This week’s massive highway jam in China made me strangely happy, and I’m feeling pretty guilty about that. I get fidgety in slow traffic and am cheered whenever I’m gliding down the interstate and see that the opposite lane is backed up, simply because I’m not stuck on that side.

It’s schadenfreude, I know. Taking pleasure from the misfortune of others. It’s a silly reaction for a couple of reasons. Slow traffic on the other side of the interstate can easily trigger a gawker slowdown on my side, which can turn into a real smugness dampener.
And then there’s the air.

As I drive past any line of backed up cars here in the U.S. I can almost see a cloud of frustration swirling around the vehicles. Or is that exhaust? People tend not to turn off their motors, even if they’re going nowhere. Lungs ache at the thought of the air quality along China’s 10 day, 60 mile long stoppage. Add to that the fact that many of the bumper-to-bumper trucks were carrying coal to feed the country’s rapidly growing energy needs, and its easy to see this Chinese jam as both a hydrocarbon generating and hydrocarbon generated monster.

And it’s back!

What do you do when you’re stuck for days in the middle of a thicket of overloaded coal trucks? Get out, play cards, sit in the shade, talk with your fellow sufferers, sleep and pay ticket scalper-level prices for food and water. And make up limericks.

One summer, en route to Beijing
The road was a go-nowhere thing.
When the drivers got out
To see what was about
Their new settlement lasted ‘til Spring.

How do you handle gridlocked traffic?

There is a divide between professional golfers and ordinary golfers that we ordinaries long to close. The game is so fickle and unpredictable and the small variations that make a big difference are so incomprehensibly tiny, it is possible to imagine that some day, for no reason other than the whimsy of a random universe, I will step on the course and play, not like myself, but like Jim Furyk.

In reality, that will never happen. If the professional/ordinary gap is threatened at all, it is by scenarios like this one: Furyk has a dead cell phone, his alarm doesn’t go off, he oversleeps, misses his tee time and is disqualified from a potentially very lucrative tournament.

Oversleeping. How common. Although some are more prone to it than others.

In 25 years of doing a weekday morning radio show that started as early as 5 am, I can recall oversleeping two times. In each case I was about one half hour late and both times my duties were handled by an extremely capable co-host. I felt off my game for the rest of the day, and there were other ramifications too. I developed a blister on one foot because I rushed out the door with putting on socks, and my shirt was 15% more wrinkled than normal but nobody said a word about it, perhaps out of politeness. No harm done.

But oversleeping can he hazardous.

If, for instance, you’re involved in a bankruptcy proceeding and are ordered by the court to appear at a meeting of your creditors and then don’t show up because you overslept and later you still don’t show up even though your attorney calls you to ask “where are you?” and even later when the marshal calls of course you promise him you will surrender yourself at the courthouse within an hour and a half but instead you jump in a car and go with your girlfriend to Florida with this crazy plan to hide out in a boat because you harbor a wild fantasy that you will never have to come back to face the music, then, well, you could wind up in jail.

A good alarm clock and a little common sense will help you avoid many problems.

Have you ever been penalized for oversleeping?

The Minnesota State Fair begins today, so take some time to end your summer properly with a visit to the great get together. When I go I have my usual favorite things to do, and so does everyone else. My things and your things are not always the same things. The rules that govern time and space pretty much require that any one individual will have to pass up many, many Fair features in order to enjoy their special places, experiences and foods.

This year the Fair has worked that unavoidable fact into their promotion, inviting people to narrow down the field by selecting their “Fair Four”. The lists are then posted on the Fair’s website. Take a look. Last time I checked there were over 400 entries. I wonder how many there’ll be by Labor Day?

As usual, I intend to visit the Animal Barns, one of the French Fry stands, the Art Building and the Sky Glider. Somewhere along the way I’ll have a milk shake. Ah, that’s five Fair things. Next year’s promotion, I expect.

On my list of new things to do is to watch some high school wizards battle it out by proxy in the education building. There’s a robotics display, and today it’s Edina vs. North Branch at 10, noon and 2. May the best gizmo win!

For new food, I might have to go to the Fried Fruit stand for fruit salsa and tortilla chips, or to the Fudge Puppy stand for a Caramel Apple Puppy. These fruity mouth fresheners may pave the way for some other new offerings – camel on a stick, deep fried balogna and corndog pizza. Yum!

Going to the fair?
Discuss your strategy.

Here’s a note from perennial sophomore Bubby Spamden, poster boy for the campaign against social promotion in our public schools.

Hey Mr. C.,

Well, the re-start of school is coming up in a couple of weeks, though for some of us it feels like school never ends. I’ve been a sophomore so long I don’t even have to think about what I need to have to go back. My folks bought everything in bulk about five years ago. I have a pallet of notebooks, a barrel of pencils and about a half ton of computer paper so I can print out all my assignments. My dad wondered if we could buy sheets with “F” and “incomplete” already scrawled across the top just to save the teacher some time. Ha ha.

