The saga continues

The tree in front of the Main Street Diner survived. It is blooming and starting to bush a little. Well, maybe bush is the wrong term to use. It has one stem with about 30 leaves and another with maybe 20. But its alive. I was looking at it today and thinking it might need a trim. We are still continuing the "tree meetings". We have one scheduled for tomorrow. I emailed the committee to inform them that the starlings are back and city parks director came downtown to see for himself. He concluded after measuring the size of the bird droppings (and I am not making this up) that the starlings were not back as the bird poop was to large. Let me tell you what I am looking for in a clean sidewalk. I don't want piles of bird droppings no matter from which species it originates. At least I don't have to worry about the walk in front of the Main Street Diner . No self-respecting bird is going to roost in my tree. I have a feeling some of the committee members are not going to be thrilled about the state of my tree , but my customers are. Don't get me wrong, I love trees. Just not the ones growing out of the sidewalk and into the buildings of our fair city. Maybe if they were 12 to 15 feet instead of 40. I have had a lot of offers recently to trade a midnight logging job for breakfast. But I am sworn to good behavior by the city officials and my wife so I can't take them up on it.(Unless one of you is reading this blog and decide to do it on your own "wink wink") Anyway, some birds of some kind are back and we are meeting tomorrow to talk about the problem. And talk and talk and talk. But at least the coffee is good(I make it.) Maybe I can sweeten them up with some flavored popcorn . I'll let you know what transpires.

Oh those pesky trees

The criminal mischief charges have been dismissed. Now, I am on a committee to explore the tree situation. And we are exploring it to death. 2 months now and we finally sent out a survey to the downtown merchants to get their feelings about the trees planted in our city sidewalks. Some on the committee wanted to include all the residents of our fair city. Could you imagine looking through 3 or 4 thousand returned surveys and trying to come up with some coherent thought about the situation? I think the easiest thing to do is to follow the lead of one of the business owners. The trees in front of his business "mysteriously" died. And the city parks department removed the dead carcasses. My tree looks a little under the weather. I am worried that it might not make it through the winter.

The Pendleton Tree saga

There is a tree outside the Diner by the front door. The city planted it there about 14 years ago. They planted a lot of trees on Main Street. They were cute little trees and were very lovely in the fall. But like trees sometimes do, they grew....and grew and grew. Now most of them are 30 to 40 feet tall. And they attract birds...lots and lots of birds. The business owners did not want the trees, but the CITY planted them anyway. The trees have become a giant nuisance. And now the City has decided that the trees are the property owners responsibility. The trees are uplifting the sidewalks and the afore mentioned birds are covering the ground with bird droppings. Pounds of bird droppings. Since the City informed the property owners that the trees were their responsibility, my tree was trimmed...from 35 feet to a more manageable 12 feet. Needless to say, that left very few branches where birds could roost. And my sidewalk in front of the Diner is clean and shiny which my customers love.Evidently the city likes bird poop covered sidewalks because they sent the code enforcement officer to write me a citation..a CRIMINAL citation. They charged me with criminal mischief which carries a year in jail and a $6250 fine if convicted, even though they are the ones who told us to trim the trees in the first place. They said the trim job should have left more than eleven leaves on the tree. They should have been more specific in the original letter. In any case, My customers love me, the City Manager hates me and my attorney says we have the law on our side (not to mention common sense). I'll keep you posted.

Diner Dues and Blues

Sometimes I wonder if there is any meaning to life other than to be God's comic relief. He must be in stitches most of the time. I mean, can there be another species as gullible and uneducated as we have become? We have several coffee klatches that frequent the Diner and I get to sit in with one or the other every now and then. Here are a few of the nuggets I have gleened. One of the clubs is made up of some very senior citizens. One of them told a story about a person who knew a person who knew a person's nephew. It went on for at least 10 minutes. When he was through, one of the other members said , and I quote " don't be telling those long boring stories anymore because I am too damn old to pay attention". Then there is the political group, which consists of 2 conservatives, a liberal ,a know-it-all, and an out and out kook. The know-it-all dominates the conversation and comes up with gems such as: Sarah Palin and Barack Obama are secret lovers, We would have more than enough oil if the oil companies would quit hiding it in the desert, Americans have more gold in their teeth than is in Fort Knox, and Dogs are the transportation wave of the future. The kook fully beleives George Bush flew one of the planes into the Twin Towers, parachuting at just the right moment(says he has seen video), Republicans are poisoning our air and water supply( which the liberal agrees with) and blacks could be (and he stresses could be) a figment of our collective imagination. The liberal believes everything he hears on ABC news and quotes it almost word for word. Even when some of the stories are later proven to be incorrect, he stands by them saying "Its the right wing talk show hosts spreading lies and deceit." I am not sure what the conservatives think, because they can't get a word in edgeways. They just sit there, sip coffee and smile. I think they might be up to something.

