(sent by Bill Wahl)

You have to be old enough to remember Abbott and Costello, and too old to REALLY understand computers, to fully appreciate this. For those of us who sometimes get flustered by our computers, please read on...

If Bud Abbott and Lou Costello were alive today, their infamous sketch, 'Who's on First?' might have turned out something like this:

COSTELLO CALLS TO BUY A COMPUTER FROM ABBOTT

ABBOTT:

Super Duper computer store. Can I help you?

COSTELLO:

Thanks I'm setting up an office in my den and I'm thinking about buying a computer.

ABBOTT:

Mac?

COSTELLO:

No, the name's Lou.

ABBOTT:

Your computer?

COSTELLO

: I don't own a computer. I want to buy one.

ABBOTT:

Mac?

COSTELLO:

I told you, my name's Lou.

ABBOTT:

What about Windows?

COSTELLO:

Why? Will it get stuffy in here?

ABBOTT:

Do you want a computer with Windows?

COSTELLO:

I don't know. What will I see when I look at the windows?

ABBOTT:

Wallpaper.

COSTELLO:

Never mind the windows. I need a computer and software.

ABBOTT:

Software for Windows?

COSTELLO:

No. On the computer! I need something I can use to write proposals, track expenses and run my business. What do you have?

ABBOTT:

Office.

COSTELLO:

Yeah, for my office. Can you recommend anything?

ABBOTT:

I just did.

COSTELLO:

You just did what?

ABBOTT:

Recommend something.

COSTELLO:

You recommended something?

ABBOTT:

Yes.

COSTELLO:

For my office?

ABBOTT:

Yes.

COSTELLO:

OK, what did you recommend for my office?

ABBOTT:

Office.

COSTELLO:

Yes, for my office!

ABBOTT:

I recommend Office with Windows.

COSTELLO:

I already have an office with windows! OK, let's just say I'm sitting at my computer and I want to type a proposal. What do I need?

ABBOTT:

Word.

COSTELLO:

What word?

ABBOTT:

Word in Office.

COSTELLO:

The only word in office is office.

ABBOTT:

The Word in Office for Windows.

COSTELLO:

Which word in office for windows?

ABBOTT:

The Word you get when you click the blue 'W'.

COSTELLO:

I'm going to click your blue 'w' if you don't start with some straight answers. What about financial bookkeeping? You have anything I can track my money with?

ABBOTT:

Money.

COSTELLO:

That's right. What do you have?

ABBOTT:

Money.

COSTELLO:

I need money to track my money?

ABBOTT:

It comes bundled with your computer.

COSTELLO:

What's bundled with my computer?

ABBOTT:

Money.

COSTELLO:

Money comes with my computer?

ABBOTT:

Yes. No extra charge.

COSTELLO:

I get a bundle of money with my computer? How much?

ABBOTT:

One copy.

COSTELLO:

Isn't it illegal to copy money?

ABBOTT:

Microsoft gave us a license to copy Money.

COSTELLO:

They can give you a license to copy money?

ABBOTT:

Why not? THEY OWN IT!

(A few days later)

ABBOTT:

Super Duper computer store. Can I help you?

COSTELLO:

How do I turn my computer off?

ABBOTT:

Click on 'START'..... ........

COLUMN: I Think I See Kooks

By Tobin Barnes
   
The kooks are coming out of the woodwork. Again.
   
One of the subjects that I’ve taught over the decades is U.S. history. My major in college was English, but history has been my avocation. I find it fascinating to trace how much things change while simultaneously remaining the same.
   
It’s kind of crazy, really.
   
But that’s why history is so useful. Similar dilemmas keep popping up again and again.
   
As George Santayana said, “Those who do not know their history are doomed to repeat it.” And the great Harry Truman, a self-taught student of history, said, “The only thing that is new in this world is the history you don’t know.”
   
Mankind’s accumulated knowledge has increased exponentially over the millennia of recorded history—particularly in the last century. We used to store knowledge in millions of books in huge libraries. Now we can store it all in a broom closet full of computer chips.
   
But at the same time that knowledge has taken leaps and bounds, human nature and brain power have remained at virtually the same levels as those of the pyramid builders.
   
Evolution marches on in all plants and animals, but it takes millions of years, not hundreds. So we can’t look down our noses at the ancients, probably not even at the cavemen. Their petty biases, jealousies, faults, and neuroses are, sadly, still ours.
   
Are we less animalistic than our ancient brothers? Sometimes, yes, sometimes, no. Many events of the Twentieth Century and this century would go in the “no” column. There’s no need to document the obvious. And the same could be said for the ancient people in relation to their ancestors.
   
