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IN THIS ISSUE

• Rafiki begins the story of how she learned to ride a motorcycle
• Dick Monaghan regrets not having moved to Oregon years ago
• Tom Telfer forwards a virus warning for Explorer users
• Jack Peaker sends new answers to an old question
• Gerrit de Leeuw admires the girls from Saskatchewan
• Zvonko Springer forwards the story of a sign
• Kate Brookfield recommends a site for learning Chinese

Rafiki describes

THE MOTORCYCLE ADVENTURES OF A BEGINNER

In The Beginning ...

Somewhere it should be written, Thou shalt not tell thy baby sister she´s too old to learn to ride a motorcycle. It makes a baby sister determined to prove a brother wrong!

Unknowingly, my brother set me up for failure, at least in his mind: he put me on his 400cc Honda. It was away too heavy a motorcycle for a beginner, plus my toes barely touched the ground. First, I had to get my balance, and for this I needed assistance. (This will bring back memories for many of learning to ride a bicycle.)

Now picture this: my brother running along, holding onto the back of the motorcycle, and my husband running along holding onto the side of the motorcycle! This only continued for so long until both brother and husband ran out of breath and let me go free-willy. There were lots of laughs along with good directional advice.

To say the least, I was slightly wobbly and could never have managed to drive a straight line. It was truly a Kodak moment, but thankfully nobody captured the moment on camera!

So my brother and husband sat themselves on a log to observe my wobbly ways in first gear, riding on gravel. My brother told my husband that I would lay the motorcycle down, and that would be the end of it. Meanwhile, I kept on riding and riding.

My brother told me to go out in the clover field and ride. My gut feeling said this wasn´t a good idea, but I did as I was told. Believe me, I was praying for some help and hoping that there were no groundhog holes. Surprise, surprise for my brother, I kept the motorcycle upright! I passed the test!

My brother told me that I had "no fear", so he provided me with a demonstration of how easy it is to wipe out a motorcycle. This can easily happen when you are not paying attention to speed and conditions. Under my brother´s guidance, my husband demonstrated with the motorcycle on wet grass and applied excessive throttle. The back tire spun around and the motorcycle went down on the ground. Lesson learned: keep your wits about you!

My brother stressed the importance of riding with the proper riding gear: a full-faced helmet, a leather motorcycle jacket, leather gloves, and leather boots. Many times on the road you see people riding with sandals, shorts, and tee-shirt. My brother knew of people riding in shorts who had burned their legs on the exhaust pipe when they went to get off their motorcycles. When bugs hit you, it feels as if a stone has hit you and can leave a bloody, nasty wound. My brother always wears a full-faced helmet because of stones that can fly up from passing vehicles. He wears no jewellery because if you should have an accident it will ruin the jewellery and injure your fingers.

In addition, a good motorcycle rider never leaves home without toilet paper! My dearest brother told me to make sure to carry toilet paper, just in case a situation should arise. And without further explanation, I will only say that my brother gives very useful advice!

Next I graduated to riding my husband´s 250cc Honda Rebel. (Note: my husband graduated to a 500cc Kawasaki.) The Honda Rebel was more my size. It had a lower centre of gravity and I could firmly plant my feet on the ground. I learned to ride on gravel and never went faster than first or second gear. That way I gained expertise in balancing the motorcycle. Once you ride on paved roads, you might have to pull over onto the gravel to avoid a car, or animal, etc., and it is essential to have gravel experience. Gravel on paved roads is like riding on marbles and must be done cautiously.

Next, I wrote the test for my Motorcycle M1 licence, and now I was legal to ride the roads. The fun began with learning how and when to shift gears with ease. Practice, practice, and listening to the sound of the motor revving. Oops, sometimes I would forget what gear I was in. Oops, sometimes I would forget to shut off the signal light. This forgetfulness at my younger age is called "Sometimers", not "Alzheimer´s".

To be concluded.

Dick Monaghan believes in giving

POWER TO THE PEOPLE

I live in the State of Washington, just next door to the State of Oregon, whose incomparable beaches, mountains, and high desert have long provided enjoyable vacations. However, I have never considered living there - until now.

What, you ask, has brought about this epiphany, this sudden revelation, this opening of the eyes?

A story in a recent edition of The Oregonian newspaper laid out the costs of an overhaul of the State Capitol at Salem, including the costs of refurbishing the offices of Oregon´s state senators. I got about this far in the story, merely grumbling about the resplendent digs for the lawmakers, when the next sentence caused me to sit upright and instantly regret my failure to have moved there years ago.

