OMG WTF AIG

A.I.G. Chief Asks Bonus Recipients to Give Back Half

Ever gotten a "bonus" at your job? Maybe it was enough to to cover a down payment on a new car or pay off a credit card. Did it feel good to be rewarded for your efforts? Maybe your department or even whole company had an "off year" but you performed well and were encouraged to work harder because of it.

When I heard about the A.I.G. bonuses, I wanted to believe that most of the $165M in bonuses were to folks like you or me. Hard-working middle-class people who got a little extra in these hard economic times. Yeah...not so much.

Of the 418 employees who received bonuses, 298 got more than $100,000, according to the New York attorney general, Andrew M. Cuomo. The highest bonus was $6.4 million, and 6 other employees received more than $4 million. Fifteen other people received bonuses of more than $2 million and 51 received $1 million to $2 million.

It baffles me. It knocks the wind out of me. It was shocking that the company gave out bonuses. Harder still to believe that these "bonuses" were clearly not tied to actual performance, but instead contractual. And still, none of that bothered me, angered me, as much as the actual per-person pay outs.

How is this shit not criminal?

I don't have a problem with people being rich. But good grief.

I could go on, at length, with an even more curse-laden diatribe but you get the idea...

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Wall Street? What About Pro Sports Pay?

Let's see...

Redskins land Haynesworth for 7 years, $100 Million

The Dodgers and Manny are fighting over $25 Million (for 1 year)

Jayson Werth's winter contract is worth $10 Million for 2 years.

$20 Million here, $10 Million there. Where's the outrage when sports stars ask for such money? Sure, they aren't responsible for the economy. But the players & the people who employ them are just as guilty of milking us. We can't watch most of their games without paid television services. The tickets, parking & food is too expensive for a family of one. We're forced to fund their new stadiums with local tax dollars under the threat that they'll move somewhere else.

When the owner of Lowes Motor Speedway wanted to build a drag strip, the town of Concord, NC didn't want it. So, he just threatened to move. Next thing you know, not only did he get to build his drag strip, the town helped.

We're so enthralled with and dependent on our sports that they have a strangle-hold on us. Yet, as we sink players like Manny Ramirez can demand millions. A-Rod, Bonds, Big-Mac. They cheated, but A-Rod is still playing. And you can bet that Bonds & Big-Mac would be too if they were still young enough.

Marbury acts like a complete jackass in New York and what does he get? He gets to join the world champion Celtics for a $20 Million contract buyout & a minimum veteran's salary of $1.3 Million.

The players aren't the only ones I blame here. They are just one part of the great sports machine that's milking us for all we're worth. Will the economy get bad enough that fans stop paying for their fancy channels & cramped seats? What then? Will the NFL be asking for a bail-out? Will NASCAR be begging for fuel-subsidies?

I've grown weary of it. Maybe I should start following my local little-league teams.

Trust Issues

Sorry for the lack of posts. It's been a long strange trip. Last week it became readily apparent that I needed to drive back up to New England to help my sister with a few things & spend more time with my family in general. It's been a good trip, more or less, that enabled me to spend some time with my college friends watching the Eagles game (sigh) & playing Wii. But I digress...

I got a TomTom (GPS) for Christmas. It's been a great traveling companion. Not so much because I need GPS -- Lord no, I have an uncanny, almost supernatural sense of direction -- but because it's been great helping me track the details like ETA, miles, how far to the exit. Getting to a major divide and having this nice British lady say, "In 2 miles, stay right" is just really helpful when you're traveling in heavy traffic on the Jersey Turnpike. So, in many and various ways the TomTom has been complete and utter Awesome Sauce...

Until, that is, she failed me...

For those who have not experienced GPS devices, the thing I learned very quickly is that they often plan routes differently than you would. To get the full value from the device, you must decide to follow (or not follow) it's directions. Once you start listening, you may find yourself on a stretch of road you've never been on. You may find yourself at the mercy of some strange British woman. I call her JaneJane...

As I approached the George Washington Bridge into NY, Jane showed me an alternative to the bridge. Route 9 to Palisades Ave. I went with her. It really worked. Jane had saved me minutes & it was a nice little shortcut. It was a reminder to me to trust her. Jane would never steer me wrong...

