No, I won’t chip in. In our household, we’re comfortable and expect to have a bit of spare change left over when Bonnie and I pass on. But for now, we won’t chip in.

During this fervid election season, I am firmly convinced, politicians would like to share in our inheritance, when that time comes — or sooner. Specifically in my laptop mailbox, I receive regularly tons of emails asking me to take part in a survey. About 80 percent of the items in my “in” box ask our opinion on the presidential candidates, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, with a gratuitous mention of our own former Gov. Gary Johnson thrown in.

The questions are straightforward, but because “C” comes before “T” in the alphabet, some may infer a slight advantage for Hillary, as her name generally appears first.

I enjoy being quizzed on which one has a better plan, which one would be a disaster, which one won the latest debate.

Then, after asking a few demographic questions such as where I live, how many unchained dogs roam the streets of Las Vegas, how old I am, how much I earn, how many zoos are in my hometown and how I’m registered to vote, the questionnaire asks if I’d be willing to “chip in a dollar” to help the cause. Continue reading →

There are only two kinds of people in the world: those who use the Oxford comma, and those who don’t. I’m not a willing user, even to the peril of a lowered grade in school.

An instructor we suffered through in the Dark Ages at Highlands University laid out some arcane rules we were to follow in doing our homework. One was that we use the serial (or Oxford or Harvard) comma whenever necessary. “It looks neater,” she said.

Well big whoopee! We now write things on the basis of neat looks! In addition to working harder on neatness, I had a tough time choosing the right sentence structure that made my prose flow without having to insert that wretched Harvard-Oxford comma.

That comma is the punctuation mark that goes before “and” or “or” in a list of three or more. Here’s an example, but this should not be construed as an endorsement. Let’s say that I enjoy three things for breakfast: eggs, toast and coffee. It’s clear that these three are distinct. The Oxford person would insert a comma before the “and” and render it this way: “The three things I enjoy are eggs, toast, and coffee.” Did you notice the comma in front of “and”?

Ostensibly, this practice serves to avoid confusion. I contend it’s redundant: why use both “and” and a comma? In years of chasing commas and other marks of punctuation I’ve been asked countless times whether I’d recommend using a comma before “and” in such a sentence, or whether I’d prefer to “do it correctly” (my choice of words, not theirs). Continue reading →

Remember when a nickel would buy us a candy bar or a bottle of pop? And even a penny amounted to something when inserted into a gumball machine. I recall that the Coke machine in the mechanics’ area at B.M. Werley Auto Company, the Ford dealership on Grand and University, got rid of possibly the last nickel pop machine in town, charging a dime for the “new and improved” product.

And the jerks that replaced the machine didn’t even provide a bottle larger than the six-ounce drink we received.

Some of those memories returned on Bonnie’s and my trip to Santa Fe last week. We had an appointment in Santa Fe, and decided to squeeze in a movie downtown at the Velvet Crown Theater. The maps app on our cell phone stopped speaking to us, so we needed to watch the car’s GPS very closely. As we approached the theater, we stopped at a series of parking meters.

They wouldn’t accept bills or plastic and certainly not those dollar presidential coins I usually carry, or the Sacajaweas. And that makes me wonder whether the newish dollars serve any purpose other than making people think you’re a cheapo when you plunk some of them down as a tip but they’re mistaken for a quarter. Try using the dollar coins for anything mechanical. They won’t fit, so what’s their appeal? Continue reading →

Man oh, man, did I ever have a rough day! Well, I’ll be a monkey’s uncle if I ever have a day like today. You see, Monday, Labor Day was a holiday. I went to the office to do some of Tuesday’s work on Monday, and there was no one available to man the office.

Perhaps some 30 years ago, none of the above would have caused a ripple. Today, it seems, there are many who might argue that using all those masculine terms is offensive and sexist. http://rezio.net/woa/wp-admin/post-new.phpThat makes it difficult to say or write anything.

Let me unscramble what I’ve just written. Today, without even being aware of it, there are many ways to offend — even if the offense is inadvertent. The first paragraph uses the word “man,” if only as an exclamation, along the lines of “boy, oh boy!” The term “monkey’s uncle” excludes females, and the final sentence turns the second usage of “man” into a verb. I doubt many people agree to woman an office. Continue reading →

I almost got my lights punched out, as a child over something that I swear was unintentional and unexpected.

You see, my barrio on the upper end of Railroad Avenue was also named Tough Street. It seemed to me, as about a 10-year-old, that the boys in each house got progressively meaner and tougher as one walked along the ascending house numbers.

An oversimplification was that the boys on the 100- and 200-blocks of Tough Street were wimps; the boys in the 300s and 400s a little tougher; boys who lived in the 500s and 600s generally ran away from trouble, and by the time we reached the 1000-block and beyond, there was only fear and trembling on the menu.