I know 10th grade better than most of the teachers, and I can tell you for sure that it hasn’t changed all that much. Except this one thing, and it’s really bugging me. The food is different. Every time I go back there are more fresh fruits and vegetables and fewer meals covered in melted cheese. It’s getting so I don’t even recognize the smell of the cafeteria anymore! They talk about making healthy choices and eating locally grown food and getting lots of exercise and the whole thing gives me this sick feeling in the pit of my stomach because I’m afraid I won’t get to eat wiener winks for lunch ever again!

One cool thing about summer – with my folks at work all day I can pig out on donuts, pop and ice cream sandwiches. Going back to school is going to be a kind of dietary cold turkey and I don’t know if I’m up to it. I might go into some kind of low calorie shock if all I can have for lunch is a rice cake and some raw carrots.

You have a lot of connections, right? I’m wondering if you can get word to the people who make those potato chips in a can and see if they can create some that lay perfectly flat – flat enough so that a single chip could hide between the pages of a book. I know those snacks are squeezed out of a machine anyway. It shouldn’t be more complicated than just twisting a dial somewhere to get the wave out of those round goodies. I figure a 320 page book has space for 321 Stealthy Chips, which ought to be more than enough to get me through the morning most days.

And if they like that idea, maybe a whole line of Stealthy Snacks would be a big money maker, like cheddar puffs that look like acne. You can stick them to your face first thing in the morning and leave them there until you’re feeling a little hungry. When the teacher isn’t looking, grab that pockmark off your forehead and pop it in your mouth! We could call them Cheese – Zits!

I have plenty of great ideas for sneaking bad food into the health crazed prisons that our school cafeterias are turning into, but I need somebody on the “outside” to make the connection to the multinationals for me.

Whaddaya say? I’ll share some of my Gummi Pens with you!

I told Bubby there’s no chance of a deal. I’m actually in favor of the healthy food push that’s going on in school cafeterias, and if he doesn’t like the new menu choices he should finally apply himself to his studies and try to graduate so he can choose to dine on French fries all day as a free, unhealthy adult. Now that I think of it, maybe he failed all these years just so he could keep eating turkey gravy over toast every other Wednesday. This might be just the thing to get him to turn his work in on time!

What was your favorite school lunch?

Please don’t take this the wrong way, because I like Blevins and Rhonda just fine. As a Babooner, I have a fondness for red-bottomed primates that can never be shaken. But on a weekend trip to the Minnesota Zoo to see the Faces of the African Forest exhibit, I encountered a wonderful new monkey.

I like monkeys in general. I know they have their bad monkey moments, can be ferocious and under certain circumstances they like to throw their poo, but these human-like weaknesses make them more interesting. When I look at most monkeys I think “we could be relatives.” Sometimes specific names come to mind.

The Colobus Monkey, however, comes across like Garbo – a movie star with an aloof, above-it-all style, and I had not seen one until yesterday. When my wife Nancy and I first approached the exhibit, it appeared a large black cat with an extravagant white tail was sleeping up against the window. But when this “cat” lifted up its head and turned to look at us, we realized that it was definitely not Puff.

Colobus monkeys have a fringe of long white hair that falls off the shoulders like a cape, so when they swing from branch to branch they look like comic book crusaders coming to the rescue. But really, they’re coming for leaves. These monkeys are treetop dwellers and they eat a lot of leaves. Their stomachs are compartmentalized, like a bovine’s, to help digest all the roughage they take in each day. And because digestion is so much a part of what they do, they have that logy after-meal look that always says it is just about naptime. Rumor has it they fight less than other types of monkeys.

The black-and-white color scheme is a mystery to me. Why would it benefit the colobus to look like this? It seems a little flamboyant for a supposedly laid back creature that lives in a cloud of leafy greens. And the C. Everett Koop beard and the Rod Blagojevich pompadour are features that only a particularly needy animal would sport. Perhaps there is a secret longing to be noticed.

All of these conflicting qualities combine to make the Colobus monkey my new totem animal – an aloof, relaxed, peaceful, attention hungry, caped, vegetarian sky cow.

Which critter in the zoo best describes you?

Yesterday’s discussion got me thinking … When you really have to choose one or the other, which is better? For some reason a website called bankrate.com took this one on.
I guess dealing with actual bank rates became too depressing.

A recycling website, reuseit.com, occupies the middle ground.

And like every other type of human conflict, this one has been in court. The contest was described in one of my favorite short radio programs.

The Living Law! Cases from the back files of the law firm of Badger and Hackle. Today, the highly emotional case of Paper V. Plastic.