As I crossed the bridge, I did everything she said even when my instincts began to question her.

"Stay Left"

"But Jane, that's the lane that exits to the Hudson Parkway. 95 is the right lane." I've done this hundreds of times.

"Stay Left"

"Jane, if I don't get over now, I'm going to be on the streets of Manhattan."

"Stay Left"

"Jane you ignorant slut!"

Jane fell silent. Jane's screen began to do that recalculating thing. I, as I suspected, was getting off onto the Henry Hudson Parkway.

"At the end of the ramp, turn left."

"Jane, you're back! What do I do?"

"Turn around as soon as possible!"

"You have failed me for the last time!" In my best Darth Vader voice.

Lost - Ahem - is not something I experience outside of video games. If I've seen something once, I know it. It's like the good Lord took all my abilities to remember names, phone numbers, dates in history away & used it all on this weird visual memory. It's great, except that my crappy memory for all those other things sucks so much. I can't even remember street names. It's just this odd feeling of knowing a place and where it leads me. In 36 years, the only thing that has ever kept me from remembering how to get back to something has been modern construction. My family tells stories about people asking me for directions at the age of 6.

So, here I was on the Hudson Parkway and I remembered the time, 11 years ago, that Slick & I got a ride out of Manhattan with some of MrsMetsFan's friends after seeing Rent with the college gang. We had been on that road & I knew were it would get me.

"Jane, try to keep up."

The Hudson Parkway goes to the Sawmill to the Cross County. Jane starts to come around to my plan. Once I hit the Cross County, I was on a road I had been many times & knew that it would become the Hutchinson & eventually the Merritt. By the time she started 'helping' me, I was already in my element.

So, listen to your GPS, trust your GPS, but trust yourself too.

A wise man once told me that life is made better through the art of story-telling. A bad situation can make for good stories.

American Automakers...Lying Mu#^%$@ers

The 2009 Detroit Auto Show is upon us and all I have to say is BULL SHIT!

I've had a beef with the "Big Three" for about a decade. Their trucks, SUV's, CUV's all kept getting bigger and more elaborate while small & mid-sized cars kept getting less & less enticing. I got on my soapbox about GM caring more about their short-term shareholder profit than they cared about quality vehicles that consumers really wanted to buy. If they had a long-term vision for fuel economy, practicality & fun cars to drive, we might not be in this mess.

The argument against these points is two fold. One, American consumers demanded bigger. Two, nobody could have foreseen the meltdown. I find both points inexcusable. American consumers took what they gave us. Had the Big Three actively pursued quality, budget-friendly vehicles for American consumers, we would have bought them. Sure, we'd also be driving our F-150's, but there would be a better mix of options from Detroit on the road.

The writing has been on the wall that the Big Three business models were behind the times for years. But has there been any real efforts to produce revolutionary products? Has anyone been to a car show & been wowed by something that's fresh & practical? No. Well, from Toyota & Honda, sure. But what has Chevy given us? The "holy grail" named Volt? They've been advertising that shit for years and it's projected price tag will be $30-40k. How's that practical?

So, they whined for a bail-out. Under the circumstances, I even support giving them the money. (Mostly because it's a pitance compared to that miserable TRAP effort.) $15-Billion could save the industry & jobs. If it doesn't, it was "only" $15-Billion.

But, I digress...

The Auto Show is now upon us. What do we see? Hybrids & practicality. Where were they hiding these cars? Some are existing European products. Some they pulled out of their asses. Thus lending credence to my belief that they could have easily given us better a long time ago.

I saw a picture of a UAW worker protesting outside of the Auto Show. He had a sign that warned us to buy American or the next job lost could be ours. Yes, the scare tactic. That works well on me.

Somewhere along the lines we got fat & happy. Complacency set in. Innovation stopped happening in Detroit.

When it's time to get our next car replacement, I hope to have honest, value-added options. I'm looking for small, but comfortable. I'll be searching for a vehicle that finds that right balance between fuel economy & performance. A hybrid would be nice. Right now, there are zero American cars in production that interest me. I really hope that changes.

Stop trying to "advertising campaign" your way out of this. Build & innovate. Better yet...

Evolve or die.

