Enrico Caruso was a Vulcan

Used to be there was always something that needed tendin’ around the spread. But in the evening, after all the chores got done, I’d kick back and watch a little TV.  There was one show I liked a lot. That was Star-Trek.  It starred William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy.  Shatner was skinny back then. ‘Course most of us were.  You folks probably don’t know it, but that Shatner fella was a comedian before he got that spaceship.  And the show was pretty funny sometimes.  Partly ‘cause of bad acting and partly from them weird situations Captain Kirk and his Vulcan sidekick got into.


I hear tell they made up a lot of that stuff as they went along.  Like the Vulcan saying of “live long and prosper” and that split-finger greeting thing.  Yep, they just done it on the fly.  Reckon I always thought that Vulcan woulda made a good honest corporation honcho.


Now, years later I find out Vulcans are real!  And they been here among us a long time!  Got proof, too!  You see, the other day I was getting’ stuff together to sell at the Annual Mayberry Community Garage Sale.  Thought I’d see if anybody might want some of my old record albums.  For you young'uns, that’s how we listened to music before iPods and CD’s and cassette tapes.  Yessir, they’re even older than 8-track tapes.


Anyway, I found this one album of opry music. Yea, yea, I know.  What the hell am I doin’ with opera music?  Well, Junior, it just so happens I like opera music.  An’ if you don’t like it, you can just go clean the barn.  Sure’s a lot better than that “cRap” stuff! 


So, I found this album called Opera’s Greatest Moments.  It even has a booklet that tells ya ‘bout each recording.  It’s got pictures of the singers, too.  And that’s where I discovered the truth about Caruso.  This here picture is the famous tenor, Enrico Caruso.  It was taken somewhere ‘round 1920.  Don’t rightly know who took the picture, but he done good.  And it absolutely proves that Vulcans have been around here a long time!

So there you have it.  Caruso was really a Vulcan.  Reckon that’s why he sang so good.  Glad I found that out.  Gotta go now.  Getting’ dark.  Time to set on the porch an watch the sky.
Justan O. Geezer

Losing Records

It was time to get my ears lowered the other day, so I headed in to Perry’s Barber Pole.  While I was waiting for ol' Harry to finish the fella he had in the chair, I picked up a copy of the Springfield Observer.  The Observer does a pretty good job of lettin' us know what goes on up there in the county seat.  Reckon somebody forgot it.  Heck, it was only a couple weeks old.  Still in pretty good shape.  There in the sports section was an article about how we lost another record to some foreigner. Our national pride sure has been takin' a lickin’ lately.

We used to be pretty good at dang’nabed everything we done. Down there on Daytona Beach we used to have the fastest straight-line cars in the world.  An’ if you liked see 'em go in circles, them fellas over in Indianapolis got goin’ pretty good.  Always wondered how they kept from gettin' dizzy.  We had the best baseball and football teams anywhere.  We learned enough about hockey to go out 'n beat the Russians.  Some ol’ boys even started racin’ around on their lawnmowers!  Doin' 80 miles an hour, at that.  Don’t reckon you can get a good cut goin’ that fast, but it sounds like fun for someone half my age.

But I'll tell ya neighbor, somewhere we lost our edge. We’re losing records to foreigners pretty regular nowdays. Some of them started showin’ up at Bonneville and stole our thunder.  Over there in Indianapolis, we got foreigners drivin’ rice-burners to the flag.  And now, or all things, some Limey over there in England got out on a beach and drove his lawnmower at over 86 MPH!  Where’s it gonna end?

I think more of our young’uns need ta learn how to hop-up engines an’ such... instead of settin’ on their behinds, “tweeting.” That’s what I think, but then I am…

Justan O. Geezer

What's in your...

A while back, I was settin’ there on my throne.  Just kinda looking around the room.  Bored, if you know what I mean.  I spotted this bottle of hand lotion up by the sink.  The kind of bottle that’s got one of them mash-down pump things of top.  Well, I had nothin’ better to do, so I decided to read the label.

On the front near the bottom, it said "Fragrance Free" in purdy green letters.  Naturally, I had to take a sniff, just to check it out.  Sure got me a surprise!  It smelled like one of them “musk oil” perfumes.  Hotdamn!  That company was lyin’ to me!

