Who needs Steak when you can have a BURGER?
...or, sometimes low-budget cravings are the best cravings of all!!!

There are times when I've just got to have a big, sloppy CHEESEBURGER. Sometimes there is just nothing better. Plus (and I don't know if this is true), I heard once that a scientist came out and said that the combination of meat & cheese actually protected one against cancer! No, that doesn't mean you can smoke a pack of cigarettes and then eat a cheeseburger and think that you're not taking a risk. Maybe, in addition to black-lung, you'll also have high cholesterol. Sounds like "double-trouble" to me! Anyway...

This is an old photo of the PAUL BUNYAN DRIVE-IN, from waay-waay back, as you can tell by those grand old cars. I understand that the Paul Bunyan sign currently violates the current postage-stamp "sign code" that is imposed upon area businesses. A few years back, the drive-in was remodeled, and care had to be taken not to move the sign one IOTA, because that huge sign is "grandfathered" in. In short, if it's taken down, it can never go back up again. So even Paul Bunyan himself is a slave to sign regs! Not even Babe the Blue Ox herself would be strong enough to bust thru CDA's almighty sign code!

What I DIDN'T know about the Paul Bunyan drive-in, however, is that it once operated under another name, that of "Louie's In-n-Out", which was the home of the Paul Bunyan burger, the anti-dote to "Cheeseburger Cravings" of area residents. The picture above is the front of a postcard, and the printing you see at left, is the back of that postcard. From "back in the day" when "New Micro-Speaker Service" was a BIG deal!
____________________

Holidays throw everything out-of-whack dept.: It might be great to have an extra day off in the work week, as a lot of folks had recently. I used to sell newspaper advertising, though, and I always found that when there was an extra day off, all it really meant was that you had one less day to accomplish the work you'd normally do in 5 days' time. And I guess the Holidays threw things off for our quasi-local newspaper, the Spokesman-Review, which made me think of this self-created joke:

Q: What did today's "Spokesman-Review" have in common with Natural Childbirth?
A: There was no "C"-section. Ha, ha, ha.

Seriously, there was a little blurb in the newspaper, saying how Section "C" was missing, due to holiday production demands. However, I think there was a section "A", "B", and "D". What I would have done is call section "D", section "C", to preserve the alphabetical order. But, that's just me.
____________________

Big Brother takes the place of Peter the Meter Reader dept.: I guess, in Vancouver, Washington, they're getting new parking meters which are actually designed to read the license plates on your car! So, if you pay for an hour's worth of parking, but you're parked there 90 minutes, and take off without paying for that extra time, the powers that be will scan the image of your license plate that the meter "took", and send you a bill for that extra period of parking. Actually, I understand there is a "15-minute grace period", but this is just another reason to get paranoid. Cameras taking pictures of intersections, meters taking pictures of parked cars, satellites in the sky taking pictures of YOU...to say nothing of the secret phone-tapping approved by the Bush Administration. Especially since, if your phone is tapped, you don't GET a 15-minute "grace period". "DISgrace" is more like it!
____________________

Sociological Constipation dept.: I had some stuff to do today at the Social Security office, and when I got there, the place was chock-full of people. "An hour and a half wait", the on-premises security officer told me. So, I decided to go have coffee at the Java place. When I got there, ANOTHER long line. It was a cold wet drizzly day, and people wanted hot coffee. Rather than stand in line, I sat down, waiting for the line to shorten so I could place my order. Well, the people kept coming...and Coming...and COMING...so, finally, I got up from the table and joined the line. And guess what...while I was placing my order, some HOSER took the table I was sitting at! At that moment, I felt like going postal, but then I remembered that MURDER is ILLEGAL. So I behaved myself. "Sociological constipation?", you ask. Well, nothing was MOVING today!
____________________

How about another little joke here, which kinda sums up my day...
Wife: "Honey, did you ask the boss for a raise today?"
Husband: "Yes, I did, and the boss was like a lamb."
Wife: "Really? What did he say?"
Husband: "BAAAAA!"