The plaintiff, Paper, contended that the defendant, Plastic, had wrongly and wantonly usurped Paper’s position as all-purpose goods carrier to the nation. Furthermore, Paper alleged that Plastic damaged the previously solid reputation of the Single Use Bag Community (SUBC) with loose post-purchase behavior, defaming all bag-dom by blowing randomly in the wind, choking defenseless animals, collecting along fence lines and gathering in large, floating unregulated garbage piles far out at sea.

Plastic’s defense was that Paper’s charges arose from simple jealousy and typical sour grapes, which, if they were rotten and weeping, you would want to carry in a plastic bag. Possible reasons for this resentment include but are not limited to:

– Paper is fat and thick while plastic is thin and light.

– Paper is expensive to produce and wastes trees, while Plastic is magically extruded from oil, which is a finite resource that is already spread all over the ocean, so Plastic’s tendency to return there is only natural.

– Plastic is colorful while Paper is drab and brown.

Plastic’s attorney argued that Paper’s suit against Plastic was frivolous, and nothing more than the last gasp of a dying industry. He suggested that cashiers should ask the famous “paper or plastic” question differently, saying “Plastic, unless you feel you absolutely NEED to have Paper.”

If you were a judge, what would you say?
The answer after a word from our sponsor.

Have you ever been accused of wrongdoing and had the unpleasant task of finding an attorney to represent you? Most attorneys believe every person deserves a fair trial and they will defend even the lowest, sleaziest reprobate in the interests of keeping our legal system functional and fair. But if you did the crime, even some of these helpful lawyers will look down on you and they will not treat you with sympathy.

The attorneys at Badger and Hackle are different. Many of them were worthless punks when they were teenagers and twenty-somethings. A lot of them are still punks today!

So if you’re accused of a crime, consider bringing your case to the law firm of Badger & Hackle. Especially if you really, really did it. We relate to people who are a blight on the behind of society. No matter how awful you are, you deserve a lawyer who understands you!

Badger and Hackle – the ones to come to when you’re guilty!

The judge ruled that while Plastic had indeed engaged in reckless, harmful and morally suspect behavior, those actions reflected only on the reputation of Plastic and not on Paper or any other member of the Bag family, including Canvas, Cloth, Lunch, and Papa’s Got A Brand New.

Paper, the judge said, should “get a grip” and try not to “fall apart so easily.”

Sound unlikely? It’s the Living Law!

How do you feel about courtroom dramas?

It appears to be supermarket/big box store week here at Trail Baboon. Monday we talked about satellite surveillance of the parking lot and our personal habits around the cart corral. Yesterday it was the Future Of Bananas.

Today there is evidence from New York City and Warroad, Minnesota that hi-jinks happen at the cash register and most people, even careful shoppers, usually don’t go to the trouble to check.

In New York, an investigation found half of the supermarkets overcharged for the products they were selling.

And in Warroad, a grocery store cashier has admitted stealing money gradually over the course of three years. He says he took “about 100” dollars each shift for a total of around 5 thousand dollars. Authorities claim he siphoned off 52 thousand dollars. I know the people behind me in line are going to have to wait, but I guess I need to talk to a manager about the discrepancy in this bill.

I admit that I will stand in the middle of the grocery store aisle choking traffic for ten minutes while I weigh the merits of two rolls of paper towels, comparing them for value based on square footage, sheet count and thickness of the ply. But I do not watch the prices as they go up on the screen when I check out, and I don’t review the receipt.

Newly concerned about being hornswaggled, I contacted Captain Billy of the Muskellunge and he confirmed my worst fears:

Aye, we don’t even call ‘em “supermarket cashiers”. “Land pirates” is the name we has for ‘em. If’n I was to come ashore lookin’ fer likely candidates t’ join us aboard th’ Muskellunge, the grocery store check out line is the first place I’d go, on account of the people what works there is strong from standin’ all day, fast with their hands, an’ they is already well acquainted with every variety of homo sapiens what walks th’ earth. When we is pillagin’ a village, my “land pirates” is th’ ones I sends in first, ‘cause they ain’t surprised by nothin’.

I assured Captain Billy that the vast majority of supermarket clerks are honest and kind and not at all piratical. He laughed.

“Suit yerself,” is all he said.

Do you check the prices as they ring up?
Do you review receipts?
Paper or Plastic?

Five years ago there was a banana extinction scare in the news, and it had me fearful for the future of my favorite yellow fruit. The article I read said it would take five or ten years for the crisis to ripen. Now that future is here and surprisingly, so are the bananas. Does that mean the scare was a hoax?

