While on vacation in Rome, I noticed a marble column in St. Peter's with a golden telephone on it. As a young priest passed by, I asked who the telephone was for. The priest told me it was a direct line to heaven, and if I'd like to call, it would be a thousand dollars. I was amazed, but declined the offer.
Throughout Italy , I kept seeing the same golden telephone on a marble column. At each, I asked about it and the answer was always the same: It was a direct line to heaven and I could call for a thousand dollars.
Then -
I finished my tour in Ireland . I decided to attend Mass at a local village
church. When I walked in the door I noticed the golden telephone. Underneath
it there was a sign stating: "DIRECT LINE TO HEAVEN: 25 cents." "Father,"
I said, "I have been all over Italy and in all the cathedrals I visited,
I've seen telephones exactly like this one. But the price is always a thousand
dollars. Why is it that this one is only 25 cents?"
The priest smiled and said, "Darlin', you're in Ireland now. It's a local call."
Happy St. Patrick's Day!!!
Welcome to the 2009 edition of getting to know your friends.
What you are supposed to do is copy (not forward) this entire email and paste
it onto a new email that you will send. Change all the answers so that they
apply to you, and then send this to a whole bunch of people (including the person
who sent it to you). Put your name on the subject line. The theory is that you
will learn many little things about your friends, if you did not know them already.
1. What time did you get up this morning? 7:48 am
2. How do you like your steak? Don't eat it.
3. What was the last film you saw at the cinema? Coraline
4. What is your favorite TV show? No t.v.
5. What did you have for breakfast? shrimp in lemon juice
6. What is your middle name? Elizabeth
7. What is your favorite cuisine? food - taco salad
8. What foods do you dislike? Lima Beans-yup
9. What are your favorite chips? I like the bbq flavoring, I could just lick that off and toss the chip
10. What is your favorite CD at the moment? Right now I'm listening to Harry Potter
11. What kind of car do you drive? Honda CRV
12. What is your favorite sandwich? Hmm, I have no favorite.
13. What characteristics do you despise? Liars, for sure!
14. What are your favorite clothes? clothes that are comfy (wish I had little ones *sigh*)
15. If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation? alaska (again) & hawaii and I add "any beach"
16. Favorite brand of clothing? Brand? Does Thrift Store count as a brand?
17. Where would you want to retire? near my family
18. Favorite time of day? mornings
19. Where were you born? Turlock, Califorinia
20. What is your favorite sport to watch? Watch a sport ???
21. Who do you think will not send this back? Does it matter?
22. Who will send it back first? Who ever feels like it at the time.
23. Pepsi or Coke? Is there a difference?
24. Indoors or out? out doors, especially if I can be at the beach
25. Are you a morning person or a night owl? morning
26. Pedicure or manicure? Never tried either.
27. Exciting news you would like to share? Anything new to me is exciting.
28. What did you want to be when you were little? a teacher
29. What is your best childhood memory? Playing cards with my dad and cooking with my mom.
30. Piercings? One hole in each ear and that's it!
31. Farthest you have traveled? What's farther, Bajia de Los Angeles, Alaska, Alberta - Cananda, or Baltimore - Maryland?
32. Ever been toilet papering? yes
33. Been in a car accident? nope
34. What is your favorite song? I have no favorite
35. Favorite day of the week? I'm especially partial to Saturdays
36. Favorite restaurant? Any place I don't have to cook.
37. Favorite Flower? hydrangas and pansys
38. Favorite ice cream? chocolate
39. Favorite fast food restaurant? Don't do fast food
40. How many times did you fail your driver's test? 0, zip, nada, zero
41. From whom did you get your last email? Mom?
42. Which store would you choose to max out your credit card? Max out a credit card? I don't think so!
43. Bedtime? 8 or 9 or 10 or 11
44.Who are your most curious about their responses to this? everyone
45. Who was the last person ate out with? Like at a restaraunt? Josh and Jeff.
46. What are you listening to right now? The computer making it's humming noise.
47. What is your favorite color? purple/pink/bright turquoise
48. How many tattoos do you have? zero - never,never,never. I can't think of anything I'd want to wear forever!
49. Favorite movie? None
50. Favorite magazine? jewelry and bead making magazines
51. Books your reading right now? Just finish the Twilight series.
52. What time did you finish this email? 10:35 am.
53. Starbucks drink? Forget the calorie count, do you know how much they cost?!!
THE PERFECT DIET
Yesterday I was at my local Wal-Mart buying a large bag of Purina dog chow for my loyal pet, Biscuit, the Wonder Dog and was in the checkout line when woman behind me asked if I had a dog.
