From the moment that I bought my first DVD player (probably 1999 or 2000) I started collecting the plastic discs. Favorite movies, TV shows, and the like were voraciously purchased and enjoyed over and over. Shows like Family Guy, South Park, The Avengers (1960’s) and tons of movies found their way into my collection.

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Yesterday, I did one of those periodic rituals. About every 5-6 weeks, I go to the local “Great Clips” and get my hair cut. I am pretty boring, trimmer #2 on the back and sides, scissors on the top, and sideburns off at the top of the ears.

Sorry, I am not adventurous.

Then I noticed that instead of the $21 listed price, I was charged $18, because the stylist listed me as “Senior”.

Ouch.

Mega ouch.

So I gave her an extra big tip. (I have been tipping heavily to help them through the pandemic anyway, this time I tacked an extra three bucks on it)

The march of time…

A bit of self reflection today. I was born on the leading edge of Generation X, just as the conflict in Vietnam was escalating, I joined the mass of mankind in the world (or, 1965).

I struggled in early education, and I was never sure why. My parents whispered behind my back, and I occasionally caught snippets. But one thing I do know is that I had poor hand-eye coordination.

It is why my penmanship is – to be blunt – awful. And it is also why I was not a natural of playing ball sports (baseball in particular).

Of course, my parents tried to improve it. But, in the early 1970’s there weren’t a lot of fun ways for a kid to work on their hand eye coordination. I recall my dad trying to teach me to play banjo at the ripe old age of 5. That didn’t go well, as you can imagine.

The irony is that had I been born a decade later, mid Gen X so to speak, I would have had the growing video game craze to help train my hand-eye coordination. Perhaps that would have made the difference.

Or perhaps not. I suspect that I lie somewhere on the spectrum, and as was common back in the late 60’s and 70’s it was just not diagnosed.

C’est la vie. Now that both my parents have passed, I am left to wonder what my early childhood was like from the snippets of my memories.

When I worked at OpenText, the company would send you a gift for your birthday. A nice touch, and the only place I ever worked that did.

What did they send you? It was a container of “The World’s Finest Chocolate”. Essentially mini-bars, about the size you would hand out at Halloween, in their various flavors.

Want to know a secret? It really wasn’t the world’s finest chocolate. It wasn’t even as good as the waxy Hershey’s crap you get at the store.

But what great branding.

I bring this up because “The World’s Finest Chocolate” seems to team up with high school band and sports ball teams to fundraise for events and shit. My wife felt pity for one kid on the route she walks at lunch time, and bought a few bars. $5 for 5 bars. I am sure that about 80 cents of each dollar go to the fundraiser, because there is no fucking way this bar is worth more than twenty cents.

At least I hope so.

“If you say it, people will believe it …” perhaps.

I get barraged with offers for subscription boxes. Dog toys/treats. Japanese unique candy. Men’s accessories. And many more. It is pretty easy to ignore.

The idea is that the purveyor selects a collection of items. For the “Men’s Accessories” I have seen things like a shaving cup and brush, a Leatherman tool, or some men’s grooming items. For $40 or whatever a month, you will get a box with the goodies in it.

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We all suspect that members of our family harbor some racism and/or bigotry. I mean, we all have that crazy uncle (or Aunt) who causes us all to roll our eyes at Thanksgiving by saying some completely insane shit out loud.

But, having grown up in Silicon Valley in the 60’s and 70’s where people of color were segregated due to a long history of redlining, and a lot of implicit racial segregation.

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