This item appeared in the Montana Craigslist under resumes, proving that youthful entrepreneurship is alive and well in the American west. I share it unedited:
RANCH EXTERMINATOR
"I only exterminate with shotguns and rifles so you might want to have some land. anything from gophers to coyotos. ill take care of it! i only can do this on weekends untill the week of june 7th, after that full time anytime.
-my charges is just a flat fee of 35.00$ NOTE: not a 100% chance of geting your request on that day, but free the untill i get the request.
-please know that i am only 14yrs. old but i have done this for almost 2yrs. now and preety knowledgable about tracking and exterminating the pests.
-also know i will not go past three folks or Livingston."
This youngster can’t drive himself, can’t work weekdays until school’s out, and is geographically confined (probably because Dad won’t spring for long-distance gas money). But he is learning a trade still valued on the plains and prairies. One can almost picture a young Wm. H. Bonney placing a similar ad in the Wichita, KS Gazette in the year 1863.
And yes, I note the inadequacies in spelling, punctuation, and grammar. But it’s clear he wrote this himself without parental assistance. I grow weary of Letters to the Editor written by nine-year olds that appear to have graduated from the Columbia School of Journalism. Out here kids are encouraged to go it on their own, blemishes and all.
##########
The London Daily Mail reports that last year some 43,576 British patients were kept waiting for longer than one hour in ambulances outside emergency rooms before being taken inside. It seems the British Government instituted a rule requiring that patients entering emergency rooms be seen within 4 hours, and in busy periods the bureaucratic dilemma is solved by leaving them outside so the 4-hour clock wouldn’t start running. Lest you smirk, such scenarios may soon become commonplace in a hospital near you. One would hope that Michael Moore doesn’t fall ill in the English capital.
##########
Billy Hamill (NY sportswriter Pete’s father) thought that the only unforgivable sin was self pity. I don’t know if it’s the only one, but it has definitely become fashionable to hoard one’s joy while sharing pain with all and sundry. I recall a time when the exact opposite was true. But now, grace of the ever-expanding psycho-drama we call modern living, we are told it is OK, we are encouraged, to share our misery, the way folks used to share fried chicken on long train rides across the plains. What good is pain if it can’t be used to elicit a little sympathy.
I was on a flight some time ago when my “seatmate” (there was a time when they were just passengers and not “mates”) volunteered that he was traveling to see his grown children to inform them that his wife, their mother, was having an extramarital affair. Just what the children need, I thought, and I’m sure he must now feel so much better that he has spread the grief around a bit.
And because modern life cannot exist without an equal and opposite reaction (society catching up with physics), I read recently of a man who died painfully of cancer, yet smiled to the end so as not to burden his family. But at the funeral he was roundly faulted for not sharing his last days with them “honestly and openly.” My Nana often said that she “couldn’t win for trying,” and I think she was right.
##########
I am awash in spam, typically the recipient of several hundred a day, offering breast enhancement, breast reduction, adjustment of other anatomical components, and so much more. But I also note that the flow diminishes dramatically on weekends. Even the idiots and scammers require a day of rest it seems.
##########
I mentioned that I now have a library card. I don’t recall hitherto having set foot inside one of these institutions since college, save several Saturday morning story sessions with my children when they were toddlers.
In college I believed the library existed for the purpose of securing Saturday night dates. I recall that on Mondays and Tuesdays the place was a ghost town. Volume picked up on Wednesday, and by Thursday it was beehive, every nook and straightback occupied (these were the days before Barkaloungers were installed at public expense to assist digestion of the written word).
Stacks were clogged with anticipation accompanied by furtive glances, shy smiles, and quiet whispers. This was, after all, the 1960s, when “hooking-up” meant a soda in the Student Union, not a liaison necessitating the purchase of latex products. Fridays radiated desperation, with wild-eyed singles plowing ground well thinned by previous traffic. Saturdays were almost too depressing to bare, as well I know, having spent all too many post-football late afternoons in those grey and desolate places, hope trumping reality.
##########
Spring snow again outside my window. Grey clouds 10 minutes ago, and now the ground is covered. What folks in Washington, DC would call a blizzard, sending thousands of bureaucrats scurrying for their cars to light out before the one inch mark and chaos. I like snow. I’ve often thought that snow in our nation’s capital is God’s way of slowing down the bureaucracy and keeping it from spinning out of control.