What did she think I had, an elephant?
So since I'm retired and have little to do, on impulse I told her that no, I
didn't have a dog, I was starting the Purina Diet again. I added that I probably
shouldn't, because I ended up in the hospital last time, but that I'd lost 50
pounds before I awakened in an intensive care ward with tubes coming out of
most of my orifices and IVs in both arms.
I told her that it was essentially a perfect diet and that
the way that it works is to load your pants pockets with Purina nuggets and
simply eat one or two every time you feel hungry. The food is nutritionally
complete so it works well
and I was going to try it again. (I have to mention here that practically everyone
in line was now enthralled with my story.)
Horrified, she asked if I ended up in intensive care because the dog food poisoned
me. I told her no, I stepped off a curb to sniff an Irish Setter's ass and a
car hit us both.
I thought the guy behind her was going to have a heart attack he was laughing so hard. Wal-Mart won't let me shop there anymore.
Better watch what you ask retired people. They have all the time in the world to think of crazy things to say.
HOW TO CALL THE POLICE WHEN YOU'RE OLD AND DON'T MOVE FAST ANYMORE.
George Phillips , an elderly man, from Meridian, Mississippi, was going up to bed, when his wife told him that he'd left the light on in the garden shed, which she could see from the bedroom window. George opened the back door to go turn off the light, but saw that there were people in the shed stealing things.
He phoned the police, who asked "Is someone in your house?"
He said "No," but some people are breaking into my garden shed and stealing from me.
Then the police dispatcher said "All patrols are busy. You should lock your doors and an officer will be along when one is available."
George said, "Okay."
He hung up the phone and counted to 30.
Then he phoned the police again.
"Hello, I just called you a few seconds ago because there were people stealing things from my shed. Well, you don't have to worry about them now because I just shot them." and he hung up.
Within five minutes, six Police Cars, a SWAT Team, a Helicopter, two Fire Trucks, a Paramedic, and an Ambulance showed up at the Phillips' residence, and caught the burglars red-handed.
One of the Policemen said to George, "I thought you said that you'd shot them!"
George said, "I thought you said there was nobody available!"
One of The Dangers of Ipods
You are on the bus when you suddenly realize ... you need to pass gas.
The music is really loud, so you time your emissions with the beat. After a couple of songs, you start to feel better as you approach your stop.
As you are leaving the bus, people are really staring you down, and that's when you remember: You've been listening to your ipod.
NEW WORDS FOR 2008: Essential vocabulary additions for the workplace
(and elsewhere)!!!
1. BLAMESTORMING: Sitting around in a group, discussing why a deadline was missed
or a project failed, and who was responsible.
2. SEAGULL MANAGER: A manager, who flies in, makes a lot of noise, craps on
everything, and then leaves.
3. ASSMOSIS: The process by which some people seem to absorb success and advancement
by kissing up to the boss rather than working hard.
4. SALMON DAY: The experience of spending an entire day swimming upstream only
to get screwed and die in the end.
5. CUBE FARM; An office filled with cubicles.
6. PRAIRIE DOGGING: When someone yells or drops something loudly in a cube farm,
and people's heads pop up over the walls to see what's going on.
7. MOUSE POTATO: The on-line, wired generation's answer to the couch potato.
8. SITCOMs: Single Income, Two Children, Oppressive Mortgage. What X-generationers
get into when they have children and one of them stops working to stay home
with the kids.
9. STRESS PUPPY: A person who seems to thrive on being stressed out and whiny.
10. SWIPEOUT: An ATM or credit card that has been rendered useless because magnetic
strip is worn away from extensive use.