Fibro-Frustration

I'm going to vent today so I can just get this out of my system and try to move on to salvage this week.

In many way, I've gotten used to my weird cycle of fibro symptoms. For the most part I can manage a week around them. I can have a few productive days (or hours in a day) and then need a few days or hours to recover. It leads to an almost normal life. It starts to make me think about a future where I'll do more thing like work part-time or volunteer. It gives me hope.

Then weeks like this one happen. Several of my most egregious pain & muscle fatigue symptoms are in full bloom. And yet, I'm feeling active and aware. In other words, I'm not having a chronic fatigue week where I'm hazy and tired, I just HURT! Being hazy and tired would almost be preferable. At least when I'm hazy and tired I have but one choice, go lay down.

Instead, after surviving a fall chock full of fighting off sinus migraines, I'm dealing with a mid-December pain onslaught. My back hurts. My neck hurts. My legs hurt from my hips to my toes. My arms hurt from my shoulders to my finger. Heck, my fingers hurt enough that I feel the click of every keystroke writing this. Gripping my fucking coffee mug hurts.

I'm completely and utterly conscious and in need of mental stimulation. I just can't seem to find something to occupy my mind that doesn't HURT!

This all started Sunday and has gotten progressively worse all week. Today, I just want to find a dark corner and crawl into it.

And now, having gotten that out of my system, I'm taking a deep breath, grabbing the iPod for some soothing music and will attempt to walk the dog.

Recent State Anti-Gay Marriage Laws

Anyone else really bothered that states are passing laws to systematically treat a group of people as second-class citizens?

I would like very well to respect the "moral" arguments of fellow Christians and other religious people. I try really hard. The so-called moral decline of our society is a farce. Were we more or less moral after the Emancipation Proclamation or Women's Suffrage? Shall we undo those? And if so, how far back would people like to go for a more pure and moral society?

Shall we return to the time of Prohibition? Because, those were certainly moral times. Further? The Constitution? Folks were certainly less rebellious before then. Oh I know, let's go back to the times of Puritanism. Yeah, nothing like a good witch burning! Screw it, not moral enough. Clearly, all this is sinfulness is the result of so-called individual rights. Let's forget about the Magna Carta while we're at it.

Still not far enough back. Shoot, the Cruisades were an up-right "Christian" period. Just have to pick one. I mean, if we can't bring morality to the world by looting and pillaging once or twice, we'll try nine times over several hundred years just to make sure!

If I keep going back, I'll get all the way back to Sodom and Gomorrah right? The basis for every half-baked argument against gay rights. Yes, that's why all of society's problems are because of us Liberals right?

Everyone seems to have a lot of hang-ups about sex. (We seem fine with a little violence, but I digress...) I understand this is hard to wrap our brains around because of all "our" collective hangups, but Gay Marriage is not about Sex! It's about the rights of two equal people to share their lives together and receive the same legal and societal rights as anyone else.

And before the cowards start arguing that opening the law to gay marriage suddenly opens the law to other types of unions, just don't! One injustice a moral-buffer does not make. Defend or attack the rights of gays on their own basis. Do not lump them into the moral quagmire of other "alternative" forms of relationships.

Sorry for the rant. It's late, I've had a two-day migraine, I can't sleep and the top story on MSNBC was about this shit.

EST Sucks

I love daylight savings time. Eastern Standard Time sucks. The only real problem I've ever had with EDT is the time adjustment playing online games with our friend living in Thailand. Now that we're back to "regular" time, it's a 12-hour difference. Aside from that, I see no intrinsic value to EST. When the sun suddenly set at 5:30 today, it just felt screwy. All I get from this so called "regular" time is less sunlight and a need to remember to turn on the front lights before Slick comes home. I don't understand why we can't just say screw it and adjust all the clocks 1 hour and be done with it. Who needs extra daylight first thing in the morning?

Seriously, if I wanted less light to be a "feature" I would move to Canada. Granted, if McCain wins on Tuesday...

Stung

On Tuesday, I took the car to the shop and walked home with the dog. Unfortunately, about a mile from home, I got stung by something on the left hand. I honestly thought it was a wasp, but the whole thing happened so fast, it could have been just about anything from a fire ant to a spi...nothing to see here dear... There was no visible stinger and other than a mark on my hand and a sharp sting I seemed OK. I arrived home without further incident. I got through the rest of the day and aside from a pin-prick of pain forgot about the whole incident. No worries right? Yeah well...

