Quit making me cross

What’s with the people who insist on mashing those traffic control buttons at street crossings no matter how much traffic is on the road? I’ve seen people pressing those things with an air of grave impatience at 3 in the morning, like it was noon in Time Square. Jamming those buttons when traffic is light is like using the vomit bag in an airplane just because it’s there. I have spoken.

Futhermore

How come nobody uses the word “cross” anymore to indicate mild anger? It’s fallen into a state of antiquation just like the terms fink, dungarees, swell, upchuck, reefer, gosh, the fuzz, billfold, ice box, ice tray, gams, britches, twit, stoop, parlor, picture show, radar range, refuse, galoshes, LP, rubbish, foxy, jeepers, spectacles, housecoat, soda crackers, frankfurters, sass, bottom, cur, son-of-a-gun, fiddlesticks, gadzooks, zounds, cunning, dear, comely, cruiser, smooch, stinker and hanky panky. It’s a gosh darn shame and it’s got me in a tizzy.

Lists

Are a great way to fill column inches when you ain’t got nothing.

The North Pond hermit

Is getting sprung soon. That eloquent and fascinating soul has no idea how he’s going to survive among a population he sees as strange and wilder than anything he encountered in the woods of Rome. I’d suggest he re-acclimate in the in-between world of the woods between Riverside Cemetery in Lewiston, but the last I looked, they were building a three-lane highway and a Chipotle down there.

Fascinating fact

There are no less than 104 ways to pronounce Chipotle, every single one of them wrong.

A lovely autumn

August, that is. It’s been cool and cloudy, with nippy nights and chilly mornings. I mean, what in the sweet . . . August is supposed to be torrid, with annoying photos in the newspaper of people seeking relief with garden hoses and fire hydrants. Instead, you’ll find stories about back-to-school glee, apple picking and the Farmers’ Almanac predicting Jupiter’s ice moon Europa-like temperatures, all on the same day in mid-August! Whomever built the great state of Maine really should have put it closer to the equator.

Flash in the pan

A delighted reader wrote last week to tell me he was flashed by a woman on Ash Street in Lewiston one recent morning. Completely unsolicited, he says, and I believe him. Frankly, I think this is a positive sign. In downtown Lewiston, some of the ladies will give you the shirts off their backs in five second increments — 10 seconds if you’re having a really good day.

Good vibrations

What the heck are they doing on the Veterans Bridge? They’ve got the road all torn up and grooved so when you ride along it on a motorcycle, it provides weird vibrations in your lower half. I rode the Veterans Bridge 100 times in two days just to verify this observation.