Monday, January 31, 2011

Senior Moment

This is supposedly a true account recorded in the Police Log of Sarasota, Florida

An elderly Florida lady did her shopping and, upon returning to her car, found four males in the act of leaving with her vehicle.

She dropped her shopping bags and drew her handgun, proceeding to scream at the top of her lungs, "I have a gun, and I know how to use it! Get out of the car!"

The four men didn't wait for a second threat. They got out and ran like mad.

The lady, somewhat shaken, then proceeded to load her shopping bags into the back of the car and got into the driver's seat. She was so shaken that she could not get her key into the ignition.

She tried and tried, and then she realised why. It was for the same reason she had wondered why there was a football, a frisbee and two 12 -packs of beer in the front seat.

A few minutes later, she found her own car parked four or five spaces farther down.

She loaded her bags into the car and drove to the police station to report her mistake.

The sergeant to whom she told the story couldn't stop laughing.

He pointed to the other end of the counter, where four pale men were reporting a car jacking by a mad, elderly woman described as white, less than five feet tall, glasses, curly white hair, and carrying a large handgun.

No charges were filed.

Moral of the story? If you're going to have a senior moment... make it memorable!...

Friday, January 7, 2011

70-Year-Old Woman Makes Living Delivering Water Bottles


A 70-year-old woman who lives in Beijing's Shijingshan District is perhaps the oldest water cooler bottle deliverer in the capital.

Gao Meiyun has worked full-time since 2006 delivering hundreds of 20-kilogram bottles of purified water to various apartments and offices in western Beijing each day, according to an article by China Foto Press.


Gao, who is a widow, lives with her physically disabled son and mentally disabled grandson. The money she earns from her water delivery job is their only income and must also cover her son's medical expenses.

Gao Meiyun's family lives in a 20-square-meter room with no air-conditioning, which is filled with water cooler bottles that she will deliver to homes and offices in Beijing's Shijingshan District.


Gao has become quite famous in the community since elderly people usually do not perform such a physically demanding job. But as long as customers continued to call, Gao said she would deliver water at any time regardless of weather conditions. She also said her family is her motivation to keep up with the job.

Gao believed her son would eventually take over her water delivery business, but he was unable to do so because of health problems. But now that Gao has health problems of her own, some volunteers assist her every Wednesday.


On the other hand, Neighbors have accused an elderly woman of exaggerating her difficulties to local media to exploit people's kindness for profit. Gao's neighbors have questioned her motives, as the family is not in as dire straits as some previous media reports claimed. According to them, Gao's family earns around 3,000 yuan ($450.50) per month, including pension and allowances, and public healthcare and the sub-district cover most of their medical bills.


Gao said the allowances were enough to cover daily expenses but not medical bills. She said she would donate extra money she received to the federation for the disabled. "I'm not trying to con people out of money," Gao told the Beijing News. "The neighbors may be slandering me because they are jealous of all the help we are getting."




Nevertheless, being old but still working hard, some people may have to live like that, whether they like it or not...