Today I’d like to talk about marriage. It always seems like a topic that everyone has an opinion on and so do I. As far as I can see there are no real experts on marriage. If there were they couldn’t possibly explain why a little more than fifty percent of all marriages fail miserably. I have the right to speak on this subject because I’ve been married twice and divorced twice. I married for sex initially (bad move) and then married for love (or so I thought), (another bad move). Do I have solutions for this trend – I do not. As best I can determine getting married is much like going to Las Vegas and losing everything you own and then complaining about Las Vegas for ruining your life. I’m currently unmarried and my better-half and I have been together for almost thirty years. That just tells me when it’s the right person, life can be good.
Todays post will cite a number of well known celebs on their thoughts on marriage. This should convince you that they have no clue either. Here we go . . .
“Bigamy is having one wife too many. Monogamy is the same.” Oscar Wilde
“The most happy marriage I can imagine to myself would be the union of a deaf man to a blind woman.” S.T. Coleridge
“Marriage is popular because it combines the maximum of temptation with the maximum of opportunity.” George Bernard Shaw
“If variety is the spice of life, marriage is the big can of leftover Spam.” Johnny Carson
“If you are afraid of loneliness, don’t marry.” Anton Chekhov
“Never go to bed angry. Stay up and fight.” Phyllis Diller
“I was married by a judge. I should have asked for a jury.” Groucho Marx
“I don’t worry about terrorism. I was married for two years.” Sam Kenison
“It’s true that I did get the girl, but then my grandfather always said, “Even a blind chicken finds a few grains of corn now and then”. Lyle Lovett – after marrying Julia Roberts
“Marriage is like putting your hand into a bag of snakes in the hope of pulling out an eel.” Leonardo da Vinci
My Fav
“Marriage is like a bank account. You put it in, you take it out, then you lose interest.” Irwin Corey
I really and truly hate the media. Even before the term “fake news” appeared, I was well ahead of the game. I was raised during a time when there were only three networks and the main voice for America on any subject was Walter Cronkite. Whatever he said was immediately believed as information that came down from the Mount with the Ten Commandments. Now that we’ve progressed a little (LOL) we’re beginning to find out what fools our parent’s generation was and unfortunately they passed some of that foolishness along to their kids. Eventually the rest of the country finally figured all of this out because of a few thousand regular folks taking to the airways armed with a new term called “Podcasts”. Thanks also to people like Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg for maintaining freedom of speech on their social media platforms. With that being said todays post contains misquotes and misstatements from numerous and varied celebrities experts and media outlets. Enjoy . . .
“If it weren’t for electricity, we’d all be watching television by candlelight.” George Gobel – comedian.
“The crime bill passed by the senate would reinstate the federal death penalty for certain violent crimes: assassinating the President, hijacking an airliner, and murdering a government poultry inspector.” Published by Knight Ridder News Service
Retraction: The “Greek Special” is a huge, 18-inch pizza and not a huge, 18-inch penis, as described in an ad. Blondie’s Pizza would like to apologize for any confusion Friday’s ad may have caused. Correction in the Daily Californian (real fake news)
As a prize – a beautiful riding mower with optional ass scratcher. Announcer on TV who meant to say “grass catcher”.
“To say this book is about me (which is the main reason I was uncomfortable – me, me, me,. me . . . frightening) is ridiculous. This book is not about me.” Kate Moss, model, on her book, Kate: The Kate Moss Book
“We don’t like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out.” Decca Recording Company turning down the Beatles, 1962
I really and truly hate the media. Even before the term “fake news” appeared, I was well ahead of the game. I was raised during a time when there were only three networks and the main voice for America on any subject was Walter Cronkite. Whatever he said was immediately believed as information that came down from the Mount with the Ten Commandments. Now that we’ve progressed a little (LOL) we’re beginning to find out what fools our parent’s generation was and unfortunately they passed some of that foolishness along to their kids. Eventually the rest of the country finally figured all of this out because of a few thousand regular folks taking to the airways armed with a new term called “Podcasts”. Thanks also to people like Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg for maintaining freedom of speech on their social media platforms. With that being said todays post contains misquotes and misstatements from numerous and varied celebrities experts and media outlets. Enjoy . . .
