Lessons

Happy Saturday – Actually it’s been a quiet week. Quiet, except for the fact that I took our little Corolla ‘beater’ in the have the resonator piping replaced, and that on my birthday no less. It must be that old cars and old guys’ ‘resonator’ piping suffer a similar issue – loudness, especially in public.

The other aging phenomena is the reappearance of kindergarten aged fart jokes and the like.

So, here is a resultant juvenile limerick, one of many.

When you enter your eighties – life takes on a different format:

An irritable person is Dirk the faultfinder.
A legit and professional griper.
People had no idea why he had the blues.
Turns out he had a full diaper.
They quickly got a nose full of clues.

It’s still early and still dark, so back to my coffee.

Presidents Day – Here is a quick question regarding last Monday. Who of you all actually spent a nano-second reflecting on even one of our Presidents last Monday as we celebrated our 147th Presidents Day (1879)?

I would guess that topping the list would be critical events such as mistakenly putting out the garbage a day early. Or checking the mailbox forgetting that there was no delivery that day.

Was your bank open, did you buy a piece of furniture or a mattress at the weekend’s onslaught of sales? Any of you care to share your favorite screw-up?

Cathy on the air – Tomorrow is the start of an important week, especially for us, the elderly. National Consumer Protection Week (NCPW). It runs from March 1 to 7, 2026, with March 5 designated as National “Slam the Scam” Day to focus on government imposter scams.

Our Cathy at Cincinnati’s Pro Seniors heads up the organization’s Statewide Senior Medicare Patrol (SMP) sector. Quoting their stats; “In 2024, the 54 SMP projects had a total of 5,643 active team members who conducted a total of 22,752 group outreach and education events, contributing to $35.1 million in expected Medicare recoveries.”

Last evening, using Roku’s Live Streaming setup I listened to a wonderful show on WMKV – 89.3FM where the station hosted Cathy representing Senior Medicare Patrol and a representative from the Better Business Bureau (BBB) to alert listeners to the myriad and ever more sophisticated onslaught of scams – over 200% increase in about a year.

This week especially, be alert, verify and incoming calls and requests. If the ‘pitch’ sounds too good to be true, most likely it is!

A tale of two women – is proof that it’s not just by being from a group, a culture, a gender, a religion that becomes the criteria by which to judge a person. All this was brought home to me when I spotted the antics and untoward attitude expressed by one representative, Ilhan Omar during this week’s State of the Union presentation.

The tale of the two women is made oh so clear when we look at Representative Ilhan Omar who is little more than a grifter, a masterful and successful grifter at that. A grifter who constantly caps on America and openly expressing a deep-seated hate for Jewish people.

The other is Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Ayaan same country of origin endured female genital mutilation as a child and fled an arranged marriage. Ended up In the Netherlands, exposed Islamic misogyny through her writings and the film *Submission* with Theo van Gogh, which critiqued the oppression of women under fundamentalist Islam (van Gogh was assassinated by an Islamist in 2004).

Hirsi Ali received death threats, moved to the United States and has been living under protection. She is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University where she champions our values, freedom, tolerance, and women’s rights. She embraces a gratitude toward the nations that sheltered her. She is a hero.

The plan today is that our Cincinnati family meet up for brunch. Assuming Marcia is up for it we’ll head for one of my favorite coffee/sandwich shops; “Mom ‘n Em”. No better Avocado or Anchovy toasties anywhere!

Then proud congratulations to Derek who the day after his birthday showed up an Austin courthouse to report for jury duty. He survived ‘voir dire’! Was seated, then on Thursday at 6:30pm, after a two-hours of deliberation, the jury of twelve came to a verdict. He faced his civic duty with aplomb and performed well.

Life is AMAZING!

Dirk

BONUS POINTS:

How many iterations of the American flag have been made? Hint, the United States holds the world record for the most changes to a national flag.

1. 27
2. 13
3. 6
4. 29
5. 18
6. 21
7. 17

Last week answer – #2