Eat This and Die Happy

I was at market this evening and I vaguely entertained the notion of buying a live lobster for tonight's repast. Yummy, for sure, but I'm not sure I currently have the heart to steam the poor bastard to death.
Sure, they'll do it for you, but by the time I've made my choice from the tank of tragic crustaceans I'd have an emotional bond with that lobster. I would probably even give it some silly-lobster name-like Sparky, Rocco or Big Red.
That's MY lobster, you bastards.
Nobody boils my lobster and gets away with it.

Frozen lobster tails are about as enticing and delicious as leftover pizza warmed in a microwave, but they cost a lot more.

Besides, I'm a single guy with limited funds. What the hell am I thinking -"Maybe I'll cook a lobster tonight?"
I should be eating peanut butter out of the jar with a plastic spoon while watching Star Trek in my shorts.

What to do? The prawns look good, but $11.99 a lb? The lobsters are on sale for less than that.

Beef? Between Atkins-fueled high prices and fear of Mad Cow, no thanks.

Here's the recipe I came up with:

1 giant-ass fudge brownie (I admit I used a mix-make sure you have a couple eggs, some butter and a bit of milk on hand)

1 softball-sized scoop of natural vanilla ice cream.

1 big blob of all-natural peanut-butter. Make sure it has no hydrogenated oil or sugar added.

1 handful chopped peanuts.Honey-roasted work best for me.

Chocolate syrup to taste.

Note: If you have a life-threatening allergy to peanuts, don't eat this.

Take the peanut-butter blob, put it in a dish and pour chocolate syrup on it, as much as you want.
Microwave this until it's warm/hot and has a pourable consistency. Depending on your nuke-box, this can happen very fast (ten seconds ), so watch carefully. Remove and stir once or twice while heating. Remove from microwave.

Place brownie into bowl, top with the ice-cream scoop and cover with the melted peanut-chocolate sauce. Toss chopped nuts on top.

Repeat nightly until dead or too fat to leave the house.

Enjoy!

Good Advice I've Ignored

More than once someone has told I shouldn't be so hasty to wear my heart on my sleeve.
More than a few times I have realized in hind-sight that maybe I really fucked up this time.

I almost never feel good about the past and I let this ruin the present. This bodes ill for the future.

Enough of that. No more heart-on-sleeve mutual crying-fests. My heart is going straight from my sleeve and into my beer cooler. That's how most pre-transplant human organs are kept during transport ,is it not?

This works on a number of levels. Once I chuck that dark piece of cold dry ice into the Coleman all my warm, leftover beer will instantly be chilled to a frosty 40 degrees F.
If I hand this frozen bloody mass of duct-tape and crazy glue to the wrong person, all I need say is," oh,sorry-I meant to hand you a beer instead". Handing someone a beer is rarely a faux pas. Unless they are in AA or something. Even in that case, they're unlikely to run away, screaming in fear. And tell all your mutual friends about it.

Sidebar: I'd like to open a bar next to an AA meeting place and call it "Good-Bye Mr. Chips". I'd have Unhappy Hour where people could trade in their sobriety chips for drink discounts. I fucking hate AA. At one point I'd gone several years without a drink , which isn't really that hard, but a "pal" convinced me to go to an AA meeting with him. I stopped on the way home and got a 12-pack and a fifth of Cuervo Gold. So much for that.

Anyway, back to the cooler. My cooler is made of durable, high-impact plastic, which would help prevent sudden shocks and any resulting bruising or breakage. It's a bright cheerful red in color,and is mercifully opaque. You can stare at it for as long as you want to without knowing what's really inside.

I wish my eyes were like that.

Small Victory, Mid-Sized Defeat

My Big Boss was here this morning. He asked me how everything was going.

"Well,Boss, I'm a BIT uncomfortable just sitting here doing absolutely nothing 95% of the time and very little the other 5%."
"Don't worry about it. If you weren't here I'd have to drive down here a couple times a week. Nobody wants that. Read a book or surf the web-I don't care. If anyone gives you a hard time, tell them to call me."

Well, okay then. I can do that.

I'm going to be woefully out of work-habits if I get another job where I have actual work to do. So be it. This forty hour week is like a vacation after the sixty and seventy hour weeks in the months following the Hurricane.