Right quick, I flipped that bottle 'round and took a gander at the ingredients.  Couldn’t believe it all the stuff it takes to make hand lotion.  There musta been 30 different things in that bottle.  Not only that, they was mostly big fancy words that’d take doctor or rocket scientist to understand.  But I gotta admit, never found the word fragrance or perfume or nothing like that.

 Well sir, that was a poser.  If there ain’t no perfumes in there, how come it still smelled like that?  Didn’t take me long to figure none of them ingredients words were in my Funk and Wagnalls.  So I took that bottle with me down to Miller Drug.  I asked Bernie what all that stuff was.  He looked at the bottle and said he’d look ‘em up when he got the time.  Said I should check back in a week or so.

Ol’ Bernie ain’t fast, but he’s a good Pharmacist.  Never heard of nobody in town getting sick or dying from him messin’ up a prescription.  And he was true to his word, too.  He wrote me out a list of all them ingredients and what they’re used for.  I still can’t believe what all was in there.  Sure is a bunch of stuff.   Well anyway, here’s the list folks.  It is one LONG list, but real interestin'.  (And don’t you worry none, even Bernie couldn’t pronounce some of ‘em.)

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- Dimethicone (active ingredient) - Used as a "skin protectant.”  Also used in making Silly Putty, tub and tile caulks, silicone grease and in the treatment of head lice.

- Urea (aka carbamide) - Waste product found in uric acid.  Also used in fertilizer, as a stabilizer in explosives,  a “flavor enhancer” in cigarettes and an alternative to rock salt.  

- White petrolatum (Petroleum jelly) – a “base” (Used because it is cheaper than glycerol)

- Potassium lactate - An almost clear liquid used to preserve leather book bindings and to adjust pH value in foods

- Stearic acid - A saturated fatty acid from animal or vegetable fats.  Also useful in making candles, fireworks, soap and plastics

- Helianthus annous seed oil - (really sunflower oil) Also used to produce biodiesel fuel

- Corn oil - Yep, cooking oil!

- Methylparaben - A popular, low cost food and cosmetic preservative

- DMDM hydantoin - A preservative.  Works by releasing formaldehyde into the product

- Titanium dioxide - Used to make white paint

- BHT (Butylated hydroxytoluene) - Antioxidant food additive or preserver.  Also used in jet fuel, rubber and embalming fluid

- Magnesium aluminum silicate - A natural clay that contains aluminum

- Stearamide AMP - Chemical that gives the hand cream an opaque, “pearlized” look

- Trolamine (Triethanolamine Salicylate) - An odorless analgesic

- Lactic acid (2-hydroxypropanoic acid) - Used as an antiodidant or to control pathogenic micro-organisms or as a pH adjusting ingredient

- Cetyl alcohol - An emollient and emulsifier made from petroleum or vegetable oil

- Glyceryl stearate - Emulsifier made from hardened vegetable oil and vegetable glycerin mixed with stearic acid

- Glycerin - A sugar alcohol that is used as an emollient (softener).

- Glycol stearate - A saturated fatty acid that comes from animal or vegetable fats

- Collagen amino acids - Collagen is the main protein in human connective tissue and consists of only amino acids

- Sodium stearoyl lactate - A mixture of lactic acid and stearic acid, which reacts with sodium hydroxide to make sodium salt

- Ethylene brassylate a thick, almost colorless liquid with a sweet musky odor – “provides a silky afterfeel to skin”

- Sodium PCA - A humectant (can absorb water from the air) used as a “moisturizer”

- Carboner - White powder used as a thickening agent

- Disodium EDTA - A chelating compound and “stabilizer” (prevents chemicals from interacting)

- Lecithin - A natural emulsifier/lubricant made from soya or sunflower seeds. It helps in mixing dissimilar liquids and to keep liquids from separating

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Yep, they called it “fragrance free,” but with that Ethyene brassy-stuff in it, sounds more like it belongs in my tractor’s tank.  I threw it out.  Yep that’s what I done. But then , I am…

Justan O. Geezer

"Gay Marriage"

I was readin’ the Mayberry Post last night. Back on page 5 was an article ‘bout “gay marriage.” Yep, that put a crick in my neck. Was written by some lawyer fella. Says the whole problem is that good Christian folks, been doin' a lot of “mixing of religion with civil law.” Now ain’t that somethin’! Reckon I don’t see how religion can “interfere with laws” as he says. Ain’t all them laws ‘bout doin’ what’s right? And didn’t laws start with ethics and moral codes that been around forever?