Not according to writer Dan Koeppel, who published a book two years ago called “Banana- The Fate of the Fruit That Changed the World.” He claims that the yellow banana we know and love is doomed because the very same seedless variety is sold worldwide and it is gradually being attacked by an incurable disease. The Cavendish banana will someday be gone from our store shelves completely, just as the smaller, more flavorful Gros Michel (“Big Mike”) banana common in the 40’s and 50’s has disappeared. It was also a victim of blight.

Imagine that. Two generations hence what people think of as a “banana” will look and probably taste quite different, and that’s only if a suitable replacement can be developed.

So enjoy a wacky bright yellow banana today. Have your picture taken while holding one. Do it for your great, great, great grandchildren, who may never have the chance to eat one. They will doubt that there ever was such an unlikely and garish bit of produce, unless it is immortalized in art.

In fact, we should commission all sorts of banana works. Glass, wood, steel – anything that can physically outlast the banana itself, which would be just about everything. Make banana cave paintings and sculptures so that, like the Easter Island Heads, they can be both a monument and a mystery for people in the distant future. They’ll say “the sculpture appears to be some sort of tropical fruit, but why was this totem chiseled from rock in a location so far north?”

We’ll have to carve them out of marble, because because hoarding bananas in the fallout shelter doesn’t work!

I hate the idea of losing anything lovely due to shortsightedness and monoculture.
But if you had to nominate a fruit for extinction, which one would it be?

Dear Dr. Babooner,

My wife is a professor of Human Relations at the University and one of the “ground rules” of our marriage is that she can not use examples from our life at home in her lectures or publications.

Recently the dew point has been very high and the world outside has been quite uncomfortable. I was walking across campus one afternoon when it became so unbearable I ducked into a nearby building for a moment’s respite, only to realize that my wife was teaching a class in one of the large lecture halls.
I thought I would slip into the back of the room to cool off, but when I approached the door I heard her voice clearly say the following thing:

“According to the Kinsey Report, every average man you know much prefers his lovey-dovey to court when the temperature is low. But when the thermometer goes ‘way up and the weather is sizzling hot, Mister pants for romance is not.”

Dr. Babooner, I was shocked and heartbroken. “Mr. Pants” is a special pet name for me that I thought we used only in the privacy of our home! And here she was tossing it around in public to describe one of the most intimate aspects of our relationship!

A number of other things bothered me too. She was ending a sentence with an adverb. That’s wrong, is it not? Plus, I don’t think the Kinsey Report ever said anything about love and temperature. And on a more fundamental level, as far as our personal dynamic goes, Mr. Pants for romance always IS.

Hints of academic fraud, evidence of grammatical incompetence and heartless personal betrayal combined with a public mischaracterization of my readiness have combined to make me wonder what has happened to the woman I love!

Can this marriage be saved?

Sincerely,
Mr. Pants

I told “Mr. Pants” that one should never give second hand or overheard statements too much weight in determining the course of a relationship. Shakespeare did a lot of that in his comedies, and his characters are always wrong about what they think is going on. Do you want to wind up being humiliated? And Shakespeare was a guy who wore funny pants. Coincidence? I doubt it.

But that’s just one opinion. What do you think, Dr. Babooner?

Here we are in the heart of August with heat and humidity at amazingly high levels. It has been a wet, lush summer in the Twin Cities and it’s hard to imagine better conditions for promoting the rampant growth of just about any plant. Every time I walk out the door it seems that some new green thing has leapt out of the soil and is tall and vigorous enough to look me in the eye. A lot of these show-offs are common weeds, but I don’t say anything about it. No sense getting the encounter off to a bad start with name calling.

In the middle of a hot day there’s nothing like a piece of fresh watermelon to provide some relief. I enjoy watermelon today but as a child I was tormented by the pit disposal question – do you spit them out or swallow? Spitting was more fun, of course. But if you are hanging out with a group of 8 year olds, once the projectile launching starts escalation happens quickly and in warfare there is no turning back. Better perhaps to unilaterally disarm by gulping down the watermelon seeds, although that had its hazards too. I had my mother’s assurance that a melon wouldn’t sprout in my stomach, but friends, uncles and my brother all told different stories. Parasites were a favorite topic when the guys got together and the descriptions were vivid.

And now comes this story about the 75 year old guy who had a plant growing in his lung. Ron Sveden went to the hospital over Memorial Day weekend because he had lost his appetite and was experiencing bad coughing spells. The x-ray showed an ominous dark spot on his lung, and Sveden and the doctor expected to find a tumor.

Instead, it was a sprouting pea.

What a gift for an older fellow with health issues. No tumor, AND a chance to talk to a national audience about your emphysema and how you feel lethargic and dehydrated. Not to mention the great potential for giving self-gardening tips to people who may not be interested in growing lung peas but may have an interest in esophageal strawberries or abdominal potatoes. Imagine the State Fair horticulture competitions once this idea catches on!

How is your garden growing this summer?