By Wednesday morning the back of my hand was red and itchy. By Wednesday night, the back of my hand was red, itchy and swelling. We applied various bite creams and looked in WebMD for treatment info. By Thursday morning the swelling increased, the itch spread to my wrist and my hand was in pain. Sigh! On Thursday afternoon I saw the Nurse Practitioner at my Doctor's office, who basically told me that since I had survived the first 48 hours, I would probably live. She directed me to ice, elevate and increase my Benadryl dose. She warned me that the spreading might continue a little more but not to panic unless...

So, I spent the evening semi-sedated with my hand elevated & wrapped in ice. Stupid

This may be my last post for a few days since typing is uncomfortable. If you've had a hand or wrist injury, you understand my frustration. I can use my hand if I have to, but it's not comfortable.

Did I mention sigh!

Gotta Know When to Walk Away, Know When to Run

Coming home today from the daily dog walk, my dog saw my neighbor & her dog outside and absolutely had to say hi. Our neighbor is great. I could pontificate about her greatness, how she takes care of Max when we're away, watches her grandchildren,...but that's not the point of this post.

Her brother & sister-in-law are visiting with their dog. After we got over the pleasantries of dog-ownership, dog-breeds & weather the conversation accidentally turned to politics. These very "moderate" (not) leaning folks are voting McCain and it's rather clear that their big issue is abortion. I very carefully defused the issue with an agreement that we're all faithful people and that we can simply respect eachother's position. Then the brother makes an aside comment about Obama's being Muslim.

I was floored. In that instance, I wanted to shout at this nice retired gentleman, "WHAT ARE YOU STUPID?" I wanted to point out all the fundamental problems with the lies he's obviously been spoon-fed. I wanted to remind him that this is a fundamentally pluralist society and that Muslims have died defending his right to say stupid stuff like that.

Instead, I took a deep breath, remembered how much my neighbor means to me, and beat a hasty retreat.

McVP

Newly featured on the McCain Dollar menu is McVP. Pobble expressed her general enthusiasms about the historic nature of these elections. And she's right to call people to task about this being a "stunt" by the McCain camp. Of course the selection of both VP candidates is about political manuvering. And no, I don't think this is a knee-jerk reaction or a shake-up. Repeat: It's not a "stunt." No, this is shrewd politics. And say what you will but the Republican party has cornered that market for the last decade or so. It's not about right or wrong it's about winning.

For whatever reason, there appears (and not just because the media tells us) to be a large block of Clinton supporters who don't want to vote for Obama. Is it a gender thing? A race thing? Not sure. Still, make no mistake. This is a direct shot at the Democratic base & the undecided Clinton supporters.

As for the VP candidates themselves, I'm completely and honestly unimpressed with both of them. Rarely* have I seen a VP who's so completely worthless that they can't handle the position of back-up QB & deadlock-vote maker.

Growing up in Philly, my opinion of Biden has basically always been that he's got diarrhea of the mouth. Sure his politics are spot on, but he's also been around long enough to put his foot in his mouth a few times. I'm glad he's not actually running for president. I've already been forced to pull the lever for Kerry and we all know how that turned out.

Palin's another matter. I didn't know squat about her. The news broke and I really did ask, "WHO?" Thankfully, the news told me she's Alaska's Govenor. Whew! What I do know is that her experience makes Obama look like a seasoned veteran. Sure, Alaska's big, but who the hell lives there? She's anti-abortion & a card-carrying member of the NRA. These two facts are the ones that should be repeated to any and all of your liberal friends. And this is no shot on hunters. I have family who hunts. I love venison! The press has already spoken about her using terms that I find derogatory. Don't believe me? Read this quote from MSNBC:

She was described by the Anchorage Press as "a small-town, angel-faced mother of four, an avid hunter and a fisher with a killer smile who wears designer glasses and heels, and hair like modern sculpture, who's taking it to the boys ever so softly."

Yes, because heels are an excellent accessory to an Orange vest & a huntin' rifle.

