Here’s a “fun” little story from the New York Times: Dallas police officers have cited drivers for not being able to speak English 38 times in the past three years.  So here’s the thing, there is no law in Dallas requiring drivers to speak English.  The other thing is that 44% of the population is Hispanic.

This means that these six officers somehow got the genius idea to start using their power to penalize people for speaking a different language.  I haven’t been able to find any justification for this great plan, besides the fact that they thought it was a legitimate offense.  In fact, it is clear from the last person to be issued such a ticket, that she could (and did) communicate with the officer.  It was just done with bits and pieces of English.  So, he must have given her a ticket because she didn’t speak enough English.

I don’t really have that much to say about abuse of power, or racism, or IQ, or Texas.  But this story did give me some great ideas for some things that should warrant a traffic ticket.

• Having a shiny bald head
• Thinking too quickly while merging
• Parallel parking too easily
• Possession of concealed glutes
• Possession of lawless abs
• Absence of crouching tiger
• Overabundance of hidden dragon
• Unsupervised SWS (Sticky Wicket Syndrome)
• Texting while asleep
• Cruel intentions
• Basic Instinct
• Quoting Beowulf in a school zone
• Judging people in a residential zone
• Limerick in a construction zone
• Car rear looks too much like a face
• Drive by cruising
• Cruise by rolling
• Drag racing while not wearing drag
• Not being able to speak Old Earth Elvish

I invite you to add your own.

Folding laundry is THE ritual for domestic spirituality.  I’m not talking about any specific spirituality.  I’m talking about that state of rapture where you become one with your domestic task; where time melts and your body-mind is at peace.  You could even call it your “happy place.”

Many of us know this truth.  But beware brothers and sisters!  Heresy slinks surely around the corner whispering you away from the way, the truth, and the lint.  I was accosted by such foul untruth the other day when two gentlemen informed me that doing the dishes was far more fulfilling than folding laundry.  (I know this is hard to face, but the only way to kill a snake is with a snake dart).

They claimed that dishes rivaled laundry because “folding laundry is so boring,” and “when you clean dishes you are plugging in to the great cycle of nourishment.”  They loved the fact that when you do dishes you get wet.  And one false prophet even stated that he would let the dishes build up for days in order to have a sloppy Palmolive orgy.

Allow me scrape these dust bunnies into the can.  First of all, what you get when you get wet is chapped and pruny.  Second, when my sink fills up it smells like the devil and moves like a wolf spider.  Doing the dishes deals with dirty, while folding laundry deals with clean.  When you fold laundry you are doing zen oragami.  You are an artist.  How do you want to fold that t-shirt?  Department store flip or Grandma roll?  Will you fold your wife’s danties?  (no they are impossible–just put them in a pile for her to sort out).  Thank you.  Next!  I could care less about washing my garlic press with one hand, but the challenge of folding socks with a single extremity will keep me riveted for minutes at a time.

So stand firm in the way fellow-folders!!  Give me an iPod and a fluffy pile and may the dishes be damned.

This financial meltdown got me thinking about all the things that money can actually buy. Here are a few, based on average costs in the U.S.

Life

• Artificial insemination: $500
• Heart Transplant: $4,400/yr health insurance premium
• Antibiotics: $90 (for 60 250mg generic Zithromax pills)

Love

• eHarmony subscription: $250/yr
• Speed Dating in NY: $35

Sex

• Life Size Anatomically Correct Doll: $6200 (including shipping)
• Sex with a human: prices vary

Death

• Remington Synthetic Shotgun: 79.99
• McDonald’s Big Mac: $3.29/ea in NYC
• Cave Diving Training: $350
• Iraq War: 341.4 million/day

After-Life

• Indulgences: prices vary (including cost of time travel to middle ages)
• Granite grave markers: $295
• Turning your remains into a diamond: $3,499-19,999

But don’t let all of this fool you folks, materialism is ugly and really detracts from what makes life worth living. So stop working so hard and go tell someone you love them (sending them flowers: $24.95).