Baltimore

Just got back from a wedding in Baltimore, Maryland.  More traffic than one can imagine–true gridlock.  Poor highway markings.  You come up on a sign which says your exit is 1 mile away, and when you get there you don’t know if your turn is left or right.  You try to stay in the middle and hope that you can get over to the correct side, which is tough with bumper-to-bumper traffic.  Stayed in a fancy hotel  on the Inner Harbor, with lots of old restored brick warehouses turned into condos.  All in all, though, I would prefer Philadelphia.  I did get to watch Florida play South Carolina in football, however, and learned that that game was the first time that a Heisman winning coach had coached against a Heisman winning player.  In another game I watched, the announcer said that the rookie receiver (I don’t remember the name) had the distinction of being the first player in college football  history to catch his first 2 rookie passes in the opponent’s territory.  Oh, back to Baltimore.  It is a lot like the West End or Deep Elm in Dallas, only colder and rainier and stuff. 

A Little Knowledge

One of our friends from the past loves to tell the story about her pre-teen daughter.  One day when she was getting out of the shower her daughter came in the bathroom.  Later her daughter said proudly “I saw your penis.”

The German Experiment

I was browsing a book in Barnes and Noble recently, and read about an experiment in Germany in 1964, where the underwear of 500 people were examined for fecal contamination.  The results indicated that all were contaminated, and that some were seriously contaminated (They didn’t explain what “serious” was.) If that could happen in Germany, it makes me wonder what the results might have been like in Italy, Spain, Poland, or (heaven forbid) France.  I heard a comedian say that the person who invented white underwear should be locked up.  Investigation, anyone?

Bulletin Board

On a recent trip to Ruidoso, New Mexico, to visit one of my summer vacation residences,  I had occasion to lunch at the exclusive Alto Golf Club.  After lunch I walked town the hall of the club toward the Pro Shop, toothpick hanging casually from the corner of my mouth (not really).  Outside the Pro Shop there was a bulletin board with (among other announcements) the minutes of a recent Executive Committee meeting of the Golf Club.   I started to read the minutes, and noted that they concerned expansion and improvements to the sewer systems in and around the Club.  Under each topic, there was a paragraph devoted to what was discussed and decided in the meeting.  For example,under “Waste Water Management”  a new waste water facility was to be built and another expanded.  A “Sewer Expansion Plan” was identified to add sewer lines to the new areas under development around the Club.   Under “Liquid Waste” a plan was described to put in place  a new filtering system.  Finally,  under “Solid Waste” there was nothing but the statement “No comment.”  It was like they didn’t want to talk about it.  Made me wonder why they would even list it as a topic for the meeting.  Maybe someone can help me with this. 

On the way back to the El Paso airport later in the day I passed a small insurance office in a strip mall on Montana Street.  A big sign on a pole in front of the building announced the name of the insurance agency, then below the name was the statement  “The most beloved insurance agents in the United States.”