See how entertaining stupidity can be?

It's a foregone conclusion that dumb people are a source of entertainment in our society. How else can one explain the proliferation of "reality" TV and, indeed, the entire Jerry Springer-esque genre of talk shows?

The "buried treasure" morons in Massachussetts, however, have provided news outlets (see here) and morning radio hosts with a rich new source of material. I expect Leno will jump on this one as well. In case you hadn't heard, a couple of 20-something roofers in Massachussetts landed themselves all over the national news for allegedly digging up a buried treasure in their backyard. The booty included banknotes from the 19th and early 20th centuries, as well as old coins, etc. Well, as it turns out, they didn't dig up the money, they just stole it from a nearby neighbor for whom they had been doing some roofing work. So the local police were able to take the news clippings of these men's great fortune, pair them up with the report of stolen banknotes and the result was a quick arrest of these two buffoons.

So here it is, very late in the month of April, and we're getting snow today in the Denver area, and will be lucky to break the freezing mark. It's certainly not unheard of to get snow here this late in the season (indeed, even later -- I've seen it snow here in town in early June), but it's not really common either. What's making this weather exceptionally odd is how long it's lasted. The gloomy rain-and-snow mix blew into the area a couple of days ago, is still lingering, and we're getting more snow tonight, rain tomorrow, and snow again on the next day. It's like Seattle, only with fewer coffeehouses and no ocean.

Anyway, I was driving to work this morning in the slushy mess, and got behind this behemoth Ford Excursion with no less than three of those asinine yellow "Support Our Troops" ribbon magnets plastered on its formidable rear end. There are entire websites devoted to how much some people hate these things, so I won't bitch about them too much here, but suffice it to say, I hate them, too. I mean, really, these have got to be the same people who went out and bought a flag that was bigger than their neighbor's in mid-September of 2001, just so they could effectively say to everyone, "I'm more patriotic than you." How does slapping a $2.00 magnet that's likely made in China and sold at Wal-Mart support our troops? Especially when they're affixed to these ridiculously huge SUVs that get about 11 mpg and, while not the cause of this Iraq mess, certainly play a part by ensuring that our country remains ever-dependent on Middle East oil. Enough with the ribbon magnets!!

I should probably get to work....