It's own rewards...

I'll admit it.

I often complain about living here in the cornucopia of California, the San Joaquin Valley.

There isn't often a lot to do, although I will admit that things have been getting better on that count for the past few years. I can think about lots of jokes about watching the raisins dry.

But sometimes living here is its own reward, especially if you like a good laugh.

Take last week.

Friday, I was driving down McKinley Avenue and passed a yard sale. Not unusual around here. But the sign in front sure was. In big black letters, on a piece of poster board attached to a shopping cart, was a sign that read: "Fuck it sale".

I imagine that whoever made that sign was feeling very frustrated at the time...the economy sucks right now, after all. But when I saw that sign I started laughing so hard that I nearly had to pull to the side of the road.

Fast forward to the next morning.

I was up entirely too early, on my way to a 9 a.m. middle school football game.

I don't know anything about football, but my best friend teaches middle school and I go out to their football games because hardly anyone else does and I figure that someone needs to support the kids in their activities.

Anyway, I had the radio on and I heard an advertisement for some bars. The names of the bars? The Bar. The Other Bar. The Next Bar. Again, I thought I was going to have to park the car until the giggling fit passed.

And then tonight, as I was coming home from visiting my mother, there was a car stopped at a light in front of me with this license plate frame: "Grow dope. Plant a man". Sexist? Yeah, sure. But would you have thought of it?

The imagination (the license plate frame and the yard sale sign) and the lack of it (the bar names) around here just amaze me sometimes.