Not So Famous…

I took this picture on July 27th because it amused me, and I thought I’d share it with you.  :)

What you see are 2 ducks waddling across the entrance to a gas station on Highway 132 near Empire, CA. Those who have been to the Fruit Yard filling station know that there are lots of ducks out at the fountain behind this station, but the framing of this particular picture made me laugh.

This is the kind of intellectual dishonesty that annoys me, and I think I’ll share it with you.  Today, I was having to drive to Hayward to fix a major problem with their network, and I had to stop and put gas in my car.  While I was filling up, I noticed a sign, which I read out of sheer boredom. (Reading is better than standing there watching the numbers count up.)  This is the sign I saw:

What annoyed me about this sign is the fact that most Americans will ignore the words and see only the little picture things.  (Most Americans have never really progressed in their reading skills past the 2nd grade.) So what do they get from this sign?

1. Do not use your cell phone while fueling your car.
2. Do not fill a portable fuel container on top of a vehicle.

They don’t have a picture for sitting back down in your car, getting back out, and touching the nozzle, sparking, and igniting the fumes coming from your gas tank. The problem with this is twofold:

1. THERE HAVE BEEN NO CONFIRMED CASES OF CELL PHONE USE CAUSING A FIRE AT A GAS STATION! So they are recommending against using your cell phone for no reason.  You already can’t drive while talking on a cell phone, and now you can’t do it when you’re gassing up! All for no reason. Use your cell phone, people.  It’s not going to cause a problem at all.

2a. Most Americans won’t look at the small word-things at the top that warn against the very real danger of sitting down in your car and creating a static charge, which can discharge into the nozzle, igniting the fumes escaping your gas tank. They won’t even look closely at it.  They will only come away with a false belief about the “dangers” of cell phone usage at filling stations.

2b. If they’re sitting in their car, they’re not reading this sign…

So they end up thinking there’s a problem with using their cell phone while filling up their car, which there is NOT…and they end up having no idea that sitting in your car while filling up and then touching the nozzle without first safely discharging their charge isn’t a problem at all, which it is.

Retarded, really.

I’m not that big on the whole momentary patriotism thing.  When 9-11 comes along, I see people put up their flags and get all weepy.  Why not feel this way the whole year? That’s my thing.  I see the 9-11 anniversary hoopla as not much more than a way to drum up this momentary patriotism.  However…

Does this mean that you shouldn’t observe the anniversary of one of the few times America has been attacked on her own soil? No…I think you should.  I think you should remember that we were attacked.  Remember the clips of people jumping out of the Twin Towers.  Remember what those freakin’ BASTARDS did to us!!!  And then support the President in prosecuting the war!

You might point out that Bush has not prosecuted the war as he should have. This is true…and it’s because he wants to be popular, and that is sad in and of itself.  However, Bush might prosecute this very important war as he ought to if the country would support him as they would have 50-60 years ago.

Remember 9-11, but do it with a point in mind.  Remember why we are fighting this culture that feels it would be better to be dead than to live in a world with non-Muslim westerners.

So Sunday night, we held an event that is all-too-rare for our group.  We got together and had fun.  :)  While we have fun at Bible Study, when everyone can make it, we don’t BBQ and talk about random stuff too terribly much.  Anyway, we really had a good time, and these are some pics I took with my phone.

Early in the evening, we went for a ride in Derek’s car.  The picture doesn’t do it justice…I was cramped.  :)  But it was still fun!

Mackeson’s Triple Stout is a good beer.  I had a couple of these…and then a couple others….maybe a couple of those…………

…and fun was had by all.

Jeff is tall….or else Gabe is looking for God.  Not sure which…

This is why drunk people should not take pictures with camera phones.  However, this could well be an accurate picture as seen through my eyes.  :)  Just kidding…I was never that bad.  This is Rachel laughing…really, this is Rachel almost all the time.  She smiles a lot, which is awesome.  :)

Artsy-fartsy me.  Yeah, it’s just a bunch of bottlecaps.  I call it sculpture.

I would comment on this, but I have no idea why Derek was making this face.  Can someone remind me?  :)

This is a picture of Daniel’s very not-tasty premium rum.  More for him…I’ll stick to beer, thanx.  I’m better at beer.  :)

This pretty much characterizes the night.  We drank, we told stories, we laughed a lot.  This is what good times are made of.

Thank you to everyone who came and had fun.  MAJOR thank you to Derek and Kim for having us all there.  Thank you to Derek, who stayed up to have fun with us even though he had to work the next morning early.  I look forward to the next one.