“If it weren’t for electricity, we’d all be watching television by candlelight.” George Gobel – comedian.
“The crime bill passed by the senate would reinstate the federal death penalty for certain violent rimes: assassinating the President, hijacking an airliner, and murdering a government poultry inspector.” Published by Knight Ridder News Service
Retraction: The “Greek Special” is a huge, 18-inch pizza and not a huge, 18-inch penis, as described in an ad. Blondie’s Pizza would like to apologize for any confusion Friday’s ad may have caused. Correction in the Daily Californian (real fake news)
As a prize – a beautiful riding mower with optional ass scratcher. Announcer on TV who meant to say “grass catcher”.
“To say this book is about me (which is the main reason I was uncomfortable – me, me, me,. me . . . frightening) is ridiculous. This book is not about me.” Kate Moss, model, on her book, Kate: The Kate Moss Book
“We don’t like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out.” Decca Recording Company turning down the Beatles, 1962
I recently began rereading Isaac Azimov’s “The Foundation Series“. I’ve read it at least four or five times over the years which probably makes me a crazy rabid Azimov fan. Since I’ve lately reintroduced him to my brain, todays post will include a few of his limericks. While he was a prolific writer of books, he was also a lover of all things limerick. In company with a friend and fellow writer, John Ciardi, they’ve written hundreds of limericks both funny and many times a little bawdy. Here are a few to make you smile.
I’ve been a lover of books since a very early age. The term bibliophile meant nothing to me back then. The first real book I ever read cover-to-cover occurred in 1952 at the ripe old age of 7. I was walking from the school bus a mile and a half to my home. Along the way I passed a neighbors house and noticed a number of large cardboard boxes filled with all sorts of things which had been placed there for a trash pickup the next morning. I noticed an old worn book sticking out of one of those boxes, pulled it out, and it was titled 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne. I read a few lines from page one and was hooked. The book went into my bag and I couldn’t put it down and finished reading it in just two days. That book changed my life because I was forced to read it with a dictionary in one hand and the book in the other. There were so many words I’d never seen or heard before and it made the entire process a major learning experience not just for reading but also how to properly use a dictionary. The one unpronounceable word that has stuck with me ever since was rendezvous. For quite some time I pronounced it as “ren-dez-e-vos” and not “ron-de-voo“. Many thanks to my mom for explaining that to me and even now when I hear or see that word it takes me right back to 1952 once again.
Todays post contains the titles of ten obscure books published in the far past concerning everyone’s favorite topic: SEX. They are hilarious and can only be truly appreciated by a dedicated bibliophile. Are you one? Do you want to become one? I highly recommend it.
Is Pleasure Worth the Penalty – Henry Butter 1866
The Girdle of Chastity – Eric John Dingwall 1931
Training of the Young in Laws of Sex – Hon. Edward Lyttelton 1900
In and Out and Up and Down – Jo L.G. McMahon 1922
How to Pickup Girls on a Public Beaches – Raleigh Leo Stanley 1982
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Bullying and Sexual Harassment: A Practical Study – Tina Stephens and Jane Hallas 2006
Happy Though Married – Sophia Gertrude Wurtz 1922
A Kiss for a Blow – Henry Clark Wright 1920
Heroic Virgins – Alfonso P. Santos 1977
History of the Girls’ Friendly Society – Agnes L. Money 1897
BONUS – My Fav
Wed to a Lunatic – A wild weird yarn of love and some other things delivered in the form of hash for the benefit of tired readers – Frank Warren Hastings 1896
As you are aware I hunt like an obsessed bloodhound for topics that are a 7-9 on the weirdness scale. Fortunately for me all that weirdness has for some reason had little or no effect on me (I hope you are someone who doesn’t miss a satirical comment when you read it). Todays post will contain six blurbs about well-known people who were truly weirder than anyone ever imagined.
