Wednesday Ponderables

1) At some point during the height of the Second World War, did anyone ask the admissions office of the Vienna College of Art the question on all of our minds: "Were his paintings really so bad you couldn't accept him???"

2) Did the creators of the University of Maryland University College decide it wasn't clear enough whether their institution was a place for higher education?  Could they have thrown in a few more references to "college" in their title?

3) How can anyone believe that the Great Wall of China can be seen from outer space with the naked eye?  It may be thousands of miles long, but it's no wider than a highway.  If you can see the Great Wall from any point in space you should also be able to see the New Jersey Turnpike.

4) It seems in war films the guy with a girl back home that he's planning to marry will be the first to be killed tragically, and the sullen guy with a death wish will save the day and survive to the end.  If I ever get drafted into the army I'm going to get real sullen real fast.  And make sure I'm teamed up with a young, engaged guy who'll have to take a bullet for me.  Sorry, I don't make the rules!

5) Teaching people to write in cursive in the 1980s--a time when typewriters had been around a while and computers were becoming big--was a sad waste of time and those hours are ones I'll never get back.  Damn teachers unions with their handwriting specialists.

6) It still makes no sense to me that at restaurants we ask the waiters for "the check" when we want them to bring us the invoice.  They've certainly never brought a bank check to me, though I'd appreciate their sense of humor if they did that just once.

7) It saddens me that there is such a thing as an Indiana Board of Tourism because it implies that there are people who have no choice but to take their vacation in Indiana.  (I automatically rule out the possibility of a tourist who chooses Indiana over anywhere else.  Except maybe Michigan.  Which is also sad.)

8)  If there were just one political pundit who was truly all over the map on every issue--favors abortion, but only in the second trimester, wants the death penalty, but only for rape and not murder, wants to nationalize the airlines but not trains, is anti-war except in leap years--I'd definitely tune in to him or her.  It's tiring to see the same predictable "red team vs. blue team" snorefests.