Last night I dreamed I woke up in Safe Mode. Yes, it was a nightmare where I was a computer running a Windows Operating System with a not too wise user holding down the office chair. For the past eleven years I have been doing tech support in one form or another, so I guess it was high time for me to have a dream where I was a computer. Here is how it went...

I don’t remember how things started, but Safe Mode was my only solution for protecting myself from this user who had assaulted my keyboard and mouse. Since I engaged Safe Mode, I had effectively paralyzed most of my programs so I couldn’t return fire by popping up any of my favorite error messages that go beyond the comprehension level of this user. Darn. All I could do was watch the user and pray that tech support was on the way. I heard cursing then, and all I could think was. "Oh great, please call tech support, don’t reboot me again…Give me a minute to try to...

"Ouch!!! Holy components! What was that? I felt a surge, and then everything went dark. I must have been rebooted again! Okay user! I am sticking to my digital circuitry here. Safe mode is as far as I’m going… What caused this mess anyway? How did THAT get in my registry? Do I detect some lousy new gaming software? Hey! User! What DID YOU install here?"

I heard another voice then asking which operating system is running. Oh good! I feel better already! Then I hear my user say, "Office 2003." What! Office 2003 is not an operating system!

"HELP!!! Tech support! Please stop this user, and save me now before it’s too late! Okay tech support, read my electrical impulses - Go with the Last Known Good…Last Known Good…Last Known Good…"

And then suddenly I was back to normal...from three days ago. Ahhh! Tech Support had restored me back to the Last Known Good configuration. Thank you tech support! What day is it today? Boy does my registry feel good. Booting into normal mode."

http://www.helpdesknotes.com

Charles Darwin, Father of Evolution, deduced that humans have been evolving for millions of years by means of survival of the fittest and natural selection. From the Cro-Magnon man with a club, to the CEO on vacation with Club Med, and from pre-historic tools, to the hand-held remote, we descended from a monkey and slowly evolved into intellectual bipedal human couch potatoes. Where are we headed in the next million years? Who cares, as long as the head rests have built-in tv’s. Set this brain-plane on auto-pilot.

Not too long ago, we veered off the Historic Highway at an Evolutionary Rest Stop to take a whiz that we had been holding back for like the last ten thousand rest stops. Meanwhile, our bladders are evolving into 64oz Big Gulp holders and we can't manage to navigate our way around a 700 square foot resting complex without a "you are here" arrow. We need to get back on the road pretty soon before we get passed up by the Ford Tortoise because me thinks we are getting dumber.

Past civilizations saw the invention of the wheel, while our civilization is watching Wheel of Fortune.

"I'd like to buy two vowels: an I and a Q please."

My TiVo started secretly recording episodes of BookTV for me while I wasn’t home because it thought my vocabulary needed more...how you say...wordiness. But I’m like “Hey, I don’t want a high IQ, I want a Hi-Def TV!” Was that a haiku? I digress.

Wheel of Fortune was actually the first syndicated show to broadcast in high-definition, which just proves we watch too much television. If we need to watch a game show, on a TV so vivid that the Roadrunner cloud will actually set off the smoke detector (Beep!!!Beep!!!) in the next room, it’s time to flip it off, literally and figuratively.

In 200 BTV (before television), I can only guess that life was more like, well...reality TV. I just imagine our ancestors coming over to America on boats while Joe Rogan is asking them "So what's it going to take for you to eat this thing, dude? You still look pretty hungry from the potato famine."

I think our wheel in society has started rolling down hill and some will stop it before it gets too far, others will jump in and run in circles, while others are asleep at it all together.

My whole point is this, we need to get a little smarter than a fifth grader and we need to do it now!

"Okay Pat, I'd like to solve the puzzle!"

Just watch less TV and pick up a book. Take your opposable thumb outta your tookus and flip a page, not a channel. Now gimmee back my Darwinian-Pop-Up-Book of Evolution and prescription 3-D reading glasses.

However, reading has a downside. I recently met a very smart Asian girl who was reading a book called Egg Drop Soup for the Soul of Humpty Dumpty in the self-help section of the book store where I buy my books-on-tape and she told me that I should join her book club.

The Cliff’s Notes story is that two hours before the book club meeting, I am sitting in a darkened movie theater with my book, while my laser pointer whizzes across the screen because the entire film was sub-titled! I’m just lucky some people were reading them aloud.

I can barely read the instructions on the back of a TV dinner without cracking open a dictionary. I would like to see a high-definition TV dinner for those of us with big appetites and smaller than average dictions.

But the truth is, is that TV is not the reason for stupid people, because stupid people exist where TV does not.

