Joy to the World

           

            On Sunday I walked down the street to pay for my phone service, but I didn’t take a bike ride because it had been raining and I didn’t want to ride through any puddles.

            In the evening, Sundar knocked on my door, and once again I’d forgotten to take the money out of the bank for the rent. I had to tell him that I’d give it to him on Monday.

            I watched an episode of the George Burns and Gracie Allen show that had finally downloaded after over a month. There wasn’t really much of story, but it was the funniest episode I’ve watched so far just because of all the funny lines that Gracie had. The show begins with Gracie having prepared breakfast for George as a reward for doing such a great job directing an amateur vaudeville show that was put on by their son’s school. She tells George that he’s an absolute genius and he tells her that it’s not true. She insists that he is a genius but he’s just too stupid to realize it. She assures him that this is his day and that he won’t have to lift a finger. He asks for the morning paper but she says, “I read it for you. This is your day!” Their friend Harry drops by and ends up eating George’s breakfast for him. When George leaves he goes to kiss Gracie but she kisses Harry so George won’t have to kiss her.
            At the end of the episode George and Gracie just stand in front of the audience doing their vaudeville act. George asks what she did today and she tells him that she spent the whole morning in the travel bureau. George is surprised. “Are we planning a trip?” “No, they are. We’re just going.” “Where are we going?” “The travel agent suggested a trip the world, but when he told me the price, I asked if it would be cheaper if we bought return tickets.” She met a woman there who wanted to know if flying is as safe as taking a train. Gracie assured her that it’s just as safe to take a plane as long as you don’t stick your head out the window when it’s going through a tunnel. Another woman told her that she’d taken a car through Europe and found the experience very broadening. Gracie said that she could see that it had been but suggested that next time she get out and walk now and then.

            I’ve been having problems with my external hard drive. It sometimes disappears from the My Computer window and I have to shut it off and back on again for it to return. I tried unplugging it from the USB port and then plugging it back in and then I got a message advising me that the port might not be fast enough for that device. I didn’t even know that some ports are faster than others. A map was displayed with the faster ports shown in bold but I couldn’t orient myself to the map, so I just switched the device to another port. So far it’s worked.

            I received a message from my sister that a guy I went to high school with recently died. His name was Wade Bartley and we were sort of friends in Grade Ten. We were in a small singing group called The Peace Seekers that consisted of three guys and two girls and we sang popular songs that we liked, such as Hoyt Axton’s “Joy to the World” as made popular by Three Dog Night. I remember we had a problem with our ultra religious high school principal over the line, “I helped him drink his wine”. I don’t think I’d seen Wade or even thought about him since 1972. He was born in 1955 like me, so it looks like I win that race.