Dear Dr. Babooner,
Yesterday my mom told me she was taking me out for ice cream.
I got kind of excited about that but instead of going to Jake’s we wound up at some thing in a parking lot where all these geeky people were standing around talking and waiting in line to meet this one guy who looked like he just walked out of a magazine picture.
Somebody said he’s the Governor of Texas and I thought ‘What’s he doing here in New Hampshire?’ I know from school that Texas is a pretty big state, so you’d think whoever was Governor of it would have to be watching it pretty much all the time or he’d miss something.
Anyway, my mom told me we were going to wait in line and meet this guy no matter how long it took, and I said, ‘What about my ice cream?’
And she said I would get my ice cream after I talked to him and asked him how old the Earth is.
Beats me why she wanted me to ask the Governor of Texas how old the Earth is. What I learned in school is that people from Texas don’t care about much that isn’t all about Texas, and last time I heard, most of the Earth wasn’t, so why would HE know how old it is?
I don’t really care how old the Earth is either. But I do care about ice cream, so I said I would do it if it meant I could have a waffle cone.
And then she said if I asked about Evolution I could have a slice of cake also! Man! What sweet deal!
Or so I thought! But you’ll see in the video that I didn’t even get to ask that question.
With mom feeding questions into my ear like that, it got to be real hard to concentrate on what was going on around me. I got confused and didn’t even ask him why he didn’t believe in science like mom told me to. And then she said we weren’t going for ice cream ’cause I hadn’t earned it!
Dr. Babooner, is it fair to get punished like that for not asking questions that weren’t even your questions to begin with? I hear all those big TV anchors have something in their ear where somebody is always talking to them, and if this is what it’s like, I guess I don’t want to be Brian Williams or Wolf Blitzer anymore. It’s just too tough to concentrate! If I had been allowed to ask what I wanted, I would have asked to see a horse, or if he didn’t have one of those, a gun, because I hear that everybody from Texas carries one.
But instead I got all this whispering and arm squeezing, a real snootful of the Governor of Texas and his after shave, and no ice cream and no cake. Not even a candy bar or a bag of Peanut M & M’s. And definitely no horse.
Should I have done something differently? I feel cheated!
Respectfully,
Mom’s Mouthpiece
I told Mom’s Mouth that he had every right to feel cheated. His mom went back on her word because if I read the story properly, there were no conditions applied to the initial idea of going out for ice cream.
To add qualifying events as a trigger for the ice cream AFTER the arrangement has been proposed and agreed to is unethical, and your Mom should be told to stop manipulating you that way.
Next time your mom offers to take you out for a special dessert, get it in writing first, and be sure to read the fine print in case there are any weird conditions or expectations.
After all, learning from previous mistakes is what evolution is all about!
But that’s just one opinion. What do YOU think, Dr. Babooner?
Trail Baboon 
I’m Steve from Saint Paul, and I’m hopping mad. WordPress has forgotten how to recognize me again. So I have to log in. But WordPress doesn’t recognize my password. It invites me to change my password, which I have done four times, but WordPress then refuses to recognize the new password. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr! Welcome to Monday and work week frustrations.
MM, you have a right to feel injured., Your mom is having a bad day. It was lame of her to try to make a political point in the media by operating you like some puppet, trying to get you to speak for her. It was rude of her to yap at you while you and the governor were trying to talk. Finally, it is lousy parenting and poor ethics for her to shove you into an unpleasant social situation for a reward that she then fails to give. Sixty demerit points for the Mommy team!
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I don’t recognize you either. What’s your name? John who?
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It’s a conspiracy, Steve! WordPress has it in for you.
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And now WordPress is doing its “kiss and make up” number by showing my gravatar unexpectedly. It has “found” me again. I’m still cranky.
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Rise and Shine Baboons!
