Economics be damned!!

Well, looky there! It's a picture I took with my fabulous green digital camera. I think, however, that from now on I will have to call it my fabulous green albatross digital camera. Yes, yes, I HAD to have it and I love taking photos with it, but I may never know how to download the stupid things onto the computer (Tony did it for me) and I don't really even understand what some of the settings mean, let alone know how to adjust the damn settings. And before you get all over my case about reading the instruction book...I read the fucking book, okay? I still don't get it. I liken the digital camera to my college economics class. I didn't get that either. I even had my brilliant MBA student boyfriend try to help me, but he finally threw his hands up in the air and called me stupid. He still denies ever calling me stupid, but he did and he knows it. Big deal, so I don't understand economics. I really don't even remember most of it...I think it had something to do with supply and demand and the economy. WHATEVER! I can't believe people actually study that. It all boils down to: Everybody wants cool stuff. There isn't enough cool stuff to go around. Soooo...you have to decide if you really NEED the cool stuff or if you just WANT the cool stuff...and that's called an economic decision. For example, I needed a digital camera (don't tell me I didn't need it, I most certainly did so just go with my logic here, OK?) and I wanted to get the one that best fit my budget while serving my needs, right? So I went to Costco, compared the various choices in digital camera technology and decided that it made economic sense to pay $10 more for a green camera even though the one that was less money was a better quality camera. After all, everyone I know has a silver digital camera and it is most definitely worth ten bucks NOT to have one that looks like everyone else's.
That, my dears, is economics in a nutshell.
Pat (the previously mentioned brilliant boyfriend who called me stupid) is now reading this and rolling his eyes in utter disgust. Who cares? I'm not stupid; economics is stupid.
Let me tell you a little story about Pat. He and I have been friends ever since I was 18 years old. We dated for a while and then we didn't and through it all we were always, always friends. He is still my friend. We made it through our "practice" marriages, our divorces, my dad's 2 month hospital ordeal, the death of his incredible parents who raised a shit-load of really great kids, the births of my children, the loss of his hair, and some crappy heart-break and remained friends. He recently installed door alarms at my parent's house so that if my dad tries to "escape" in the middle of the night the alarm will go off and my mom will wake up. I think my mom got her first restful and complete night of sleep in years the night after he did this. I didn't ASK Pat to do this; he just did because I was trying to figure out how to keep my dad from running away again. So, he asked for the key to my parent's house and went over there and installed them and then wouldn't even let me pay for the equipment. Pat is the kind of guy who will jump up in the middle of lunch at Panera and hold the restaurant door open for someone in a wheelchair. The story I am going to tell will illustrate what a great guy Pat is...but since he also called me stupid once I feel compelled to include a picture of him circa 1984.

I only wish that he was looking at the camera so you could see how BIG those plastic rimmed glasses were. And...HELLO!! Is that a spiffy Member's Only jacket? Also, you can't tell from this photo, but Pat was so skinny that you could see his hipbones through his clothes. Luckily, he doesn't have to worry about his unfortunate male-pattern baldness anymore as he no longer has hair. Seriously, his only haircare product of choice is sunscreen. Clancy, the magnificent Irish Setter in this photo, was our family dog. Until I got Snoopy and Lucy (our beagles) I thought Clancy was the dumbest dog ever. Clancy once ran across the street because he saw a cat and ran full speed into the side of a police car that was cruising our neighborhood at about 5 MPH. The idiot dog knocked himself unconscious. So, he was laying there in the street and the cop gets out of his car just as I was running towards Clancy screaming, "What did you do to my dog?!?!?" The cop looked so confused as he answered, "Umm...he ran into my car. Right here on the passenger side door..." I was crying and yelling, "You killed my dog! You hit my dog! I can't believe you killed my dog!" At this point the policeman was getting really uncomfortable because our neighbors were starting to come out of their houses to see what was going on. So, as I am crying and yelling and the cop is apologizing and trying to explain that the dog hit HIM, not the other way around, Clancy wakes up, looks around and takes off after the damn cat again.

Okay, back to Pat. Pat came out to visit me once when I was living in an apartment with my friend Laura. We were constantly broke and when we did have money we spent it on Guess? jeans and Wham! albums. Needless to say, there wasn't anything in our fridge but Yoplait yogurt and cold pizza. Pat decided that we needed some food so he took us to the local Hy-Vee grocery store and told us that whatever the three of us could CARRY out (no shopping cart allowed) he would buy for us. I think there might have even been a time limit.Yipppeee!! It was like a game show. Laura and I quickly walked through the store picking out things that we could carry while Pat followed us around so he could help us carry what we had chosen. At one point, we had a gallon of milk, toilet paper, paper towels, some boxes of cereal and maybe some tampons. Pat looked at us, shook his head and yelled, "What are you doing?? Go get some steaks! Get meat! Get real food! Toilet paper?? What?? I'll buy ANYTHING IN THE STORE!" I think he fell just short of calling us stupid. Laura and I were laughing and laughing. Come on! Like we knew how to cook! What the fuck were we going to do with a bunch of meat? I think we compromised and got some ground beef and a box of Hamburger Helper. But, you see, even through this act of generosity, Pat was still trying to teach me about economics. What a guy.
I love you, Pat!