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There seems to be at least one advantage when you get to be an old codger. People just expect you to be grumpy, at least some of the time. So following up with that theme here is a partial list of things or people that can be classified as irritants to me.
•People (men or women) who drive in the left lane of a four or six lane highway, 5 miles an hour below the speed limit and who are intently engrossed with their cell phone conversation.
•When we are in the middle of a drought, the TV weatherman who says we should luck out as the heaviest thunderstorms will pass to our north or to our south.
•Sports announcers who treat Tiger Woods as god. With all the great golfers out there we are treated with how Tiger walks, how he frowns and how he picks his nose. When he hits a bad shot, it is blamed on the demons that have haunted him for the last year and one-half.
•Nancy Pelosi!!
•Tree huggers that believe trees should be protected at all costs and never harvested. There is more timberland now than at any time in history. Consider the staple of a Barbara Walters interview, “If you were a tree what kind of tree would you be?” Scrub Oak, maybe?
•Those individuals who are so proud of themselves for putting bricks in toilets and never let the water run when they brush their teeth. These are the same people who despise big corporations like Monsanto who save billions of gallons of water by producing corn and soybean seeds that require 50 percent less water.
•Tender young clerks who stare blankly at you if you buy something for ninety-one cents and hand them a dollar and a penny. Bless their hearts, they will probably say, “You really gave me too much money”.
•I must include those NPR types who say how dreadful Rush Limbaugh is but will tell you they never listen to him. The probabilities are when no one is around they are regular listeners or they are only parroting their elite friends.
•Golfers who have bad swings like me. I don’t understand why they don’t have enough sense to improve. When I asked my golf pro why I make bad swings, he simply says, “Don’t do that”.
•Horses that don’t run. After I spend hours studying their past performances, their workouts, their trainers, their jockeys and their breeding, they finish next to last. In a perfect world horses should not have bad days.
•Staying in the animal world - please tell me why the deer love anything we plant or try to grow. We have tried deer repellant, mothballs, loud noises and cursing. The result – instead of six deer bedding down in our yard, we now have twelve.
•Atheists or near atheists who think they know all the wisdom of the Bible. If they really knew all the wisdom, they would no longer be atheists. You know the kind. The person that complains about all the hypocrites in church, but lets you know he is above all that. Since he has no basic beliefs, he cannot be hypocritical.
•Consider TV and radio stations reporting on events that are not stories. A typical example – air, milk and water that has a minute trace of radioactive material. The trace is so small it is 5,000 times smaller than anything significant. So why is this a story?
•These people who stubbornly believe, or at least they tell you they believe, the change that Obama promised is being fulfilled. Now two and one-half years after the 2008 election consider this:
There seems to be at least one advantage when you get to be an old codger. People just expect you to be grumpy, at least some of the time. So following up with that theme here is a partial list of things or people that can be classified as irritants to me.
•People (men or women) who drive in the left lane of a four or six lane highway, 5 miles an hour below the speed limit and who are intently engrossed with their cell phone conversation.
•When we are in the middle of a drought, the TV weatherman who says we should luck out as the heaviest thunderstorms will pass to our north or to our south.
•Sports announcers who treat Tiger Woods as god. With all the great golfers out there we are treated with how Tiger walks, how he frowns and how he picks his nose. When he hits a bad shot, it is blamed on the demons that have haunted him for the last year and one-half.
•Nancy Pelosi!!
•Tree huggers that believe trees should be protected at all costs and never harvested. There is more timberland now than at any time in history. Consider the staple of a Barbara Walters interview, “If you were a tree what kind of tree would you be?” Scrub Oak, maybe?
•Those individuals who are so proud of themselves for putting bricks in toilets and never let the water run when they brush their teeth. These are the same people who despise big corporations like Monsanto who save billions of gallons of water by producing corn and soybean seeds that require 50 percent less water.
•Tender young clerks who stare blankly at you if you buy something for ninety-one cents and hand them a dollar and a penny. Bless their hearts, they will probably say, “You really gave me too much money”.
•I must include those NPR types who say how dreadful Rush Limbaugh is but will tell you they never listen to him. The probabilities are when no one is around they are regular listeners or they are only parroting their elite friends.
•Golfers who have bad swings like me. I don’t understand why they don’t have enough sense to improve. When I asked my golf pro why I make bad swings, he simply says, “Don’t do that”.
•Horses that don’t run. After I spend hours studying their past performances, their workouts, their trainers, their jockeys and their breeding, they finish next to last. In a perfect world horses should not have bad days.
•Staying in the animal world - please tell me why the deer love anything we plant or try to grow. We have tried deer repellant, mothballs, loud noises and cursing. The result – instead of six deer bedding down in our yard, we now have twelve.
•Atheists or near atheists who think they know all the wisdom of the Bible. If they really knew all the wisdom, they would no longer be atheists. You know the kind. The person that complains about all the hypocrites in church, but lets you know he is above all that. Since he has no basic beliefs, he cannot be hypocritical.
•Consider TV and radio stations reporting on events that are not stories. A typical example – air, milk and water that has a minute trace of radioactive material. The trace is so small it is 5,000 times smaller than anything significant. So why is this a story?
•These people who stubbornly believe, or at least they tell you they believe, the change that Obama promised is being fulfilled. Now two and one-half years after the 2008 election consider this:
% of Increase
Price of gas 69.6
Price of #2 corn 78.1
Unemployment rate – blacks 25.4
Food stamp recipients 35.1
Failed banks 17.1
National debt 32.2
The liberals answer – all this is George Bush’s fault.
•Must include all of our climate change friends. Their leaders, Al Gore and Barbara Boxer have cost this country trillions of dollars in wasted spending by the government and consumers. Worse yet, this propaganda has been force-fed to our school children and gives them a warped sense of man’s control over climate.
After unburdening all these irritants, some with tongue in check, I would be amiss not to seriously consider unlimited reasons to be optimistic, cheerful and thankful.
As a starter how about the great people we have in this community and indeed, over the entire world. What God has given us in all aspects of life. The opportunity to travel, to express ourselves and to promote causes we believe in, the ability to change our government without violence and the right to worship as we believe. Many more.
(Jerry Jackson of Heber Springs writes his “conservative viewpoint” column each Wednesday)