That reminds me. It's Hurricane season soon. I may have this job forever. The pay is good and they don't require urine-testing, so all in all it's not so bad.
Plus he said if I wanted to take a few days off, that can be worked out. Not long enough for a Chicago trip, but long enough to flee to the mountains or visit a closer city. Anywhere I can drive or take the rail to. Everytime I fly I get pulled aside and thoroughly searched and interrogated, so I just don't fly anymore.

I've got a pen pal in Australia who wants me to come visit, but I'd have to make a Kon-Tiki out of milk jugs and old canvas tents just to get there. Maybe one day...

Maybe Baltimore. Baltimore is the kind of city that just screams "Lost Weekend"! I have Alcoholic Diplomatic Immunity in Baltimore, but then again ,so does half the city.

On the down side I got the dreaded "that was great, thank you, but I can't see you anymore" call late last night. I think my new friend has that unique female ESP that warns them -"Call this guy now, because you know he's sitting alone having an internal debate on whether to call you or not. Eventually, he will and you'll both be embarrassed". I was going to call her today. She could tell I was. How do they know these things?

I understand her reasons, which is pretty unusual for me. Actually I really don't, but I said I did, because it's easier that way. I suspect she's not quite as estranged from her husband as I was lead to believe.

I don't want to get in the middle of a mess like that. Not after last time.

Happy Iraqi Freedom Day!

I'm sure glad Iraq is free so we can stop worrying about the Middle East and pay attention to
important stuff like this.
Where was this Aryan Ice Goddess when I was an over-stimulated adolescent? I went to 13 public schools and never once got seduced by a teacher, much less one who looks like Ilsa, She-Wolf of the SS.

Actually it's pretty damn sick and almost jaw-droppingly stupid.
Can you imagine?

"Okay, Johnny, make sure you don't tell anybody now?"

He's just a stupid kid, but what's her excuse?

Vaughn Isn't Dead, But Laurie Is

The other night I wound up having a few late night drinks with someone I barely know and have a lot in common with.
She's worried about how her divorce is going to affect her teen-age sons-I'm a poster child for broken homes.
Their dad is an unemployable addict. Mine is a jobless drunk.
She used to drink at all the bars I used to work at-how we never met is a mystery to me. We know a lot of the same people, or at least we did.

"Hey, remember Marty, who worked at such and such?"
"Yeah, I just found out he's got cancer and won't make it."
"Shit. Did you know Ron died last year?"
"I heard that.That sucks. How about Laurie from so and so?"
"She killed herself a few years ago. Pills , I think."

I can't speak for a second, so I wordlessly push my glass forward-two fingers saying make it a double.

"We went out for a little while, a long time ago. A long time ago."
"Oh Jesus,I'm sorry. She had problems you know."
"Yeah I know. She scared me. A lot she scared me."
"Christ. Were you two serious?"
"No, not really", I say, unsure if I'm lying or not.

"How about Vaughn? Is he still working at this and that?"
"I don't know. I haven't been there in years."
"Let's change the subject. Got anything to drink at your place?"
"Always."

Use your imagination. I'm an old-fashioned Southern Gentleman and I never treat a lady with disrespect.

This morning the IT guy at my new office couldn't seem to get my Web,Fax and phone connections working, so I left after lunch and went to do laundry.

Vaughn was there. I figured he was dead, but he's not.
I told him this.
He said he thought the same thing about me.
We laughed.

Countdown to Handover

What the hell kind of non-sequitur is this? Countdown from what? Handover to whom?

Let me bang the goddamn drum loudly in case you haven't been awake for the last few years. If you don't want my opinion- which I can defend with facts- don't read this.
Come back when I'm in a better mood. Or stay away.If you don't care about anything you will reap the rewards of your apathetic shallowness.
Don't ask me for help when the men behind the curtain turn out to be eating bananas,masturbating in public and grooming each other for parasites.

Do you truly believe that Bush is a President, much less a good one? If so, you are either too young to remember history, politics and just how bad the 'Nam was - or- you don't care because it doesn't affect you. See above. See below. See, speak, and hear no Evil. Blind, dumb, deaf and amoral.

Good for you. I envy you your youthful vigor and happiness.

I'm too old to be drafted. I bet you're not. So go ahead and sign up. See the damn world through the window of a soft-skinned Humvee. Dig a foxhole in a field polluted by depleted uranium shells. Rest your reproductive organs on radioactive debris. It's easy.