Language barriers

One of my cooks is learning how to make our flavored popcorn . She is hispanic and speaks little English. I don't speak Spanish so we sometimes (and by sometimes I mean usually) have a slight communication mixup. She is wonderful at reading the tickets at the Diner, but the recipe book for the flavored popcorn is another story. This afternoon, she was making cinnamon flavored popcorn and I sampled some of the first batch. The color was nice but the flavor was not! I asked her to show me the steps she took and immediately realized what was wrong. She thought teaspoons were tablespoons. The next batch she made turned out a lot better. I have learned that when we talk and she smiles at me and nods, she is not getting the gist of what I am saying.. Last week I asked her if we needed green peppers and she said "Si" so I ordered a 25lb box. The next day she asked "Why peppers??" I said because you said we were out. She shook her head and walked away. I figured out she meant "Si, we have lots of peppers" She thinks I need to listen better,

The wonders of marriage.

HOW TO IMPRESS A WOMAN

Compliment her, cuddle her, kiss her, carees her, love her, stroke her, comfort her, protect her, hug her, wine and dine her, buy gifts for her, listen to her, respect her, stand by her, support her, go to the ends of the earth for her.

HOW TO IMPRESS A MAN

Arrive naked ... with beer.
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Why do women pay more attention to their appearance than improving their minds?

Because most men are stupid, but few are blind.
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My girlfriend told me I should be more affectionate. So I got myself two girlfriends.
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A man said his credit card was stolen but he decided not to report it since the thief was spending much less than his wife did.
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Man is incomplete until he is married. Then he is finished.
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A woman was telling her friend, "I made my husband a millionaire."
"And what was he before you married him?" asked the friend.
"A billionaire." she replied,
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If you want your spouse to listen and pay strict attention to every word you say, talk in your sleep.
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It's not true that married men live longer than single men. It only seems longer.
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Just think, if it weren't for marriage, men would go through life thinking they had no faults at all.
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I think one of the greatest things about marriage is that as both husband and father,
I can say anything I want to around the house. Of course, no one pays the least bit of attention.
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A successful man is one who makes more money than his wife can spend.
A successful woman is one who can find such a man.
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Words to live by: Do not argue with a spouse who is packing your parachute
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The most effective way to remember your wife's birthday is to forget it once.
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At the cocktail party, one woman said to another, "aren't you wearing your wedding ring on the wrong finger?"

The other replied, "Yes I am, I married the wrong man."
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What does a man consider a seven course meal?

A hot dog and a six pack of beer.
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Why does it take 1 million sperm to fertilize one egg?

They won't stop to ask directions.
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Mother to daughter advice:

Cook a man a fish and you feed him for a day.

But teach a man to fish and you get rid of him for the whole weekend.
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If a man is alone in the forest, and he says something, and there's no woman there to disagree with him.

Is he still wrong?
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How many men does it take to make pop popcorn? or flavored popcorn

Three. One to hold the pan and two others to act macho and shake the stove.

Road Rage

I can now almost understand the phenomena known as road rage. I almost caught it today. I was driving to work minding my own business and singing along with the radio when from a side street a guy in a Caddy blows through the stop sign (he didn't even slow down) and cuts me off. I have to slam on my brakes to keep from rear-ending him. I'm thinking to myself "this guy must be really late for an appointment or something" but I was wrong. As soon as he gets in front of me, he slows down to about 15 mph. I am a patient person but this was as much as I could stand but I figure what the heck, life goes on. So, I am following him at 15mph (the speed limit was 35) for a few miles until he decides to finally speed up.I start thinking "this is better" when all of a sudden he clamps on his breaks and starts to turn onto a side street. I hit the breaks to keep from smacking into him and just as he finishes making the turn, he signals. I guess it didn't occur to him that it is probably better to signal your intention to turn before you actually turn. But at least he was finally out of my way. I'm about a mile from work by this time , when it happens again! A guy takes a free right at the stoplight with me entering the intersection. At this point I wanted to force him off the road, jerk him out of his car, and explain politely that you should take a free right turn when there is NO traffic coming. But I didn't . I just got to work and yelled at the walls for a minute or two. It's no wonder that there is so much tension in the workplace today.