Sigh! We finally have a woman this close to the White House, she's a fucking conservative and the press is telling me about her heels. But America is doing well?

Canada anyone? Anyone?

Please win Mr Obama! Please!

*Note: Rare exceptions include Darth Cheney & Aaron "Deadshot" Burr.

GAAAAHHHHHH NOOOOOO!!!!

Sorry, perhaps the title is a bit excessive, but the little snorkel rod from the foam maker on the espresso machine flew into the air, bounced end over end TWICE and slid down the ventilation shaft in the kitchen. Poof! Gone! Also, the inside of the duct work in the kitchen is disgusting. But more importantly, it's gone! What do I do?!? I am not sticking my arm in there! Maybe if Slick brings home rubber gloves from work and I put on an old long-sleeved t-shirt.

At least it happened AFTER I frothed the milk for my cafe'.

So very sad! I wanted to cry. Thankfully, the comical nature of the bounce & the pregnant moment when I thought "NOooooo!!!" made me laugh at myself. Because, life is better in slow-mo.

And Now A Few Words About The Works of Jason Statham

The other day my sister and I admitted to being unwitting victims of a Jason Statham movie. We laughed at our misfortune, bad taste & the overwhelming horror of Mr Statham's career. Why? How? What idiot keeps making these films? (Well, Lionsgate is the usual culprit.) With the imminent release of Death Race (Remake of the cult-classic Death Race 2000) I thought it was my duty to do a public service announcement. I implore you to avoid Jason Statham movies!

Our trouble began with a small 2002 hit known as the Transporter. It was a fun ride with great stunts, fun (but formulaic) plot & a Hong Kong action feel. Statham was perfect. He exuded strength, sexuality, and presence onscreen. He had a British Bruce Willis feel.

The Transporter was followed up by a role in the 2003 remake of the Italian Job. He was perfectly type-cast as Handsome Rob the getaway driver & lady's man. The movie was good, fun & was one big minicooper ad.

Statham, unfortunately, had arrived. He's made several movies since. And most are in the running for the worst film I've ever seen. I appeal to you to avoid his movies (except the for the ones above) at all costs. Do not be sucked in by Crank or In the Name of the King. These films blow the most amazing chunks that they make Highlander 2 (which I actively forget exists) look like academy award material. Statham's fall may make the collective works of Jean-Claude Van Damme look like masterpiece theater. And Van Damme made Street Fighter! Street Fighter!

Avoid Statham. Think of the Children!

Suppostions of Faith vs Scientific Theory

Everyday after exercising, I take time to scan a variety of news sources. This morning I saw the following video link, No Credit for Creationism. The crux of it is that Christian colleges are teaching religious elements in their science classrooms and California isn't accepting those credits state-wide. One of the interviewed students commented that they are being taught the range of theories including intelligent design & evolution. The news story painted a picture of these colleges & their students as victims of the rules. Sigh! So much for objective journalism. (Not that it really exists.)

I admit bias in this situation. I admit that I find it difficult to look upon the purveyors of Creationism as anything but perversion of the Christian ideal & of rational scientific methodology. But then, this is my blog. But, I digress...

Creationism & it's twisted-sister known as intelligent design are disagreeable theology at best. The moment someone, for whatever reason, points at something and says, "God did that!" it is no longer science. Faith is a wonderful and beautiful thing. It's not science.

I do not believe in Evolution. Rather, I consider it the current scientific theory that best answers the scientific question of life on earth. Any argument that survival of the fittest or evolutionary divergence points to or away from God is a matter of faith and not science.

Science is not immoral. Science is amoral. There are those who would have you believe that this is not true. We all know the argument against Evolution. It does not point to God. It can be used as an argument against God's existence. It does not conform to a strict interpretation of the Bible. Intelligent design is the insidious response. Life is too amazing to have been an accident, therefore it points to a designer. We are told to "believe" that this is science. Rational thought? Perhaps. A matter of faith? Most definitely.

I believe, as a matter of faith, the core concept. God did make us. Evolution, creation, everything belongs to God. That may be it's most insidious part. Reasonable people of faith can not disagree with the core concept. When I attack - as I am now - Intelligent Design, it's supporters can call me anti-Christian. When I say that it has no place in a science classroom, it's supporters can also call me bias. And so, I become sad and embarrassed.

