Green Eggs and Uncle Tommy

As you may likely know, we here at Uncle Tommy have readers all over the planet. We’ve picked up readers in Africa (Hi folks!) a few posts ago. That was the last continent we had not reached. We’ve heard that, for whatever reason, people are reading these Uncle Tommy posts to their infant children, grandchildren and even great grandchildren. We think this is remarkable, especially considering most of the posts are not illustrated. Some readers reported that the children fell asleep while they listened; a few reported that the children laughed. One reported that they had to change the child’s diaper after each reading. Of course we know that’s not true! 

While we never saw ourselves as a player in the children’s literature world, we guess somebody’s gotta fill that Dr Seuss void.

%^*# Lyrics

Remember when Second Lady Tipper Gore had that crusade against obscene music lyrics back in the 90’s? Well, I think she lost that battle. People have pretty much forgotten about Tipper. My friends named their dog Tipper, but that dog’s been gone for years. Too bad she didn’t crusade for higher waitress tips. People would remember something like that. When they got up to leave the restaurant, say, IHOP, one of them would say, “Remember the Tipper.”

So, for the record (no pun intended!), yes, I am totally against obscene lyrics in music. We’ve made it through centuries of music without obscene lyrics. Take opera for example. There’s no cussing in opera, is there? If there was, it would be awful, ‘cause they repeat their words a lot. And they print the words in the program sometimes. Imagine going to a hip-hop concert and having the words printed in a program. Yikes!

The only possible exception for obscene lyrics would be if you really needed the word to complete a rhyme and there was no other word available that rhymed. Rhyming is important.    

Subway Series

If you live or vacation near the ocean, you get a lot of sand in your car. But you can get your oil changed at Walmarts and they’ll vacuum out your vehicle for free! I used to get this done on the last day of our family vacation so we’d have a clean van coming home. It worked out great. I got to walk around Walmarts while I waited. In hindsight, I have no idea if they changed the oil, but that van was clean.

It’s time for the World Series. (There’s a tie in here, really.) I’m hearing of parking costs approaching $100 per game on those surface lots where the guy flags you in. I’m sure it’s a supply and demand thing. The lot owners are gonna get what they can get. That’s the American way. But, would it be asking too much for them to have a vacuum cleaner there and go around and clean out the cars during the game? C’mon. For $100, am I asking too much? I’m not asking for an oil change here…

Somehow, for $100, the Subway “buy one sub get the second sub for half price” coupon on the back of the parking ticket doesn’t do as much for me.     

You Don't Need a Weatherman to Know Which Way the Wind Blows

Today I called a doctor’s office; their answering machine said there were four calls ahead of me and that my estimated wait time was one minute. Figuring I could spare a minute, I waited. And I waited. There was hold music so it was an obnoxious wait. (I have friends who have cool hold music but most people shy away from using cool music. Businesses shouldn’t use hold music of any kind because you can count the songs and figure out how many minutes you’ve waited.) So today I waited through 4 songs (almost an album side) and finally I surrendered and hung up. Four calls ahead of me? Yeah, right. Try fourteen. What if I had been really sick? (No, I still haven’t made it to RiteAid’s Drive Thru for my flu shot.)

So, who makes these hold time estimates? Is there like some expert guy in Kansas somewhere? Whoever it is is not very good at it. On second thought he does his job just fine. His job is to lie to you about the expected wait time to lure you into the waiting process. 

Speaking of guys who try to predict things, do you know why God created economists? He wanted to make the weathermen look good.

Receipt Coupons

Do you ever pay attention to those coupons you get on the back of your receipt at the grocery store? I’m paying more attention lately. I’ve always been preoccupied trying to watch the screen at the checkout to make sure the prices are correct. That’s exhausting, isn’t it? Well, everybody says those coupons on the back of the receipt are computer generated. I’m not so sure. I looked on the back my receipt recently and it had the following coupons: mouth wash, barber shop, diet soda and stain remover. So yeah, I’m wondering if the cashier has buttons she can push on her keypad to select the coupons based on the appearance of the shopper. Next time I go to the grocery I’m gonna lose a few pounds, get a haircut, wear a clean shirt and gargle, and then see what kind of coupons I get. Stay tuned...

  

PS: Don’t try to sell your coupons in the parking lot to people coming in. Management frowns on that.  

“How ‘Bout a Little More Coffee Over Here, Bernice?”

Have you ever gone to an event where you get one of those sticky name tags and you forget to take it off after the event?  And then you stop on the way home at a carryout or somewhere and you go in and the cashier greets you by name? Or another shopper greets you by name? Then you have to figure out how you know that person. And you rack your brain trying to figure out who they are. So, all the way home you’re trying to figure out who the person is. Finally you get home and you walk into your bathroom, see yourself in the mirror and realize you never took off that name tag… 

Speaking of name tags, what if you’re at, say, IHOP, and the person you’re with insists on calling the waitress by her name ‘cause she’s wearing her name tag. C’mon. Really? Are you going to call the cashier by name also? Where does this end? It seems to me like if you call her by name, you’ve established a relationship of some sort, and you should tip more. I’m gonna bring that up next time somebody does that...

They don't use their real names on the name tags anyway, do they?