Senate President Peter Courtney (D-Salem) is quoted as follows: "In the end, we said we owed it to Oregonians to do it this way. We weren´t trying to be arrogant about that. We really feel that this place should be taken care of, and it has been allowed to fall apart.

"This isn´t my furniture, this is your furniture. It belongs to you, it belongs to all Oregonians."

Why did I delay moving there? To move now would make me look like an opportunist. If I have moved there a decent interval before this renovation, I could have driven to Salem, walked into a senator´s office, and plumped myself down on his $1,667 executive chair behind his $4,400 walnut desk and admired his $6,700 matching hutch, credenza and wardrobe. If this brought on momentary fatigue, I could lie down on his $2,764 leather sofa and watch his $599 (surprise!) Sony Bravia 26-inch LCD television. If you´re wondering about leather for the sofa, Scott Burgess, legislative administrator, said they picked leather over fabric for the couches because the leather would hold up longer and require less maintenance. The savings, he estimates, [presumably with a straight face] would be $100,000 for all 90 [?] couches over 30 years.

"I lived for 11 years in the building with that godawful 1970s cloth furniture," says Senate Minority Leader Ted Ferriorli (R-John Day), who served on the legislative oversight committee. "If you sat down (on the couches), you couldn´t get out of them." (Which may explain some legislation, or lack of it.)

But all is not mere glitter: for the first time in years, people will actually be able to drink the water in the fountains, thanks to the replacement of corroded pipes, the Oregonian notes.

Next, I would summon the solon´s secretary and inform her that, since she is paid by the taxpayers, a portion of her duties belong to me. I would question her closely as to what duties she performs for the senator.

Yes, I am aware that I would have to share these perquisites with Oregon´s approximately 3.7 millionother taxpayers, but still, ownership is ownership - the rest is mere detail.

Tom Telfer forwards this from David Gray:

VIRUS WARNING

We´ve seen a number of clients who have been infected with a sales- bot (not a virus but a pernicious and hard to remove sales add-on) that comes from an internet Explorer popup called "AntiVirus 2009". The virus installs when a user surfs to a website and the pop-up claims that "A virus has been found," and exhorts them to "click here" to scan for or remove the virus. If the user clicks, they install a spyware/adware program that will bog down their computer, give them incessant pop-ups to buy the software, and generally be a royal pain to remove.

We´ve found cleanup can range from an hour to several hours, depending on the operating system and patch level. Because this isn´t a virus per-se, just an adware program that the user has to actually click through several steps to install, antivirus doesn´t catch it.

What Should You Do?

1. Ignore the AntiVirus 2009 pop-up. This sales tactic is not new, but this one is more aggressive than some. Always ignore advertising and pop-up windows that claim that your computer needs cleaning. I think it´s safe to say that they are always bad news.

2. If you´ve been infected, get professional help. Unfortunately this one´s not a do-it-yourself removal.

Jack Peaker forwards these new answers to the age-old question:

WHY DID THE CHICKEN CROSS THE ROAD?

Barack Obama: The chicken crossed the road because it was time for a CHANGE! The chicken wanted CHANGE!

John McCain: My friends, that chicken crossed the road because he recognized the need to engage in cooperation and dialogue with all the chickens on the other side of the road.

Hillary Clinton: When I was First Lady, I personally helped that little chicken to cross the road. This experience makes me uniquely qualified to ensure - right from Day One! - that every chicken in this country gets the chance it deserves to cross the road. But then, this really isn´t about me....

Dr. Phil: The problem we have here is that this chicken won´t realize that he must first deal with the problem on THIS side of the road before it goes after the problem on the OTHER SIDE of the road. What we need to do is help him realize how stupid he´s acting by not taking on his CURRENT problems before adding NEW problems.

Oprah: Well, I understand that the chicken is having problems, which is why he wants to cross this road so bad. So instead of having the chicken learn from his mistakes and take falls, which is a part of life, I´m going to give this chicken a car so that he can just drive across the road and not live his life like the rest of the chickens.

George W. Bush: We don´t really care why the chicken crossed the road. We just want to know if the chicken is on our side of the road, or not. The chicken is either against us, or for us. There is no middle ground here.

Colin Powell: Now to the left of the screen, you can clearly see the satellite image of the chicken crossing the road....

Anderson Cooper (CNN): We have reason to believe there is a chicken, but we have not yet been allowed to have access to the other side of the road.

John Kerry: Although I voted to let the chicken cross the road, I am now against it! It was the wrong road to cross, and I was misled about the chicken´s intentions. I am not for it now, and will remain against it.

