Clarence Thomas and his White law clerks

 Well, happy Christmas eve everybody.  We got drizzles here in Central PA, and they're supposed to be lingering throughout the day.  Fun stuff.  Temps are going to hover around in the mid 40s (F).  Tomorrow, however, they're supposed to climb up into the 50s (F).  Keep in mind, even though 2023 has been the warmest year since humans have started keeping records, there is no such thing as global warming, at least as far as many of the truly religious are concerned.  God wouldn't let that happen to us.

As expected, yesterday there were not a lot of customers in the store yesterday.  For the most part, the 6 hours I spent there were truly boring.  I did talk to people, but scheduling was lite; management must finally be reading the room.  I did sell some flooring yesterday, and one customer signed up for a credit card.  We did have 2 customers, a husband and wife, who scammed us on getting a military discount.  We knew there was a problem, but they knew exactly which bells and whistles to tap and blow in order to get their 10% discount.  I have no problem with people who are thrifty, and frugal, and who try to save a penny, but those that lie and cheat in order to pay the lowest price they can possibly get?  They are one of the reasons retailers raise their prices.  Corporate is going to do everything within their power to make Market Share, even if it means raising the prices for everybody.

And I saw this picture in the Washington Post this morning.  Tell me, what stands out in this photo of Clarence Thomas and his law clerks?

Do you think it was that there was only one black person standing in front of a lot of white people?  Does this mean that Clarence doesn't like black people?  He, himself, rose in the ranks with the use of affirmative action, yet he has also stridently worked against it.  Maybe he believes minorities should be hired by others, and not him.  Or, perhaps he thinks that if he hires minorities he'll be showing reverse prejudice.  Or, and this seems to be the most accurate possibility, Clarence wants to be white, and so surrounds himself with white people.  He's been called an Oreo, black on the outside and white on the inside, for a long time.  For those of you still wondering this is a good illustration of an Oreo.

Fatties and their scooters

I always like to scan through the news headlines first thing in the morning just to see what catches my eye.  One of the first things I saw was two of the founding members of the Hypocritical Society of America, Huckabee and Davis, standing together for a picture... well, enough said on that subject.

Something else that caught my eye was an article on walking, how the Surgeon General says we all need to walk more.  Six months ago, when I was on the verge of undergoing major back surgery, I'd asked my Orthopedic Specialist what kind of physical therapy I'd have during my recovery stage.  He told me what I needed to do was 'walk.'  That's it, nothing more.  Rather then wait until after the operation, I started walking right away, first with a walker, then with a cane, and finally without a cane.  Amazingly, all of those bulging and herniated discs fell back into place and my major surgery was totally unnecessary.  My 82 year old mother says it was Jesus... nah, it was walking.  Instead of laying around on my ass taking meds for the pain, I got up and walked.
Which brings me to one of my major pet peeves, fat people who ride around on one of these little scooters rather walk - laziness, you know?

Now there are people who really do need to rely on one of these to get around, I know, I work in retail.  I see them driving by the paint desk with their portable oxygen bottles, and their braces and their casts.  But I also see the fatties.  You know who I'm talking about, those people who pinch themselves in between the arm rests.

My favorite fatty story is of the woman in my local Giant supermarket.  She was trying to maneuver her way around a corner wing-stack of tissues and got herself stuck.  As I approached her, she began to sob "I just can't take this anymore, I can't take this anymore."  Then I got a look at what was in her cart and the first thing I saw was two large packages of Oreo cookies.  And there was more, Cheez-itz and a can of spray cheese, and potato chips, and a package of Fig Newtons, and... her entire basket was filled with garbage food, nothing nutritious there.  Instead of giving her a hand, I walked by her thinking, she needs to get out of that cart and do it herself, and after that she needs to put that garbage back on the shelf and buy herself some food. But I know that didn't happen because a couple minutes later I saw her scooting her way down the ice cream aisle.

I think that what the Surgeon General really needs to do, rather then put out articles on walking that fatties are never, ever going to read, is to create "Kick a Fatty out a Scooter Day."  This would allow those of us who walk regularly, to go up to a fatty in a scooter and, with out fear of repercussion, tell him/her to get off his ass and walk.  Of course that will never happen.  We might hurt their feelings and they might have to eat another half-gallon of cookie dough ice cream.