Dear MM: Welcome to our psychotic political year. Apparently at each end of the Mississippi River there are politicians that are so preoccupied with themselves that they will use children or anyone else for their own purposes. I’m so sorry to hear that those politicians have included your own Mom in their kinda weird behavior. As a state Minnesota know how you feel. Our political Mom, MB, promised us ice cream but makes us pray before we can eat it. Then it is all melty and bad tasting.
I’m gonna run away from home. Wanna come with? Wisconsin has some rebel forces with ice cream.
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…mmmmmmm!…rebel forces….
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not to mention really, really good ice cream!!!!!
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It is totally unfair that your mother takes out her frustration at not getting her questions answered by denying you ice cream. No mother should ever deny their kid ice cream unless the circumstances are extreme (e.g., “if we stop for ice cream we may not have enough money to pay for Timmy’s operation to fix his ingrown narcissism” or the even more extreme and sad circumstances of lactose intolerance). These are questions that media professionals should be asking the governor, not kids set up to appear precocious by overbearing mothers. I suggest you take a couple of quarters from jar when your parents put them when they do something that may cause you to go into therapy (it may be labeled “therapy jar” or “therapy savings fund”), and go buy the ice cream yourself. Do not share it with Mom. If she fusses, tell her you’re buying your therapy on the cheap while you still can.
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“…jar where your parents put them…” doh.
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Oooh, I love “ingrown narcissism”, Anna! It might just end up as another Accepted Term in the Glossary…
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Good morning to all,
MM, you should tell your Mom you have to get the ice cream first and then you will do what she wants. After what happened to you I think next time you should say you want both ice cream and cake before you will do something for her that requires a bribe. I think you have the right to refuse to do anything that requires a bribe. In fact, as a kid you can refuse to do just about anything. You are bargaining from a strong position, make use of it. Don’t tell your mother I told you this.
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its time your mother come straight with you. its the gop that took away your ice cream, they take away all childrens ice cream because all those children don’t deserve it. the money for that ice cream should go to pay for the wars and financial colapse caused by w and the rovies. thy would like to have all ice cream stopped because we don’t need ice cream and can’t afford to pay for it. we could take it out of schools and hospitals and retirements cnters where we spend too much money and send it to our soldiers where we can’t cut a nickle. big businesss would like to eat some too because when they eat it they poop out more than they take in and we can have it after they have processed it for us. it is called ice cream creation. give the rich tax breaks ad they will create more ic cream for all of us. ask the governor about the ice cream creation
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If you can get your Mom to come straight about the GOP, MM, you should also ask her why the Democrats are interested in doing some of the same things that the GOP is doing because they think that might give them a better change of staying in office. In other words, why don’t we have any politicans that care more about doing their jobs than they do about staying in office?
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I think most politicians would do well to create more jobs by providing funding for more ice cream-making ventures. Especially if they stuck with only funding small operations that use milk from grass-fed cows. You would create jobs for the farmers raising the cows and extra hands to help with the milking (and we’d have happy cows, eating grass), you would have lots of people learning the craft of making ice cream (with real fruit – another potential source for new jobs – organic farmers to raise fruit and cultivate other non-chemical flavorings). And then the people to pack and drive the ice cream to market. And we, as consumers, can boost the economy by eating the ice cream. With enough ice cream this could also be a boon to the health and fitness markets as well…
Hmm…perhaps I should run for office on the Icecreamitarian ticket….
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I’d vote for you, especially if you convinced Breyers to bring back coffee ice cream.
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If it’d get your vote, I will ship you the signature flavor from Crema cafe/ice cream – it’s like a smooth cappuccino in ice cream form…
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Our son claims I turned him into a lifelong Democrat by telling him when he was very small that Ronald Reagan was the wicked hunter who shot Babar’s mother in the first Babar book. I never would have promised him ice cream to ask Ronnie why he shot Babar’s mother and then not delivered. A promise is a promise.