I am sad because both the faith I love & the science I studied are both being subverted. I'm embarrassed because it's not happening in some communist country or some oppressive middle-east nation, but here in our supposedly great nation.

FYI - Hawaii is in the USA

Hawaii is our 50th State! It's not some foreign country. When someone grows up in Hawaii or lives in Hawaii or vacations in Hawaii, they do so in the United States of America and thus have American "roots." Yes, it's a beautiful place. Yeah, it's in the middle of the ocean. It's still American soil!

Are we clear? I could totally go on about the inherent racism, jingoism & all around stupidity of people...You know what, forget it! The heads of all the Native American Tribes called. They want their land back. Everyone pack up you shit and go "home."

I hear I might be a distant relation to the chancellor of Germany. Think she'd let me sleep on the couch?

Bad Marketing Decision

So today's Road Runner bill came and once again proves the general stupidity of corporations.

On the front and back of my bill is an ad for the new "Lighting-Fast!" service. On the back it specifically states "Road Runner has increased its speed but not its price." This is eye-catching marketing that is perfect for customers like myself who do online gaming, music & video streaming and frankly live in front of my computer. A friend who works for TWC has hinted to me that the company has been increasing it's bandwidth for all customers. This I assume is to help deal with the rising tide of FioS. I opened the notice expecting to see details relevant to me.

Except, when I open my bill there's a notice inside that states "Attention High Speed Internet Customers." Uh oh! Seems they are raising my rate by 6%. In other words, in the same mail that they advertise an increase in service w/out a rate increase I get a rate increase. WTF? My urge to call customer service was HIGH! Since I once worked in customer service, I stopped myself.

There is good news. The speed increase already happened. I noticed it a few weeks ago. They increased us to 7Mbps from 5. And my experience with TWC/Road Runner has been very good. In 3+ years, I can still count a handful of real service outages or problems. In those rare situations where I've had to deal with them, customer service has always been helpful. And, they are still the only viable game in town for me. We have DSL in the area, but it's only the 3Mbps service. Since we don't have home phone service, we would have to pay too much to justify the loss in bandwidth.

Sigh! I'm just not happy when I get bullshit in the mail. I also think that the juxtaposition of that advertisement with a notice about a bill increase demonstrates internal problems with the company. It shows that different departments aren't talking. That's never a good sign to a customer.

Torture

I caught this great commentary on Slate today concerning the connections between the Bush Administration's use of torture & the character of Jack Bauer on tv's "24."

Our torture policy has deeper roots in Fox television than the Constitution

This is a great read and another example of learning the wrong lessons from books & tv. It also reminded me of a post I made last year about Batman & torture.

Batman Tortures His Enemies Too

This got me thinking about the latest Batman "lesson."

There is a great scene in the new Dark Knight movie where Batman pounds the snot out of the Joker in police lock-up. Many have commented that there was a lot of symbolism throughout the movie and specifically this scene. Perhaps, but the scene itself is not new to the Batman mythos. Nor are the results. The results are tainted, mixed with half-truths and leave a scar on everyone involved. That's the one reality that we can take from this fiction. It's one of the many lessons that Batman taught me through the years: Yeah, you can use ends to justify the means, but get ready to face the consequences.

But, I guess John Yoo doesn't read/watch enough Batman.

Boycott this Jacksass

I try really hard to ignore the shit that comes out of the mouths of so-called radio & television personalities. But, I unfortunately couldn't escape this story. Conservative radio host Michael Savage made a horrendous comment about Autism. Here's the AP story:

Radio host angers parents of autistic children

My nephew is autistic. He's not faking. My sister & her family aren't being put on. His comments spit in my sister's face. She agonizes daily with visiting doctors, getting special care in school and trying to figure out out to potty train a 6-year old who can't talk. It puts a strain on the entire family. My sister and her husband work full-time as pastors & they care for the Silent Prince while still trying to give my niece the attention she deserves.

What makes Savage extra-evil is that he had an opportunity to apologize for his remarks and would not. I'm going to try really hard and pray for Savage. In the meantime, I hope he loses his job. Shit like this just makes me angry.