##########
Bloggers often end their posts with cute taglines. While I’m not into cute, I have stumbled across metaphors submitted by English teachers, taken from actual high school student essays. I will share one at the end of each forthcoming post. Remember, these are high school essays.
“He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant and she was the East River.”
…..the adventure continues…..
PS: Because I have elected not to foist these posts on anyone unannounced, and because they appear sporatically, I send a short notice "New Post on My Blog" to interested followers. To be added to or subtracted from these notices, send request to: solovoyager@gmail.com
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
MONTANA 001
The peripatetic scramble subsides for the moment, as I curl up at the foot of the Montana Bridger mountains. Although it should be known that I have received a tentative cat-sitting offer in Paris for mid-April, confirming my suspicion that if one hangs about long enough a suitable métier might just pop into view.
The most dispiriting news is that on return from France my cheese was confiscated, not by the ever-vigilant U. S. Agriculture police and their olfactorilly-advanced canines, but by French security. It seems in France fromage falls into the “liquids and gels” category, particularly, I suspect, if your larder is bare and you don’t want to be inconvenienced by a detour to the fromagerie on the way home from security detail.
Protestation was (predictably) to no avail, and a request to speak to a supervisor was met with a blunt and smirky “non.” I then offered my bagette to M. le Cheese Police, reasoning that he could hardly enjoy the dairy without the wheat. “Non, zees cheese goes wis ze garbage,” he replies, and I respond “yes, I know, that is why I wanted you to have the bread.”
His English was quite good, advanced enough in fact to catch the idiomatic slur, and I trundled off in haste lest La Belle France insist on extending my stay under circumstances far less attractive than the Marais from which I had just departed. But I fret over the dangerously slipshod application of French security measures, considering that I have passed unmolested with similar contraband at least a half dozen times in the past several years (I was assured that the “no cheese” policy had been in force “for many years”).
#####
I had occasion to pass several hours today in the local community hospital. I consider it an odd phenomenon that in our citadels of wellness and healing the majority of its practitioners and staff are overweight, some grossly, others morbidly. Not to mention those clothed in whites or scrubs huddled in freezing doorways puffing on Sir Walter Raleigh’s gift to England and all the civilized world. I am certain that this observation has offended one or more of you, and so I add my standard disclaimer “present company excepted.”
#####
I am attempting a noble but daunting experiment. My current digs are tubeless, devoid of the vast electronic wasteland. I know that Blitzer, Cooper, Matthews, O’Reilly, Olberman, et al will survive nicely in my absence. Less certain is how this former news junkie will fare. One day at a time…
I do have a new library card, an interesting experience for one (correctly) described as a “reluctant reader.” But my lack of literary knowledge has already gotten me into trouble. Thinking I was checking out “Everything I Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten,” I somehow ended up with “Running with Scissors.” I am now faced with the task of inventing a new English-language word to describe the book. All suggestions appreciated.
#####
I attended (but did not participate in: I'm working at getting back into shape) a local 10-k race this past Saturday. It highlighted yet another difference between the civilized Coasts and the wild west. All the races I have attended (mostly in the east) were surrounded by masses of flags, cones, police cars re-directing traffic, ambulances at critical junctures, water stations, mile markers, communications vehicles ready to detail any possible disaster, and so much more.
This event was run partly on snowy, muddy trails, with not a single official vehicle or personage in sight. A teenage volunteer with a ratty handheld “Stop” sign attempted (mostly without success) to limit traffic near the finish, and small children ran into the path of exhausted runners to cheer on Mom or Dad in their final 50 paces.
Oh, and the race ended at a pub. Each runner got a free beer. I love this place.
…the adventure proceeds apace…
The most dispiriting news is that on return from France my cheese was confiscated, not by the ever-vigilant U. S. Agriculture police and their olfactorilly-advanced canines, but by French security. It seems in France fromage falls into the “liquids and gels” category, particularly, I suspect, if your larder is bare and you don’t want to be inconvenienced by a detour to the fromagerie on the way home from security detail.
Protestation was (predictably) to no avail, and a request to speak to a supervisor was met with a blunt and smirky “non.” I then offered my bagette to M. le Cheese Police, reasoning that he could hardly enjoy the dairy without the wheat. “Non, zees cheese goes wis ze garbage,” he replies, and I respond “yes, I know, that is why I wanted you to have the bread.”
