Quote of the week . . .

“A brat is a child who acts like your own but belongs to your neighbor”

—CC—

Area seniors will soon be graduating and making decisions about their future. There are so many possibilities for graduates and two of my favorites are the military and Vo-Tech School. You don’t have to take out huge student loans for either and will actually learn a profession.

I know that for some college may be the best choice. However, for many it is a waste of time and money.

Whatever your choice is, here is some good advice from Bill Gates (Who has done rather well) to those graduating:

RULE 1 ... Life is not fair; get used to it.

RULE 2 ... The world won’t care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something BEFORE you feel good about yourself.

RULE 3 ... You will NOT make 40 thousand dollars a year right out of high school. You won’t be a vice president with a car phone, until you earn both.

RULE 4 ... If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss. He doesn’t have tenure.

RULE 5 ... Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your grandparents had a different word for burger flipping; they called it opportunity.

RULE 6 ... If you mess up, it’s not your parents’ fault, so don’t whine about your mistakes, learn from them.

RULE 7 ... Before you were born, your parents weren’t as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you are. So, before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parents’ generation, try “delousing” the closet in your own room.

RULE 8 ... Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life has not. In some schools, they have abolished failing grades; they’ll give you as many times as you want to get the right answer. This doesn’t bear the slightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.

RULE 9 ... Life is not divided into semesters. You don’t get summer off and very few employers are interested in helping you find yourself. Do that on your own time.

RULE 10 ... Television is NOT real life. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.

RULE 11 ... Be nice to nerds. Chances are you’ll end up working for one.

—CC—

It doesn’t seem that long ago I was concerned about buying “stuff”, now my concern is about who gets the “stuff” I thought was so important once I die. I am now more concerned about my “wills” than I am my “wants.”

I know how Jim Muller felt when he wrote the following . . .

WHEN THERE’S A WILL

The nurse asked me if I had a living will. “Yes, I do,” I said.

“Did you bring it with you?”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Why not?”

“Well, I’m only here to have my teeth cleaned. I didn’t really think I’d need it.” I could see how important that would be if I was having a filling, or a wisdom tooth pulled, but a cleaning? Was it really that life-threatening? Maybe I should be looking for a new dentist.

There was much consternation behind the counter. Could they proceed with the cleaning without the living will? Do I really look that old? Or is it like that annoying teenager who always gives me the senior discount down at the Shop and Spend every Tuesday? I want to tell her she’s just given me a 15 percent discount for being prematurely gray. But I just shut up and take it.

I can’t even remember what it says in my living will. I don’t want to be in constant pain. I don’t want to linger. I don’t want to be in a coma. But I would like Netfl ix. And one of those Alexa thingies. Did I remember to put that in there? Is it too late to change it? What happens if I want to linger for, like, a week?

I have a friend who keeps her will on the refrigerator door and changes it about once a week, depending on who has disappointed her in the past seven days. There are so many notes scribbled on it that I doubt if it’s a legal document anymore.

And where did I put it? Where do you put something like that? In the home office? In the glove compartment? On the nightstand? I can’t find the phone bill in my home office. I don’t need a living will; I need a living fi ling clerk.

I do remember meeting with my lawyer and drawing up the papers. He said, “You should have a living will so that if you become incapacitated, your wishes will be carried out.”

“My main wish is that I shouldn’t become incapacitated.”

“Do you have a health care proxy?”

“Of course not. I’m married. Besides, at my age . . .”

“Proxy. Not doxy, you pathetic old goat. Turn up the hearing aid, would you? Do you have a will?”

“I don’t think I need one. Everything’s held jointly.”

“Yeah, but what if you both die in a plane crash? Where’s your money go then?”

“You’re just trying to cheer me up, aren’t you?”

“Say you both die in a nursing home fi re? Who gets your estate then? I hear about this kind of stuff all the time. If some of my clients only knew what happened to their estates after they died, they would be turning over in their graves.”

“Have you ever thought of becoming a motivational speaker?”

“Let’s talk about your living will. For example, let’s say you’re completely conscious, but you can’t move a muscle. Would you want them to take extraordinary means to keep you alive?”

“No, I’d want them to take extraordinary means to make me move.”

“Sorry, that’s not on the form. Let’s say someone has to cook all your food, constantly clean up behind you, run all the errands and do all the chores while you sit in bed all day and watch television because you can’t do the simplest things by yourself. Would you want them to take extraordinary means to keep you alive?”

“I’m married. That’s the way I live now. I want them to take extraordinary means to keep Sue alive.”

“I just did her living will. She said she wanted you to die first, but she didn’t want to spend her golden years in the clink.”

“She’s thoughtful that way.”

“That’s one way of putting it.”

—CC—

Usually I have a favorite story of the week but this time I have two. . .

Mary Sibert writes that driving home from church one Sunday, her husband tuned the radio to a country and western station. “How can you stand that stuff?” complained her 16-year-old son. “It’s all about lonesome cowboys, gunfights and broken hearts.”

Knowing he preferred rock ‘n’ roll, she asked, “Well, what’s your music about?”

“That’s the beauty of it,” her son said. “You just don’t know!”

And the second one I can identify with . . .

My fiancée and I were in the process of buying a condominium. After finding out how much our mortgage was going to be, my future father-in-law smiled broadly and remarked, “What a country! One day you have nothing, and the next

day you have $80,000 less.” Contributed by Arthur Kotsifasa.