#272 Less Ma-jest

A listener asked me something the other day. Naturally at the time he was talking. He asked if it was tough to find so many things to be angry about every day. Is that really how I come across? As an angry person? Cause I like to think I have positive things to say. I’m an idealist. So let’s look at positive stuff. Like I really like little doggie bag dispensers. I bemoan the fact that people find it necessary to walk their dogs and encourage them to plop in public—which can mean other people’s yards, community common areas, and public parks, but hey, a call of nature can’t always be put on hold. When my oldest was a toddler we got a puppy. So for a while he confused the words puppy and poopy. You might say he had a vowel movement. In any event, puppy or poopie bags are a good idea. Unfortunately the homeowners association in my neighborhood got tired of warning homeowners not to leave their pet excrement behind so felt it necessary to erect two of them at either end of the development. And even more unfortunately, that gave the sub-teenage vandals something to vandalize. Pushed over poles, bent boxes, and breeze blown bags strewn from here to the stormwater retention pond where late night adult vandals sneak in their yard waste. So, like I say, a positive thing—right up till the time you get humanity involved.
Another positive thing: I heard the other day that a child was found abandoned near a dumpster. The dumpster itself was inside a chain-link enclosure and locked. Hmm. Dumpster protected, child left out in the cold. Sometimes the human species as a whole is capable of mind-boggling priorities. Then the news story gave this information: A few years back the legislature passed a child abandonment amnesty law. If you take your child within 72 hours of birth to the hospital or police department, you can give it up and not be held accountable by any legal organization for abandonment or neglect. Kind of a “get out of parenthood free” card. The positive thing is, the poor children won’t be left near dumpsters or stormwater retention ponds. The negative thing is I never heard about this law. If I never heard of it, and I follow the legislature and the news a lot, then how can they expect the people who really need to take advantage of the service to know anything about it? It’s kind of a tough challenge to advertise. If you’re pregnant, and thinking of abandoning your child upon birth, you only have 72 hours. Where are they going to put the ad? Newspaper? Radio? Maybe signs on the dumpster. “Do not play on or around. Do not deposit babies. Place child in a hospital within 72 hours.” Yeah, and then one of those cartoon stick figure instruction signs—like they have on doggy bag dispensers...
America, ya gotta love it.