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In the words of another memorable elephant, Horton, “I meant what I said, and I said what I meant. An elephant’s faithful one-hundred percent.” Or, in your case, an elephant comes through with the ice cream…
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Wasn’t he?
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Dear MM,
I’m sorry to have to tell you this but you’re a tool. I think we both inherently know this but it’s important that full recognition be achieved to try to make this a complete learning experience. Politicians don’t like uncomfortable confrontations with adults, so sometimes adults use kids as tools because kids are (reputedly) cute and people get outraged more easily when they’re blown off or treated rudely. Of course, politicians themselves are certainly not above using kids either. (Remeber this?: http://prescriptions.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/11/07/hoisting-babies-in-health-debate/) Was your mom right to use you to try and get Governor Perry to say that he believes in talking snakes? No. Was Governor Perry right in trying to answer your mom through you in a pretty condescending fashion? No. Was your mom right in stiffing you out of your agreed upon deal? No. Really, you were put into a ‘no-win’ situation. This is one of those ‘life’s lessons’ that really stinks to have to learn but is important for you to have in your tool kit. As you’re faced with more situations like this, at least you’ll have this lesson to remember. And, like the rest of us, you’ll have a choice as to how you handle it. You can take the high road, call your mom and politicians on the table and be your own person OR you can just be a better grifter than either of them. Remember, you’re a kid…you’re (reputedly) cute…they’re not expecting you to be smarter than them…that’s your real advantage.
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When people aren’t asking questions
They’re making suggestions
And when they’re not doing one of those
They’re either looking over your shoulder or stepping on your toes
And then as if that weren’t enough to annoy you
They employ you.
Ogden Nash
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To make the matter more succint:
Suppose my fellow man extinct.
Why, who would not approve the plan
Save possibly my fellow man?
Yet with a politician’s voice
He names himself as Nature’s choice.
The finest of the human race
Are bad in figure, worse in face.
Yet just because they have two legs
And come from storks instead of eggs
They count the spacious firmament
As something to be charged and sent.
Though man created cross-town traffic,
The Daily Mirror, News and Graphic,
The pastoral fight and fighting pastor,
And Queen Marie and Lady Astor,
He hails himself with drum and fife
And bullies lower forms of life.
Not that I think much depends
On how we treat our feathered friends,
Or hold the wrinkled elephant
A nobler creature than my aunt.
Ogden Nash
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Tableau at Twilight by Ogden Nash
I sit in the dusk. I am all alone.
Enter a child and an ice-cream cone.
A parent is easily beguiled
By sight of this coniferous child.
The friendly embers warmer gleam,
The cone begins to drip ice cream.
Cones are composed of many a vitamin.
My lap is not the place to bitamin.
Although my raiment is not chinchilla,
I flinch to see it become vanilla.
Coniferous child, when vanilla melts
I’d rather it melted somewhere else.
Exit child with remains of cone.
I sit in the dusk. I am all alone,
Muttering spells like an angry Druid,
Alone, in the dusk, with the cleaning fluid.
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I cannot even keep up with you today Clyde. Wow
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Dale’s fault. He got me to digging in O. Nash poems last week. Then you people triggered memories of what I then read.
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nice poems, Clyde – thanks.
we’re baaaaaaaack.
WOT: (way off topic) Carlton County Fair Goat Report:
fair was fun – i don’t think i’ll show again because too much hectic, milk here, milk home, etc. but i’m glad we tried it and the people attending the fair really enjoyed the goats. there were surprises in judging. Kona, my big, beautiful milking yearling got fourth place in her age group and her sister Lassi (who is a bubbleheaded, dancing and kicking the milk pail, tiny-teated pain (but charming) got first in their age group and Reserve Champion of all Alpine milkers any age. go figure. then Lassi’s 4.5 mo. old BIG doeling Juju (who, again, i thought would be most likely) got third in junior doelings (Alba’s Rosa’s doeling, Geraldine, took first in that age group and Reserve Champ. in the whole category of non-milking Alpines does.). and Kona and Lassi got second in Produce of Dam, and Lassi and Juju got sixth in Dam and Daughter. so i think the plain fact is i don’t know anything about judging goats 🙂 i just like a good, calm milker that’s easy to squeeze and gives me plenty of milk. so Kona is still a winner in my book.
