INEXPLICABLE OBJECT OF THE WEEK

Week of 3/18/01:

WEEK 152

Old Man in a Hat with a Wonder Gourd

This is not so much an object as a rant. As I don't have any pictures of old men in hats driving, I've included some handy information on Luffa, the Wonder Gourd of the Orient. It's from a booklet from the 1930s, and I can picture a cranky senior yelling "Back in the Depression, we didn't have none of your fancy store-bought sponges! We grew our own Luffas and made our own shock absorbers! And we LIKED it!"

"Luffa is the technical spelling. However, the navy calls it 'loofah' and many other people refer to it as 'Loopha,' or 'Lufa' or 'California Okra.' It is also well known as the 'dish cloth gourd' or the 'vegetable sponge.' "Its resiliency makes it useful for many purposes like shock absorbers, slipper soles, table mats, packing material, pillow stuffing, and as oil filters in steamships. The young fruits are often eaten in the Orient, like we eat squash in the U.S.A., being served in soup or stew or etc." Trust us. It is fun to make things with Luffa. Or "Loopha," or "California Oprah Winfrey," or, as the navy calls it, "that fucking wonder sponge shit." Oh! The navy swears like sailors! Make slippers! It is fun! Be the first on your block to wear a hat made of spongey gourd! It is fun! Except when it rains, when it is damp. Make... Make... A third object that is fun! Use Loofah to send subtle messages to your husband that your marriage is not what you'd hoped it would be! Giggle insanely as you Bobbittize! Ahh, who needs men anyway! Loofah has MANY uses!

The Greatest Menace on the Road Today, after drunk drivers, is The Old Man In A Hat. This is a proven fact. Insurance companies will tell you the deadliest driving ages are 16-24, followed by 70+ (the things you learn, living near Hartford CT, the Insurance Capital of the World & America's Filing Cabinet). Once I was driving side-by-side with an Old Man In A Hat as we were coming up to a light that went from yellow to red. It had been red for a good 30 seconds when we reached it and I stopped. He kept going, slamming on his brakes halfway through the crosswalk as a car with the green passed within inches of his hood. As soon as it passed, he started right up again & someone else barely missed hitting him! He then demonstrated the universal reaction of very bad drivers everywhere--he gave the finger to...umm, someone. Himself, since he was the only 1 who deserved it? Or I guess the world, as that sure seemed to be his philosophy. The Old Man In A Hat is terrible thing. About 5 years ago I was rear-ended by an OMIAH (hmm, if you read that aloud,it sounds like what you say as a OMIAH attacks--"OH MY --AAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!"). He hit me so hard, my car pushed the car ahead of me forward 10 feet, despite the fact we were BOTH IN PARK. And it happened in line at the Emissions Testing Station! No, Methuselah, you depress the BRAKE before you shift into drive, NOT THE GAS PEDAL. I had my license for only 2 months when I was behind 1 as we were both coming to a red light. The light changed to green. Somewhere in his dusty memory cells he remembered that 1 color of the light meant "STOP DEAD," and I'll admit that he did have a 50% chance of remembering which color that was...but that color ain't green. screeeech I missed by inches. I hit the horn in 16-year-old fury & he looked in his rear view & shook his fist at me, like I was the Red Baron & he Snoopy. I pointed at the light, & he tried his alternate plan, Go Forward If Green. Of course, if a 16-year-old had rear-ended a geezer at a traffic light, who do you think the cops woulda blamed? Not the geezer. Old Farts have some sort of second-childhood universal cuteness in some people's eyes. The cops in the town in which I grew up let this 2,000 Year Old Man (in a hat) drive every day, despite the fact the only way he safely could was to do 15MPH with the yellow line on the shoulder centered between his front wheels. If I'd tried that for 15 seconds I'd have been getting a sobriety test within 10 more. At the liquor store where I work, we have a OMIAH who needs a 5-foot-high bright red antenna attached to his hood ornament to be able to find the center of the road. Stay outta those crosshairs, folks... WARNING SIGNS THAT OMIAHS ARE EVEN MORE DANGEROUS THAN USUAL: Driving a Buick or Oldsmobile the size of an M1 tank This is how they've lived to be nonagenarians. It's the people they hit that die Having 1 of those wooden beaded back-massager thinggies on their seat I have no idea why, but it's true. It must disrupt the flow of information through their spines. Bumper stickers proclaiming their: Love for America (because we don't make them retake their driving tests no matter how inept they are) Love for God (He must appreciate all the people OMIAHs send up to Him before their time) Hatred of abortion (LOOK, you're 82 years old & a man--what makes you think you have any input into this discussion?) Numbered license plates Face it, anyone who started driving when there were only 1,027 cars registered in the whole state has been on the roads waaaay too long But the main thing is the HAT. I don't care if it's 90 degrees out! I wore a hat when I voted for Eisenhower, and, dagnabbit, I'm not stopping now!

INEXPLICABLE MUSIC VIDEOS OF WEEK

Didn't anybody tell Tunak that it's impolite to point?

Thanks to Rich VL for the download!

"The hat lives so funny/Yes, the hat lives so fuuuunny"

Thanks to Amanda Langill for the download!

Is that song really about gluing ham to your hat? Check the lyrics!

Thanks to Karl D'Annucci for the link!

Don't wanna watch music videos?
Watch Papu Smash Licebox

Objects from Previous Weeks

©2001 Bill Young