A Blog Post Full of Really Bad Words

The ever-helpful New York Department of Education has alerted us about some really bad words that offend people. They want them banned, at least from standardized test. But let's go for broke and ban them altogether.

Here are some of the nasty words dinosaur, Halloween,  birthday, dancing, homes with swimming pools, running away, rap music, rock music, and disasters such as tsunamis and hurricanes

A kid dressed as a dinosaur for Halloween, thereby
offending the N.Y. Dept. of Education in two ways.

There's a "logic" to the Ed Department's wish to scrub the words from standardized test. "Dinosaur" suggests evolution, which would offend some religious types who don't believe in it. "Birthday" is bad because Jehovah's Witnesses would be offended because they don't celebrate birthdays.

"Halloween" is bad because it suggests paganism. The house with the swimming pool is a no-no because it suggests rich people, which could inspire jealousy. And people are afraid of disasters, so keep those out, too.

CNN reached out to Stanford Professor Sam Wineburg, who thinks the N.Y. Ed. Department is being stupid. (By the way, "stupid" is probably a banned word too. Says Wineburg:

"The purpose of education is to create unpleasant experiences in us. ... The Latin meaning if education is 'to go out.'  Education is not about making us feel warm and fuzzy inside."

Wineburg questioned the idea that the New York City Department of Education would want to "shield kids from these types of encounters."  He said the goal of education is to "prepare them," adding "this is how we dumb down public schools."

Geez, though, I think any word can offend anybody out there.  Maybe we should ban all kinds of words. I have some suggestions.   The word "the" offends me, since it's used so much and I'm sick of it. I have the same problem with words like "and" "it," "a" and "of."

So we just ban words completely, just so we don't offend anybody.

Bohemian Rhapsody Arrested Guy is New YouTube sensation

The latest big celebrity to come out of nowhere via YouTube is one Robert Wilkinson of Edson, Alberta, Canada.

The name doesn't yet ring a bell yet, I'm sure, but you'd recognize him even if you saw the slightest snippet of news over the past day or so.

He's the guy sitting in the back of a Royal Canadian Mounted Police cruiser after his arrest for public intoxication. He belts out the famous Queen song "Bohemian Rhapsody" on his way to the police station in, um, memorable fashion. See for yourself, with more thoughts on this below the vid:



The charge against Wilkinson is public intoxication.  He might have a case strong enough to get acquited, as far as I  can tell.

True, screaming the song "Bohemian Rhapsody" in its entirety after an arrest and while sitting in a police cruiser doesn't exactly strengthen Wilkinson's case. And, not to be negative, but I'm afraid Wilkinson can't really match Freddie Mercury's awesome vocal pyrotechnics as he sings the song.

But, in Wilkinson's favor, he remembers all the lyrics to "Bohemian Rhapsody." If you've seen any drunken driving arrest videos, most arrestees can't even manage to recite the ABCs. Which proves there is some cognitivie function there.

According to the Edmonton Journal, Wilkinson received the video of him singing in the cruiser when he obtained arrest records from the RCMP so he could defend himself in court. He decided to post the video onto YouTube and the rest is history, according the Edmonton Journal report.

Even of Wilkenson is ultimately convicted, he still stands to gain from this experience. Other colorful personalities have gotten fame and fortune from YouTube after their, um, unique perspectives went viral.

Chris Crocker urging us, via YouTube to Leave Britney Alone!!

There's Chris Crocker, the "Leave Britney Alone" guy, who came to the defense of Britney Spears, in a rather dramatic, loud, tearful manner, when Britney was being hounded by the press. And he proved that fans could be bigger drama queens than celebrity drama queens.

He says he's a singer songwriter whose sold 100,000 downloads of his music. He also put an obnoxious self-promoting advertising overlay over his famous video, which has gotten 43 million hits. So Crocker's making money, it seems.

Then there's the double rainbow guy, who was so taken by an admittably awesome double rainbow over Yosemite that he was reduced to a long bout of babbling and tears over the beautiful sight. I guess nature can do that to people. Or pot. Or both.

His video has 33 million hits, and he's selling merchandise from the notoriety, including t-shirts and some sort of double rainbow iPhone download.

Then there's Antoine Dodson, who a couple years ago had what was certainly one of the most memorable interviews on a local television station. He was understandably annoyed at the guy who broke into his home and tried to attack his sister. He was trying to frighten the attacker via the TV news and I'm sure he succeeded.

The news clip video has gotten 41 million hits, and Dodson has had gotten some money and attention from that, so he's good to go.

I think it's my turn to win fame and fortune via YouTube. I've got to find a way to be arrested for public drunkeness while tearfully defending Britney Spears, while simultaneously telling a local television reporter how much I hate an attacker, while marveling at a double rainbow and singing "Bohemian Rhapsody" badly.

Gotta go. Time to practice for my upcoming Internet fame!

Another Elderly Woman Isn't Really Old

I don't know why I have been obsessing in this blog about older people who do remarkable things. Maybe it's because I want hope that when I get really old, I'm still functional. You know, just be coherent, mobile, sort of alive.

Then we get people like Johanna Quaas, 86, who is a gymnast. See for yourself if she's still got it:



Yep, she's still got it. Especially since almost everyone who is 60 years younger than Quaas can't do any gymnastics better than her.

How many of you can even bend over and touch your toes while keeping your legs straight, never mind rolling around a gym floor like a lithe nymph?

Bike Wizard Give Us Inferiority Complex

In our continuing efforts to make readers here feel inadequate and inferior, I offer you the following vidoe of one Andrew Dickey, a fearless Australian who does amazing things on a bicycle, involving major drops, bounces and leaps.