the teaching aspect of fair was really fun – to talk to folks about different breeds, about milking, keeping, etc. next year i’ll participate as a holder at the on deck space and will help out with whatever needs doing but will probably not bring any of my goats. they are very happy to be home again and so am i. Blog update coming this week sometime.
On topic: you just learned a valuable lesson, MM – life is not fair and probably neither is your Mom. hope you have someone in your life that you can trust.
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I had the funniest dream last night about you and one of your goats. I dreamed that the agency in which I work had been relocated in a large three story house, and you had been hired to get a goat to live on the third floor for some reason that I never figured out. I have no idea what it might mean.
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Do you only have dairy goats at your fair or are there fleecies as well-just wondering.
’tis State Fair time again and the urge for goats is once again tickling at the back of my brain.
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MIG – no fleece goats! no pygoras or angoras. no pygmys either. but they are “market” goats (meant for meat, i guess) lots of sheep. i didn’t see and alpacas, vicunas except llama in petting area for kids. but i bet State Fair would have plenty of fleecies for you.
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Indeed, I will have to check the schedule to see when the fuzzy goats are at the Fair so I can plan accordingly next year. This year, my options are very limited.
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And another new acronym – WOT!
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and 1/2WOT
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For political ideas quite wonky, we blame the lowly donkey.
For ideas odd and infirm, we blame the innocent pachyderm.
For idiots who have come but not gone, the symbol should be the mastodon.
You know, the ones, the tea party revolution, do disprove human evolution.
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well done clyde, i like the poetry by nash and you (i presume) it make s the day better.
as all in favor of pro choice as i am
the tea party makes me think otherwise of them
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Dear MM-your mother clearly did not attend a baby shower with me in attendence. The one’s I go to always have a part where we each give the mom-to-be our very best advice (I go to multi-generational baby showers, so one gets a nice variety of advice from several perspectives-I think this is a good thing).
My advice to new mothers (or parents for that matter) never varies: Never make a promise you cannot keep nor a threat you have no intention of carrying out.
Following that rule has sometimes made my 12+ years of motherhood a bit uncomfortable, but I am sticking to it and have no regrets on that score.
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my dad was pulling a number on me like that once and i asked him if he wanted a window in his retirement home room or if the cheaper inside room with no window would be ok. it got a chuckle out of him. maybe you should ask your mom if she remembers anything like this her parents diod to her because you think you will remember it for a long long time.
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only tangentially on-topic.
There is an ice cream truck that frequents our neighborhood. We do not patronize that truck (partly because sometimes he comes around after we have called it a night and are jamicized, thank you very much), but we do enjoy it very much.
I don’t know where one gets the sound cards or whatever for an ice cream truck, but this one usually has some rather odd selections playing. This summer, he has outdone himself-the s&h just about laughed himself senseless when he realized that indeed, that was Silent Night he was hearing. I found it a little weird yesterday afternoon to hear the ice cream truck version of the Hallelujah Chorus.
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There must be an ‘Ice Cream Truck Music’ website because there’s a rather creepy looking Ice Cream truck down here with the same random selection of music!
It has an odd, sort of Spanish paint theme to it and all I can think is ‘Get a better sound system!’; if you’re going to play Silent Night at least make it sound better than those cheap tinny cell phone speakers!
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The West Side ice cream truck that comes by our house also plays Christmas music. Did the same thing last year. I thought I was the only one who found that strange. I guess, you’re never the only one.
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PJ, we are also on the West Side, I think it has to be the same truck.
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Probably so! He usually drives by so fast that there isn’t time to catch him.