Nancy Grace: That chicken crossed the road because he´s GUILTY! You can see it in his eyes and the way he walks.

Pat Buchanan: To steal the job of a decent, hardworking American.

Jerry Falwell: Because the chicken was gay! Can´t you people see the plain truth? That´s why they call it the ´other side.´ Yes, my friends, that chicken is gay. And if you eat that chicken, you will become gay too. I say we boycott all chickens until we sort out this abomination that the liberal media whitewashes with seemingly harmless phrases like the ´other side´. That chicken should not be crossing the road. It´s as plain and as simple as that.

Bill Gates: I have just released eChicken2008, which will not only cross roads, but will lay eggs, file your important documents, and balance your cheque book. Internet Explorer is an integral part of eChicken. This new platform is much more stable and will never cra ... #@&&^(C% ... reboot.

Dick Cheyney: Where´s my gun?

Gerrit de Leeuw declares

YOU HAVE TO LOVE THOSE SASKATCHEWAN GIRLS

A farm girl from Saskatchewan walks into a bar in Calgary and orders three mugs of beer. She sits in the back of the room, drinking a sip out of each one in turn. When she finishes them, she comes back to the bar and orders three more.

The bartender approaches and tells the farm girl, "You know, a mug goes flat after I draw it. It would taste better if you bought one at a time."

The farm girl replies, "Well, you see, I have two sisters. One is in Australia, the other is in Cranbrook. When we all left our home in Saskatchewan, we promised that we´d drink this way to remember the days when we drank together. So I´m drinking one beer for each of my sisters and one for myself."

The bartender admits that this is a nice custom, and leaves it there. The girl becomes a regular in the bar, and always drinks the same way: she orders three mugs and drinks them in turn.

One day she comes in and only orders two mugs. All the regulars take notice and fall silent. When she comes back to the bar for the second round, the bartender says, "I don´t want to intrude on your grief, but I wanted to offer my condolences on your loss."

The farm girl looks quite puzzled for a moment, then a light dawns in her eyes and she laughs. "Oh, no, everybody´s just fine," she explains. "It´s just that my husband and I joined the Baptist Church and I had to quit drinking. Hasn´t affected my sisters though."

Zvonko Springer sends

THE STORY OF A SIGN

A blind boy sat on the steps of a building with a hat by his feet. He held up a sign which said: "I am blind, please help." There were only a few coins in the hat.

A man was walking by. He took a few coins from his pocket and dropped them into the hat. He then took the sign, turned it around, and wrote some words. He put the sign back so that everyone who walked by would see the new words.

Soon the hat began to fill up. A lot more people were giving money to the blind boy.That afternoon the man who had changed the sign came to see how things were. The boy recognized his footsteps and asked, "Were you the one who changed my sign this morning? What did you write?"

The man said, "I only wrote the truth. I said what you said but in a different way." What he had written was: "Today is a beautiful day and I cannot see it."

Of course both signs told people the boy was blind. But the first sign simply said the boy was blind; the second sign told people they were so lucky that they were not blind. Should we be surprised that the second sign was more effective?

ED. NOTE: The site Geoff Goodship sent last week told the same story, though with a different main character: http://arunaurl.com/2hjb

Don Henderson relates a

SAD STORY

Bill, Jim, and Scott were at a convention together and were sharing a large suite on the top of a 75-story skyscraper. After a long day of meetings, they were shocked to hear that the elevators in their hotel were broken and they would have to climb 75 flights of stairs to get to their room.

Bill said to Jim and Scott, "Let´s break the monotony of this unpleasant task by concentrating on something interesting. I´ll tell jokes for 25 flights, Jim can sing songs for the next 25 flights, and Scott can tell sad stories for the rest of the way."

At the 26th floor, Bill stopped telling jokes and Jim began to sing. At the 51st floor Jim stopped singing and Scott began to tell sad stories.

"I will tell my saddest story first," he said.

"I left the room key in the car!"

RECOMMENDED WEBSITES

Kate Brookfield writes: I found a good site that has clear instructions and little video lessons for learning Chinese. You may not want to learn Chinese, but the explanation of the origin of the characters is interesting: http://sonicnovel.com/kanji.html

For animal lovers:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adYbFQFXG0U

To read this newsletter online, go to http://members.shaw.ca/vjsansum/or

http://nw-seniors.org/stories.html

"Part of the secret of success in life is to eat what you like and let the food fight it out inside." - Mark Twain