The Ant and the Grasshopper - Two Versions

THE ANT AND THE GRASSHOPPER

This one is a little different.....
Two Different Versions! ................. Two Different Morals!


OLD VERSION: The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter.

The grasshopper thinks the ant is a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away.

Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed.

The grasshopper has no food or shelter, so he dies out in the cold.

MORAL OF THE STORY: Be responsible for yourself




MODERN VERSION:

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter.

The grasshopper thinks the ant is a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away.

Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving.

CBS, NBC, PBS, CNN, and ABC show up to provide pictures of the shivering grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food. America is stunned by the sharp contrast.

How can this be, that in a country of such wealth, this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so?

Kermit the Frog appears on Oprah with the grasshopper and everybody cries when they sing, 'It's Not Easy Being Green.'

Acorn stages a demonstration in front of the ant 's house where the news stations film the group singing, 'We shall overcome.' Rev. Jeremiah Wright then has the group kneel down to pray to God for the grasshopper's sake.

Nancy Pelosi & Harry Reid exclaim in an interview with Larry King that the ant has gotten rich off the back of the grasshopper, and both call for an immediate tax hike on the ant to make him pay his fair share.

Finally, the EEOC drafts the Economic Equity & Anti-Grasshopper Act retroactive to the beginning of the summer.

The ant is fined for failing to hire a proportionate number of green bugs and, having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by the Government Green Czar.

The story ends as we see the grasshopper finishing up the last bits of the ants food while the government house he is in, which just happens to be the ant's old house, crumbles around him because he doesn't maintain it.

The ant has disappeared in the snow.

The grasshopper is found dead in a drug related incident and the house, now abandoned, is taken over by a gang of spiders who terrorize the once peaceful neighborhood.

MORAL OF THE STORY: Be careful how you vote in 2010.

A New Twist on "Who's On First"

You have to be old enough to remember Abbott and Costello, and too old to REALLY understand computers, to fully appreciate this. For those of us who sometimes get flustered by our computers, please read on...

If Bud Abbott and Lou Costello were alive today, their infamous sketch, 'Who's on First?' might have turned out something like this:

COSTELLO CALLS TO BUY A COMPUTER FROM ABBOTT

ABBOTT: Super Duper computer store. Can I help you?

COSTELLO: Thanks I'm setting up an office in my den and I'm thinking about buying a computer.

ABBOTT: Mac?

COSTELLO: No, the name's Lou.

ABBOTT: Your computer?

COSTELLO: I don't own a computer. I want to buy one.

ABBOTT: Mac?

COSTELLO: I told you, my name's Lou.

ABBOTT: What about Windows?

COSTELLO: Why? Will it get stuffy in here?

ABBOTT: Do you want a computer with Windows?

COSTELLO: I don't know. What will I see when I look at the windows?

ABBOTT: Wallpaper.

COSTELLO: Never mind the windows. I need a computer and software.

ABBOTT: Software for Windows?

COSTELLO: No. On the computer! I need something I can use to write proposals, track expenses and run my business. What do you have?

ABBOTT: Office.

COSTELLO: Yeah, for my office. Can you recommend anything?

ABBOTT: I just did.

COSTELLO: You just did what?

ABBOTT: Recommend something.

COSTELLO: You recommended something?

ABBOTT: Yes.

COSTELLO: For my office?

ABBOTT: Yes.

COSTELLO: OK, what did you recommend for my office?

ABBOTT: Office.

COSTELLO: Yes, for my office!

ABBOTT: I recommend Office with Windows.

COSTELLO: I already have an office with windows! OK, let's just say I'm sitting at my computer and I want to type a proposal. What do I need?

ABBOTT: Word.

COSTELLO: What word?

ABBOTT: Word in Office.

COSTELLO: The only word in office is office.

ABBOTT: The Word in Office for Windows.

COSTELLO: Which word in office for windows?

ABBOTT: The Word you get when you click the blue 'W'.

COSTELLO: I'm going to click your blue 'w' if you don't start with some straight answers. What about financial bookkeeping? You have anything I can track my money with?

ABBOTT: Money.

COSTELLO: That's right. What do you have?

ABBOTT: Money.

COSTELLO: I need money to track my money?

ABBOTT: It comes bundled with your computer.

COSTELLO: What's bundled with my computer?

ABBOTT: Money.

COSTELLO: Money comes with my computer?

ABBOTT: Yes. No extra charge.

COSTELLO: I get a bundle of money with my computer? How much?

ABBOTT: One copy.

COSTELLO: Isn't it illegal to copy money?

ABBOTT: Microsoft gave us a license to copy Money.

COSTELLO: They can give you a license to copy money?

ABBOTT: Why not? THEY OWN IT!

(A few days later)

ABBOTT: Super Duper computer store. Can I help you?

COSTELLO: How do I turn my computer off?

ABBOTT: Click on 'START'.............

Geocaching Adventure

To catch you up to speed, here's the basic idea of geocaching. You hide some sort of container with a little log book in it and you mark the coordinates with your GPS. Next, go to www. geocaching.com and make an entry describing your cache container, how hard it is to find based on a predefined scale and enter the coordinates from your GPS. Now other people can go to the web site, download the coordinates and look for your cache. Once they find it, they sign the little log book and then log back onto the web page and log their find. When they log their find, it is courteous to put a little note about the hunt...to share a story.

