8/29/2007 – Editorials

From the e-mails:

If you are 30 or older you will think this is hilarious!

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes about how hard things were when they were growing up; what with walking 25 miles to school every morning — uphill BOTH ways!

Yadda, yadda, yadda. And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way I was going to lay a bunch of crap like that on kids about how hard I had it and how easy they’ve got it! But now that I’m over the ripe old age of 30, I can’t help but look around and notice the youth of today. You’ve got it so easy! I mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a Utopia! And I hate to say it, but you kids today don’t know how good you’ve got it!

I mean, when I was a kid we didn’t have the Internet. If we wanted to know something, we had to go to the library and look it up ourselves, in the card catalog. There was no e-mail! We had to actually write somebody a letter — with a pen! Then you had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the mailbox and it would take like a week to get there.

There were no MP3’s or Napsters! You wanted to steal music, you had to go to the record store and shoplift it yourself! Or you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio and the DJ’d usually talk over the beginning and screw it all up!

We didn’t have fancy crap like call waiting. If you were on the phone and somebody else called, they got a busy signal, that’s it! And we didn’t have fancy caller ID boxes, either. When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was. It could be your school, your mom, your boss, your bookie, your drug dealer, a collections agent, you just didn’t know! You had to pick it up and take your chances, mister!

We didn’t have any fancy Sony Playstation video games with high-resolution 3-D graphics. We had the Atari 2600. With games like "Space Invaders" and "Asteroids" and the graphics sucked! Your guy was a little square. You actually had to use your imagination. And there were no multiple levels or screens, it was just one screen forever. And you could never win. The game just kept getting harder and harder and faster and faster until you died. Just like life!

When you went to the movie theater there no such thing as stadium seating. If a tall guy or some old broad with a hat sat in front of you and you couldn’t see, you were just screwed.

Sure, we had cable television, but back then that was only like 15 channels and there was no onscreen menu and no remote control. You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on.

You were screwed when it came to channel surfing. You had to get up and walk over to the TV to change the channel and there was no Cartoon Network either. You could only get cartoons on Saturday morning. Do you hear what I’m saying!? We had to wait all week for cartoons.

And we didn’t have microwaves. If we wanted to heat something up we had to use the stove . . . imagine that! If we wanted popcorn, we had to use that stupid Jiffy Pop thing and shake it over the stove forever like an idiot. That’s exactly what I’m talking about! You kids today have got it too easy. You’re spoiled. You guys wouldn’t have lasted five minutes back in 1980!

—000—

A priest, a Pentecostal preacher and a Rabbi all served as chaplains to the students of Northern Michigan University in Marquette. They would get together two or three times a week for coffee and talk. One day, someone made the comment that preaching to people isn’t really all that hard. A real challenge would be to preach to a bear.

One thing led to another and they decided to do an experiment. They would all go out into the woods, find a bear, preach to it, and attempt to convert it.

Seven days later, they’re all together to discuss the experience.

Father Flannery, who has his arm in a sling, is on crutches and has various bandages, goes first. "Well," he says, "I went into the woods to find me a bear. And when I found him I began to read to him from the Catechism. Well, that bear wanted nothing to do with me and began to slap me around. So I quickly grabbed my holy water, sprinkled him and, Holy Mary, Mother of God, he became as gentle a lamb. The bishop is coming out next week to give him first communion and confirmation."

Reverend Billy Bob spoke next. He was in a wheelchair, with an arm and both legs in casts, and an IV drip. In his best fire and brimstone oratory he claimed, "WELL brothers, you KNOW that we don’t sprinkle! I went out and I FOUND me a bear. And then I began to read to my bear from God’s HOLY WORD! But that bear wanted nothing to do with me. So I took HOLD of him and we began to wrestle. We wrestled down one hill, UP another and DOWN another until we came to a creek.

So I quick DUNKED him and BAPTIZED his hairy soul. And just like you said, he became as gentle as a lamb. We spent the rest of the day praising Jesus."

They both looked down at the rabbi, who was lying in a hospital bed.

He was in a body cast and traction with IV’s and monitors running in and out of him. He was in bad shape. The rabbi looks up and says, "Looking back on it, circumcision may not have been the best way to start."