Bottom of the News… Friday, November 30, 2007

Good morning my fellow Rotarians… For our news this week we will look at a report recently released by the American Assoc for Retired People, AARP. With baby boomers just starting to retire, AARP decided to conduct a study on the best parts of the country to live after retirement.

You can Live in California where...
1. You make over $250,000 a year and you still can't afford to buy a house.
2. The fastest part of your commute is going down your driveway.
3. You know how to eat an artichoke.
4. You drive your rented Mercedes to your neighborhood block party.
5. When someone asks you how far something is, you tell them in minutes rather than miles.
6. The 4 seasons are: Fire, Flood, Mud, and Drought.

You can Live in New York City where...
1. You can get into a four-hour argument about how to get somewhere in the city, but can't find Wisconsin on a map.
2. You think Central Park is a "nature area".
3. You believe that being able to swear at people in their own language makes you multilingual.
4. You've worn out a car horn.
5. You think eye contact is an act of aggression.

You can Live in Maine where...
1. You only have four spices: salt, pepper, ketchup, and Tabasco.
2. Halloween costumes fit over parkas.
3. You have more than one recipe for moose.
4. Sexy lingerie is anything flannel with fewer than eight buttons.
5. The four seasons are: winter, still winter, almost winter, and construction.

You can Live in the Deep South where...
1. You can rent a movie and buy ammo in the same store.
2. "Y'all" is singular and "all y'all" is plural.
3. "He needed killin'" is a valid legal defense.
4. Everyone has two first names -- Billy Bob, Jimmy Bob, Mary Sue, Betty Jean, Mary Beth, etc.

You can live in Colorado where...
1. You carry your $3,000 mountain bike atop your $500 car.
2. You tell your husband to pick up Granola on his way home and he stops at the day care center.
3. A pass does not involve a football or dating.
4. The top of your head is bald, but you still have a pony tail.

You can live in the Midwest where...
1. You've never met any celebrities, but the mayor knows your name.
2. Your idea of a traffic jam is ten cars waiting to pass a tractor.
3. You have had to switch from "heat" to "A/C" on the same day.
4. You end sentences with a preposition: "Where's my coat at?"
5. When asked how your trip was to any exotic place, you say, "It was different!"

So, for you early boomers out there, you now have the results of this AARP survey and this will help you to make a more educated decision about where you may want to retire - Darrell, are you listening?

And this is the bottom of the news for Friday November 30, 2007.

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Good morning my fellow Rotarians… For our news this week I thought it would be fun to look what is going on in corporate America, according to one of foremost business experts… Dilbert.

You know the nerdy guy and comic strip character that seems to right on the right on the money when pointing out the obvious and the absurd in the workplace. According to Dilbert’s official magazine, "Dilbert Management Today", the Dilbert Immediate Response Team (or DIRT Team) continually is on the lookout for real-life Dilbert-type managers.

So, here are a few REAL quotes from Dilbert managers across America…

1. (Switching supervisor, AT&T) "We know that communication is a problem, but the company is not going to discuss it with the employees."

2. An employee was telling his boss that his sister passed away and her funeral was scheduled for the following Monday. The boss did not react well, telling the employee that his sister died on purpose so that I would have to miss work on the busiest day of the year. When the boss asked if the employee if he could change her funeral to Friday, the boss was quoted as saying, "Friday would be better for me." (Shipping executive, FTD Florists)

3. Quote from the boss (Marketing executive, Citrix Corporation): "Teamwork is a lot of people doing what I say."

4. "No one will believe you solved this problem in one day! We've been working on it for months. Now go act busy for a few weeks and I'll let you know when it's time to tell them." (R&D supervisor, 3M Corp.)

5. "Doing it right is no excuse for not meeting the schedule." (Plant Manager, Delco Corporation)

6. "This project is so important we can't let things that are more important interfere with it." (Marketing manager, UPS)

7. "E-mail is not to be used to pass on information or data. It should be used only for company business." (Accounting manager, Electric Boat Company)

8. "What I need is an exact list of specific unknown problems we might encounter." (Lykes Lines Shipping)

9. (Fred Dales, Microsoft Corp.) "As of tomorrow, employees will only be able to access the building using individual security cards. Pictures will be taken next Wednesday, and employees will receive their cards in two weeks."

Yes, Dilbert if alive and well in corporate America! And this is the bottom of the news on this Friday November 16, 2007.

Bottom of the News… Friday, November 8, 2007

Good morning! Well, my fellow Rotarians, it’s a wild week when wacky laws are in the news…

LONDON (AFP) - Queen Elizabeth’s speech in the British parliament last Tuesday may have been routine but at least nobody got bored to death. And that’s a good thing because boredom with the Queen is against the law in the UK!

That’s right and a number of other little known ridiculous laws came to light last week when a British TV station released the results of a survey that asked people their thoughts on the most absurd and ridiculous laws in Britain.

Other rules deemed utterly stupid includes the ability to kill a Scotsman if he is carrying a bow-and-arrow within the city walls of York, northern England. Also, the prohibition of spitting in public is still on the books throughout the UK, as it is in several US cities as well.

So, here are the top 7 most ridiculous British laws…

7. It is illegal to enter the Houses of Parliament in a suit of amour (three percent)

6. A pregnant woman can legally relieve herself anywhere she wants and even a policeman must oblige even if she asks to use his helmet (four percent)

5. In Scotland, if someone knocks on your door and requires the use of your toilet, you must let them enter (four percent)

4. Mince pies cannot be eaten on Christmas Day (five percent); this originates from the 17th century when Puritan Oliver Crowmell was determined to eliminate gluttony. Nearly half of those surveyed admitted to breaking this law annually.

