THESE TIMES

Random thoughts for a day in February

Kirk Ericson | Feb 01, 20240

It’s easy to be entranced by the innocent looks of toddlers. They appear to have no idea what’s coming at them.

The wonderful thing about quitting cigarettes is you have the opportunity to start them all over again.

When both our boys were living at home and would go out for the evening, returning after I went to bed, one of my first destinations the next morning was to check the shoe rack to ensure their shoes were there. Seeing those shoes always gave me a serene feeling. All was well with the world, at least for a moment.

Our society tends to ignore old people, probably because we can’t extract labor from them anymore.

Do ruminates ruminate?

Our country is divided along many lines, but it’s especially odd that we seem to have camps that are pro-carbon and anti-carbon.

A friend in Thurston County shared a joke:

Q: Why do people in Tumwater and Olympia go to yard sales in Lacey?

A: To get their stuff back.

Why is Abraham Lincoln’s face on the $5 bill?

Because the back of his head was bloody.

The Sumerian who created and promoted the concept of zero in Mesopotamia thousands of years ago probably had to put up with a lot of skeptics at work muttering behind his back, “We’ve been doing just fine all these years with only plus or minus. All he’s got is nothing!”

Of all the technological advances of my life, I never saw any of them coming: Cassettes, Spotify, electric cars, cellphones, anti-lock brakes, desktop computers, cable TV, Skype. The only technological advance I did foresee was flying cars.

I had an editor many years ago who never pretended to be happy when she wasn’t. I admire that in people.

I like my neighborhood because it doesn’t have rich people or poor people. We’re middle class, and that’s the class that makes this country hum. Moderation in all things …

On aging: You think you look as old as you could possibly look, and the next thing you know, a year or two goes by and you discover you look even older. Why can’t we grasp that we’re just going to keep looking older and older?

This doesn’t happen anymore: Cops drawing chalk outlines around corpses.

Here’s an idea that should spread: When you’re waiting in line in a public place to use the bathroom, ask the person behind you, “On a scale of 1 to 10, how badly do you have to go?” If the answer is higher than yours, you let that person go ahead of you.

Advertisers and the political industrial complex have drained the words “patriotism,” “freedom” and “liberty” of any of their original meaning.

Shut your eyelids

open your eyes

hear the voice

that’s unheard inside.

I once asked one of my sons, “Do you think there’s anything beyond this world?”

“Yes, I think there’s another planet like Earth in the universe.”

“Why?”

“Because there has to be balance in nature.”

If you’re reclined on a couch and you utter a lie, you’re lying while lying on the couch. If you told a lie while you were reclined on a couch, you lied while you laid. If you’re reclining on a couch while you’re telling a lie, you’re lying while you lie.