You don't have to do anything to get from where you are now to where I just described.That's the idea. Just sit on yer ass watching "Service Island" and wait for your call to duty.

You'll learn how to clear the sand from an M-16 rifle.
You can't go to Canada. The National Guard is deployed overseas. Are your parents millionaires?

Vote for Bush. Get drafted. Watch other people's kids get drafted.
Who needs football/soccer riots?
War is the world's #1 spectator sport.
Sports already have a draft system in place.

Invest in the Future

Scroll down look to the right until you see the Project-Blog web-site. Or just click this tertiary link if you are lazy or busy . Find someone who is working for something you believe in. Make a pledge and keep it. Don't make a five dollar pledge- it costs almost that much for many small non-profits groups to process the donation.
Make it a $25 pledge or more-spread it around if you can.

If you can't chip in, at least spread the word.
No good cause is too small to ignore.

Final Post

My cube is cleared out and all my office sundries packed. Next step:Packing up the workstation and driving across town to my new assignment. I can't believe they're letting me put an expensive computer, fax machine and a box of blank Company checks into my car and trusting me to actually show up at the other office.
I should just go home , use their computer to print $999,999.99 of checks made out to me and flee the country before it's too late.
Maybe my next post will be from the Cayman Islands.
I wonder if they let you blog from prison?

Nah. I'm hoping the re-location to a new office will be a nice change of pace.
Although after what just happened, I might be coming back out here more often than I thought. Heh. Heh. Can't tell you about that right now. Maybe later, from home. Heh,heh,heh. My back hurts.

Now it's time to clear all my "cookies" so the new IT person doesn't find out what a truly horrible person I am.

What is a "Relationship"? What's a "Link"?

I drive through the same toll-booth at least twelve times a week. I often see the same cashier at my local market. The manager at my favorite liquor store used to buy comics from me.
Do I have a relationship with these people? I don't know where they live. I don't sleep, eat, fight or go to the movies with them. If you really wish to push semantic technicalities, you could say I have a relationship with them. It's a stretch, though.

If the girl who sold me my new eye-glasses decides to go home and use a chain-saw to dismember her boyfriend; do I have a relationship with a psycho-killer? I there a link between myself and improper chainsaw safety habits?

If you apply the Bushites tortured logic to this hypothetical situation, I'd be pre-emptively imprisoned to prevent any possible murders I might one day commit. Or at least held up as an anti-safety scapegoat the next time some poor unfortunate loses a body part to a mishandled wood-cutter.

This administration's lies are blatant,repetitive, well-documented,often contradictory and more dangerous than drunken chain-saw juggling.(Don't try this at home)
Even normally moderate and polite liberals are writing angry indictments about the Truth, the White House and the fact no one has seen them together for at least three and a half years.
I'm not moderate, polite or liberal, so I've been trying to get people to wake up and smell the cordite for years.

Just because I'm a paranoid crackpot doesn't mean I'm wrong.

Offensive Content Warning

When I read something like this story I can't help but regress into juvenile toilet humour mode. The young lasses seem to be enjoying themselves, but the photo doesn't quite show all the details.

If you're at an outdoor show by this group you may wish to carry a barf bag as well. Perhaps you could get one of these anorexic-looking sweeties to "autograph" it for you.

While that group of skeletal sexpots is raking in the dough, old folks who can actually play their instruments can't sell enough tickets to go on tour.

At least this award proves that the entire UK hasn't lost it's collective mind.

Hey Man, it's OK

Antagonistic co-worker apologized today for "jumping down my throat" yesterday. He's been having some rough days lately. Apology accepted. I hope things get better for him.

