Random thoughts for a December day

Kirk Ericson | Dec 01, 20220

Here’s how we get people to stop using guns to kill people: We work on making people not want to kill people.

An example of lazy object naming: The orange.

People should use their baby photos in their obits — that’s when they looked their best.

We have a lot of public art in Western Washington that depicts salmon, so much so that if anyone is around in 2,000 years to dig through what remains of our civilization, they’ll think we worshiped those swimming creatures. Imagine their shock, then, when they discover we ate the object we worshipped, often with a lemon slice.

I have yet to see a Tesla automobile with a dent in it.

Consider the word “shower,” as in “taking a shower.” We could have just as easily called it “taking a rainer.”

Maybe more people would exercise if we substituted the word “playout” for the word “workout.”

The phrase “old-timey” is the new-fashioned way to say, “old fashioned.”

The adage “the final nail in the coffin” is out of date because nails aren’t used as often for coffins, and most dead people in the United States are cremated. So, we need a new metaphor. Maybe, “the final flame on the femur?”

Remember the time when it was shameful to have hair with split ends?

Does this happen to you? You hit your head hard on something, like an open kitchen cabinet door, and your instant thought is “Who hit me?” Then, a split moment later, when you realize it was you who hit you, do you call yourself an idiot?

Information that’s new to me: You know the evergreen you often see along bluffs? The one with reddish, papery bark? The one we call “madrona?” Outside of the Northwest, it’s called “madrone.” The following was in a March 2020 article published in the nearby Key Peninsula News: “In California and in most field guides, the tree is known as a Pacific madrone. The “a” at the end is an appendage attached only in the Pacific Northwest. The madrone-madrona divide seems to be somewhere around the Siskiyou Mountains.”

“Orange hole sun”: A description we could use to describe the sun when it’s obscured by wildfire smoke. It would also allow us to make a veiled reference, for no clear reason, to the Soundgarden song.

Here’s a new word: “Zoomies,” or Frenetic Random Activity Periods. It refers to those explosions of energy that dogs and cats occasionally have.

Scene from a coffee shop: A casually well-dressed man accompanied by a woman says to the barista: “I’ll do the hazelnut, leave room.” While standing behind them, I asked whether they were from around here, and the woman says, “Why do you ask?” I explained that the man’s attire, and his use of the phrases “leave room” and “I’ll do the hazelnut” spoke of someplace else. She replied, “We’re not. I just moved here from Iowa.” The man said, “I’m from Seattle.” Bingo.

What do you call someone who thinks oxycodone isn’t addictive? An oxymoron.

I’m not a believer, so I’m neither Christian nor Hindu nor Muslim or anything of the sort. I’m also not a disbeliever, so I’m not an atheist. And I’m unsure about what I don’t know, so I’m not an agnostic. We need a fourth option.

Some sounds we don’t hear anymore: The sound of a slider moving over a credit card imprinter (some people called them “knuckle-busters”); the sound of a VCR tape being rewound; the sound of a telephone off the hook; and being asked “regular” or “supreme?” at the gas station.