Snake in a Can

Just when you thought it was safe to go into the bathroom, comes a new fear for city dwellers. A woman in Brooklyn got up in the middle of the night to answer nature’s call and found a python in her toilet.

No it wasn’t a prank, nor was it a pet in her household or something one of her kids was hiding that got loose in the middle of the night. It was literally coming out of the toilet after somehow crawling through the pipes from the basement up to her apartment.

I don’t know about anyone else but all I can say is EWWWW!! As if I didn’t have enough paranoia when I get up in the night to go to the bathroom, now I have to check the toilet every time I use it lest I get a tickle while I tinkle.

Oh and in case you’re wondering, everyone is doing fine. After a long struggle to get someone to believe her, the woman finally got the fire department and her landlord to come. Both snake and woman are doing fine.

Husband Wanted. Rich Only Need Apply

So who hasn’t dreamed of meeting that special someone and finding out that yes you can spend the rest of your life with them? Every little girl dreams of meeting her prince charming and being swept up in a romantic whirlwind and living happily ever after. Then we grow up and realize there are more frogs out there than princes. But there are some who never give up on their prince charming. I know I never did and even though I kissed many a frog I finally found my prince.

On the other hand there are those who are looking for the prince not because of the romance but because of the royal coffers. Sure who hasn’t had the fantasy of marrying a rich guy and living in the lap of luxury for the rest of their lives. I know I did and when I did find my prince charming I will say that yes he is rich, but not in the financial sense and that meant more to me than all the money in the world. But for some women that isn’t enough, they need more than intelligence, sense of humor and all the good things that are far better than money.

Take the unnamed woman who recently put an ad on Craigslist looking for a rich husband. She obviously had her priorities straight. She wasn’t caring about anything other than the size of his bank account. The other important things in a relationship meant nothing. But hey at least we can say she was honest right? How many men date women only to later realize they were more interested in their stock portfolio than in their future plans? I’ve seen many a girl go out with guys and demand all kinds of pricy gifts to prove their love. Later when the relationship goes south those same girls head to the pawn shop to at least get something back from all the time they wasted on the loser. (Hmm wonder who the real loser is in that scenario).

Hmm that puts me in mind of a song, maybe you’ve heard of it? A little ditty called Gold digger.

Public or Private?

I’ve been hearing a lot of grumbling lately about the right to privacy around the city. People who object to a new plan putting cameras in downtown Manhattan that will take footage of all cars entering and leaving the area. There is also a group who is upset about cameras being put on buses and trains. They claim it’s an invasion of their privacy.

My question to you is, when did going out I public suddenly become private? I mean every time I walk out of my house I’m in public, I’m being viewed by hundreds of people. Maybe more since I have no idea how many people may be looking out of a window at any given time.

I’ve ridden in a few of the buses that have cameras in them. What are they going to see? Me reading as the bus goes cross town, people getting on and off the bus, the man in the back row picking his nose, the woman in pink talking on her cell phone. Face it, I saw all those people and everyone else saw those people so what difference does it make if those same activities were recorded on camera? If you’re not doing anything illegal what difference does it make?

Think about London and how quickly the bombing suspects were identified and captured. It happened so fast because of the cameras that are everywhere. If I’m in a public space, I don’t expect any privacy. I’m sitting on the bus having a cell phone conversation, then I expect that people near me will hear what I have to say no matter how much I try and keep my voice down. Hell I’ve been privy to more cell phone conversations than I want to. But I can’t help it, its in public and people are gonna hear you. I can’t tell you how many conversations I’ve listened to while traveling around the city. It’s not like I want to listen but its hard not to hear what people are saying when they are right next to you talking.

Sure privacy is a good thing and we don’t “Big Brother” tracking our every move for the hell of it. But do we really have that much to fear? I mean so what are they gonna do see me on bad hair days? See how many days I take the bus at a certain time over another time. I have a strong feeling that unless there is a strong reason to do so, most of the footage won’t even be looked at. So it’s just like they weren’t there anyway. So please tell me what’s the problem?

What is the World Coming to?

I admit there seems to have been a lack of good odd news to write about lately. But this time around I seem to have found a gem. Seems a library in Westchester County demanded a fine for an overdue book be paid when the library patron’s daughter returned the book. Of course the woman tried to explain that the reason the book was returned late was that her mother had died. But still the fine was due and the appalled woman paid the fine.