I Got This Great New Book

I got this great new book in the mail today.It's called The Last Night That London Burned. On the surface, it's a short photo-journalistic account of Joe Strummer's final concert ,11/15/02, but inside there are written tributes ,background and historical pieces and plenty of great older photos. More than enough to open a flood gate of memories. I'd not really thought about it before, but reading through this book made me realize that the Clash played a major role in making me who I am today. I think that's a good thing. Feel free to disagree.
I think it was tenth grade, maybe eleventh (circa 1981)and I was living in a "planned" (artificial and character-less)community called Columbia,Md. Most of my time was spent smoking dope,playing Dungeons and Dragons,taking acid,going to Grateful Dead shows ,drinking and having reckless sex in public places. More of the first things than the last, I'm sad to say.
Anyway, I asked an older pal to make a copy of a Deep Purple album and he said, OK, but only if he could turn me on to a band called the Clash. He put a mix from the first album and some bootlegs and stuff on the other side of the tape. Cool.
At this time I had the world's best paper route.It was in a hi-rise apartment building and the papers came around four in the morning, so the world was always very quiet. Being a rebellious teenager, I hated a quiet world. I got a Walkman. I'd grab a cart from the laundry room, chuck the papers into it and start making the rounds.
Listening to "Career Opportunities" while high on acid and delivering newspapers really makes you think. It makes you ask questions,it makes you demand answers. That, to me, was my quintessential punk moment of clarity.

I'd like to say that I immediately eschewed all things 'Hippie', got a Mohican, painted an Anarchy symbol on my leather jacket and joined an activist movement,but real changes don't work that way.
What I did was gradually start paying closer attention to the world around me. To what the Reagan administration was doing in Central America.
To the social-economic dynamic that prevents so many of us from living at peace with ourselves and with others.
To why I really didn't feel like listening to the Grateful Dead anymore.
To why I didn't want to dedicate my life to a job I hated.
To the fact that I'd only never be truly happy if I wasn't doing something I believed in.

It wasn't long before I traded my Atari video game for my first electric guitar.
I'll never be famous. I don't care. I have my beliefs and my passions to sustain me. I can suffer through shitty jobs because I can play their game.
I can smile because I know they can't play mine.

I thank Joe Strummer for helping me ignore alien orders and be myself. I just wish I'd done it sooner, damn it.

Wasting Words on a Witless Worm

I am constantly amazed at just how off-target reactionary neo-conservatives become when presented with an idea or concept that doesn't fit neatly into their narrow and inflexible ideology. I was sitting at the picnic table outside ,reading a book about the Republican control of the mainstream media , when Baboon Boy walks over and states, apropos of nothing,"I bet you think gay marriage is a great idea!"
Huh?
I'm certain by now that I'm not gay, and almost as sure I'll never get married, but, like most political issues, I have strong opinions on this.
"It doesn't matter if I think it's a great idea ,or a good idea or the worst idea since
New Coke- it's the right idea", I opined to Baboon Boy.
Completely missing my point, he muttered something about people marrying animals -I'm forced to overhear talk radio all day, so I'm not unfamiliar with this spurious and irrational argument.
"Animals don't have the intellectual or legal status to enter into binding social and legal contracts of any kind. A Baboon can't even apply for a Discover card, much less a marriage license. That won't change if gays start getting hitched", I said.

"That's the problem with you liberals-you can only argue emotionally. You can't think with facts!", he replied,storming off.
That's one of the most puzzling statements I've heard since I started working in the belly of this Beast.

By all means, everyone should be able to get married if they want to. That's my emotional response. If gay friends invite me to their weddings I will show up, get all misty-eyed , drink, dance ,hug and kiss and leave feeling happy for them.
That's a fact.
.

Paused,Refreshed

The computers at work all crashed this morning, which was just fine with me. I was able to openly read a book istead of making furtive forays into cyber-space. Am half-way through with David Brock's latest, The Republican Noise Machine which is quite informative and helped confirm some of the sneaking suspicions I have about who really controls the media, how they do it and why it's working so well. More on this soon.
What I really enjoyed was how many dissapproving looks and muffled comments the brazen flaunting of this tome elicited here in neocon hell.

Had a short but spirited debate with someone I barely know about something he doesn't understand . I can't wait to get out of this office.

I knew This Would Happen

The company just asked me if I would mind working for "a couple more weeks". Sure, what the hell-I need new brakes anyway. Despite the fact that I sit in my cube fucking off all day, have a habit of coming in late and hung-over and leaving for three hour lunch breaks, I somehow have a reputation for doing excellent work. Go figure.
I'm moving to another office on the other side of town, so at least it'll be a change.

Positives: A)Since they're cutting my hours back to a mere 40 per week; I asked for , and got, a raise. Three dollars an hour raise! B)I can get my car in top-travel shape.
C)There's a woman over there who flirts with me every time I go there. I'm sure this is a lost cause but at least I'll have someone to talk to.

Negatives: A)I'm still here in Fallentown. B)I'm not somewhere else C)I'm still here.

