Can You Relate to This?

I thought of this while driving home from the Childrens Museum (that's right, while the rest of you are contemplating art, poetry, dinner plans, what's on your dvr, etc., I'm thinking of things like this). I saw a familiar license plate cover--one that we've all seen hundreds of times on the road, usually affixed to a giant Mercury Grand Marquis (no offense to Grand Marquis drivers):


I've had a lot of experience with the kind of folks who drive vehicles like this with this type of license plate and I thought that the following might be more appropriate:

It was an easy Photoshop edit and I'm guessing that many of you can relate. Am I right?

Forgive Me For Being Stupid

I suppose you could say that I'm a product of the automobile industry in the United States. My dad was the breadwinner in our house and he worked at a tire factory where he eventually retired. He took care of me and my two brothers. He paid for most of my college education. So, you could say that somehow the automobile industry took care of me and my two brothers and the automobile industry paid for most of my college via my dad's hard work. Dad was also a consumer of the automobile industry. He was one of those guys that had to have a new car at least every two years. I never remember being in an old or junky car as a kid.

And yet I've never purchased a new car. I'm not sure that I ever will. These are my cars...


They look much more beat up in real life today than in these pictures. They've been well-used and I guess that we've been fortunate to get so much out of these used vehicles.

And that's what I don't get. How many new cars does this country really need every year? I just read today that Honda was originally planning to build 1.46 million vehicles in 2009 and now they've reduced their plan to 1.3 million. GM was originally planning on building 3 million cars & trucks in 2009 and now they plan to build just 2 million. Notice that I'm not even including Ford and Toyota and all of the other automakers in the world.

It doesn't take an economic genius to figure out that the automobile industry is going to be hurting severely this year (and perhaps in the years to come). And as I can attest to as a product of the generation, it's much bigger than just the factories that make the cars. Think about all of the components and accessories and you have a huge economic impact.

In our lifetime, my wife and I have had the following vehicles:

• 1974 Nova (ugly green with a three on the tree manual transmission--I should blog about this some time)
• 1987 Plymouth Horizon (referred to as "The Hor")
• 1985 Honda Accord
• 1990 Mercury Sable (like a Ford Taurus, but uglier)
• 1992 Chevrolet Corsica
• 1998 Plymouth Grand Voyager (pictured above)
• 1996 Honda Accord

Of these seven cars only six have been around during our marriage (we've been married over 16 years) and only four were actually purchased during our marriage. So why do we need so many cars? I don't see the current changes/struggles in the automobile industry as all that surprising. Am I missing something here?

Gifts for the Holidays: Hidden Treasure & Costly Pearls

I'm not one to blog too deep into my own time in the scriptures, but I'll share a little bit of what I was reading and reflecting on today--two little gems (pun sort of intended) from Matthew 13: 44-46 (New American Standard Bible):

Hidden Treasure

The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in the field, which a man found and hid again; and from joy over it he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.

A Costly Pearl

"Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant seeking fine pearls,and upon finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had and bought it.

In both of these parables you have a person who finds something good and then gives up everything to get it.

Kat Storee

The other day I posted something about paperclips and received this wonderful story from Hunny Bee of "It's a Honey of a Life". You can read it in the comments of the actual post or simply enjoy it below as I've created my own interpretation of how this would look if it were written on real paper (none of the words were changed). It's an instant classic. Enjoy!

Know What You're Smoking

Central Indiana has produced a number of great news stories lately. Just the other day we learned about deer jumping off of bridges and today we have a young lady who really likes to live on the edge...

Woman lights wrong smoke in front of trooper

MUNCIE, Ind. -- Police say a Muncie woman was arrested after asking a state trooper whether she could smoke -- and then trying to light up a marijuana joint.

Thirty-two-year-old Honesty Knight was a passenger in a vehicle that Trooper Eric Perkins pulled over for a traffic violation early Friday. While the trooper was talking to the driver, Knight obtained the trooper's permission to smoke.

Police say Perkins then asked to see the cigarette, which contained marijuana, not tobacco.