Animal rights activists in Australia wanted to have a monkey legally declared the status of a person. According to these people, the monkey should have civil rights. 200 million years of evolution only to find out that a monkey is a person, too! If you agree with these people, the only difference between a chimp and a chump is "you”, my friend.

...then again how stupid do you have to be to not have a TV? I have seben...I mean, seven.

On the other hand, maybe we should embrace this social brain fart and replace The Thinker with...the Statue of Limitations. That’s in the Museum of Modern Art, right?

I’m thinking Arby’s.

I love the south and all its' charms; fantastic weather, scenic beauty and most importantly, if you can subdue it, southerners will fry it and eat it! Strange...whenever I'm reminded of the south, a familiar song plays in my head. I'm sure you know it too...

"I wish I was in a land of cotton.
Old times there were not forgotten
Look away! Look away! Look away, Dixie land!"

The land of cotton; birthplace of the necessary fibers to make comfortable underpants. History owes a great deal of gratitude to Eli Whitney and his innovative creation; the cotton gin. Where would we be, if old Eli shunned his calling to be a key component in the industrial revolution and pursued his other passion...making homemade, salt-water taffy? Sure, we'd have a delicious treat to enjoy while ambling the county fairgrounds but an important by-product of the cotton gin would never have been devoloped. Of course, I speak of women's feminine protection.

I think we're all adults and can handle a mature discussion about women and their nudie parts...hee hee...nudie parts!!! My experience with this topic started in grammar school. One afternoon, all the fifth and sixth grade girls were called to the gym for a "special assembly." No boys allowed. We guys knew they were discussing something about sex and being that we were 10 years old, creepy and fascinated with nudity, it was our duty to try and catch a glimpse of what was going on inside. One by one, we slowly walked by the gym doors, necks craned, trying to peek through a crack and hopefully see some skin. Rumor had it, Dave Olsen saw some upper thigh and Wally Casey swears he either saw a boob or a bee-hive. It was never determined what he saw but we lauded his efforts nonetheless, as almost seeing a naked boob was more than any of us had ever witnessed.

Now I'm married and possess a mature, comfortable knowledge of feminine products. Many people have their own meaning behind the letters, P.M.S., however I have my own breakdown of those three, nasty letters; "P"ick up "M"y "S"upplies. Although I know the whole gist of what these things do, it never fails to boggle my mind when I head down the feminine hygiene aisle of the local drugstore. The sheer magnitude of varying products is dumbfounding.

Let's analyze the different sizes. There's your mini, maxi, light days, heavy days, Days of Thunder, kill your husband days, Linda Blair look-a-like day and on and on. Take the mini...it looks like it sounds, not too intimidating, easy to manage. The maxi resembles something you'd find protecting football players from bone-jarring impacts. Then there's the "Cowabunga dude" size, which has all the qualities of a cotton surfboard. Finally, the "Colossus", which for all practical purposes, looks like a harnessed bedroll, strapped to the back of a Union soldier.

If the differing sizes aren't enough to make your head spin, there's the "upgrades" you can add to personalize your supplies. They come scented, unscented, with adhesive strips, tape, rip chords, pulleys, floral patterns, pictures of famous mathematicians and lastly, wings.

Finally, you have the absorbance factor. "Absorbent" seems to be the bottom of the barrel and something to be shied away from when making your decision. "Super-Absorbent" has the word "super" in it and conveys something amazing is going on or a comic book super-hero is somehow involved in the process. ALWAYS buy products associated with super-heroes!

Next, and not very well-known, is the "De-humidifier" absorbency, which will, by the very nature of its name, suck all the moisture from the air in any room. It may also cause others close by to experience nose bleeds or a severe case of cotton mouth. And, by prescription only, one can purchase the "Decimator 4000", which if worn while swimming, will completely drain small ponds or lower the water in lakes to levels not conducive, or safe mind you, for boating, motorized water sports or rowdy chicken fights.

So now, when I shop for feminine products, the same song plays in my head, only the words are altered just a bit. It goes something like this,

"I find myself in an aisle of cotton.
Time spent there, I wish forgotten!
Look away! Look away! Look away, Maxi-Land!!!"

www.ebloggy.com/MatthewFoley

Where would we be without people like Danny Bonaduce? Bad example. How about Dwight Eisenhower? He was a redhead. Who else could we taunt about their appearance without insulting them? "Hey match-stick head," "I’d rather be dead than red" and "Where did you get that hair?" are just some examples of the pleasant comments we’ve often heard.

A common myth is that redheads have tempers. (That peeves me). Many people assume red-haired women are wild between the sheets. (My husband doesn’t.) Others believe redheads should answer to original and witty nicknames like "Red," "Carrot top" and "Peppermint Patty."(as I do.) A recent episode of "South Park" refers to the redhead as a "Ginger," suffering from "Gingervitis." Supposedly the "Ginger" has no soul. (What- ever.)