3. It is an act of treason to place a postage stamp bearing the British monarch upside-down (seven percent)

2. It is illegal to die in the Houses of Parliament (27 percent). This ban has a legitimate reason… anyone who dies in the royal palace is technically entitled to a state funeral. So, if they see you looking sick, they quickly carry you off the premises

1. Most ridiculous law in Britain… In Liverpool, it is illegal for a woman to be topless unless she is a clerk in a tropical fish store (six percent).

So, how about a few examples of stupid US laws…

In Ohio… it is illegal to get a fish drunk!
In Florida… Unmarried women cannot parachute on Sunday
In Alabama… is illegal to be blindfolded while driving a vehicle (6 per cent). Did I say Alabama?

And that my friends is the bottom of the news on this November 9, 2007.

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Bottom of the News… Friday, November 2, 2007

Good morning! Well, my fellow Rotarians, let’s take a look at some of the weird and crazy things that are happening in our world…

Russia: President Vladimir Putin identified a new priority this summer and has rolled out a program to dramatically increase Russian’s declining population. Putin has decided to create a national youth movement with the sole purpose to encourage young Russian couples to have more babies.

According to a July report in London's Daily Mail, one Russian province is promoting September 12th as a patriotic conception day; they are giving away new SUV’s, major vacations and cash incentives to couples whose babies are born on June 12, which is Russia's Constitution Day.

Putin held a two-week convention in July with over 10,000 people in attendance. The conference had many workshops and promoted contests and prizes to encourage people to build larger families. One conference attendee said… “As a homework assignment, we were encouraged to have lots of sex so we could have lots of babies! Now that’s homework I can enjoy!” Wow.

Kansas: Recently a police patrol car was parked outside a bar in Jerseyville, Kansas after last call. The officer noticed a man leaving the bar so apparently intoxicated that he could barely walk. The man stumbled around the parking lot for a few minutes, with the officer quietly observing. After what seemed an eternity in which he tried his keys on five different vehicles, the man managed to find his car and fall into it. He sat there for a few minutes as a number of other patrons left the bar and drove off.

Finally he started the car, switched the wipers on and off--it was a fine, dry summer night—he flicked the blinkers on and off a couple of times, honked the horn and then switched on the lights. He moved the vehicle forward a few inches, reversed a little and then remained still for a few more minutes as some more of the other patrons' vehicles left. At last, when his was the only car left in the parking lot, he pulled out and drove slowly down the road.

The police officer, having waited patiently all this time, started up his patrol car, put on the flashing lights and promptly pulled the man over. He administered a breathalyzer test and to his amazement, the breathalyzer indicated no evidence that the man had consumed any alcohol at all! Dumbfounded, the officer said, I'll have to ask you to come with me down to the sheriff's office because this breathalyzer equipment must be broken." "I doubt it," said the truly proud non-drinker. "Tonight I'm the designated decoy."

And as your Rotary Reporter, this is the bottom of the news for November 2, 2007.

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Bottom of the News… Friday, October 12, 2007

Good morning! Well, my fellow Rotarians, let’s take a look at some of the weird and crazy things that are happening in our world…


Seattle, WA – The Do It Yourselfer… Last week when a man went through the self-checkout station at a Home Depot store in Seattle, Wash., he accidentally punched the button for the computer to talk to him in Spanish. After several attempts to get the machine to revert back to English, the man apparently became very "frustrated” that the machine continued speaking Spanish to him regardless of what buttons he pushed, according to the police report.

The first item the man was trying to buy was a pry bar and as his frustration reached a breaking point he used the bar to smash the computer at the store. After beating on the machine for what seemed like several minutes, according to store employees, the man dropped the pry bar in his shopping cart and walked out.

The result was $10,000 damage to the checkout station and the man still has not been found by police. Good thing he wasn't buying a chainsaw!

Denver, CO – Something Fishy Here… The state of Colorado and the
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service have been working since the 1970’s to restore the official Colorado State Fish, the greenback cutthroat trout, to rivers in the Rocky Mountains.

After 30 years of working on this project, the University of Colorado decided to do a study (at a cost of $300,000 by the way) to see how they're doing. The result… you guessed, they have been stocking the wrong fish! DNA analysis shows that the fish being stocked in the rivers for the past 30 years isn't the greenback cutthroat trout, but rather the Colorado River cutthroat trout.

One Colorado legislative member, after learning of the 30-year mistake, decided it would be easier and cheaper to simply change the state’s official fish rather than spending the untold hundreds of thousands of dollars to restock the right fish. The senator has introduced a bill to change the state’s official fish to the Colorado River cutthroat trout.

London, UK – To Protect and Serve… "I was just walking along the pavement and heard the police car siren coming behind us," says Daniel Horne, 28 of Beddau, Wales. Horne was walking on the sidewalk in his neighborhood when a police car jumped up the curb off the roadway and hit him.

"The car hit my right leg and knocked me over” and Horne’s foot was crushed under the front wheel of the patrol car. The police offer was very apologetic and told Horne he felt terrible! He took Horne to the hospital, stayed with him for three hours as his foot was put in a cast and then gave him a ride home.

As it turned out, Horne's ordeal wasn't over. That same afternoon, the officer pressed charges to Horne for "criminal damage" -- denting the police car, which resulted in a fine of 80 Pounds (US$160) fine. Horne as since hired a lawyer to fight the fine and to sue the police department. The only comment from a police spokesman was that they had… "Received a complaint from Mr. Horne and we are looking into it."


And as your Rotary Reporter, this is the bottom of the news for October 12, 2007.

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