rico Marley was arrested as he emerged from the bathroom at a Publix supermarket in Atlanta. He was wearing body armor and carrying six loaded weapons — four handguns in his jacket pockets, and in a guitar bag, a semiautomatic rifle and a 12-gauge shotgun.
O
Senator Patty Murray, a Democrat, had consistently won re-election by healthy margins in her three decades representing Washington State. This year seemed no different: By midsummer, polls showed her cruising to victory over a Republican newcomer, Tiffany Smiley, by as much as 20 percentage points.
So when a survey in late September by the Republican-leaning Trafalgar Group showed Ms. Murray clinging to a lead of just two points, it seemed like an aberration. But in October, two moreRepublican-
Jennifer Savage was scrambling to pull something together for dinner. Deep in the back of her fridge, she found a container of stuffed peppers. Very old stuffed peppers. She groaned, then did what millions of Americans do every day, without a second thought: She scraped the rotten food into the garbage.
Sitting nearby, her daughter, Riley, burst into tears.
Riley, then a fourth grader, had learned at school about people who don’t have enough food to eat. She’d also learned about the impact of food waste on the planet: When food rots in landfills, it generates methane, a greenhouse gas far more potent than carbon dioxide. Seeing her mother toss one of her favorite meals in the trash brought these messages home
I’m never going to a brick and mortar store again!
Well, unless there is service. Like at the ski shop in Vail. But you pay for that service, more
than MAP (Minimum Advertised Price). But the employees have been at it for years, unlike
at Vail Sports, where the seasonal employees mounted all the demo skis incorrectly.
But no one wants to pay for service. That’s the conundrum. People want a rock bottom price
for their flight. They want every last penny squeezed out of the deal. As a result, the few
people who are working retail are untrained and inexperienced and therefore unhelpful.
Just a year ago, we were focusing on Russian troops massing on the border with Ukraine, which the U.S. government and allies recognized as an attempt both to keep Ukraine from joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), a longstanding military alliance resisting Russian expansion, and to test the unity of the democratic nations that made up NATO itself. Former president Donald Trump had weakened NATO and vowed to pull the U.S. out of it if he won a second term, demoralizing our allies, but Democratic president Joe Biden and his secretary of state, Antony Blinken, had worked hard to pull the alliance back together.
Biden worked the phones and Blinken flew around the world, talking to allies not only to warn them but also to get pledges to pressure Russia, help Ukraine defend itself, and accept refugees if necessary. On one day alone, Biden spoke with leaders from the U.K., France, Germany, Italy, Canada, Poland, and Romania; the secretary general of NATO; and the presidents of the European Union.
"What are you doing?!" she asked. "I'm waiting for Brian to come home from work," the daughter-in-law answered."But you're naked," the mother-in-law exclaimed."This is my love dress," the daughter-in- law explained."Love dress? But you're naked!”"Brian loves me and wants me to wear this dress," she explained. "It excites him to no end. Every time he sees me in this dress, he instantly becomes romantic and makes love to me for hours on end. He can't get enough of me.”The mother-in-law left.When she got home, she undressed, showered, put on her best perfume, dimmed the lights, put on a romantic CD, and laid on the couch, waiting for her husband to arrive. Finally, her husband came home from the golf club.He walked in and saw her laying there so provocatively."What are you doing?" he asked."This is my love dress." she whispered sensually."Needs ironing," he said "What's for dinner?He never heard the gunshot….
Morality: If you share critical information pertaining to credit and risk with your shareholders on time, you may be in a position to prevent avoidable exposure.
Morality: If you are not well informed in your job, you might miss a great opportunity.
Morality: Always let your boss have the first say.
Morality: To be sitting and doing nothing, you must be sitting very, very high.
Morality: Bullsh*t might get you to the top, but it won’t keep you there.
Today's Villages jokeA few years ago, my wife and I moved into a retirement development inMorality:1- Not everyone who sh*ts on you is your enemy.2- Not everyone who gets you out of sh*t is your friend.3- And when you are in deep sh*t, it’s best to keep your mouth shut.