In some societies, the term redhead is synonymous with hard-headedness, the Devil or being mentally challenged. Best of all, this is all considered politically correct.

The world will be frightfully ordinary in the future without redheads. Try to picture the year 2150. Everyone will have dark brown hair, brown eyes and skin the color of a weak cup of latté. In other words, they will be attractive. Due to global warming, Earth will be a tropical paradise.

Few clothes will be worn because tawny skin will rarely burn. There won’t be any leprechauns (redheads, all) left, so there will be no chasing rainbows. Action figures and dolls will be dark-haired, pretty and handsome, but Kewpie, Troll and Raggedy Ann will go by the wayside. Clowns (flame-heads), of course) will crawl back into that tiny little car, never to return.

There will be museums featuring stuffed redheads of the past. Like the dinosaur, "redheadisinteruptus" will be a highly contemplated phenomenon. It will be speculated that the species died off because their skin rejected the sun. Conspiracy theorists will suggest that the large Celtic population was banished to a faraway island, where they step-danced themselves to oblivion.

There will be stories about famous redheads: Van Gogh, William Shakespeare, Sarah Ferguson, Woody Allen and Lucille Ball, thus illustrating the fine line between genius and insanity. There will be nostalgia parties at which revelers dress as their favorite redhead: Little Orphan Annie, Woody Woodpecker, Elmo.

The redhead will be just a silly memory in the next millennium if we do not act now. The future is "plain" to see: Who will the dark-haired, perfect beings compare themselves to without the titian-haired, with their alabaster skin and freckled faces, not to mention invisible eyelashes and eyebrows? The greeting card industry will have lost its poster children. The future looks seriously beige.

Red is not dead, yet. There may be hope for flame-heads in the future, such as redheaded test tube babies or cloning. This may be irresponsible in light of the fact that the extinction of the redhead seems to be a natural evolutionary phenomenon. Who messes with Mother Nature? Jurassic Park does make a good case against resurrecting extinct species. I believe the (new) dinosaurs ate the people.

My flaw, my only flaw, is the flaw of not being perfect. While I’m unsure how this flaw affects the lives of others, it has surely been a thorn to my proverbial side (and my other one). As a child I would gaze into the stars and dream of being a scientist, or if not that at least one small boy on top of another boys shoulders inside a trench coat pretending to be a scientist.

Neither of these dreams came to fruition. Instead of being at the forefront of major breakthroughs in Stockholm I was in a hotel in Long Island. It was my responsibility to go around from room to room and make sure that the shower caps were properly calibrated. This work was as dull as it was unfulfilling.

One day I felt that I could not go on living any longer, but then something happened that completely vanquished this feeling. I was arrested. I had been caught winking at a female body builder. Luckily my judge was magnanimous; he softened the punishment and only enjoined me to one lifetime in prison.

I managed to cut my life sentence short by turning two of its words into a conjunction and was very quickly out of the slammer (while I must confess there are still some aspects of prison I miss to this day, particularly our weekly scrabble game.)

When I returned home I immediately re-entered the dating scene. My first marriage to the dreaded Mrs. Turner ended in divorce due to irreconcilable similarities and had left me weary to relations with the opposite sex, now I felt almost compelled to find a significant other. Being too old for singles clubs I, frequented dating websites. I had exhausted the all of the major sites Biology.Com, Snatch, eLarceny, to no avail. I had the worst luck with JMate.com; it said the perfect woman for me was Eva Braun.

On some inconsequential spring day I happened to stumble across an ad in my local news paper:

INSOLATED BLACK HOLE CREATED IN GLENWOOD LABS

LOOKING FOR HUMAN GUINEAPIG TO LEAP INTO GAPING VOID

PREFERABLY A MAN WITH NO HUMAN ATTACHMENTS, UNFULFILLED CHILDHOOD DREAMS, AND A BALANCED CHECKBOOK

IF YOU SURVIVE YOU CAN USE THIS EXPERIENCE AS A TAX DEDUCTION.

For reasons you can already guess this ad intrigued me. I felt I was perfect for this job considering I already fulfilled two out of three requirements. I drove down to the labs and the scientists immediately chose me for the job, I’ll never forget the scientist’s words when he saw me "If there is any man to chuck into a black hole and never see again, it is him!"

I remember my last few moments before entering the black hole, I was televised nationally, I had a big ad for Johnson’s Baby/Motor Oil emblazoned across my chest. The scientist counted down from five, when he reached two he started counting up to one hundred seventy three, then he counted down to zero.

