Nobody Asked Me, But…

by Woody

STRAW_CoverWoody’s highly anticipated new book “STRAWBERRIES IN WINTERTIME: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” is NOW available! Order your signed copy HERE! 

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Thoughts and Rants on This and That

Nobody asked me, but here goes anyway . . .

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Back in the dinosauric pre-computer age, which my writing career’s beginning touched the ending, journalists composed stories on typewriters and turned in hard-copy pages.

Instead of typing “The End” as with a movie script, a writer would put “–30–” at the bottom to let the typesetter know the story was over.1_30

I bring this up because Stephen Curry, the NBA’s reigning MVP on the reigning champion Golden State Juggernauts (pronounced “Warriors”), wears jersey number 30.

Nobody asked me, but I think the league should make Curry add two dashes and wear “–30–” because when he’s on the court, the game is pretty much over.

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The 2016 NCAA championship basketball game proved, once again, that sports is the most exciting “reality TV” imaginable.

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The murder trial of Jane Laut, who was recently convicted of first-degree murder in the shooting her husband Dave Laut at their Oxnard home on Aug. 27, 2009, proved that reality journalism of a high-profile trial is far more captivating than any CSI TV series.

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Add Laut trial: One of the most important aspects of VC Star reporter Marjorie Hernandez’s outstanding daily coverage of the unfolding drama, I believe, was in showing how far the tragedy ripples out and how many people it touches beyond the victim and perpetrator – from family members and friends, of course, to colleagues and even jurors who had to hear grisly details.

Indeed, this wasn’t CSI Oxnard, this was – and is – real life, real death, and a real life sentence in prison.

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It is so refreshing, and welcoming, to visit a city that doesn’t have parking meters.1park

While I’m resigned that moneymaking meters are here to stay in downtown Ventura, is it too much to ask they be upgraded so as not to be so frustratingly slow? On top of delays between each button that must be selected in the process, they finicky-ly spit out perfectly valid credit cards.

Add in a patron who forgets the ID number of their parking spot – understandable after the lengthy delays – or if a couple people are waiting in line, and you can be late for a movie of dinner reservation.

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It takes dirty fingernails and an ugly blister, or three, to grow a beautiful garden. That’s pretty much true for any accomplishment. Just saying. . .

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Just asking: Why is it that an airline passenger seat or the driver’s seat in a car is so much less comfortable than spending the same length of time in a movie-theater seat or on a sofa?

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Nobody asked me, but I think most will agree it’s difficult (pronounced “impossible”) to imagine the frontrunner of the “Party of Lincoln” saying the words below from President Abraham Lincoln’s famous second inaugural address:

“With malice towards none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.”

More Trump-like is this: “With malice towards all, charity for none . . . ”

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Tesla Motors founder Elon Musk announced that its Model 3 mass-market electric vehicle – which, with an average mix of options, will cost about $42,000 – had 180,000 pre-ordered in the first 24 hours.

That eye-popping total soared like a SpaceX rocket – a company Musk also founded – to 325,000 after just one week. This is all the more remarkable considering a deposit of $1,000 was required for a car that won’t be delivered until 2017.

For those with wallets fatter than a Big Mac, the Model 3 is the iPhone 6 of cars. Musk – this generation’s 2.0 version of Steve Jobs – didn’t ask me, but he should rename it the iTesla 3.

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For my observations, comments and complaints today, that’s a –30–

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Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

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