December 13, 2005

Short and To The Point

The point on my head, that is.

Just a brief Almanac to mention two items of interest. The House of Rancid Lunchmeat has recently begun appending the following onto their cash-register receipts:



At first I thought this was meant to say, "God Bless U.S.," as in the United States, but you wouldn't write that ... you'd write either "God Bless the US" or "God Bless USA."

So I'm not sure of what to make of this: Is the owner of the store asking us to pray for him? Is he saying that God has already blessed him? Or is this a Christmakwanukah tie-in, a la Tiny Tim in "A Christmas Carol"? (Maybe they were trying to write "God Bless Us Everyone," but the last word wouldn't fit.)

It's been on the receipts the last three times I shopped there, so it wasn't a mistake. Maybe no one else has noticed.

In other business, if you don't read the weekly chats held by Gene Weingarten, a humor columnist for The Washington Post and author of the disturbingly funny The Hypochondriac's Guide to Life. And Death, you should. You're missing off-the-cuff exchanges like these:

Dear Mr. Weingarten: I am eight years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, "If you see it in Mr. Weingarten's chat, it's so." Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?

Gene Weingarten: You blew it. Your place name should have been "Virginia."

However, I shall answer your question.

Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. Why, there is a Santa as surely as there is a Virginia! Go to any shopping mall, and behold him. True, he may often look like some homeless guy with a false beard earning a few bucks for booze by forfeiting his self-respect for the further enrichment pf corporate bloodsuckers trying to trick customers into overspending money they don't have on presents they can't afford for people they think they love.

It's love that doesn't exist, Virginia. We all die alone.

Posted at 07:12 am by jt3y
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December 12, 2005

Correction, Not Perfection

After reading my reference Friday to our sheriff, who I called "Shirley's dad," an Alert Reader wrote: "Excuse me, but you're blogging to a confirmed couch potato here. DeFazio was Laverne's name ... not Shirley's. Watch more WBGN."

You mean you're not familiar with Sheriff Feeney?

You know, that was truly an idiotic mistake. I swear on my autographed picture of David L. Lander that I was thinking "Laverne DeFazio," and yet I typed "Shirley" anyway. Blame it on the fermented egg nog I drank Thursday night. Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.

Originally, I was going to call him "Pizza Bowl Pete," but I thought that was a bit of an obscure reference for most people, and it also seemed to be a little disrespectful toward one of our elected officials.

In a related topic, in Sunday's Post-Gazette, Torsten Ove wrote a lengthy story about Pizza Bowl Pete ... er, Sheriff DeFazio ... which raised as a serious possibility that the sheriff is honest, but out of touch:

(Many) deputies and others close to the sheriff's office portrayed Chief Skosnik as the true head of the department and Sheriff DeFazio as a figurehead who was somewhat detached, perhaps a touch naive, and presiding over a staff where loyalty and "chain of command" was everything.

So while the sheriff often talked and joked with deputies, he also was insulated from what they were doing by a layer of "white shirt" command staffers. ...

Another example of the sheriff's detachment is the allegation in the federal indictment of Chief Skosnik that the chief stole some of the money that he had collected for Sheriff DeFazio's campaigns. To the extent this was taking place, some deputies said, the sheriff could be seen as a victim of his own staff.

Writes Ove: "Ego aside, many said Sheriff DeFazio is an honest straight-shooter. In addition to being extremely religious, he is devoted to his parents in an old-world Italian way, to the point where he would never want to dishonor their name. ... One sergeant who has known him for decades agreed. 'He's a fine and decent man,' he said. 'He wants to be a good, honest cop.'"

I suppose being oblivious is better than being dishonest by a wide margin, and I have to admit that I've always admired DeFazio's panache, so I'm almost willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

But if he was truly unaware of the muck and slime that was spreading around him (even as he was insisting that the department's squad cars stayed squeaky clean), then it speaks poorly of his judgement, I fear.

Alert Reader and erstwhile blogger Officer Jim (no fan of Pizza Bowl Pete's) notes there was a nice article in the Easton Express-Times about the new state champion McKeesport Tigers.

Writes Jim: "The articles on Duquesne-South Columbia also were positive towards the Dukes' chances. Too bad they couldn't keep the momentum going in the second half. (I hope you saw the score already. If not, they lost 50-19. Which is deceiving, because the score was 20-19 at halftime.)"

(How about them Tigers, by the way? Do I need to mention that they're the state high school football champions, or does everyone know by now that they had a decisive 49-10 victory over Bethlehem Liberty High School? The Harrisburg Patriot-News called it a "rout." Nice work, guys, especially considering that the season got off to a rocky start ... fighting back to win the state championship took a lot of heart!)

Officer Jim also agrees with Bob Braughler of Subdivided We Stand that I tend to ... erm ... prattle on a bit, as the Brits would say: "To be fair, though, you can go on and on about subjects. Particularly in relation to 'Fibber McGee and Molly' and other such archaic things."

As Jack Benny would say: "Hmmmmm."

Finally, a tip of the Tube City hard hat to three new (newish?) blogs: Karen Hoffman's K-Blog, Jonathan Barnes' Barnstormin', and McKeesport Candy Co.'s Candyblog. As a proud consumer of their products, that one gets my personal, if somewhat saccharin, seal of approval, though it makes my teeth sore just to think about it.

Posted at 06:36 am by jt3y
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