WALT WHITMAN
When American poet Walt Whitman died in 1892, his brain was put in a jar and donated to the University of Pennsylvania. The University doesn’t have it anymore because a clumsy lab technician dropped the jar on the floor and damaged the brain. The University quietly discarded it, and Whitman’s “Specimens Days” were over.
MARGARET WISE BROWN
American children’s author Margaret Wise Brown (1910 to 1952), who wrote many tender kitty-and-bunny tales, including Good Night Moonand The Bunnies Birthday, loved to hunt rabbits and she collected their severed feet as trophies.
VOLTAIRE
Voltaire always fainted whenever he smelled roses. He also drank seventy cups of coffee every day. Are the facts related, who knows?
EMILY DICKINSON
Poet Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) will’s final requests were that she would be buried in a white casket, that heliotropes be placed inside along with a posy of blue violets to be placed at her throat. All of her wishes were granted.
AGATHA CHRISTIE
Agatha Christie nearly pulled off a real-life hoax worthy of her mystery novels. Upset that her husband was leaving her for another woman, she set up an incriminating crime scene that almost got him arrested for “her murder”. Luckily for him, an employee at a distant seaside hotel saw news photos of Christie and recognized her as the woman who had slipped into their hotel under an assumed name. Although Christie claimed amnesia, the police were not amused after having wasted a week of searching rivers and bogs for her body.
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And last but not least goes to someone who finally discovered his true worth.
TUPAC SHAKUR
Requested that his ashes be mixed with marijuana and smoked by his friends in the band Outlawz.
Let’s talk about the subjects most people immediately shy away from: Death & Serious Injuries. They are a part of our lives (at least at the end) but still a rather gruesome topic for discussion. For years I loved reading about the endless stupid deaths reported by the Darwin Awards and found them sad but still a little humorous at times. My goal in life was never to be mentioned in the Darwin Awards by dying in a stupid fashion. I realize that’s an odd thing to have on a bucket list but it’s still on mine. Here are a few trivia tidbits (both old and new) that might interest you on deaths and serious injuries.
Boating accidents claim an average of 700 lives each year.
Since 1924, 13 people have been killed in Pamplona, Spain’s annual “Running of the Bulls”.
From 1982 to 1997, cheerleading accounted for 57% of the catastrophic injuries and fatalities among young female athletes.
From 1973 to 1975 there were 81 known fatalities from hang-gliding,
In the United States, at least seven fatalities and numerous severe injuries have been reported among bungee jumpers using a hot air balloons as a platform.
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In 2007, 45 people were struck and killed by lightning in the United States, a quarter of them in or near water.
Each year about 50-70 confirmed shark attacks occur. 5-15 shark attack fatalities occur around the world.
There were 850 hunting accidents in this country in 2002, more than 10% of them were fatalities.
Once at the Middle Tennessee District Fair in Lawrenceburg, a 60-year-old woman was severely injured when she fell 30 feet from the top of Ferris wheel and landed on the spokes close to the center wheel axle.
Once a Washington, D.C. based study on the correlation between admissions to emergency rooms and outcomes from Washington Redskins football games showed that admissions of female victims of stabbings, gunshots, assaults, and other violence actually increases when the team wins.
In keeping with the theme of this blog “everyuselessthing”, I thought a short history lesson was in order to supply readers with a little known trivia tidbit about NASA and the first moon landing. In 1969 Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the moon as we all know but were you aware that William Safire, President Nixon’s speechwriter, gave the president a draft of a speech he might have to give if the moon mission failed. It is claimed that the president never saw it. Here is a copy of that speech.
Fate has ordained that the men who went to the moon to explore in peace will stay on the moon to rest in peace.
These brave men, Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin, know that is no hope for their recovery. But they also know that there is hope for mankind in their sacrifice.
These two men are laying down their lives in mankind’s most noble goal: the search for truth and understanding. They will be mourned by their family and friends; they will be mourned by their nation; they will be mourned by the people of the world; they will be mourned by a Mother Earth that dared send two of her sons into the unknown.