I've had this temp job longer than quite a few "real" jobs. I have a history of just walking off the job- this looks bad on my resume. My last "real job" I threw a Timberland boot at my boss in a store-full of witnesses. I'd have punched him, but my arm was in a sling.
So this isn't so bad.I'm out by August though- I must get some summer travel or I shall implode and collapse inward like a dying sun. I hate it when that happens.

The City That Fun Forgot

Don't take my word for it. This was on today's front page. Note that the locals think Washington(d.c.) is 'cooler' than Richmond -they also think it's almost as 'cool' here as NYC, and 'cooler' than San Francisco. They've obviously never traveled more than 90 miles from home, ever.

Insomnia #44

If you show up on my front door in the middle of a blizzard, wearing nothing but a floppy wool cap and carrying a broken flute,I won't be especially surprised. So you've decided that you are the reincarnation of John Mosby? Whatever.
I'll just invite you in and and give you blankets and coffee.
The vowels and other sounds strike me in the head ,but don't make it inside my ears. I'm busy.
I'm looking through a pile of useless scrap paper for your social worker's phone number. I'm wishing someone would invent speed dial and touch-tone phones. I'm trying not to wake up Kathy, she hates it when you do this. I'm trying to remember how to treat frostbite.
I call your social worker. It's three A.M. and I've got a half-frozen Confederate officer on my couch and he's not just whistling Dixie. He's whistling Dixie through a broken flute.
He tells me to check your fingers and toes. OK , red and flushed. We don't need an ambulance, but he's on the way over to pick you up.
Kathy wakes up and starts yelling at me.
You toss off your blankets and start dancing around the room.

Unwelcome Observation

What the hell is this? Maybe I'm new to blog and such, but anything that monitors almost 3 million blogs and keeps track of what is said on each one can't be good.
I have this awful feeling I'll be in one of a series of political Gulags next year. I imagine I'll meet some fellow bloggers. Does Morse code tapped out on the wall of a prison cell count as a web site?

He's All Heart

This story
pisses me off. Note Justice Scalia's flippant remark near the article's bottom. What he's saying is essentially ," if you weren't so poor, you'd have had better care" and using that as a way of protecting those poor little HMO'S from the sick and dying patients they make sicker or dead.
In 2002 my arm got really sick-my regular doc tried everything from Vioxx to steroids, but nothing worked. My fingers were like little purple link sausages and every movement was accompanied with near-blinding pain when my insurance finally gave the OK to see a neuropathologist of their choice. He stuck some wires in my arm and ran some current through, took some X-rays and decided that I had a rare form of neural disease and the arm was gonna have to come off. I was not very happy about that, so I went to see an Orthopedic surgeon that my doc recommended. He checked me out and said he didn't find anything to support this-instead a few benign tumors had pushed the Ulnar nerve out of the channel it normal occupies and the pressure was slowly killing the nerve. He pushed through surgery instead of amputation and I'm whole today because of him.
But what if I wasn't so lucky? What if my second opinion was another quack?
I'd be in court, explaining why these mother-fuckers cut off my arm, and the judge tells me "it's your fault for having a shitty doctor?"
If capping lawsuits meant lowering premiums to a level I where I could afford coverage, I'd be more enthusiastic. But that's not gonna happen. It's just more profit into the pockets of the HMO's .
De-regulation ,legal protections and huge tax subsidies all help the big corporations increase profits, which causes their stock prices to rise, which let's the talking heads crow about how well the economy is doing.
If you're one of the millions working a shit job for low pay and no benefits it's hard to give a shit about Wall Street. Rest assured they don't care about you.

I Can Feel It

Recorded an entire song last night, all the tracks in one sitting. Haven't done that for a long while. Lately it's just a bunch of half-finished ideas going nowhere, but this thing turned out pretty cool, if I may say so. It helped that I was able to use someone else's poetry for the lyrics- all my latest lyrics suck. It's getting better though-I can tell.
Only a couple years ago I didn't think I'd ever be able to tie my shoes together again, much less play guitar. It's all starting to come back and that's a good thing.I'm glad to know I've still got some life in me after all.