Now while it might seem a little callous of the library to still demand the fine after being told that the woman’s mother had died. After all it was her mother who had taken the book out of the library and being dead just couldn’t get to return it in time. But what amazes me the most is how the woman reacted to the fine.

Insensitive maybe, but the library does have a right to collect fines. America’s libraries are constantly under funded and lose out on so much because of fines and lost books. Now it’s not like they were demanding some outrageous fee. The fine was only 50 cents. And while the daughter may have thought it callous of them, did she really need to act like they had suddenly demanded thousands of dollars?

Sure death is traumatic and I know I’ll be a mess one day when my own mother goes. But will I make a big deal out of a 50 cent fine? Of course not, pay the money and move on its not like that small amount is going to hurt her or her mother’s memory

Avast, me hearties!

Ah so tomorrow September 19 is a favorite for many around the world. I cant say I’m sure how it really happened but in the way of strange cult favorites International Talk Like a Pirate Day has taken flight and celebrated by many.

I guess the fun of it is what attracts so much attention. Sure real pirates were crude, rude and socially unacceptable to say the least. They were blood thirsty and cruel and well just plain not nice guys. Forget about what you see in Disney and what you read about in romance novels (yes I confess as a teenager I couldn’t stop reading romance novels. Now I’m a recovering romanceaholic.) Pirates were bad news.

I think people like the fantasy around pirates more than they like the real thing. Its fun to dress up and call women wenches and keep saying arrr all day long. In a time when there is so much bad news being reported in the papers and on TV, people need a moment of whimsy to take some of the seriousness out of their life.

So for one day people get to unleash their inner child and indulge in some serious fun by shouting Ahoy Matey and Shiver Me Timbers. I see nothing wrong about it. Of course I don’t think calling my boss a scurvy bilge rat will score me any points at work, so I’ll save the pirate talk to after work hours just to avoid any trouble.

Passing of an Era

Ok maybe I’m being a bit melodramatic in this, but when I saw the headline, my heart skipped a beat and I couldn’t help but gasp. Reading those words I felt like a friend had died. In some ways a friend did die. What am I talking about? Author Robert Jordan, most famed for his Wheel of Time series has died.

I say I feel like a friend died because for years I’ve been reading his books. He creates a world so rich and so detailed that for that brief period of time I truly am somewhere else living the adventures of his characters. In fact my love for Robert Jordan started many years ago when a friend dragged me to the book store because he heard they were giving out free books. In fact they were giving a free book of the first few chapters of the first book in the wheel of time series.

That friend bought the full book, and by the time I was dying to read it he had finished and was already devouring the next. I’ll never forget the wonder of reading those books for the first time. Every time a new book is due out I start from the beginning and read each of the books from the first to the most recent to keep the many details and characters fresh in my mind as I read the newest book. I’m going to miss that.

He was a great author who provided me with great adventures, loves, heartbreaks, triumphs and more importantly memories. RIP You will be missed Robert Jordan.

Web Deceiver

People who cheat on their significant others have long been seeking ways to not get caught. But sooner or later they always do. Now a new web site is offering to help people out with that. For a range of services at a variety of prices you can get custom made excuses, “emergency” phone calls calling you into work and of course all sorts of faked documents for conferences, business trips and the like.

Heck they’ll even take care of buying gifts for your lover so the charge doesn’t appear on you bills. They are so careful about detail they will even make up the kind of lame freebie give always you receive at conferences to make it more believable.

The kicker in all this that the founder of the web company is a former private investigator who has gone from catching cheating spouses to aiding and abetting them. The logic behind this? It can sometimes save marriages. How can a marriage be saved by helping a spouse cheat? Cheating isn’t something that can be swept under the carpet and doesn’t harm anyone.

I’m not going to get on my soap box here, I’m not going to rant and rave about my position but I am going to say that a web site like this that enables people to cheat is wrong. Besides how are the bills from the web site going to be explained away? They may do all the purchasing, booking of transportation and accommodations but they have to bill the client. How does a man explain so many large purchases at a web site to a spouse? Not to mention that with the web site making the news a lot of spouses may be suspicious now of sudden long distance conferences.