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Kim DuToit's wife also writes and she hit the ball out of the park with this essay.
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Fixing Hurricanes
Fixing Hurricanes
The comic Louis Black crafted an entire act based on overhearing stupid people say stupid things. In one of the routines he describes the feeling of hearing something said on the street and how it does things to your head. He uses the analogy of wanting to stab an ice pick in both your ears to get the thought out of your head, because try as you might, it�s damn near impossible to stop trying to figure out what in the heck they could have meant by it, or how they came to be so wrong. He used the gag of a woman saying, �if it weren�t for my horse, I�d have gone to college.�
Whaa?
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Kim�s son and heir was at a shooting competition outside Houston last weekend. When he was checking out of the motel, folks were checking in who were from New Orleans, having (this time) evacuated the area. He overheard one of the women speaking and she said, �The government really needs to do something about these hurricanes.�
I�ve spent hours with that thought in the back of my mind, trying to figure out how many things could have gone wrong for someone to be that stupid. It�s easier to assume that he misheard what she said, or there was a preface to, or a word in, the conversation that was missed. Perhaps she meant to say, �the government really needs to do something about these hurricane evacuations,� or something that would indicate that she really didn�t believe that the government was capable of altering the weather.
An excellent rant/essay -- longish but a wonderful read.
Posted by DaveH at September 9, 2008 11:22 AM