C.: Happy birthday, d.c. I brought you something to eat.
d.: Thank you, Cal.E. but I think I will just eat the lunch that I packed this morning. Thank you anyway.
C.: Well, you seem a little down for someone who is celebrating the big 5-9! Just think, since this is the middle day of the year, you can draw out all your retirement savings on December 31. You will be exactly 59 ½ then. You will not need to pay a penalty since you are the right age to do that without being penalized!
d.: I still would need to pay taxes on the money I draw out. I think I will leave it all where it is.
C.: Okay, but is there something bothering you? You seem a little down.
d.: Well, this birthday is like most of my recent ones. First, I get a phone call from a solicitor before I even go to work, then an inmate threatens to sue me because the officer would not let him into medical when he beat on the door. He wanted to have his appointment early.
C.: How early?
d.: He knocked on the door at noon. His appointment was for three p.m.; on Tuesday!
C.: What did he say when you told him he was three days early?
d.: He threatened to call his lawyer if he was not seen immediately, even though there is NEVER a provider at GThe Human Kennel on the weekends or on holidays. There were people scheduled before him when the provider gets back on Tuesday. They all put their requests in before he did. That is why he was being seen as the last appointment of the day.
I told him that I was not scared of a lawyer who got him convicted of a crime he claims he did not commit. The state was only asking for a twenty-five- year sentence for the crime for which he was accused. His lawyer got him a life sentence…without any chance of parole!
C.: It sounds as if the lawyer did not know what he was doing.
d.: I suspect the “lawyer” may not have been licensed to practice law. He probably told his client he had been to law school…not that he had a license to practice law. The world is full of
people trying to take advantage of others. It takes a keen eye and a sharp mind to out-think some of them because they can be very clever.
Most inmates are not very intelligent. They would not be in The Human Kennel if they were!
Most are in prison because they do not know how to take care of themselves or follow
directions. That is why it is difficult to have structure in The Human Kennel. Others think that they are smarter than anyone in charge of keeping them from harming others. Even though they may have average intelligence, they think that they are too smart to get caught. Compared to some of the other inmates, they may seem like geniuses. It is all about to whom one compares him or herself.
C.: To whom do you compare yourself, d.c.?
d.: Albert Einstein.
C.: Because you have a similar I.Q.?
d.: No. Because he (apparently) did not have a good memory, either. Legend has it that Einstein could not remember either his home address or his own telephone number. His reasoning was that he did not believe in wasting brain cells on remembering things he was able to look up.
Another little-known fact about Einstein is that he had six identical suits. That way, he said that he could avoid “decision fatigue.” He did not need to worry which suit he would wear on a particular day, because all six were identical. I guess Sundays were his “free” days to think about what he was going to wear.
C.: I have ridden places with you, d.c. You seem to have a good memory for addresses.
d.: That is because I trained my brain to remember numbers and street names when I was employed to drive all over Greater Houston with my former job. At that time, GPS devices were scarce and expensive. My company did not want to waste money on things like that, so we used paper key maps. One cannot read a map while s/he is driving in Houston. It is necessary to remember where s/he is going to save time, which equals making more money.
To what animal do you compare yourself, Cal.E.?
C.: Well, I did think of Garfield as my role model until I got motivated to work at a job and earn money. Now, I think of myself as the feline Lassie! I am intelligent, a hard worker, and virtuous!
d.: Okay, Cal.E., sure. By the way, that rumor rag that you leaked the story that I told you about Elvis living on an island off the coast of the Carolinas called yesterday. The reporter said that he wanted to verify his facts before he cut you a check and printed the story. You wouldn’t know
anything about that, would you?
C.: Well, that’s all the time we have for today folks! Tune in tomorrow when you may or may not see another glimpse of the King of Rock and Roll!
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