You know, I always thought them lawyers was educated pretty good. Reckon tain’t so, ‘cause this guy don’t even know where laws come from. Maybe that fancy law school of his never taught the history of laws. Ya know, like how the Roman’s Twelve Tables beat out Christianity by hundreds of years. Or how the Mosaic Law was around centuries 'fore that. 

When you set down and think a spell, the whole idea of morals and ethics and laws must go back to the cavemen. Wouldn’t ya think laws started ‘bout the time them cavemen decided that one caveman killin’ another caveman weren’t a real good idea? So I reckon it’s kinda unfair to blame the Catholics or the Baptists or whatever religion for morals-based laws. Come to think of it, ain’t our laws conjured up in Washington?


I really thought a lawyer woulda known that our Founding Fathers believed in some kind of a God. Guess he never bothered to read something writ by Washington, Madison or Jefferson. Maybe he missed the class that explained how they came up with that “separation of church and state.”  They wanted to make damn sure they didn’t end up with a state religion, like back there in England. They sure wasn’t trying to make everybody a Atheist. They just thought Americans should be free to worship - or not, as they pleased.


Oh yea, marriage. Wouldn’t ya think a lawyer would know that the idea of marriage and it’s rituals performed by tribal leaders, shaman, preachers and even captains at sea been goin’ on long before the government existed? Of course, somewhere along the line, governments took part of the authority to marry people. They set up these “non-sectarian” marriages. Then they created “marriage licenses” to officially record and track such things… and create them fees. Yet, they still gotta accept preacher marriages, right?


Well anyway, once you eliminate that blame game an' such, the real problem sure looks to be in the term “gay marriage.” Some city folks might argue the point, but most folks I know accept gays, at least in a co-existence sorta way. Folks know gays have always been around. And most folks understand that the gay community is subject to some discriminations. BUT, most folks also believe that marriage requires a guy and a gal. Tain’t no other way to reproduce and continue the species!  But now, just like other problems (some city-slickers like to call them “issues”) in this here country, a real loud minority keeps demanding that the majority of us redo everything just to suit them. So they want “gay marriage.” And like I said, them words is the real problem.


Don’t ya think a real simple solution might be to not use the words gay and marriage together? Why wouldn’t the words “civil union” do the trick? Heck, the politicians up there in the capitol already been usin’ the term! They already been changin’ laws so gays can get employer benefits, hospital visitation rights and such. All they gotta do is keep using them words.  Then nobody’d have to change all them books that already use the word marriage.


It don’t sound that hard to me. But then, I am…
Justan O. Geezer

The Census Races

No Clyde, there ain’t no winner.  But, maybe we should give ‘em an award of some kind anyways. Maybe we could give ‘em a sign.  You know, a sign like that Bill Engvall fella sang about a few years back.  Y’all remember, “Here’s Your Sign”? (If your a city-slicker, it was about people with signs that say, “I am stupid”)  Yep, they earned it. 

Oh yeah, reckon I forgot to tell ya who I’m talkin’ about.  It’s them folks over at the U.S. Census Bureau, that’s who.  They got one real sweet job up thar in Washington. They only do real work once every 10 years.  O’course once the countin’s done, they get 9 years to figure out what it all means.  I tell ya they’re gonna have hoedown with them numbers this time around.  Here’s what I mean - this here’s right off one of them Census Forms.

First off, if’n you habla español better than English, you ain’t in the Races.  But them folks are real interested in you, Juan.  Reckon I don’t know if that’s good or bad, but they sure are nosey ‘bout where you come from.

That second question really got me cornfused.  Ya see, way back when I was getting schooled, we was taught that all us human beings were divided up in 3 Races: Caucasoid, Mongoloid, and Negroid.  Of course somebody had to go and add Australoid to the list.  But that’s OK.  You can call it 4 Races if you want.  That still don’t come close to what them Census fellas come up with.  Even after kickin’ off ma shoes, I still couldn’t count ‘em all!  Maybe they was afraid of bein’ called a racist or something if they didn’t include every ethnicity on the planet.  Wonder what they’d do with a Chicano from Fiji?  Just wonderin'.

Maybe they shoulda just put 2 choices on them forms: American and Other  (followed with a blank line so’s you could enter your green card number.)   Sure make it easier to count.  It’s one or ta'other.  And if it’s “Other” and a blank line, you ship ‘em out.  That’s what I think, but I am…

Justan O. Geezer