Now that the 45th President has begun his term in office, I think it’s time we took stock of what’s really important in this country.

While President Trump was signing executive orders on his first day in office, I was busy composing a list of executive orders I would sign if I were President. You probably don’t have to worry about that possibility, but one never knows.

Executive Order #1: There will be no more giving away ink pens to people in the crowd every time an executive order is signed. Every pen given away is just another pen that has to be replaced.

If we do away with that practice, we’ll probably save a couple of million dollars right off the bat. I say if you want to keep the pen used to sign an executive order, bring your own.

Executive Order #2: From this day forward, our nation will ban the practice of filling a room with black balloons at your 50th birthday party.

What’s that about anyway? Why is your fiftieth birthday seen as a time of mourning?

You’ve been around for half a century. That’s something to celebrate. But for some reason, we plaster black balloons all over the place and give gifts of Ben Gay and Ex Lax to the people who reach that milestone.

Enough already.

At my office, the staff used to keep a large plastic bag filled with black balloons that were reused at every fiftieth birthday party in the whole company. If there’s anything worse than the black balloons, it’s black balloons that already have cake icing stains on them from Fred’s party six months ago.

Executive Order #3: Stir sticks are forever banned from American soil. I want real spoons returned to all fast food restaurants pronto.

You go to McDonalds, order coffee with sugar and cream, and they give you a tiny black stick to mix it that doesn’t begin to work effectively. I usually find myself grabbing four of five of them and latching them together with twine to create a makeshift spoon.

There’s no need for this. America will return to regular plastic spoons during my administration.

Executive Order #4: All remote control batteries will henceforth come in one size only.

It’s frustrating enough when the remote battery dies in the middle of a rotten program you can’t wait to leave, but it’s equally frustrating when you attempt to load new batteries into the remote and discover you bought AAA’s when you need AA’s.

In the Bernhardt administration, this will end. One size will fit all remotes. You’re welcome.

And while I’m on the subject, batteries will also come in packaging that’s easier to open. I bought a pack of “C” size batteries the other day and nearly slit my hand open trying to get them out of the industrial strength plastic packaging.

If the people who package batteries and a few other products I can think of worked in homeland security, we’d never have a terrorist threat in this country. No one would be able to get in.

Executive Order #5: Infomercials will become extinct.

Larry King will hate me, but I plan to annihilate them on my first day in office. I think most of us despise them, especially when we run across them at three in the morning when we can’t sleep and we actually fall for their appeal and order the product.

It’s how I wound up with one of those little Shark vacuum cleaners several years ago that seemed to have trouble sucking up even the smallest of debris. All it did was suck about a hundred and fifty bucks out of my pocket. But anything looks good at three in the morning.

These are just a few of the executive orders I will sign on my first day behind the big desk, a day we’ll fortunately never see.

But like I said, you never know.

Kent Bernhardt lives in Salisbury.