The Oppenheimer Report 2/18/13

Lemme outta here!!!! The plan is for us to go back up north early this week. We have stayed in Toronto much longer than we had anticipated, but in fact we have stayed as long as was necessary. The idea was to make sure we did not have to keep coming back every three or four days to put out a new fire. The big challenge late last week was to convince my mother-in-law that she should give up driving. At 88 she was probably still capable of operating a vehicle, but it was clear to everyone, including her doctor, that it was a good time to quit. She had not driven for two months, it’s wintertime, and she has some serious mobility issues which will impair her reaction times. With its aggressive drivers and its omnipresent rush hour mentality, Toronto is a challenging city for any driver, and it is more so for the elderly. As well, Mom Taylor should not go anywhere unattended at this point, and none of the caregivers will drive with her if she is behind the wheel. I took her out grocery shopping the other day, and she was having trouble simply putting the heavier packages in her shopping cart. We tried to explain to her that she needed to quit while she was “on top of her game,” and for her husband’s sake, but it did not go over well. While we have a potential driver/caregiver ready to help, Mom’s reaction was not unlike that of Jessica Tandy’s wonderful character in Driving Miss Daisy. Like so many of the other don’t-shoot-the-messenger discussions we have had over the past year, this one was stressful. I still have my own father’s driver license somewhere in my files, and it did not expire until well after he did. Technically, he was still legal to drive long after he was 98 and lying in his death bed! Shortly before he gave up driving - in his case at the direction of his doctor - he drove me over to the local hardware store near our house in Buffalo. I thought he drove quite well (he was about 90 at the time), but when it was time to leave the store he handed me the keys because, and I quote, “I don’t like to make left turns onto Delaware Ave.” Honestly, I cannot understand why the state or the province does not monitor elder competence more comprehensively. Elders are periodically required to submit to an eye test and a written test, but why not a road test as well? Should elder drivers not be flagged on some database; doesn’t that seem like common sense? It might prevent a lot of dangerous driving if the issuing authorities better screened at risk drivers. After the age of 80, say once every year or two, one must prove one is safe to drive. If you pass the road test, off you go. I’d hate to be one of those examiners though.

Last week in the news, Christopher Jordan Dorner shot himself to death. He was the ex-LAPD cop responsible for all those four vengeance murders. I don’t know why he snapped when he was dismissed from the LAPD in 2009; he certainly wasn’t the first black man to have a legitimate beef against the LAPD. Still, he murdered four innocent people, and I am astounded by the number of supporters who are now painting him as some kind of vigilante hero. Then again, there are a lot of people in America who think Snookie is a bona fide celebrity. Someone even likened Dorner to the Minute Men in the American Revolution, fighting for truth and justice. There are social media sites springing up all over to honor and praise him. Perhaps this is a telling sign of the times that so many people are against “the man.” Cold blooded murder is just that to me, and regardless of whether or not this guy had legitimate claims against the LAPD, or if he is deemed a martyr by some, he is in my opinion a murderer and a criminal. His advanced military and police training made him a double threat and I’m glad he took himself out of the gene pool.

Did you see the pictures and/or video of that meteorite that landed in Chelyabinsk, Russia? Reportedly more than thousand people were injured, a lot of them by glass shattering from the impact of the sonic boom. The force of that boom was so strong it collapsed a brick wall. That bang would have scared the crap out of me, and this was a relatively small rock (maybe 3 meters in diameter). Scientists assure us it was merely a coincidence that it occurred within 14 hours of when the bigger, tracked asteroid (DA14) passed so close to earth. While 27,000km may seem like a long way off, it’s a near miss relative to our solar system, and had that puppy made contact, it would have rendered global warming a non issue. Apparently they can track the big rocks but not the little ones. It’s just a matter of time (2-2,000,000 years?) before the next one becomes a serious threat to Mother Earth. When will the next big asteroid become a meteoroid and perhaps a meteorite? Just the other day I learned the difference, and am now showing off my newfound knowledge (something most inquisitive 3^rd graders probably knew already). Will it be cosmic karma that takes us all out like the dinosaurs? I look at it this this way: Snookie and Honey Booboo might be the canaries in the coal mine.

No wonder the Pope his hanging up his robe.

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2013 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED