QUARANTINE BLOG # 577

October 28, 2021

Okay, get on the bandwagon.  Line up for the boondoggle.  Hold out your hand.  Here is a new way get your snout into the trough of greed.

Kellogg is being hit with a multimillion-dollar lawsuit alleging its “Whole Grain Frosted Strawberry” Pop-Tarts are deceiving consumers, failing to warn them that strawberries are not its only fruit filling ingredient.  “Strawberries are the Product’s characterizing ingredient, since their amount has a material bearing on price and consumer acceptance, and consumers expect they are present in an amount greater than other fruits,” the suit asserted.  “The Product’s common or usual name of ‘Whole Grain Frosted Strawberry Toaster Pastries,’ is false, deceptive, and misleading, because it contains mostly non-strawberry fruit ingredients,” namely, cheaper pears and apples, the suit said.

👉  Some menace from Dennis:

👉  Pearls Before Swine and The New York Times:

👉  Here are last of our strange and unusual clubs.  

First up, the Not Terribly Good Club.  Journalist Stephen Pile started the club in the late ‘70s for people who were, well, just not terribly good at things.  To qualify for membership, you had to demonstrate your mediocrity, or, ideally, your “special incompetence.” At meetings, members would discuss and show off their inability to do things.  But the rules were absolute: no success.  At the first meeting, Pile reportedly messed up big time by catching a falling soup tureen before it hit the floor.  For this demonstration of ability, by his own bylaws, he had to step down from his role as club president.

The Association of Dead People isn’t what you think: Being alive is actually a requirement to belong.  Lal Bihar discovered that he was dead ... on paper.  In order to inherit Bihar’s share of the family’s ancestral homeland, a relative of Bihar’s had him declared deceased.  It took 17 years for Bihar to undo what his relative had done.  Frustrated with the extremely slow process to get himself declared alive again, Bihari formed an advocacy group to help others going through the same thing.

No one wants a Putney High Tide Club Membership.  Members are involuntarily inducted when they park too close to the Thames in the Putney district of London and fail to move their cars before the tide comes in.  Members are inducted via photos on the official Putney High Tide Club pages on Twitter and Facebook.

👉  You read in yesterday’s blog a closed circuit to my supplier of Blackouts and other amusing bits.  Today I received the following letter:

“Dear Loyal Customer – as you may be aware most parts of the free world are in a situation of pandemic-related supply bottlenecks.  Unfortunately this problem has recently surfaced in our supply chain and at this time we are unable to estimate when regular shipping will be reinstated in order that we may pass on our outstanding product to you.  After considerable effort, in recognition of your past commitment to our products, we were fortunate to be able to obtain a special one time sample of new market offerings.  In appreciation of your past business we provide you with these gifts but do caution you to consume them prudently as we cannot confirm specific future availability.”

Therefore, in recognition of the excellent products QB has received in the past, and of the lack of quality material QB was able to produce on its own, we are now practicing strict conservation with material from our supplier.

👉  Before there was Google, there was the library and librarians.  I was trying to describe a card catalog to one of my grandkids and was rewarded with a blank look.  It’s hard for their generation to realize there was a time when, if you wanted to learn something, you had to do more than punch letters into an electronic device.  And that was the day of the librarian.  

I remember being taught, in high school, how to use the card catalog.  It was a great research tool, but now, the final toll of the old-fashioned reference system’s death knell has rung for good: The library cooperative that printed and provided catalog cards has officially called it quits on the old-fashioned technology.

The reference librarian used to be the most important person in your local library.  Today, the library that I use has banished the reference desk to the basement and no directions are posted as to where this once crucial asset is located.  You just have to stumble along.

But just as a reminder how valuable a resource the above items were, NPR collected some questions for whose answers we used to ask the librarian.

●  Is it proper to go to Reno alone to get a divorce? (1945)

●  I just saw a mouse in the kitchen. Is DDT OK to use? (1946)

●  What is the life span of an eyelash? Answer: Based on the book Your Hair & Its Care, it’s 150 days. (1946)

●  What does it mean when you dream of being chased by an elephant? (1947)

●  Where can I rent a beagle for hunting? (1963)

●  Can you tell me the thickness of a U.S. Postage stamp with the glue on it? Answer: We couldn’t find that answer. Why don’t you try the Post Office? Response: This is the Post Office. (1963)

👉  Today’s close is from Praying with the Psalms, by Eugene H. Peterson.

“You have put gladness in my heart more than when their grain and wine around.  I will both lie down and sleep in peace; for you alone, O Lord, make me lie down in safety” (Psalm 4:7-8).

The scattered experiences of the day – distress, indignation, trust, devotion, threat – are assembled in prayer and laid before God, after which the psalmist simply turns over and goes to sleep, joyfully and peacefully.

Prayer: God of all beginnings and all endings, I bring all my unfinished business to you – everything that I started and couldn’t finish, all that I began but lost interest in, all that I began in hope and quit in despair.  Make finished work of all of it, by your grace.  Amen.

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