Tax Day

Yeah, I know -- you were expecting me to go into a big rant about taxes on April 15th. I think it's in the bylaws of the Blogger's Union that you have to post something on Tax Day regarding how lame the IRS is, or how complicated the forms are...or at least about how stupid Congress is for their continued insanity regarding how our money is being spent. (And don't get me started on the Administration's moronic plan to cripple America's technology infrastructure with the ill-conceived cuts to the human spaceflight program. I'll probably have to rant about that later, but the bottom line is that we really need to replace these twits with someone who isn't ashamed of America's history of leadership. There's nothing wrong with being good at stuff, and with being good in general. But we seem to be in a trend of legislating mediocrity, don't we? Sigh.)

I'm afraid I'm going to have to disappoint you, though; I completely missed my opportunity on Tax Day, and I just don't have the energy to go there today. Feel free to complain to the Union if you like, but today's topic has nothing to do with the productivity-killing redistribution of wealth, the disembowelment of industrial capability, or anything remotely related to the Washington housecleaning we need to perform in November.

Nope, this particular column contains nothing but random thoughts for you to ponder. Such as:

How come some oranges split apart into nice neat wedges, and others fall apart into shredded goo-blobs when you attempt to segment them? And why to the segments seem to re-attach themselves to each other when they sit in your lunch sack for a couple of hours?

How long do you think the Mythbusters are going to be able to keep coming up with ideas? I'm not sure what urban legends are still unexplored...other than the ones about the one-armed guy who loses his hook when the teenagers suddenly drive away from Make-Out Point. (There are enough movies about that topic, anyway.) So are they just going to do what my high-school science teacher did...keep repeating the same experiments over and over, just because they explode and keep the rabble entertained? Probably.

And what's up with the remake of "Nightmare on Elm Street"? Why is this needed? Gah. I have absolutely no interest in such a thing. [Random trivia: My college roommate used to work with the father of that bland curly-haired chick from the first Freddy Krueger movie. This fact simply provides more evidence that I am deeply connected to Hollywood, and that it's only a matter of time before I become a huge movie star. Right?]

Anyway, do you think the Mythbusters will start doing shows to investigate other real-life legends? Maybe some that aren't all that well-known by the general public...like how Roger Neugent jumped out the 4th floor window at Oliver Hall (carrying a fire extinguisher, no less), and only suffered a few cracked vertebrae. Or how Mickey Canaday rode a tandem bicycle for 15 miles while being towed with 10 feet of rope behind a Ford Pinto at 65 mph. Or how an irrestibly charming and intelligent marching band member such as myself could make it all the way through high school and college without getting a date. Many such mysteries exist, I'm sure.

And while we're on the topic of investigative TV shows, I find myself tempted to perform my own "Ghosthunters" experiment. It seems to me that if you collected a dozen hours of recordings (from anywhere), you'd probably be able to find a .5-second clip in there somewhere that you couldn't explain. I think I might go through some of my old video footage and see what sorts of spooky mumblings I could extract. I'm sure with the proper suggestive dialog, I could convince someone that it's from the spirit world. (It may just be the refrigerator compressor cycling...but if you have someone listen to it while prompting them that it sounds like a deep voice chanting "Four score and seven years ago", they'll probably buy into the idea of Lincoln haunting your pantry.)

Hauntings and problematic citrus fruit aside, I hope that your Spring is off to a great start, and that you are enjoying the nice weather, etc. I promise that I'll try to give you a good Tax Day blog next year, but in the meantime, enjoy pondering the mysteries of the Universe, OK? Have a great day!