AKA Australian

People who voted badly
Need to be publicly shamed.
That dreadful secret ballot
Lets them escape unnamed!

Local 5k

Third place guy in my age group
Accidentally ran off course.
Second place guy in my age group
Ran on artificial hips.
I took first place in my age group,
I ran with maximum force,
But either might have beat me
With slightly different scripts.

You Are What You Eat

When your dog eats your philosophy homework...

You get s pensive pup
Who ponders all that’s up,
Including whether the human mind
Quite compares to the canine kind.

Jumbo Planet

In tonight’s sky,
Jupiter looks stunningly large,
Which I guess is why
Roman mythology put him in charge.

Bad Blood

For book club, we read John Carreyrou’s book about the Theranos scandal: Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup. It’s kind of a page turner, where the crazed boss just keeps getting away with bad behavior until very near the end.

When you get caught in big lies
And you lose people’s trust
It shouldn’t be a surprise
That your business goes bust.

New Bike

It's the first day of summer, and I bought a new road bike. I'd had my old once since 2001. Its shifter for the front gears had started to fail. So I needed to get the shifter fixed, which I could have done, or spring for an actual new bike.

I hesitated over buying the new bike. I'm treating it as my birthday present. But I'll be 67 in August. Does it really make sense to buy a new bike at this age? How many years can I get out of it? Such are the worries of old people, I guess.

Anyway, it's more comfortable than my old bike. I took it out for a 20 mile spin in the forest preserve. It has a carbon-fiber front fork that "dampens the vibrations" as you ride over bumps. Now I'm telling myself it's a good purchase because old people need comfortable bikes as an incentive to get out there and ride!

It's from the Giant brand. They're a Taiwanese company, currently the world's biggest bike manufacturer. This is the third bike in a row I've had from them. The first I bought in 1992, so I'm a loyal but infrequent customer. They are not one of the cool name brands, but they seem to make pretty good bikes for less.

I like
My new bike.

ICE Slip Up

It happened here:

Man being deported escapes ICE agents, hails cab after using O’Hare restroom
Law enforcement officials set up a perimeter to contain him, but he was already gone, police said.

When you’re escorting
A guy you’re deporting,
Watch him closely in the loo.
It’s the smart thing to do.

Joining

Yoga is etymologically related to yoke.
The same can’t be said of toga and toke.

Coming Up Soon

It's the nineteenth of June
And we're exactly one month away
From the 50th anniversary of the day
Someone walked on
And talked on
The moon.

My Theory, Not My Practice

How could Shakespeare
Have known so much?
He hung out in bars
To stay in touch.

Fast

Since a fast is when you arrange to not eat,
The phrase “fast food” seems strangely offbeat.

Lox

I came across this headline:

"The English Word That Hasn’t Changed in Sound or Meaning in 8,000 Years"

The word is lox and the headline is misleading, since lox means a kind of smoked salmon, but 8000 years ago it just meant salmon, period.

And the story of lox, in particular, is mainly a hook to hang a general story about the ancient people who spoke proto-Indo-European, the mother of many tongues, and why there were so successful at spreading their culture - because, it is said, they were the first to tame the horse and then to attach wheeled vehicles to the horse.

I’m glad that proto-Indo-European
Proved so successful.
If it hadn’t, there would be no English,
And that would be stressful.

I’ve invested a lot into English,
A whole lot of time,
Especially studying words
Which do or don’t rhyme.

These ancients lived near salmon,
Which they called lox.
But was a squarish container
Known as a box?

Stroller Ditty

It’s just a little bump,
The kind that makes you thump,
You feel it in your rump,
Yes you do!

(Song composed for baby, to be sung when stroller wheels encounter an uneven surface.)

But It Does Happen

Making major decisions
While drinking whisky
Is widely regarded
As risky.

Apples

Apples have appeal,
And can fit at any meal,
But they won’t really block
All visits to a doc.

To Be Clear

Redundancy increases the chances
That a message will be understood;
Also it lessens misunderstandings,
Which is very, very good.

Non Euclidean

When I see two railroad tracks merge,
Is it proof that parallel lines converge?

Leon's Triathlon 2019

At the tri today, we swam in Wolf Lake.
As usual I drank some.
The water looked green but tasted clean
For this I'm rather thanksome.

There is algae, and fauna too:



Mama swan
Carrying on.

I Was Informed

If you open your umbrella in London
When you feel the very first drop,
The locals know you’re a tourist.
They wait till it’s coming nonstop.