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MIG, you’re on the West Side? I thought you were a West Ender.
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Only half-way OT: do you know there is a droll Scottish film about a battle between two ice cream truck companies? Written by Bill Forsyth (Local Hero, Gregory’s Girl). It is a little slow and cutesy at times, but likable enough.
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Must see it. Local Hero is one of my top 10.
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Writing these down…
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Man, what a rich day for the Glossary! Adding jamicized…
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have I really never used that before here? That is ancient for us-back when the s&h was first getting himself dressed, at the appropriate time we would sing:
It’s time to jamicize
We love to jamicize
It’s fun to jamicize
Why don’t you jamicize?
(yes, that is to Ta ra ra BOOM de a, for those of you who were wondering)
we made up a lot of songs in those days and still sing them sometimes
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Dear MM,
When my son was younger and had to accompany me on errands I started to call them expeditions thinking it would make it easier to jolly him into going. The name was shortened to speditions. At one point I upped the ante and offered ice cream to make the journey sweeter. Then with an elephantine memory my son proclaimed the definition of a spedition included ice cream every time.
Perhaps you needed to clarify in advance whether or not this was a spedition.
Sweetly yours,
Dr Babooner
PS Charley M. never got ice cream from Edgar Bergen
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Our bribe of choice is a Slushy from Kwik Trip…
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My expartner used to be addicted to those, and Church’s Chicken Frosties.
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My wife’s rule: two repeitions makes any treat a tradition.
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spedition – and yet another…
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Dear MM –
They were handing out free ice cream bars today at work. I think I got your ice cream (I chose the fudgesicle). Many apologies.
– Anna
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All of this talk about ice cream has me longing for Christmas music to come wafting through the windows.
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Haagen Daz rum raisin!
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Stop it already!
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Chunky monkey for all good baboons!
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How many of us are going to make a trip to the store for ice cream of some kind tonight?
I can think of nothing to add for MM, but the whole Rick Perry thing (including our MB) just gets me down. NOT looking forward to this campaign.
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stock up on ice cream NOW!
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I already have chocolate chocolate chip in the freezer – no need for an extra trip for me. 🙂
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I am married to a former badger (Uof W class of 1977) whose father was the comptroller for a large Wisconsin dairy cooperative. We are never without lots of very good ice cream in our freezer.
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Right now we have coffee, rum raisin, vanilla, butter pecan, and mint chocolate chip.
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I wish you lived closer! 🙂
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Do you know the dairy lab at SDakState in Brookings? Fun, and cheap visit.
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I had an uncle that worked for Kemps here in Rochester. He would show up with the large round brown paper tubs of ice cream… maybe 2 gallon? Never saw it in a store… This is the uncle that married his Aunt that I wrote about.
Usually just plain vanilla for us… but I add peanuts and chocolate chips. Or if I’m lucky the Reese’s hard shell coating!
Here’s a story: I first got on the townboard to fill a vacancy after a member died. I talked to his wife a few months later just to help get my bearings and figure this thing out. I asked her if he was ever mad or anxious after a meeting. She said ‘Oh yes. Some nights he’d come home and he’s be so worked up he’d just have to have some ice cream.’
Perfect. I still use that tactic once in a while…
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Fun today. Chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream in our fridge!
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I am ice cream-deprived today. None at all in the freezer. I did have a java chip frappuccino yesterday, though. That will have to sustain me.
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Be strong.
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Probably be off for a few days… heading to Chicago taking the son to college.
Behave while I’m gone.
TTFN!
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Good luck, Tigger.
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It’s not many people who know that one, Clyde.
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travel safely and cry discretely!
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One of my favorite cartoons (that I wish I’d saved) showed a woman seated on a couch, and her apparent roommate is entering the apartment (behind her, couch is facing us) carrying a barrel sized carton of ice cream. Woman on couch asking “So how was your blind date?”
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