His English was quite good, advanced enough in fact to catch the idiomatic slur, and I trundled off in haste lest La Belle France insist on extending my stay under circumstances far less attractive than the Marais from which I had just departed. But I fret over the dangerously slipshod application of French security measures, considering that I have passed unmolested with similar contraband at least a half dozen times in the past several years (I was assured that the “no cheese” policy had been in force “for many years”).
#####
I had occasion to pass several hours today in the local community hospital. I consider it an odd phenomenon that in our citadels of wellness and healing the majority of its practitioners and staff are overweight, some grossly, others morbidly. Not to mention those clothed in whites or scrubs huddled in freezing doorways puffing on Sir Walter Raleigh’s gift to England and all the civilized world. I am certain that this observation has offended one or more of you, and so I add my standard disclaimer “present company excepted.”
#####
I am attempting a noble but daunting experiment. My current digs are tubeless, devoid of the vast electronic wasteland. I know that Blitzer, Cooper, Matthews, O’Reilly, Olberman, et al will survive nicely in my absence. Less certain is how this former news junkie will fare. One day at a time…
I do have a new library card, an interesting experience for one (correctly) described as a “reluctant reader.” But my lack of literary knowledge has already gotten me into trouble. Thinking I was checking out “Everything I Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten,” I somehow ended up with “Running with Scissors.” I am now faced with the task of inventing a new English-language word to describe the book. All suggestions appreciated.
#####
I attended (but did not participate in: I'm working at getting back into shape) a local 10-k race this past Saturday. It highlighted yet another difference between the civilized Coasts and the wild west. All the races I have attended (mostly in the east) were surrounded by masses of flags, cones, police cars re-directing traffic, ambulances at critical junctures, water stations, mile markers, communications vehicles ready to detail any possible disaster, and so much more.
This event was run partly on snowy, muddy trails, with not a single official vehicle or personage in sight. A teenage volunteer with a ratty handheld “Stop” sign attempted (mostly without success) to limit traffic near the finish, and small children ran into the path of exhausted runners to cheer on Mom or Dad in their final 50 paces.
Oh, and the race ended at a pub. Each runner got a free beer. I love this place.
…the adventure proceeds apace…
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
French Letters 004
Back from the USA as I continue my ping-pong volley across the Atlantic. Montana to Virginia to Paris in 1½ giant steps, trying not to give the appearance of a bon vivant, but neither a mechant vivant.
Back to the Marais I left less than a month ago, to take advantage of a friend’s generosity before her apartment is rented for the coming year. Back, it seems, to where I left off weather-wise, a steady drizzle and bone-numbing cold. The kind of day that makes you wish you were in London! The kind of day where even reprobates like myself carry, and use, an umbrella. The kind of day that gives you an excuse to have a glass of wine at 10am, returning from the marche bedraggled, besodden (not yet besotted), yet fortified with brie, bleu d’Auvergne, several odd-shaped chevres, a lettuce for one Euro, twice the size of the one at the Leesburg Farmer’s Market that cost $5.50, assorted olives, farm butter cut from a 20 lb. block, walnuts for the salad, and a tradition noix, a bagette festooned with nuts.
For several decades and more the friend mentioned above has with exceptional generosity made various digs around the city available for visits of varying length. I first signed on as a cat-sitter, but when Petit Gris and Chat Botte departed for their grande somme in that great sandbox in the sky, I became just a sitter.
This friend has asked nothing in return save the occasional request to transport small items unavailable in France. In earlier days when our homeland didn’t require securing, this was a chore of no moment, but now with miscellaneous agents rummaging through tightly packed valises, how does one explain 5 changes of underwear and 15 packages of Butter Lover’s popcorn? Bounce (the stuff women put in dryer’s to make freshly laundered clothing…bounce?...) caused a raised eyebrow or two in voyages past. Yet miraculously this trip the 3 pounds of bacon and two loaves of raison bread did not set off bells at either end of the trip. I had visions of replacing the infamous Richard Reid – the shoe bomber -- as the diabolical chemist who discovered the volatile connection between pig and raison, and terrorized the civilized world therewith.
