Ind e-Pen I

Introduction:
===============
Welcome to the first edition of the Ind. e-Pen (punny, yeah, I know). If you’re wondering just what the Ind. e-Pen is, let me explain: it’s some sort of thing. Really. I mean, probably.
[1] Basically, it’s a weekly e-mail that you’ll receive unless you specifically request otherwise. [2] In it, I will probably talk about things that I’ve recently thought, done, or thought about doing. [3] I might even throw in some added information about my other publication: the Pix Capacitor! [4] Just think of it as the electronic version of Reader’s Digest.
And now, on to future history!

Discussion Question:
28) The writer here wants to reorganize the second paragraph to make fun of the fact that he has received Reader’s Digest for four years without ever knowingly paying them. Should he put sentence [4] after sentence [1]? I think so.

Tour Guide:
An interesting thing that I’ve learned in my travels through Mexico (pronounced Meh-hee-koh Sit-ee): that the country really enjoys classical conditioning. If you’ve never taken psychology, let me give you the quick 411 on classical conditioning: BAH! (Note: this works much better with e-mails on tape).
The point is that you come to associate something neutral (in this case reading or listening to an e-mail) with something spooky (me talking). After enough repetitions, you would come to be afraid of the e-mail itself. I know, it happens to me all the time.
Mexico knows this. It also knows that most humans like to drive fast. So it asked itself (trust me, I’m an expert. I took like two years of psychology of countries in high school) what drivers hate most. As it asked itself this, its car went over a bump and it spilled hot coffee all over its private regions (countries can have private regions too!).
After it sued McDonald’s (it lost. It turns out that it was drinking Folgers), it realized that people hate speed bumps. So it spent about 90% of Mexico’s transportation budget on installing speed bumps in the most inappropriate places (such as after traffic lights, the interstate, and the fast lane… you think I’m kidding).
But how would it ever spend the other 25% of its budget? (Yeah, don’t ever trust Mexico with your money. It’s why I don’t pay taxes there). This was when some genius came up with the absolute worst advance in driving since the sidewalk: color-coding the speed bumps.
Here is where classical conditioning comes in: Mexico decided to color its speed bumps in the exact same pattern as its crosswalks (I suppose that it’s because both zones theoretically should cause cars to slow down) This worked excellently for Mexico, terribly for Mexicans, and so-so for Mexican’ts.
Then Mexico decided to go a step further: pointless crosswalks. If you’ve never driven through Mexico, you can’t possibly understand the fear that one feels upon seeing the familiar yellow, white, yellow of speed bumps and crosswalks and random spots on the road. You never know when you really should slow down, and you always mess up at least twice per trip. It’s really quite annoying.
Perhaps next time I’ll explain about how cops turn OFF their lights to pull you over. Or how, when the traffic lights go out, everybody treats it as a green light. Or maybe even about how, during rush hour, the traffic moves slower than most tectonic plates…

True Highway Signs Spotted in Mexico:
“The left lane is for passing only”
“The shoulder is for emergencies only”
“Do not pass on the shoulder”

“Obey the signs”
“Respect the signs”
“Do not damage the signs”

New Year:
It could have been a disaster. Everything could have turned out horrible. I mean, just think about it: we could have been left without wine and grapes for New Year’s! Yeah, I live a fun-filled life.
It’s a age-old tradition to eat twelve grapes (one for every month) and drink wine (one glass for every stomach) at 12 AM on Jan. 1. The idea is that you make a wish with each grape. I don’t exactly know how this became a tradition, I’m guessing it’s a grape company conspiracy — assuming there ARE grape companies — and that my age-old ancestors liked alcohol. Not in any dangerous way mind you, they probably bought their alcohol legally.
That’s why my dad was shocked when his brother told him that no one was taking any wine this year because nobody in the family drank. Unbeknownst to my poor sober father, his brother was involved in a two-person conspiracy to dry up new years (or is that enough people to be a coup d’ état?).
It seems that my family is divided into two groups: super-christians and winos. I might be generalizing here a bit. And to be fair, I don’t think any of the drunks made it to the party, but that’s a different story. This one is about grapes.
Eventually, the more… traditional minded… of our relatives realized that there was no alcohol to celebrate the New Year. So they went and bought some wine for us. Now all we needed was grapes.
What kind of a new year would this be without a silly superstion? But just where would we find grapes for 42 cousins? I only counted 36, but hey, since when have I ever been right
Pop Quiz: 42 x 12 = 503.5
Yikes. Where would we find 504.25 grapes in four hours? The answer was nowhere. Sure, there was an uncle nearby that always had half a thousand grapes in his living room, but he still owed us the sugar that we’re sure he borrowed in 1978, so we couldn’t ask him, right?
Let’s skip ahead to midnight. By now, everyone had wine and, you guessed it, ten raisins and two nuts. Everyone except for me, that is. I had 18 raisins. I live by a different calendar. Also, it turns out that there was never 42 cousins. I had just made up the number 42 at some random point in the night. Someday perhaps I’ll tell everyone what happened… Maybe next year. I want to see what kind of an omen late wine, raisins, and nuts are. Probably something humorous. Like potpourri.

Schedule
Just in case you’re wondering just when you’ll receive these e-mails, I’ve composed this nifty little list. With the exception of this and next week, they’ll all be on Saturdays (lovely way to start the new year, eh?).

IeP Schedule:
1 1/5
2 1/11
3 1/17
4 1/24
5 1/31
6 2/7
7 2/14
8 2/21
9 2/28
10 3/6
11 3/13
12 3/20
13 3/27
14 4/3
15 4/10
16 4/17
17 4/24
18 5/1
19 5/8
20 5/15
21 5/22
22 5/29 Ooh, my birthday!
23 6/5
24 6/12
25 6/19
26 6/26
27 7/3
28 7/10
29 7/17
30 7/24
31 7/31
32 8/7
33 8/14
34 8/21
35 8/28
36 9/4
37 9/11
38 9/18
39 9/25
40 10/2
41 10/9
42 10/16
43 10/23
44 10/30
45 11/6
46 11/13
47 11/20
48 11/27
49 12/4
50 12/11
51 12/18
52 12/25

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Introduction: =============== Welcome to the first edition of the Ind. e-Pen (punny, yeah, I know). If you’re wondering just what the Ind. e-Pen is, let me explain: it’s some sort of thing. Really. I mean, probably. [1] Basically, it’s a weekly e-mail that you’ll receive unless you specifically request otherwise. [2] In it, I will…