Rally 'Round the Flag, Boobs!

You know how some boys are really rough on the knees of their jeans? Rip them out roughhousing, shred them sliding into second, disintegrate them dragging down a dirt road on a piece of cardboard towed by 4-wheeler? So rough on the knees of their jeans that iron-on patches are required?

Yeah. Not my boys. Maybe it's because they're afraid I'll iron patches on the knees of their jeans, if I ever find an iron. But I'm more inclined to think it's because they have never really liked jeans. Oh, Genius wears them NOW, the fashionable kind that you pay extra to get with a rip already made, not the cowboy or factory worker kind that built this country, like Levis or Wranglers or Lees or Rustlers. The Pony was never a jeans fan. But even his slacks are immaculate in the knee region.

What The Pony DOES wear out is computer accessories. Namely power cords and chargers and connectors. Every year. No matter what brand of laptop, something goes terribly wrong. Smoke. Sparks. Shocks. Pointy Thing A unable to insert into Holey Thing B. Today we had to drive over to bill-paying town to a computer shop to fetch him a new universal charger. That's because, unbeknownst to me until Tuesday morning, his current charger has frayed wires that smoke and give a shock if touched. Uh huh.

"You need to get online and find one and I'll order it. It will be here in two days. You're going to burn the house down."

"No I won't. I unplug it at night. I checked the rug where the cord lays. It's not charred. Besides, I've been taking it to school with me. I use it when the teacher doesn't need my help with the kindergarteners. Don't worry. They won't get shocked. They never come over by where I am."

"YOU GO GET SOME ELECTRICAL TAPE AND WRAP THOSE WIRES BEFORE WE LEAVE FOR SCHOOL! And when we get home, you're going to show me what part to order."

"I have a charger for my old computer. The one we had to get because its charger was smoking and sparking when I plugged it in. Remember? We couldn't find one except from China, and Genius said it was fake and no good. So you bought me the universal charger. Then that plug-in thing broke the next year, out of the set of connectors that came with it, and you took me back to get a connector, and they just opened a pack and gave it to me. But now I have my new laptop, so all I need is a connector that fits it, because I still have that universal charger, which should work for this new one."

"We'll go after school."

Which we did. And he took in his universal charger and laptop to show them, but funny how they didn't just give us a free connector this year, because as The Pony was showing it to them, they saw that the end of that cord, where the connector hooked on, was dangling by frayed wires. "You're going to have to replace that, buddy!"

So we have a new $43 universal charger, which came with a set of various connectors. We're good for another year. But that's not what I started out to show you. What I started out to show you was THIS:

Yeah. It's blurry, because The Pony took the picture from the seat behind me, and he is a notoriously slow picture-taker. He is like the January molasses of picture-takers. If you want a picture of a tornado, you tell him when it's five days out in the forecast.

So, what do you think we have here, this vehicle we were behind for about ten minutes at the stoplight, and The Pony unable to snap that photo until it started to drive off? Do you think, perhaps, it's a CIA vehicle, all SUV-y and black, with tinted windows and an American flag taped to the back? No. I don't think so.

Here's the disturbing part. I'll read it to you, because I have it memorized. I imagine you can see the main part: SHOW ME YOUR BOOBIES. Yeah. I did not. The left side says: WHO WANTS LAID? HONK. I did not. But the most disturbing part is...included with these two commandments are the words in each lower corner: R I P GRANDPA. WE LOVE YOU.

It may not surprise you that after going our way for a mile or two, this vehicle made a left turn into an establishment called SCRAPPIN'.

I think the driver was on of those boys who rips out the knees of his jeans.