I'm sure none of you can do the things Dickey does. I bet you don't even dare to try. I don't.

Don't try this at home, kiddies!

Tearjerky Dog Rescue Video Offers Lessons on Humanity

With this viral video, sales of Kleenex are going to go through the roof, people will weep so much.

Fiona the suddenly famous dog being rescued by
Paws for Hope. Video of the rescue has gone viral.

A group called Paws For Hope, puts out a lot of YouTube videos showing volunteers rescuing dogs from harrowing situations, getting the dogs back to good health, and putting them up for adoption in homes where all those Fidos will live out their lives loved, well fed, safe and cared for.

One of their latest videos is probably their most effective, as it has a perfect alchemy of tragedy, redemption and a happy ending. The video is all over the blogosphere, and is now invading he MSM.

The group rescued a dog named Fiona from squalor near what looks like abandoned buildings. Fiona was hungry, blind and scared out of her mind.

A veterinarian performed surgery to restore vision in one of Fiona's eyes. They cleaned Fiona up, helped her trust people again, brought her back to tail wagging, playful happiness  and found a nice loving home for her, all against a backdrop of emotional music. It's classic storytelling.

Here's the video, if you have your Kleenex handy:





Meanwhile, here in St. Albans, Vermont, our cocker spaniel Jackson has now lived with us for nearly nine months, and of course living with a dog for the first time in decades changes your perspective on dogs and their lovability.

I'd always been horrified at how people can abuse and abandon dogs like Fiona, but even more so now that I've had Jackson in my life. The little guy lives to play, and he'll be damned if you do anything else besides play and be happy.

When Jackson knows I'm getting ready to leave to go to work, he gets more insistent. "No,!" he seems to say. You have to keep having fun. (By the way, the ever inquisitive, troublemaking Jackson is very familiar with the word 'No.')

So you have to be a pretty miserable person to want to try to erase the natural happiness in dogs. And Jackson has turned me into a more playful person, which is always a good thing.

I've long complained that people get more upset when animals are abused and killed than when people are abused and killed.

I still feel that way, but maybe stories like Fiona's can inspire just a couple awful people to not hurt any animals, and extend that little bit of compassion toward our fellow humans.

With all the nastiness in the world, we need dogs like Fiona and Jackson to put humanity on a peaceful, playful path.

Painfully Lazy: Man Chops Off Foot to Avoid Work.

I love my job, and find my feet incredibly useful. I offer these random thoughts to reassure people I will not chop off either of my feet to avoid going to work.

Please keep your feet attached
if you want to stay employable

That would make me different from an Austrian man. He was unemployed, and didn't want to find a job or go back to work. So he chopped off one of his feet and threw it in the stove to render himself unable to work. 

Um, I would think that anyone willing to chop off his foot to avoid work is unfit for employment anyway. And I wonder if he really thought this through. If you want a life of leisure, wouldn't you want both feet to, I don't know, wander out to the veranda with a nice afternoon cocktail?

Then there are the medical bills. The national health care system in Austria is probably pretty good, but still, there must be out of pocket expenses for his missing foot. Don't you need a job to pay for the care?

By the way, and this is gross, but apparently rescuers retrieved the severed foot from the stove to see if doctors could reattach it to our strange man, but the foot was too badly burned to be of any use.  Maybe this guy was using symbolism. He didn't want to work, because bosses kept holding his feet to the fire. That'll show 'em!

So anyway, it's off to work for me right now. And luckily, I have two feet, so I should be able to get from my truck to the office pretty quickly.

No, Employer, You Can't Root Through Our Private Messages

If in the future I look for another job, this post might turn into a strike against me, but I congratulate Facebook for threatening to sue would be employers who insist job applicants show them the private pages of their Facebook accounts.

According to the Associated Press, some employers are now requiring applicants to hand over Facebook passwords or "friend" HR managers. 

Should employers  be able to access private pages
on job applicants' Facebook accounts?

On Sunday, U.S. Senators Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. and Richard Blumenthal, D-Ct. asked U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to see whether such demands for Facebook passwords violate federal law.

Of course, any employer should conduct due diligence when hiring somebody. That means combing through public records,  and looking at anything publicly available to see if the prospective employee is a good match. Anything on public Facebook pages, or obtained through Google, is fair game, as far as I'm concerned.

After all, it's probably a good idea to know if the applicant for Chief Financial Officer has three embezzlement convictions. And it's probably useful to know the prospective nanny has a side business producing child pornography.

It's also necessary for job applicants to tell the truth and be open to questions. That's the way it's always worked. And it should.

But really, going through the private pages of Facebook. What's next? Demanding to see every email you've ever written? Turning over those love letters you wrote in college to the HR Department? Wearing a listening device for the rest of your life so your employer knows what you are doing, where you are and what you're saying all the time?

Sorry, pal.  I'm all for giving 110 percent to your employer, but our personal life is our personal life. Yeah, we'll behave, obey the law and not do anything to hurt the companies we work for. That's the employee's end of the bargain.

Employers: If we want to have legal fun, say what we want, do what we want, go where we want on our own time and our own dime, then we will, and you'd better not make that affect our jobs.

Some conservative and libertarian critics say the government has too much power over the public. Others disagree, but in any even, that's a debate definitely worth having.

Another worthwhile debate is to discuss how much control employers should have over us as well. I know, it varies widely. Many employers are great at respecting boundaries, a few are not. We need to set minimum standards on this.

Let the discussion begin.