It's the fault of the north pole

Observations with no place to go but up

                        by Robert LaFrance 

            Here is a whole column of observations with no particular theme:

            Whatever happened to the word ‘primp’? I thought it pretty well described what was taking place—the sometimes excessive combing of one’s hair, putting on makeup (I refer to the other gender here, I hope you know), more combing of hair, checking every item of clothing to make sure it’s perfect. No, if what I see on TV is indicative, girls don’t primp any more. They either go to a super-duper ‘beauty consultant’ or they stick their finger in a light socket. Males, don’t bother laughing at that; how can you fasten your belt when the waistband of your pants is at your thighs? I am referring to my nephew Ned in Minto.

            Some days are a little (a little?) weird and I feel like the cartoon character Calvin, of Calvin and Hobbes. He’s a somewhat brainy six-year-old who, one day, got out of bed and floated up to the ceiling. “Oh-oh,” he said. “I think Dad forgot to pay the gravity bill!” Remember how I was recently pondering if the government could find a way to tax the wind? If they do, gravity is next, and no kidding.

            We’ve heard a lot about the Mayan calendar that says the world is going to end on December 21 of this year. I says to Flug: “You know that hundred dollars I owe you? I won’t have the money until New Year’s Eve. I’ll even pay you interest.” In hindsight, I am thinking that addendum about the interest was a mistake—‘an arrow in judgment’ as my old pal Fred used to say. What if the Mayans were wrong?

            You know how we look back on certain actions, events, or objects as being part of history? Like the Avro Arrow, Zoot Suits, the Edsel, the War of 1812, and like that. Well, some things don’t last long enough to become part of that history. As the late artist Andy Warhol used to say—or others used to say he used to say—everyone has his fifteen minutes of fame, but some things don’t even seem to have that. I’m thinking of mouse balls. When I bought my first computer in 1994, they had been around only a few years, and now, less than two decades later, computer mice don’t even have…them.

            I am often amazed at how quickly certain words or pronunciations catch on in the general public, but of course the reason is television. It has distorted our speech to an amazing degree. For the first sixty years of my life, the word ‘complex’ was pronounced with no accent on either syllable or with an accent on the first syllable. Now, for the past year or two, people everywhere have started saying ‘com-PLEX’. I know, you probably have better things to do than listen for such things, but that’s why I make the big money.

            What is the most insulting sign you can imagine a business would put up on its door? How about “Back in 15 minutes” with no time put on the sign. Jackie the Hairdresser could put that sign up at noon on Monday and go to Florida for a week and wouldn’t be lying. Mind you, he/she would have a rather hairy lineup at his/her door come the second Monday.

            It is said that my friend Flug never has a headache. It’s because he’s more of a carrier. Along that same line of discussion, someone recently said to my nephew Terry: “Where have you been? I thought you must have had a heart attack.” Terry replied: “LaFrances don’t have heart attacks; we GIVE them.”

            About three decades ago the comedian George Carlin noted that some words just don’t go together in a sentence. He used the example “Hand me that piano”. See how times have changed? I have two pianos that can easily be handed to other people, even though I have no intention of doing so because I like them.

            Here is a scientific observation: Global warming has been, is, and will be a problem. Those who should know blame it on ‘greenhouse gases’ and such like. I think it has more to do with the moving around of the magnetic poles. The magnetic north pole was first located in 1831 and didn’t move much until 1904, when it started shifting northeastward at about 15 kilometers a year. Then in 1989 it sped up again. They say it’s now ‘galloping’ toward Siberia at about 55 kilometres a year. I say it’s them Commies left over from the Gorbachev days. They did something in a cave near Novosibirsk and forgot to turn off the switch when the Berlin Wall came down.

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