In their exploration they stirred the people of the world to feel as one; in their sacrifice, they bind more tightly the brotherhood of man.
In ancient days, men looked at stars and saw their heroes in the constellations. In modern times, we do much the same, but our heroes are epic men of flesh and blood.
Others will follow, and surely find their way home, Man’s search will not be denied. But these men were the first, and they remain the foremost in our hearts.
For every human being who looks up at the moon in the nights to come will know that there is some corner of another world that is forever mankind.
One final tidbit of irony. In 1999, on the 30th year anniversary of the moon landing, the three astronauts were shown this text for the first time by Tim Russert on Meet the Press.
I’ve spent almost half of my life working in some manner in law enforcement. I patrolled for years as a uniformed officer, a member of the detective unit for a time, and then two years in undercover vice and narcotics. I’ve seen many guilty individuals go to jail and I’ve seen almost as many get a slap on the wrist by the court system and put back on the streets without much punishment. That punishment almost never fits the crime? I also spent six years interviewing prisoner’s in numerous jails throughout the state of Maine. I’ve seen it all and heard it all and then some. The system is just barely adequate.
As I’m want to do I decided to dig into the past for possible answers to improve our system. I must say that things were unbelievably different from our current mess. I found these eight punishments from past centuries and maybe just maybe they should be reviewed for possible reuse today but with some modifications. If your a person who thinks the punishment should fit the crime, you’ll going to love these.
The Pillory – Hands and head tightly clamped between two pieces of wood in the village square. It made a great target for passing citizens to pelt the criminal with all sorts of things.
The Dunking Stool – This required the dunking of the criminal in freezing cold water. This was often punishment for nagging wives.
The Stocks – This would be the little brother of the Pillory. The offender was seated on a bench with hands and feet held between two planks. This was punishment for minor offenses and the length of the sentence was determined by the severity of the crime.
The Whipping Post – The name is self-explanatory. FAFO in it’s first incarnation. The sentence was usually 10 lashes from a whip made from 40 strips of leather.
A Scarlet Letter – Offenders were required to have a large red letter sewn onto their clothing and forced to stand in the square for up to three hours for public ridicule – “A” for adultery, “B” for blaspheming, and “D” for being a drunk.
Branding – A scarlet letter burnt into your cheek, back, thumb, or back of the hand. “L”- Liar, “T” for thief,, and “F” for forger. They had a whole alphabet to choose from.
The Branks – A much more serious punishment. An iron cage was attached to the head with a sharp spike clamping the tongue. It was sometimes called the “scolds bridle” because many women were so punished for daring to talk back to their husbands.
The Billboes – (No relation to the Hobbit) A metal bar with attached handcuffs for the feet and then attached to the ground. Drunks and people who spoke out against the government were left to stand from dawn till dusk clamped to these.
I collect odd and unusual books and it’s not often I get truly surprised but it finally happened. I stumbled upon a book titled Bizarre Books – A Compendium of Classical Oddities. It lists in great detail some of the weirdest book titles, subtitles, and authors names I’ve ever seen. Over the next few months I’ll pick out a topic and list some of the titles mentioned in this book that apply. To start I’ve chosen a topic that will spice things up a little, Sex & Marriage. As you will see the human obsession with sex is nothing new. Here we go . . .
Seven Wives and Seven Prisons– The life of a Matrimonial Monomaniac – L.A. Abbott 1870
Shipping Semen? How to have a Successful Experience– Pennie Ahmed 1998
Sex + Sex = Gruppensex – Ruediger Bosschmann 1970
Orgasmus and Super-Orgasmus – Stephenson Verlag 1972
Castration: The Advantages and Disadvantages– Victor T. Cheney 2003
How to Pickup Women in Discos– Don Diebel 1981
Straight Talk About Surgical Penis Enlargement – Gary M. Griffin 1991
The External Genitalia of Japanese Females– Kanji Kasai 1995
In and Out and Up and Down – Jo L.G. McMahon 1922
High-Performance Stiffened Structures – Bury St. Edmunds 2000
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