Non Sequitur by Wiley Miller for August 16, 2018

Some people feel that they always must keep up ( or do better ) with the neighours. Thankfully not me. I wear my cloths until they wear out. I drive an older truck. I still use a flip phone.

Not to mention the weather vane.

Since I got rid of my flip phone years ago I’ve no need for a computer, GPS, modem, etc. and that saves me a ton of aggrevation. I use it mostly use it for convenience and not communication. Best move I’ve made in decades.

Life moves along at a snail’s pace for some.

The cupola is to cool off the inside of the shell so the snail can move faster. Kind of like loud mufflers on a Honda. Sounds terrible, does very little but gives bragging rights.

I lived in a sea town in Scotland for a few years. They had structures at the top that were like fenced in patios. They were widow’s walks. The wives would go up to see if their husbands were sailing in. Many of them were captain’s wives, I was told.

We have no land line because land lines don’t work where we live — went through 5 different systems before discontinuing (now saving lots of $). My cell phone is great for taking pictures so I don’t have to lug my camera and lenses around while hiking, etc., I can screen callers, AND I can use the speaker phone option to actually hear what callers say. I recently traded my 200,000+ mile car for a new one (my son bought it). Why? Because it is smarter than me and at my age I can’t afford to get stopped for minor traffic issues AND I can adjust the seat so I don’t crawl out of the car with a backache. Some ‘new’ is better than the old for the old.

Keeping-up-with-Joneses syndrome aside, instilling desperate need awareness is what the advertising biz does.

@dot-the-I: You are right. There are two maxims in advertising. 1. Sell the sizzle and not the steak. 2. Develop the ad copy so the viewer feels hungry i.e., dissatisfied with what one has, immediately after eating a full meal. Promoting constant dissatisfaction gives incentive to continue looking for just the right (fill in name of appliance, tv, pc, car/truck, whatever).

Will add this. When I became a public school teacher I found my years of advertising were far better than many so-called teachers’ education courses in preparing me to handle the typical public school population audience of the 1970’s to 2000. I had to sell the value of education to shoppers who did not want to be there, made little effort to learn or perform, and left feeling they had bee forced to consider something they really did not want/need. Many changed their minds along the way. A few realized only much later what they had lost.

This is the wisest thought I’ve seen in a very long time. It defines part of the human condition better than ten books about us.

Hey, that looks cool. I’ll take a cupola those.

France’s Ford Coupola ?

Did he get that from an old Howard Johnson’s restaurant??

@somebodyshort: Yes, Windows 95 works just fine, but a lot of the newer application software won’t run on it. XP is kind of the peak for Microsoft.

Dad usta tell us that was where you sat on the pot and kept lookout for Indians.

I love the grin on the ’cupulo’ed snail.

I have a sudden urge to sing “Shiny” from MOANA. HINT: It’s about a giant crab who decorates himself in gold.

There’s a classic tale of a D&D game where the DM says “Up on that hill you see a gazebo”, and one member of the party immediately wants to kill it. I suppose the story would’ve worked with a cupola, too.

Take a look at YouTube. PreMonty Python:We were so poor

I have no idea why this is funny. Apparently, I’m in the minority?

“D’ ome!”

A pleasant reminder of the folly of getting things for appearance rather than function. My favorites are the endless shills promoting ersatz high performance vehicles far more exciting than the next guy’s, all the better to use when stuck in traffic. The endless quest to serve vanity, whether vehicles, houses, personal tech, or even politicians.

I bet if they think real hard they can come up with another cupola things they can’t live without.

I’m trying to think of some pithy remark about a garlic-butter sauce being a poorer choice than the cupola, but nothing comes to mind.

I still like the comic strip. I’ll be glad when the reruns are over though. This is one of the few comics everybody at work likes. Well, I’ve got some Trumpies but we ignore them.

Oh, goodie, goodie gumdrops: I see this thread has turned “upmanship” into a “downward spiral” …

; – )))

Cupola dummies there.