If You Get Stung By A Bee, You Don't Go Kick The Hive

Well, he did it again today. The oldest judge on TV has a big problem with people of different ages being friends. Especially women with a guy a couple years younger. "Robbing the cradle" he always accuses, sex involved or not. Today she was 33 and the guy 29, only neighbors and friends, yet he went on and on about them hanging out. One time I remember the woman was really irate, saying how she's only three years older than her boyfriend, but his honor just ignored her, giving a sermon against their relationship right over her incredulous reactions to his tirade. This from an old man who every day has his court packed with young could-be Victoria's Secret models. I've never seen a woman in his court even close to half his age. I think it's maybe like those politicians and preachers who lead campaigns against homosexuals, then get caught themselves having sex with other men. Why else would it be such a big deal to him? I sure don't give a darn how old two other people together are; it's their business. People used to freak about couples from different races, different religions, different countries, even different heights. Yet you still hear, "Wow, he's old enough to be her father!" and, "Look, she's got a boy toy." (I even saw it happen with two women once at a resort. Showing up at the dining area, one of the staff asked, "Oh, is this your daughter?" One look at their reactions and it was obvious that wasn't the case.) Hmmm . . . which would be easier, get everybody in the world to think totally alike about what's a proper couple, or encourage folks to cut each other some slack?

Last night Leno said that Prince Charles gives us Earthlings eighteen months to change our ways if we're going to stop global warming in time to save life on the planet. Of course The Powers That Be would totally agree, if darn it, it wouldn't be so bad for the economy. Death before lower profits. Our "Last Day Of Life On The Planet" Sale. Doors open at 7. Ya gotta love it. (Unless, of course, you have your whole life ahead of you. Then it might be a bit of a drag.)

I don't know how it is everywhere else, but here in California, there's "registered sex offenders" hysteria. Every newscast has a story or two, often followed by reports of some prostitution sting. We could use the same brilliant logic for teenage drivers. Let's make driving lessons illegal for anybody too young to drive. Anybody under the driving age can't even legally watch somebody else drive a car or truck, not even a video or pictures of somebody driving. There's a driver in a movie, it gets an "R" rating. Anybody caught showing minors how to drive would be subject to arrest for contributing. Then when each young person turns fourteen, they're automatically given a drivers license and a car. Any one of them that has an accident or hits something will be ruled totally at fault and be labeled a "registered driving offender" forced to wear an ankle bracelet for the rest of their lives, and they can never again live within a thousand yards of a freeway on-ramp or four-way stop. Yeah, that makes about as much sense. Pity the poor women and children who have to pay the price for the religious lobby and their propaganda that prevents any and all sex education, and sex itself for anyone of any age not meeting their personal requirements. (A license, just like for driving.) God's will, they say. Jeesh, I say. (Sex education and prostitution should be legalized until God Himself says "no" to it OUT LOUD, not just inside some zealot's head.) Meanwhile, women get raped and kids get molested by guys who'd been forbidden any training or understanding about the powerful natural feelings that they experienced at a young age but were taught to feel only guilt and shame about. THAT's what's sick.

If I had my druthers, I'd rather be writing about livelier things, like the joys of skinny-dipping and the health benefits of chocolate chip cookies and beer. But forgive me, with the end of all life on Earth looming, and all we hear from the presidential candidates, congress, and on "the news" is about lowering gas prices and getting the economy going--the very causes of our peril--I'm kinda terrified. Silly me. People working to get along better, wind and solar energy, electric cars, stopping the clear-cutting of forests, having more fun while using less, was all a big thrust of the continually-discredited hippie movement. The planet was doing okay for millions of years, until the industrial revolution. Forty years wasted in reversing the damage could have done the trick. Now, well, I'm afraid we'll just have to see. But I'm sure glad I'm old and my body is worn out and I just partied my life away. All those pretty girls and dancing to live music and psychedelic softball and swimming in rivers and one-way travel and drunk volleyball and sleeping outside and shooting pool and concerts big and small and just working jobs I could see the end of, all with no student loans to repay. Shame on me.

But heck, there's lots of other planets . . . we got to THIS one, didn't we?

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Amen.