Stale Bread and Other Mysteries

There are some things I will probably never understand no matter how much information I have on the matter. Like which button is supposed to make what special feature work on my overly sophisticated alarm clock. Or why my dog hates to get a bath but loves to play in the sprinkler.

And some things are interesting to think about, but I am no closer to discovering the truth. Like why you never see a pair of shoes on the side of the road, only one. Or why I can’t fly but an airplane that weighs hundreds of times more than I do can.

But there are some things that simply do not make sense any way you look at them. Here’s a few examples of what I mean:

Why does something soft, like bread, get hard and crumbly when it goes stale, but something hard and crumbly, like crackers, gets soft and mushy?

Why do people often mean what they say, but seldom say what they mean?

Why do wasps seem to spend half their lives trying to get into something and the other half trying to get back out again?

Why do we spend good money to buy underwear that doesn’t ride up, then turn around and spend good money for thongs designed to do just that?

Why do we sometimes cry when we’re happy and laugh when we’re sad?

If someone tickles our funny bone, we laugh but if we strike our funny bone, we get the most unusual kind of pain.

If we have a cold, we often have a fever … which makes us hot.

We light the candles, sing happy birthday then let the honoree spray spittle all over the cake we’re about to eat.

A sub-par performance is only acceptable in the game of golf, which is where the concept of par originated in the first place.

Why do we call it “politics” from the root word “poly” meaning many and the word “tick” meaning blood-sucking insect?

Oh, OK, never mind. I think I just answered that last one.