Knight faces a preliminary charge of possession of paraphernalia. She was released from jail on bond, but couldn't be located for comment because no home telephone number was listed in her name.

I DO feel like it's necessary for me to point out a few things about this story:

1. Yes, her real name (according to the newspaper) is "Honesty Knight."
2. Of course she doesn't own a phone. She spends all her money on pot and bail.
3. This story would have been even better if Eric Estrada had pulled the woman over.
   

Paperclips!!!!!

I've probably stated my disgust for Microsoft's old "Clippy" character created by the company to annoy help Office users create Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, etc. However, I'm even MORE horked off (I think I just made up that term--it means "mad") by the countless broken or destroyed paper clips that I find all over the house. I'm not sure what comes over the kids, but I think that whenever they see a paperclip they feel the need to pick it up and bend it...or break it...or both.

The only reason I KNOW this is because I find them laying all over the house--on counters, on the coffee table, under couch cushions, in silverware drawers, you name it.

I have nothing profound to say about it all. It just annoys me.

ZAP!!!

I'm a Christian. It's the most important thing in my life and I'll make no bones about it. So as I share the following video from YouTube (and I'm only sharing the first one you see--if you follow the links to other videos you're on your own), I'm NOT making fun of my God or the church.

But I AM making fun of these guys. This is the most lame thing I've ever seen in my life. I'm not sure where to begin. First off, I'm sure it was made in the early 80's but I haven't looked into it to see for myself (who needs research when something is THIS GOOD). The lead singer overly annunciates every thing he says (too much staccato--but it could use more cowbell). There are several people in the video that look very bored. The "lead guitar" player looks like your uncle who is a total recluse in real life until you give him a guitar and then he gets weird--freaky weird. That's enough. I'll leave the rest up to you. Feel free to have fun with it. It's so bad that it deserves to be ridiculed (even in the church).

I almost forgot...

1. Special thanks to "The Jared" for showing this to me the other night at Higher Ground.
2. The "zap!" can be found at 1:56. Don't miss it.



"That's terrific, Sal! Thank you very much. Beautiful, beautiful, well..."

Indiana Deer Lose Hope Over Economy

Well, it's official. The economy is REALLY BAD this Christmas. Just the other day five deer in Northern Indiana committed mass suicide by jumping off a bridge over I-69. I talked to a few bunny rabbits in the area that indicated the family of deer lost a lot of money in the stock market. Don't worry, the rabbits are hanging in there (but I'm concerned for the squirrels).

Five deer leap to deaths from I-69 bridge

MARKLE, Ind. -- Five deer that wandered onto a highway overpass jumped to their deaths onto Interstate 69, one of them crashing through a tractor-trailer's windshield, police said.

After the animals' fatal plunge, their mangled carcasses littered the expressway to the horror of motorists who approached Friday's scene in the northbound lanes of I-69.

Wells County EMS paramedic Andy Stimpson said he wasn't prepared for what he saw when he arrived at the crash scene at the U.S. 224 overpass about 20 miles southwest of Fort Wayne.

"It's the weirdest run I've ever had in 28 years," he said.

John Salb, a spokesman for the state Department of Natural Resources, said the deer may have been spooked by cars as they were crossing the overpass and jumped from the overpass, not knowing that a busy highway was far below them.

The 20- to 30-foot fall killed all five deer about 12:30 p.m. Friday, said Brian Jenks, a dispatcher with the Huntington County Sheriff's Department.

The last of the five deer went through the windshield of a tractor-trailer rig, but the driver was not injured, police said.

Late fall is a stressful time of year for deer as hunters push through fields and woods, hoping to scare deer out of their cover, said DNR spokesman Phil Bloom said.

Farmers are also removing the last of their crops from the fields, reducing the animals' food supply even as deer breeding season is in full swing.

Any of these factors could have pushed the deer onto the highway overpass, Bloom said.

The I-69/U.S. 224 interchange is a likely spot for wildlife and humans to collide. The west side of the interchange is bordered by privately owned fields and the Markle State Recreation area, which is popular with hunters, Jenks said.

The east side of the interchange, an area that's heavy with traffic, marks the edge of the town of Markle.