Al Batt, Tales from Exit 22

&8220;Don&8217;t run with the scissors!&8221;

I heard that often from my mother. I do not know what it was about a scissors that made me want to pick it up and run with it. My mother made me use a safety scissors. It was no fun to run with.

My mother wasn&8217;t much of a worrier. She&8217;d let me play bottle rockets with the boy who wore an eye patch and do woodworking with my three-fingered cousin. Running with scissors was her one great worry.

After basketball practice in high school, we climbed a thick rope to the ceiling of the gym. It was a difficult task for most of the basketball team. The wrestlers could do it with relative ease; often doing the climb without the use of their legs. It was a long way down from the top of that rope. Fortunately, we were protected in a fall by a thin blue mat resting on the gym floor below the rope. The mat would have saved our lives if we made sure to fall no more than seven inches. I tried to find comfort in the advice of Alfred E. Neuman of Mad Magazine fame, whose poster proclaimed, &8220;What, me worry?&8221;

I was driving to Minneapolis when the rear doors of a large commercial truck ahead of me flew open. Shiny objects fell from the open doors. Hundreds of them poured out. They looked like glass. I swerved as much as I could. The traffic was heavy. There were vehicles to my left and a big SUV attempting to crawl into my tailpipe. As the bouncing shiny objects became closer and better known to me, I discovered that they were birdfeeders. They were the tube-type feeders made of flimsy plastic. They harmed no one except perhaps the poor truck driver who had lost his load on a busy freeway.

I had worried about a terrible collision with lots of glass involved.

Fortunately, it never happened. No worries. So many of the things that we worry about, never happen.

Mark Twain said, &8220;Worrying about something is like paying interest on a debt you don’t even owe.&8221;

If we let everything that we should worry about worry us, we&8217;d be dead from all of that worrying.

Robert Frost said, &8220;The reason why worry kills more people than work is that more people worry than work.&8221;

My mother told me that worry is like rocking in a rocking chair.

It gives you something to do, but it doesn&8217;t get you anywhere.

Ask Al

&8220;What time zone is Hartland in?&8221; I&8217;m not sure, but we don&8217;t get &8220;Saturday Night Live&8221; until Wednesday.

&8220;What is virtue?&8221; A failure to achieve vice.

&8220;What is another name for adult education?&8221; Having children.

&8220;Can you think of anything bad about lefse?&8221; It&8217;s a gateway drug that may lead to lutefisk.

&8220;When is the deer season in Minnesota?&8221; All year-round if you drive.

&8220;You once wrote that you used to raise funny chickens. What kind were they?&8221; Comedihens.

Headlines from Hartland

&8220;Hartland Perfume Co. sponsors smelling bee&8221;

&8220;Fantasy lawn mowing league forms&8221;

&8220;City tilts as Hartland Boy Scouts help everyone cross the street&8221;

&8220;Hartland dog sucked up into a tornado, then returned 10 hours later&8221; &8212; the good news is, he was completely unharmed; the bad news is, they lost his luggage.

&8220;The Den of Iniquity asks patrons to come to karaoke night and share the blame&8221;

&8220;Medical professionals are alarmed at the number of bees with hives&8221;

Have you ever wondered?

What is magnesia and who milks it?

Where did people keep their dead batteries before there were flashlights?

Why does Greenwich Mean Time have to be so mean?

How much does gravy have to cost before it&8217;s called a sauce?

Why isn&8217;t a 4×4 called a 16?

Why do brain cells die sooner than fat cells?

I&8217;ve learned

The more adjectives used to describe a food, the worse the food.

If you build it, they will come and tax it.

Every city thinks it has the worst drivers in the world.

My wife likes it when I stop and ask for directions. I don&8217;t have to listen to them, just ask for them.

Most people who are willing to meet another halfway are very poor judges of distance.

It does no good to press harder on a remote control when the battery is dead.

You may be getting older if:

Not only do your socks not match, your shoes don&8217;t either.

You have ever bobbed for prunes.

Nobody ever tells you to slow down.

People call you at 9 p.m. and ask, &8220;Did I wake you?&8221;

There is mold on your high school yearbook.

Your secrets are safe with your friends because they won&8217;t remember them either.

Hartland resident Al Batt&8217;s columns appear every Wednesday and Sunday.