11. XEROX SUBSIDY: Euphemism for swiping free photocopies from one's workplace.
12. IRRITAINMENT: Entertainment and media spectacles that are annoying but you
find yourself unable to stop watching them.
13. PERCUSSIVE MAINTENANCE: The fine art of whacking the crap out of an electronic
device to get it to work again. Often feel like doing this to my computer!
14. ADMINISPHERE: The rarefied organizational layers beginning just above the
rank and file. Decisions that fall from the adminisphere are often profoundly
inappropriate or irrelevant to the problems they were designed to solve.
15. 404: Someone who's clueless. From the World Wide Web error Message '404
Not Found,' meaning that the requested site could not be located.
16. GENERICA: Features of the landscape that is exactly the same no matter where
one is; such as fast food joints, malls, etc.
17. OHNOSECOND: That minuscule fraction of time in which you realize that you've
just made a BIG mistake. (Like after hitting send on an e-mail by mistake).
18. WOOFS: Well-Off Older Folks.
19. CROP DUSTING: Surreptitiously passing gas while passing through a Cube Farm.
Airplane Lunches
I put my carry-on in the luggage compartment and sat down in my assigned seat.
It was going to be a long flight. 'I'm glad I have a good book to read. Perhaps
I will get a short nap,' I thought.
Just before take-off, a line of soldiers came down the aisle and filled all the vacant seats, totally surrounding me. I decided to start a conversation. 'Where are you headed?' I asked the soldier seated nearest to me.
'Petawawa. We'll be there for two weeks for special training, and then we're being deployed to Afghanistan.'
After flying for about an hour, an announcement was made that sack lunches were available for five dollars. It would be several hours before we reached the east, and I quickly decided a lunch would help pass the time.
As I reached for my wallet, I overheard a soldier ask his buddy if he planned to buy lunch. 'No, that seems like a lot of money for just a sack lunch. Probably wouldn't be worth five bucks. I'll wait till we get to base '
His friend agreed.
I looked around at the other soldiers. None were buying lunch.
I walked to the back of the plane and handed the flight attendant a fifty dollar
bill. 'Take a lunch to all those soldiers.' She grabbed my arms and squeezed
tightly. Her eyes wet with tears, she thanked me. 'My son was a soldier in Iraq
; it's almost like you are doing it for him.'
Picking up ten sacks, she headed up the aisle to where the soldiers were seated. She stopped at my seat and asked, 'Which do you like best - beef or chicken?'
'Chicken,' I replied, wondering why she asked. She turned and went to the front of plane, returning a minute later with a dinner plate from first class. 'This is your, thanks.'
After we finished eating, I went again to the back of the plane, heading for the rest room. A man stopped me. 'I saw what you did. I want to be part of it. Here, take this.' He handed me twenty-five dollars.
Soon after I returned to my seat, I saw the Flight Captain coming
down the aisle, looking at the aisle numbers as he walked, I hoped he was not
looking for me, but noticed he was looking at the numbers only on my side
of the plane. When he got to my row he stopped, smiled, held out his hand, an
said, 'I want to shake your hand.'
Quickly unfastening my seatbelt I stood and took the Captain's hand. With a booming voice he said, 'I was a soldier and I was a military pilot. Once, someone bought me a lunch. It was an act of kindness I never forgot.' I was embarrassed when applause was heard from all of the passengers.
Later I walked to the front of the plane so I could stretch my legs. A man who was seated about six rows in front of me reached out his hand, wanting to shake mine. He left another twenty-five dollars in my palm.
When we landed I gathered my belongings and started to deplane. Waiting just inside the airplane door was a man who stopped me, put something in my shirt pocket, turned, and walked away without saying a word. Another twenty-five dollars!
Upon entering the terminal, I saw the soldiers gathering for
their trip to the base. I walked over to them and handed them seventy-five dollars.
'It will take you some time to reach the base. It will be about time for a
sandwich. God Bless You.'
Ten young men left that flight feeling the love and respect of their fellow travelers. As I walked briskly to my car, I whispered a prayer for their safe return. These soldiers were giving their all for our country. I could only give them a couple of meals.
It seemed so little..