We are not technologically where we are today because of some sudden flowering of the human intellect in recent years. Instead our comforts have come, to paraphrase Sir Isaac Newton, from standing on the shoulders of giants who in turn stood on the shoulders of other giants who somehow managed to incrementally think and lift themselves above their own times.
   
Usually an advance came from the inspiration of one great mind that was in turn supported by other above average intellects who had the courage to perceive and appreciate the improvement in thought.
   
Yeah, well anyway, back to history and the lessons it teaches to those who pay attention.
I tell my students that all through history, including American history, when the economic system of the time goes into a dive, the kooks come out of the woodwork.
   
Yeah, you heard me, kooks.
   
Kooks that ordinarily wouldn’t garner any attention whatsoever—would in normal times, in fact, be laughed out of the place—in times of distress, these kooks finally find a desperate audience looking for a messiah or at least a messianic message.
   
You can look it up. It’s almost like clockwork.
   
When people are hurting, the kooks come out of the woodwork promising simplistic but ill-considered solutions. And all-too-many people pay them heed, thereby becoming kooks as well.
   
Still, the original kooks and their follower kooks make up only a minority, but this minority can also be a motivated and dedicated gaggle that can cause worlds of trouble.
   
Currently, an all-too-large part of our population is suffering from the effects of the Great Recession, the greatest economic catastrophe since the Great Depression, a time when people looked for easy answers and admired the dogma of kooks from both the far left wing and the far right wing.
   
Yep, the economy is down now, and we’re right in the thick of it again. And predictably, the kooks have come out of the woodwork.
   
Fortunately, for the better part of U.S. history, saner heads have eventually prevailed. Most Americans have been too smart for the kooks. Let’s hope this particular aspect of history continues to repeat itself in similarly positive ways.

No Humor Here

Hasn't Made the Leap

The God Job

COLUMN: The Grand Tour to Nowhere

By Tobin Barnes
My life as a menial-task laborer (without portfolio) ended after five years as my folks left the motel business when I was twelve.

There was no good reason that they decided to get out. It was the steadiest, most stable income they would ever have. Actually, my mother was against it.

The real problem was that prosperity made my old man jumpy. He was a child of the depression (he always said, “I was born of poor but honest parents—not so honest, but awfully damned poor.”), so it was in his DNA that nothing good could last. On the other hand, it was an article of faith that something bad could go on forever.

He wanted to avoid the “forever” stuff by getting out of the motel business while the getting was good.

But “out” to what?

Didn’t really know. I think he was hoping for Divine Revelation.

It turned out that God had no opinion.

It was late spring and my brothers had graduated from high school and were more or less on their own by that time, so my folks and I packed up the car, headed west, and made a grand tour of our relatives’ hospitality.

That took us to Wyoming, Washington, California and Nevada. We drove as many miles as it took in one day to get from one relative to another. For a guy once in the motel business, my old man had no desire to spend money at someone else’s motel if there was a relative within one thousand miles instead.

One day, we drove nine hundred miles.

The supposed goal of this drivathon was to find a new occupation. Hopefully, one of the relatives might even have an idea.

But, like God, they had no opinion either.

So after a couple weeks, we limped back to our hometown where we had started.

Had to rent an apartment above a house. Not much out there at the time. While my dad umpired fast pitch softball games and considered his options, my mother found a job almost immediately.

One day my old man was shooting the breeze with the landlady who lived below us, telling her we wouldn’t be there very long. We’d be buying a house. She took this as gospel when actually it was baloney and went and rented out our apartment to someone else, starting the first of the month.

I guess it wasn’t all that nice of a place anyway, but it was a heck of a lot nicer than the place we had to scramble to find at the last minute. I think the Addams Family had lived there before.

The so-called apartment was in a house with four floors, and my room was an aerie with a peaked ceiling in the rafters. My parents room was on another floor completely. We shared a bathroom other tenants that I tried to avoid meeting. I was afraid Lurch might have stayed behind.

It was about this time that my old man and I were down at Rocky’s car lot, killing time so we didn’t have hang around in the nightmare on elm street.

They were enjoying BSing each other like usual when the subject of getting me a job came up. Of course, I could have raised the subject of getting my old man a job, too, but I was a meek kid raised to be seen and not heard.

Rocky said his kid, a year younger than me, was working out at the country club as a caddy. Said I should show up out there and tell the pro that Rocky had sent me.
So that’s what I did the next morning. Turned out any kid who showed up could be a caddy, whether he said “Rocky sent me” or “John Dillinger.”