March 28, 2024
Column

A roundup in which readers have a say

In this moribund week between Christmas and New Year’s Day when the national pulse barely throbs and one’s social status is determined by whether he or she has enough to clout to finagle the week off from work and go “on holidays,” as my Canadian friends put it, the year-end roundup of news events has become a media staple.

Never mind that you’d be hard-pressed to name a soul who has ever read – or is ever likely to read – one of these productions from start to finish, be it in this revered publication or in some national news magazine. Most readers, after all, have been along for the journey from the first day of January, just as the compiler of the chronology has. And chances are that their memory of once-current events is every bit as good as the rehasher’s.

Short of perhaps someone who has been marooned on the polar ice cap since Labor Day, for example, who in this particular year needs yet another regurgitating of the horrific events of Sept. 11? It is the rare bird who hasn’t been subjected to all of the media rehashing that could possibly be required of that story. Not that this will faze the recappers in the least.

To me, a good way to kiss off a year preparing to exit, stage right, would be to hang a sign on the kitchen door reading, “Gone to Florida With the UMaine Hockey Team,” and let readers have the run of the place so they might get their two cents worth on the record. Readers such as Gary MacDougal of Lamoine, who responded earlier this year to a column in which I had written that there may be a more pointless exercise than catch-and-release fishing, but I have yet to think of one.

“I have a candidate,” wrote MacDougal. “Hitting a little white ball with a stick until it goes into a hole in the ground. But first, bulldozing the homes of thousands of little animals to create an artificial ‘green’ environment, then wasting millions of gallons of precious water to keep it green, feeding it with fertilizers and pesticides and other chemicals, polluting the aquifer and poisoning the food chain – just so the little white balls can go into the holes. Now THAT is a pointless, stupid and selfish exercise…”

On behalf of the fellow duffers and hackers everywhere, ouch!

And I might include an excerpt from an e-mail from displaced Maineiac Dick Bowden of Tolland, Conn., a native of Orland. Responding to last week’s column about retired district court judge Paul MacDonald, Bowden disclosed that his only experience with Maine judges was being hauled before Judge Manson Smith in Belfast court some 35 years ago for passing on a curve. It was a fair summons, he acknowledged, considering that the state trooper approaching him had to pull into the ditch to avoid

a collision.

“Judge Smith made a real nice little speech to all us malefactors sitting in the dock,” Bowden wrote. The gist of it, as he remembers the deal, was that they could plead guilty, and he’d fine them. Or, they could plead not guilty and come back for a trial, in which case he would then find them guilty and fine them. “Judge Smith knew how to run a traffic court,” Bowden concluded.

Finally, a selection from the numerous e-mail offerings of my joker friends since the start of the year would be mandatory. To wit:

A guy walks into the produce department of the local supermarket and asks to purchase half a head of lettuce. The kid working the section says no. The customer insists that the kid check with the manager.

The kid walks into the back room and just as he tells the manager, “Some jerk wants to buy half a head of lettuce,” he turns to find the customer standing directly behind him. Without missing a beat he quickly adds, “And this fine gentleman would like to buy the other half.”

The manager approves the deal and later seeks out the lad to tell him he was impressed with the way he had gotten himself out of his predicament. “We like people who think on their feet. Where are you from son?” the boss asks.

“Canada, sir,” the boy replies.

“So why did you leave Canada?” the boss asks.

“Sir, there’s nothing but prostitutes and hockey players up there,” the boy explains.

“Oh, really?” says the manager. “My wife’s from Canada.”

“No kidding?” the quick-thinker replies. “What team did she play for?”

That would pretty much conclude my year-end summation of What You Need. To Know.

NEWS columnist Kent Ward lives in Winterport. His e-mail address is olddawg@bangordailynews.net.


Have feedback? Want to know more? Send us ideas for follow-up stories.

comments for this post are closed

You may also like