Wednesday, February 28, 2007

Random Thoughts at 10:30 P.M.

Hopefully you all had a chance on Tuesday to spend time with the most miserable people on the planet. Yes, election judges. Now, THEY aren't miserable people to be with, they are just miserable doing what they are doing. They have to be! A decade ago I performed that civil service for the princely sum of $100. I had to be there at 6:30 a.m. I think and didn't get to leave until about 9 p.m. When I am on my deathbed I will remember time wasted in my life doing two things: being an election judge and watching Soul Plane. Someone has to do it, but now I leave it to the bagger at my local grocery store who can probably use the money and has to deal those ungrateful bastards anyway. Ugh.

Today, out of the blue, I received a call from a good friend. He and his wife want to meet me out for a fish fry on Friday, have a few beers and catch up. Seems simple enough, but it was a real pick up for me. They're fun people that are great to be around. In a similar fashion, I went into my office today and it was really nice to see Ricardo again after not seeing him for a week or so. Even though I was off having fun in Tampa, I missed my friends! They're cool and I enjoy hanging out with them. Unfortunately Ricardo's wife was already going out with some people, so he an I hit Jack's Bar, conveniently located a block away from my church.

Maybe you heard about this raid on a pharmacy in Florida that was selling various drugs to pro and minor league athletes over the internet. I saw a story that mentioned attention was drawn to the pharmacy because its sales went from $200k-$300k about 7 years ago to over $30 million in sales last year. I mean c'mon. How are they NOT going to be investigated?

Have you seen this show Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? It pits an everyday person against questions that fifth graders or younger can answer. The show is actually pretty interesting and even more so to me since I essentially had the idea about 30 years ago while watching Jeopardy! Oh well, yet another million dollar idea I left on the table. Just for grins, here are some questions they asked:

1) In what month does Columbus Day fall?
2) T/F In the wild, polar bears typically feed on penguins.
3) A trapezoid has how many sides?
4) Who was the first U.S. President to be impeached?
5) If a triangle has an area of 16 square inches and a base of 8 inches, how long is its height?

Answers at the bottom of yesterday's column.

5 comments:

alexis said...

jesus, I am dumber than a 5th grader. In all fairness, they probably don't know squat about investing.

stef said...

urm..i got the first two.

Anonymous said...

I'm happy I got all five (though I guessed on one of them). I do think that these questions are beyond a 5th grade level, however -- two of the questions are HS geometry questions and the 4th question is a HS history question.

Anyway, it sounds like your trip was quite interesting to say the least. For some reason, I thought you played SS, but congratulations.

We really ought to catch up soon. It's been too long.

Lakeview Coffee Joe said...

On the show they actually tell you what grade level the question is from...1st grade to 5th. I refuse to believe I knew that stuff at one time though. I do not fair well watching the shows.

In softball, I'm our third string SS now and starting 3b. Still hitting leadoff though.

Lakeview Coffee Joe said...

And you're right Alexis, let's see them list out the classifications on a style box! Little bastards.