Remember, I said my perception of boys’ level of anger was an oversimplification. Our block, a place I often drive past now in my dotage, was special to me, my having lived there more than 20 years. Continue reading →

When people laugh at a pun, they’re really just being polite, and it’s possible the ones who laughed didn’t catch the word play. But when someone groans, well, that’s the sign of a clever pun with the added message that the groaner “got it,” as in caught on.

A pun, according to the dictionary, is “a joke exploiting the different possible meanings of a word or the fact that there are words that sound alike but have different meanings.”

While in an elementary grade at Immaculate Conception School, we actually had a nun with a sense of humor. She had opened the door by uttering a pun, a play on words. She said something like “Egyptian history lies in runes.” Only the brighter pupils caught it, usually the girls, the teacher’s pets. The nun, Sister Mary Mucha Risa, had used “runes,” ancient carvings alongside “ruins,” related to disintegration.

I still have no doubt the nun’s play on words came by accident. She seemed surprised when she received a raucous reaction from the class and then took it upun herself to let the contagion spread around. Continue reading →

It was about 15 years ago when, with my grandson and namesake, Arthur, I drove from our home in Camp Luna to the 900 block of Railroad Avenue, aka Tough Street, there to visit my childhood haunt.

I wanted to give my oldest grandchild a close-up look at the neighborhood and do some reminiscing.

We discussed how the barrio once teemed with activity: kids batted balls, skipped rope, rode bikes, roller skated, played hopscotch and baseball. There was a constant game, despite the condition of the road. The streets numbered above 600 were not paved. Our baseball games were played in a block-long section of the easternmost part of Columbia, ending at the tracks. That was our Yankee Stadium.

What I really wanted to do that day was show Arthur how impressive our little field was. This time it seemed much smaller than I remembered.

We took baseball equipment on our mini-excursion. Having Arthur pitch to me, I knocked the horsehide w-a-y over the tracks the first two times I batted. I was in my mid-fifties at the time. Why is it that while in my teens, knocking the ball that far would have been a dream? Continue reading →

You take the lead, then you go into a stall, and you pray that you win the jump three more times.

We’re not referring to heavy molten metal, entering a corral, being in a church service or what grasshoppers do. No, we mean sports, old style.

Let me explain:

In 1933, in what was dubbed “The Game to Remember,” the East Las Vegas’ Cardinals beat the Santa Fe Demons 23-2. But that reads more like a football score (yes, it’s possible to score two points, but not just one, in a football game) or even a baseball score. But this was basketball.

So how does a team hold another team to a mere two points? The source doesn’t specify whether the losing team scored a real basket or a couple of free throws. The above-mentioned stall was a big part of the game, which must have had lots of people yawning after the Cardinals’ best ball-handlers kept the ball away from the Santa Fe team for close to 30 minutes.

Back in 1933, there was no three-point score. Today, when a player shoots and scores from outside a half circle, that counts for three. The lack of the three-pointer in those days may account for the relatively low score — even for the winners. Today, a team that scores only 23 points usually loses. There was no shot clock for high school teams, which may also be true today. Continue reading →

The Entire History of Automobiles in Western Civilization probably could have been based on and written in the Trujillo household where I grew up, on Railroad Avenue, or what we called Tough Street.

It’s not that we had an abundance of cars (Dad bought the first one, a 1942 Plymouth in the early ‘50s).

It’s not that we possessed great knowledge of cars (when the dial pointed to empty, we surmised it was time for a fill-up or a ring job, an expensive procedure at the time and a word foreign to my grandkids.

It’s not that we could even afford anti-freeze. In cold weather, my brother and I took turns draining the water from the radiator each night and sometimes remembering to refill it the next morning.

And it’s not that we traveled enough to learn much about how cars operate (Dad often took out a loaner from B.M. Werley Auto Company, where he worked). Continue reading →

Oh, I pity today’s comma chasers. But first, let’s make one thing clear. The term comma chaser doesn’t refer solely to that tiny punctuation mark but is a generic term for editors and teachers, and even parents who take the time to look over their kids’ homework.

And while on this subject, let me stress that every person who checks submitted work for spelling, punctuation (not just commas), apostrophes (especially) and content already has a place reserved in the Great Hereafter.

That doesn’t necessarily mean Heaven will be populated only with erstwhile English teachers asking, “To whom do I owe this heavenly honor?” Or people like Winston Churchill, who became tired of hearing, “Never end a sentence with a preposition.” He answered, “This is the kind of arrant pedantry up with which I will not put.”

No, Heaven should contain all the people who try to improve language — any language. And while still on the subject, I believe that even people who don’t teach language but who nevertheless remediate grammar and usage issues ought to get the fast track to paradise. Why? Because they (and we) have already spent our hell on earth. Continue reading →