There are 3,000 lakes in Florida; only three are real.
Our biggest retirement concern was time management. What were we going
to do all day? No longer. Let me assure you, passing the time is not a
problem.
Our days are eaten up by simple, daily activities. Just getting out of
our car takes 15 minutes. Trying to find where we parked takes 20
minutes. It takes a half-hour in the check-out line in Wal-Mart, and 1
hour to return the item the next day.
Let me take you through a typical day: We get up at5:00 am, have a
quick breakfast and join the early morning Walk-and-Fart Club. There
are about 30 of us, and rain or shine, we walk around the streets, all
talking at once. Every development has some late risers who stay in
bed until 6:00 am. After a nimble walk, avoiding irate drivers out to
make us road kill, we go back home, shower and change for the next
activity.
My wife goes directly to the pool for her underwater Pilates class,
followed by gasping for breath and CPR. I put on my 'Ask me about my
Grandchildren' T-shirt, my plaid mid-calf shorts, my black socks and
sandals and go to the clubhouse lobby for a nice nap. Before we know
it, it's time for lunch.
We go to Costco to partake of the many tasty samples dispensed by
ladies in white hair nets. All free! After a filling lunch, if we
don't have any doctor appointments, we might go to the flea market to
see if any new white belts have come in or to buy a Rolex watch for
$2.00.
We're usually back home by 2:00 pm to get ready for dinner. People
start lining up for the early bird about 3:00 pm, but we get there by
3:45 because we're late eaters.
The dinners are very popular because of the large portions they serve.
We can take home enough food for the next day's lunch and dinner,
including extra bread, crackers, packets of mustard, relish, ketchup
and Splenda, along with mints.
At 5:30 pm we're home, ready to watch the 6 o'clocknews. By 6:30 pm
we're fast asleep. Then we get up and make five or six trips to the
bathroom during the night, and it's time to get up and start a new day
all over again.
Doctor-related activities eat up most of our retirement time. I enjoy
reading old magazines in sub-zero temperatures in the waiting room, so
I don't mind.
Calling for test results also helps the days fly by. It takes at least
a half-hour just getting through the doctor's phone menu. Then there's
the hold time until we're connected to the right party. Sometimes they
forget we're holding, and the whole office goes off to lunch.
Should we find we still have time on our hands, volunteering provides
a rewarding opportunity to help the less fortunate.
Florida has the largest concentration of seniors under five feet and
they need our help. I myself am a volunteer for 'The Vertically
Challenged Over 80.' I coach their basketball team, The Arthritic
Avengers. The hoop is only 4-1/2 feet from the floor. You should see
the look of confidence on their faces when they make a slam dunk.
Food shopping is a problem for short seniors, or 'bottom feeders' as
we call them, because they can't reach the items on the upper shelves.
There are many foods they've never tasted. After shopping, most
seniors can't remember where they parked their carts and wander the
parking lot for hours while their food defrosts.
Lastly, it's important to choose a development with an impressive
name. Italian names are very popular in Florida. They convey world
travelers, uppity sophistication and wealth. Where would you rather
live: Gary's Condos or the Lakes of Venice? There's no difference --
they're both owned by Gary, who happens to be a cheap bastard.
I hope this material has been of help to you future retirees. If I can
be of any further assistance, please look me up when
you're in Florida. I live in the Leaning Condos of Pisa in Lady Lake.
My grandmother died in the 80's but her birthday is coming up, and that always causes me to reminisce: the long walks we used to take to the shops in town, the 5 cents she gave me for meaningless jobs like pulling weeds or cleaning off the driveway. Her soothing hands helped when I would get hurt. But the thing I remember most was her sage advice.Once when I was about 13, we were sitting in the park enjoying a cookie and a Coke. She told me that one day I would find a wonderful woman and start my own family."Always remember this,” she said. "Be sure you marry a woman with small fingers & hands.""How come, Grandma?"She smiled and said gently, "Makes your dick look bigger.”Kinda brings a tear to your eye.
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