Many claim that when a human body enters a black hole it turns into spaghetti. This is untrue. Your body actually turns into a Caesar salad. Inside the black hole I learned the universe’s most intimate secret; it has a crush on Steven the shy boy in its social studies class.

Some think that once you go through a black hole you wind up in another dimension, this theory is wrong. Where you really end up is on the roof of Cowboy Jack’s Old Western Casino in Las Vegas. I was standing there donned in cowboy raiments, constantly taking my gun from my shoe holster and firing. I was completely made of neon. For months on end I would do this work day and night before throngs of gamblers. I enjoyed doing this, it was the most creatively fulfilling job I’ve ever had.

Then one day who should walk by but the dreaded Mrs. Turner. She recognized me immediately climbed to the casino’s roof and seized me and brought me back to her abode. I tried to fight to return to the casino, I even took her to court but New York State Law plainly says that in the event that an ex-husband becomes a neon sign his former spouse is entitled to full custody of him. I’ve been unhappy, but at least I’ve been able to write this memoir by leaking neon from my intricately folded wires onto the shag carpet that is now beneath me.

© Copyright by author, used with permission by Humor Press. No unauthorized reproduction or redistribution is allowed.

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I rounded the corner of the aisle at Luscious Linens-n-Other-Stuff, expecting to encounter bedding. Instead, I encountered a dog--in a stroller! Talk about the phrase “creature comfort.”

Lest you think I faced a little kid pushing a toy stroller containing a faux-fur Yorkie, be assured that this was a living, breathing, salivating, tiny dog, seated in a regular-sized stroller, with a seemingly sane adult woman pushing it. I admit to a double take, but it wasn’t my imagination. Apparently terrier is the new toddler.

My first reaction: Have we entered a new world where dogs are not safe alone at home? Would someone have called Social Services to report this woman had dog abandonment issues if she'd not taken her dog on this outing?

Second reaction: Has it that been that many years since my father-in-law chained his canine beast, Duke, outside his front door so Pops could leave his house when no one was in it? Granted, Duke, a wolf-sized mammal with incisors that could bite through reinforced concrete, overplayed his role, resulting in local officials denying my father-in-law mail delivery and garbage pickup, but Duke maintained his guard duty until nearly toothless.

Surely, though, there is a middle-ground between a stroller dog and a wanton beast, but the world seems to have taken a sizable shift from “dog protecting empty house” to “protecting dog from empty house.” To better understand the shift, I planned to ask the stroller-dog lady the specific reason she would take her dog to a mall, but as I bent to pet the animal, it wrapped its teeth around my index finger and chomped down, hard!

The stroller-pushing woman, in the sweetest voice I’ve ever heard, said, “Muffett, tell the lady you’re teething and that you’re sorry.” Muffett salivated. Short of calling Mall Security to have a dog arrested for trying to kill me, I searched out Customer Service.

“Oh,” said the Customer Service lady, “the dog is so cute, and so much less trouble than a child in the store.” As for my bloodied finger, she assured me they sold health-care items in Aisle 4.

So I left without purchasing any Luscious Linens-n-Other Stuff and drove to my dog-less home, still wondering when dogs took over the world. It isn’t that I never had a dog; I had one about 20 years ago. The difference was that I had low expectations of his abilities. I expected, as everyone did back then, that he would protect our house, although whether or not he’d wake up during a robbery was questionable since sleep was his favorite (and most frequent) activity.

As for his socializing with me outside the house, this was a lost cause since he wasn’t all that nice to me inside the house.

My youngest son, still mad at me for sending that dog to “the kennel in the sky” at the age of 18--the dog’s age, not my son’s--called today to tell me he’s thinking of adding a Shih Tzu to his household. I asked him who will care for the pet since he and his wife work all day and it is against societal rules to leave your dog alone. He then read from a brochure:

“Doggy Date is a daycare center offering a loving environment that meets the developmental and socialization needs of your dog. Your dog will experience inside and outside play all morning, be given a nutritional lunch, and then settle down for an afternoon nap . . . .”

I couldn’t help myself. I interrupted. “Do they role play?” I asked. “I mean, do they get in a circle and have the ‘teachers’ explain how a Chihuahua can protect itself from a Great Dane bully? Do they have dress-up day? Do they bring ‘Show and Tell’ because I can only imagine what a dog might bring . . . .”

My son hung up on me.

Some have suggested a dog would keep me company in my Golden Years, but canine-care rules have changed too much for me to take their advice. I like being free to go out at will, have no interest in taking a dog to the mall, and do not want to pay for it to sniff other dogs’ behinds all day, even in a loving environment.

My finger has now healed and I am ready to venture to the mall again. This time, though, I’m taking along a fake cat and using it as a decoy.