A Few Ideas for Warren and Bill

By David Wood

With an unprecedented display of philanthropy, billionaires Bill Gates and Warren Buffett have agreed to combine their fortunes into the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Their vast personal holdings – over $70 billion combined - will help solve the plethora of thorny problems that dwell in this strange world of ours. Since I’m not a direct descendant of either, I heartily applaud their largess. Had I been born Bill Gates Jr. (and trust me I’ve been scanning my family tree for years in hope there was a “Gates” or “Buffett” in their somewhere), I might have been a touch miffed at my overly generous pop. However, none of the Gates or the Buffett heirs is ever going to have to use the “Short Form” when filing their taxes.

 Of course, the bulk of Mr. Gates and Mr. Buffett’s generosity will go to research for vaccines and medical cures for what ails us humans. Finding cures for everything from those animated-green-germs-hiding-under-our-toenails-in-disgusting-television-commercials to malaria, their money will do a ton of good. World education also stands to get a hefty bite of the loot so future generations won’t be spelling “cat” with a “k” nor think a “Thesaurus” was a large creature that roamed the earth before cavemen. However, I hoping a puny million or so could be set aside to tackle a few issues I’d like addressed, such as:

 1. How does Donald Trump’s hair do that?

The Donald has a hair-do that even design engineers from MIT must shake their heads in wonderment at. With a follicle swoosh starting just above ear-level, Mr. Trump’s hair seems to sweep in every direction at once with a space-time-continuum that defies every law of gravity as well as Einstein’s “Theory of Hair Relativity.” The effect created is that Mr. Trump looks as if he wears a Tour de France bicycle helmet with his blue business suit.

 A Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation grant could be appropriated to solve this mystery of physics with a possible benefactor being NASA’s dodgy heat-shields that seem to have the same stickiness quotient as a Post-it. The space shuttle would have no trouble re-entering earth’s atmosphere if it was covered in whatever aerodynamic secret pattern The Donald performs each morning in front his bathroom mirror.

 2. Why can’t you travel anywhere where a large influx of British people live without hearing the word brilliant used for the most menial of completed tasks?

This overuse of the word brilliant may be why the British Empire is not what it used to be. I have been told in the Gatwick Airport in London I was “brilliant” by a waitperson after I had ordered a toasted-ham-and-cheese-sandwich while waiting for my flight to Edinburgh. I’ve been called “brilliant” for handing a lady a twenty-pound note for a golf hat while in the Royal County Down pro shop in Northern Ireland. Countless bartenders have called me “brilliant” for ordering a Guinness as I have traveled the remnants of that once great realm.

 While I have one or two redeeming qualities (which currently escape me), being brilliant isn’t one of them, and I have the test scores to back it up. Some of my teachers –well, all of my teachers – would testify that I’m quite the opposite of brilliant. It’s not like the British haven‘t had actual brilliance in their midst. Winston Churchill was brilliant. William Shakespeare was brilliant. Oscar Wilde was brilliant. Reaching into one’s pocket and pulling out a five-pound note for a pint of Guinness puts me even with Koko-the-Talking-Gorilla, but certainly not brilliant. I just think they need to raise the bar a touch. That’s all I’m saying. Surely, paltry few-hundred-thousand-dollars from Bill and Melinda would put this matter to rest for once and for all. 

 3. Who is that fifth dentist in the “four out of five dentists” that recommend sugarless gum for their patients who chew gum? 

How many cavities and rotten teeth has this one crazed dentist been responsible for? Since we Americans tend to do anything a person in a position of power tells us to do, this maniac has to be stopped! Not only is he telling his gullible patients to chew tooth-decaying sugary gum, he’s probably telling them to eat Ho-Ho’s and Ding-Dong’s for breakfast. Please Bill and Melinda and Warren, throw at bit of foundation cash at this problem and see if we can’t make it “five out of five dentists” in our lifetime!