Some goecaches are "muliti's". This means there may be 4 stages. The coordinates on the web site take you to stage 1. You find stage 1, but instead of a log book inside you will find the coordinates to stage 2. Stage 2 had coordinates for stage 3. Stage 3 has coordinates for stage 4. Stage 4 is the actual geocache where you sign the log.

All that to share this story with you. There is a particularly well-known, popular and difficult multi-cache about 10 miles outside of Huntsville, TX called Four Cache Loop. I wanted to the most recent online log from this geocache. Like I said, this is a long, difficult cache so most stories are not this exciting, but this gives you a glimpse into some of the "adventure" of geocaching. What follows is the story of this couples' find of this multi-stage geocache today.

Yea!!!! We found it in 7 Hours. Not bad for a pair of old farts stumbling around in the woods. We ended up bushwhacking most of it since I wasn’t sure what trail was what. After we finished the last cache I took us in the wrong direction to the car. I was basking in the glory of doing this multi-cache that I didn’t even notice that my GPS kept telling me we were .75 mile from the car. That means we were going in a circle around the car. My wife’s feet were hurting so I told her to hang out by this Frisbee golf course we were by. I told her I would walk the ¾ of mile or so up the street to get the car. When I was about ½ mile down the road my iPhone died so GPS and I had forgotten to grab my wife’s GPS when I left. But I kept thinking “it’s just up over the next hill”. Wrong. About 3 or so miles later I think I must be doing something wrong so I turned around and walked back. Turns out IT WAS JUST “just over the next hill” when I turn around. When I get back to where I left my wife I couldn’t find her!!! I freak for awhile and then I start hoping she some how got back to the car. I had the only key so I knew she couldn’t come get me. So I figured I would go back to the last spot where I had a fix on my car and was going straight for it. So I went back into the woods to find that spot. Was hoping I could cut through the woods and head straight for the car. But when I get there the direction I needed to go has real thick underbrush. I know I have about ¾ of a mile to go and I’m too tired to go bushwhacking anymore so I turned around AGAIN. When I get back to where I had left my wife I was so dehydrated all my muscles start cramping up. I had done all this back and fourth without any water. So I walked up to a house and knocked on the door and this guy saves me. He gave me couple bottles of cold water and a ride to my car. Bless you sir. When I get to my car I see my wife on her phone talking to her daughter. My incredible Geowife had Googled her location on her iPhone after I’d left and figured out that the car was about a ½ mile back up this other road in the another direction. Sorry Honey, I promise not to loose you again out in the middle nowhere. She had gone to the car figuring I would show up. I had the only key so she waited by the car and sent dozens of messages to my phone which was dead.
Hey we are still alive and we have a great story to tell the grand kids. Thank-you so much for the great patches and for the great cache. It was well worth the 10 ½ hours we went through. We left some swag and signed the log.

12 of 12 - September 2009

Basic Idea: 12 pictures from your life on the 12th of every month. This mon't, the 12th was on a Saturday.

9:35am - Kidz Live had Super Hero night from 7pm-Midnight the night before. I was getting everything ready for the chair crew to help me reset the chairs in the sanctuary.


9:46am - Laying out the tape measures to know where to reset sanctuary chairs.


10:34am - Here's the chair crew in action. Thanks to Terry, Jesse and David for your help!


11:07am - Amanda having a late (and ever-so-healthy) breakfast. She was up late for Super Hero night the night before.


11:14am - My sermon notes and Power Point for my sermon the next day "How To Be a Disciple Who Doesn't Turn Back" taken from John 6.


12:04pm - Amanda and Daddy ran a few errands.


12:12pm - While running errands, we had to stop by Amanda's favorite restaurant.


12:42pm - We stopped by Kroger for a few necessities. (We were supposed to buy stuff for lunch but we had to pass McDonalds on the way, so we just bought groceries for dinner!)


5:40pm - We LOVE our teachers at ECIA this year and are thankful for a better academic focus this year, but man, we're getting slammed with homework. Who likes weekend homework?


6:23pm - After working on homework and a sermon most of the day, Amanda and Daddy needed a Wii break!


6:43pm - It was raining outside and not very inviting for grilling...so we grilled inside.


6:46pm - Weather radar. It rained ALL weekend!

Simply Amazing

Southerners Are So Polite!

Atlanta Air Traffic Control (ATC): "Tower to Saudi Air 911 - You are cleared to land eastbound on runway 9R."

Saudi Air: "Thank you Atlanta ATC. Acknowledge cleared to land on infidel's runway 9R. Allah be praised.

Atlanta ATC: "Tower to Iran Air 712 - You are cleared to land westbound on runway 9R."

Iran Air: "Thank you Atlanta ATC. We are cleared to land on infidel's runway 9R. Allah is great.

Pause . . .

Static . . .

Saudi Air: "ATLANTA ATC!! ATLANTA ATC!!"

Atlanta ATC: "Go ahead Saudi Air 911."

Saudi Air: "YOU HAVE CLEARED BOTH OF OUR AIRCRAFT FOR THE SAME RUNWAY GOING IN OPPOSITE DIRECTIONS. WE ARE ON A COLLISION COURSE. PLEASE ADVISE!"

Atlanta ATC: "Well bless your little hearts, and praise Jesus. Y'all be careful now; and tell Allah 'hey' for us!"