Random Shots: When We Were Young

R.F. Kampfer

GROWING UP in the Bronx, we learned that the way to get some heat in the apartment was to bang on the radiator. Some of us kept it up after we moved to our own homes—with no superintendent in the basement.

Most of us came to socialism out of solidarity for the oppressed. As the years roll by, our thoughts turn more to seeing the oppressors ground into the dust Hatred, like coffee, isn’t good for us. But it keeps us going.

Having teenagers in the house makes you fat Any good leftovers will disappear before the next meal, so you might as well finish them now. Men develop a taste for things like head cheese and smoked tongue because these treats are usually safe from their families.

Children have always been obnoxious. That’s why prehistoric parents kicked them out of the cave as soon as they could survive, to cover the earth and mingle their genes. It’s just nature’s way of improving the breed.

In the midst of all the nostalgia about Josephine Baker, we can’t forget that she was on the wrong side of the barricades; in May ’68.

Shop Notes

IT’S A STATUS symbol for skilled trades workers to hang forty pounds of tools from their belts, even if all they ever use is a screwdriver and a pair of channel-locks.

If the Japanese take over Chrysler, we can at least expect some improvement in the plant cafeterias, where a “surf and turf sandwich” turns out to be a hamburger and a flshcake.

Q. What do you call a Teamster in a three-piece suit? A. The defendant.

Thoughts to Live By

DEAR MIKHAIL: If things go badly in Moscow, Solidarity will always have a place for Lenin in Detroit.

Grafitus of the month Male chauvinists are ego-testicle.

“How many men in the audience have ever had a problem with impotence?… What’s the matter, can’t get your hands up either?” —Roseanne Barr

The only alternative to affirmative action: Jobs for all.

A dear case of uneven and combined development One can now use a FAX machine to order a “prayer handkerchief,” said to be useful forwarding off demons.

Signs of the Times

SEVERAL HUNDRED Soviet Jews, having taken refuge in Germany, are resisting efforts to forcibly deport them to Israel.

Opponents of women being allowed to serve in combat are still harping about their alleged inability to use the bayonet Actually, even during the Civil War, a bayonet casualty was rare enough to merit special mention in the Morning Report Anyway, none of the brass have objected to making civilian women serve as live targets for the Air Force.

September-October 1991, ATC 34