Recently, I spent the better part of a day as an outpatient at a local hospital. (When I asked the receptionist how come an outpatient has to sign in, she got flustered and offered to call her supervisor, but my wife gave me a stern look so I backed off.)
As soon as the admitting nurse, a matronly gray-haired woman, learned I was there for a routine colonoscopy she handed me one of those horrid hospital gowns and told me to take off all my clothes. When I pleaded to keep on my underwear she said no way, not for this procedure.
"Just let me explain," I begged. "You see my underpants were designed for arctic exploration and have a back flap to guard against frontal frostbite. The doctor won't have any problem. Honest."
I had her going for a few seconds, but when the light bulb went off, she said: "Are you going to behave, or do you want me to call in your wife?"
"Okay," I said, knowing I was fighting a losing battle. "You win," and slid my drawers down to my ankles. "Are you happy now?"
"Delirious," she said, and left with a wink.
~ ~ ~
The turmoil in the stock market this year has everyone perplexed. Has the market bottomed? Is now the time to jump back in, or wait it out on the sidelines? More determined than ever not to get caught with my investment pants down, I decided to do some heavy research: money magazines, the Internet, radio talk shows, MSNBC, CNN and a dozen or so financial planning seminars (the ones that take you out to lunch). Here is what I learned:
1. 50% of the financial gurus predict that the stock market will probably go up this year, but on the other hand, it might possibly go down.
2. The other 50% of them predict that the stock market will probably go down this year, but on the other hand, it might possibly go up.
With advice like that, how can I miss?
~ ~ ~
Perhaps the most remarkable change in this brave new world of ours is that people, particularly cashiers, can no longer make change. The other night I stopped into a fast food establishment for a quick bite. My tab came to 6.31 and I gave the sleepy-eyed young pup behind the counter a ten spot, a nickel and a penny. When he blanched at the odd monetary assortment I had laid on him, I volunteered that I need quarters for the parking meters at the university library. "That's where I do research for my unpublished articles," I said, trying to bring a bit levity to his life.
"You write unpublished articles?" he wondered, as he keyed in my order.
"Well, I don't specialize to that degree, it just turns out that way," I said, attempting to ratchet up the levity a notch, but to no avail as he tolled out the obligatory 'have a good day' with my change: three singles and two dimes!
Fearing that my frisky badinage had momentarily addled the youth's mind, I said: "Young man, would you please check your register. My change is not correct."
"Looks good to me," he snapped, as he recounted the three-dollars, twenty-cents.
"Well, that's the problem," I said. "You ought to call your supervisor, you're probably not a math major."
"You got that right," he said proudly. "I'm an Ed major. Gonna be a teacher."