I was treated to one mild day where the sun considered making an appearance then demurred. Then we were back to damp and dank. Stayed on the 96 bus past St. Germain des Pres when drizzle turned to serious rain. Near Montparnasse a group of 8 Spanish teenage lasses (i.e. teenage lasses speaking Spanish) ascended, surrounding me with intermittent giggles and comments on my hat (which Europeans appear to associate with gangsterism).
As I was clearly the center of attention, I felt the need to do something, and so began humming, semi soto voce the Beatles “Yellow Submarine,” quite uncharacteristic for one who eschews public displays of anything. Soon they were all in the act (much louder than I), including an enthusiastic 6-year old several rows away, whose mortified grandma tried unsuccessfully to shush him into silence. It sounded something like “dum dum dum dum yellow submarine, yellow submarine, yellow submarine, dum dum dum dum yellow submarine, yellow submarine, yellow submarine"...reprise.
As the bus approached its terminus at Montparnasse and I descended, the happy chorus followed, like nubile serpents trailing St. Patrick out of Dublin. For a moment I wondered whether I had acquired this appendage for some extended period, but the sound dwindled, and as I turned they were waving good-bye. Not only in Paris, but not too often elsewhere.
Today snow is predicted, but the sun is out casting brilliance and warmth across the Marais. But wait, I see a cloud...it's now snowing, I swear...a full 10 minutes from sunshine to neige.
…the adventure continues…
Back to the Marais I left less than a month ago, to take advantage of a friend’s generosity before her apartment is rented for the coming year. Back, it seems, to where I left off weather-wise, a steady drizzle and bone-numbing cold. The kind of day that makes you wish you were in London! The kind of day where even reprobates like myself carry, and use, an umbrella. The kind of day that gives you an excuse to have a glass of wine at 10am, returning from the marche bedraggled, besodden (not yet besotted), yet fortified with brie, bleu d’Auvergne, several odd-shaped chevres, a lettuce for one Euro, twice the size of the one at the Leesburg Farmer’s Market that cost $5.50, assorted olives, farm butter cut from a 20 lb. block, walnuts for the salad, and a tradition noix, a bagette festooned with nuts.
For several decades and more the friend mentioned above has with exceptional generosity made various digs around the city available for visits of varying length. I first signed on as a cat-sitter, but when Petit Gris and Chat Botte departed for their grande somme in that great sandbox in the sky, I became just a sitter.
This friend has asked nothing in return save the occasional request to transport small items unavailable in France. In earlier days when our homeland didn’t require securing, this was a chore of no moment, but now with miscellaneous agents rummaging through tightly packed valises, how does one explain 5 changes of underwear and 15 packages of Butter Lover’s popcorn? Bounce (the stuff women put in dryer’s to make freshly laundered clothing…bounce?...) caused a raised eyebrow or two in voyages past. Yet miraculously this trip the 3 pounds of bacon and two loaves of raison bread did not set off bells at either end of the trip. I had visions of replacing the infamous Richard Reid – the shoe bomber -- as the diabolical chemist who discovered the volatile connection between pig and raison, and terrorized the civilized world therewith.
I was treated to one mild day where the sun considered making an appearance then demurred. Then we were back to damp and dank. Stayed on the 96 bus past St. Germain des Pres when drizzle turned to serious rain. Near Montparnasse a group of 8 Spanish teenage lasses (i.e. teenage lasses speaking Spanish) ascended, surrounding me with intermittent giggles and comments on my hat (which Europeans appear to associate with gangsterism).
As I was clearly the center of attention, I felt the need to do something, and so began humming, semi soto voce the Beatles “Yellow Submarine,” quite uncharacteristic for one who eschews public displays of anything. Soon they were all in the act (much louder than I), including an enthusiastic 6-year old several rows away, whose mortified grandma tried unsuccessfully to shush him into silence. It sounded something like “dum dum dum dum yellow submarine, yellow submarine, yellow submarine, dum dum dum dum yellow submarine, yellow submarine, yellow submarine"...reprise.
As the bus approached its terminus at Montparnasse and I descended, the happy chorus followed, like nubile serpents trailing St. Patrick out of Dublin. For a moment I wondered whether I had acquired this appendage for some extended period, but the sound dwindled, and as I turned they were waving good-bye. Not only in Paris, but not too often elsewhere.
Today snow is predicted, but the sun is out casting brilliance and warmth across the Marais. But wait, I see a cloud...it's now snowing, I swear...a full 10 minutes from sunshine to neige.
…the adventure continues…
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