That F@#%er!

White House: Bush to lift offshore drilling ban

Is it too late for a double-impeachment? Surely Nancy can run the government until January...or at least do a better job than the current occupant. WTF?!? Yeah, gas is $4.04 down the street. I'm sure it's even higher elsewhere. More off-shore drilling does NOTHING to current gas price. Long-term conversion of our energy infrastructure to sustainable & environmentally friendly resources is our best shot. We need more fuel-efficient vehicles NOW. The little-three could have planned ahead and gotten here first. Imagine if Ford or Crysler had invested in Prius-like concepts 10 years ago in preparation for this day? What happened to this country's innovation? It didn't all go into the computer industry, did it?

For over a decade my wife (who claims to know nothing about geo-politics) has been saying that we are headed for a paradym shift in the way that Americans (& the world) live. Our extravagant, gas-guzzling, credit-fueled days are numbered. If she saw this 10 years ago, before the gas crisis, the housing crisis & Bush's War, how did the people in Washington miss it? We could have delt with this with vision & direction. Instead we're running around like Chicken Little and making things worse.

Sigh!

I need a hug & a solar array!

Happy Birthday Tom Cruise

File under weird shit that I remember. Today is Tom Cruise's birthday. Why do I know this? Way back in 1989, he played Ron Kovic in the movie Born on the 4th of July. I remember, oddly enough, the interview he gave while promoting the film. It bothers me that I can remember the birthday of this nut-job, but have to look up my niece's birthday.

I have a love-hate relationship with the "trappings" of the 4th. I'm big on our country's history (especially the Revolutionary War,) consider myself Patriotic and love the Constitution. I dislike drunk people with fireworks and never got into parades (Unless it's the Mummers.)

Anyway, back to Tom. Ever since he went off the deep end, I won't see his movies. Frankly, I can't emotionally separate the idiot from the actor anymore. Still, Born on the 4th of July was a powerful film when I saw it at the tender age of 16.

To this day, the story of Ron Kovic serves as a reminder to me about innocence lost and the dangers of clinging to the flag. America is never as bad as it's detractors suggest, but it's also never as good as the Zealots want us to believe. Kovic's story is also one that should, perhaps, be re-introduced to today's generation. Already, the news is too filled with horror stories about injured Iraq Vets receiving inadiquate care. The past repeats.

We the People, at least on the surface, are doing a better job of honoring our soldiers. Brave men and women are not returning to angry and hateful attacks on their honor. Unfortunately, we're imbroiled in another wasteful conflict with no end in sight.

Tomorrow, we pause to reflect, to celebrate, to BBQ in honor of a hard-faught dream. Our challenge tomorrow (and everyday) is to honor our country while still holding it to a higher standard.

Oh, and happy birthday Tom.

Frustration

After our trip north last month, my body needed time to recuperate. We all knew it would. Over the next few weeks I was feeling "OK." I spent a lot of time functioning at about 80%. This meant I was able to relax, sleep, have fun & still get a few things accomplished. Since I wasn't feeling super, I reserved more and more time for fun and left projects like yard-work & home repair sit idle.

Well, weeks went by and I never really got my groove back. In fact, on Friday things just got worse. My body is in full-blown pain. I know this because I caught myself taking my 3rd painkiller of the day yesterday. Most days I don't take any. Some days I have to take 1 or 2. Three means I'm miserable.

This makes me look back at the last month in disgust. I could have paced myself in June and accomplished projects when I could have managed them a piece at a time. Now, there's no way I'm doing any of the yard work. Slick will have to clean the kitchen before our guests arrive for the 4th.

There's only one thing left to do now. I must find a distraction and I must relax. My body is so tense that even my shoulders feel like they are numb and asleep. The pain-killers (when I've taken them for several days) start to make me feel nauseated. So, I absolutely need to stop feeling bad.

PS. It should be noted that June was (once I stop feeling frustrated about it) a good month. My health was better than worse. Slick & I have been having a lot of fun. Until this weekend, I've been really excited about the summer. I'm still excited. We have friends visiting for the 4th of July. We have vacation with my family. We have vacation with Slick's family. My uncle is visiting in Sept. It'll be a great summer. I just have to get through this first.