Columbus was lost.

A while ago, then mayor of Philly and now governor of PA Rendell renamed Delaware Avenue. It is now Colombus Boulevard.

When it was renamed, Rendell made a big ballyhoo about it about what a great guy Colombus was and so on.

Of course, this clown Rendell is the same buffoon that came out during a gigantic snowstorm that paralyzed the state to compliment a group of people that dug out a couple of streets with a big to do about how 'this is the real Philly', yada yada yada. Rendell was seen on TV with a bunch of the people that dug out the several block area.

According to a shipmate of mine sitting next to me when we watched him on the news, Rendell was complimenting local crack dealers, who financed the shovel-out because they were losing a fortune in drug sales.

This is what I would expect of a political hack that would rename Delaware Avenue after a murderer and piss poor navigator like Christopher Colombus. Colombus killed a lot of Natives with smallpox infected blankets and enslaved a lot more of them. It's also claimed that he discovered America, even though there had been people here for thousands of years before he arrived.

Several years ago a group of Native Americans landed in Genoa airport on Thanksgiving day and claimed to have discovered Italy. Their claim has just about as much validity as the claim that Colombus discovered America.

Truth is, Colombus was lost.

He thought he was in India.

It's the reason out Native Americans are called 'Indians'.

Our Native Americans are not Indians by a long shot, but they are called that because that boob Colombus didn't have clue one as to where he was.

I sometimes wonder what would have happened if, say, he thought he was in Manila.

Our culture would be different as far as Hollywood is concerned. In Western movies where the wagon train is attacked by Native Americans, we would probably hear the wagonmaster shout something like this:

"Filipinos! Draw the wagon up into a circle!"

I've told this to a number of Indians, most of which have been mildly amused. I've also told this to a number of Filipinos that laugh outright. The Native Americans I've told this to roll their eyes and agree. One Native American asked me what would have happened if Colombus thought he had arrived in Helsinki. Would our children be playing cowboys and Swedes?

We both laughed like hell when I called him sunburned Swede.

There are quite a number of Indians that have moved to this country and most of them seem pretty industrious. The Indian-owned convenience store jokes are no longer the joke they were a few years ago, they are a simple part of the landscape. I've asked a number of them why so many of them why convenience stores are so popular with Indian immigrants and they have mostly explained that being a small business owner is the American Dream.

Fair enough. Nothing wrong with that.

What is interesting is that many of the convenience store owners are engineer types that in addition to working a full time job, they own and run a store, to boot. Tht's a lot of work because you really have to keep an eye on things when you own a small business.

Although the stereotyped Indian runs a 7-11, there are quite a number of Indian born professionals here that go unnoticed. I can honestly say that an Indian doctor has saved my life, and another one saved my eye.

More than once, I have wryly commented that ever since I got scalped at the Little Big Horn, the Indians I've met since have been working their asses off to make up for it.

The doc that saved my eye picked up on it pretty quickly when I deadpanned him with that line. It took him a second, my deadpan humor takes a second or two to pick up on. He smirked, we shook hands warmly and I thanked him again.

I said it during my recent colonoscopy and I hope the doc picked up on my wry humor. He's the one that saved my life.

I owe him big time.

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This continent got it's name from another Italian explorer named Amerigo Vespucci.

They feminized his name and we became 'America'.

I wonder how close we eally came to singing 'God Bless Vespucciland'?

It fits, and has a pretty nice ring to it, so it wouldn't have been too bad.
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Why don't crematoriums give discounts to burn victims?
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