Five more days at work. For some odd reason they're not letting me issue payment checks anymore (why should they trust a short-timer temp) so my last week will consist largely of blogging, solitaire and reading once every one else leaves the office. Then it's a couple weeks to get the life in order and time to hit the road. I don't know if it's a series of short visits , or a couple long stays or much of anything else about my own plans.That's the way I like it. Did get a cats-sitter. That's important.Thanks Mike!

Special thanks to Anonymous for letting me use the words. With me singing it it sounds a bit sinister, but it just all fell together very natural-like.

Now for Something Completely Disgusting

Today is the first day of summer. This makes me want to travel. When traveling to a distant and exotic lands (like Baltimore or Chicago) it's important to know a few things:
What are the local liquor laws?
What languages do they speak?
What sort of internal parasites am I likely to encounter?

I found this ad on the web-looks like good stuff to have if you're tired of feeding your tapeworm. I think I have worms that feed on beer. Last night I drank ten beers and wasn't even drunk. Frustrating goddamn sobriety worms!

Anyway, if you scroll down a bit in the ad you'll read gleeful testimonials from a family that has apparently has made a household game of showing each other the dead abominations they've been leaving in the toilet. One happy camper gleefully described crapping something "the size of my hand and shaped like a rubber glove". Eeewww...

What kinds of scars are being left on these people's children?
"Hey kids! Come see what crawled out of Daddy's ass!"
yecch.

Holidays Ruin Everything

What could be more unnecessary and painful than spurious holidays? I fucking hate any holidays that involve religion, family members or historic occasions . Unless I get the day off w/pay or gift-wrapped free stuff I hate holidays.I even hate my birthday. This goes double for holidays that remind me that my mom is still dead and my dad's still an asshole. Thanks a lot ,Hallmark. Thanks for bringing up shit I'd rather not have to deal with . Thanks for waking me up in the middle of the night because my goddamn nightmares won't let me sleep. I appreciate it. Really, I do.
There's not enough pills, pasta and pilsner on the fucking planet to blot out the pain and anger I feel when someone innocently asks me,"How was your Mother's Day?"
Or,"What're ya doin' fer Father's Day?"
Don't ask me these questions. Any honest answer would be require at least a mutually unpleasant hour to answer. Who's got time for that anyway?
I do.
Because the sun isn't even up yet and I can't go back to sleep. If I close my eyes I see nothing but drying blood on white walls. I remember holding the coldest hand I will ever touch.
That's what I did this Mother's Day. That's what I'm doing every Mother's Day for the rest of my fucking life.

Sometimes every night seems like Mother's Day.

My dad taught me how to shoplift. He didn't exactly show me how , but sometimes there wasn't any food in the house , so my brother and I would liberate junk food from the 7-11. One Thanksgiving we tracked our dad down at the local watering hole and he took us across the parking lot to a fucking Jack-in-the-Box burger joint. "Get anything you want",he said.
I hate Father's Day and anything else that reminds me of him. I hate anything that makes me wonder what kind of parent I would be. I fucking hate Father's Day.
Can't we just combine the two "holidays"? I'd call this new holiday "Free Liqour to Bitter Children Day". Or "Angry Ghost Day".
Yeah, I fucking love these crap "HOLIDAYS".

The Sow In the Mail Room

There's a very strange pig in our mailroom. Not only can it sort mail,it can,and does, quote scripture.
For a talking Christian pig it says some very un-Christian things-last week it was squealing about it's new sty-mate, it's very proud that it's new barnyard lover is half it's age. (The mailroom pig looks to be well over 50 yrs. old-I suspect the younger porker must have had it's eyes burned out with lye or something).
Today I heard it making oink about how "...they oughta take all the queers and atheists and the libberuls and put 'em in a giant prison until we beat terror."

I suspect Michael Savage Weiner taught this pig how to talk.

I'm certain that if it was back on it's home farm it would have included blacks and Jews as well, although it would have used different terminology.

Jesus would shit flaming halos if He could hear what modern self-professed Christians were saying today.

Tenet/Limbaugh Connection?

You may have wondered why George Tenet didn't get fired despite all the disastrous intelligence failures that occurred on his watch. I certainly did.
I was surprised when he, followed by deputy director of operations James Pavitt, suddenly resigned. Apparently, so was Bush.
I was less surprised when I heard that Rush Limbaugh's wife wants a divorce, although I must admit it would have made more sense to just help 'facilitate' an Oxycontin overdose-that way she could keep all his undeserved wealth. (I know it's evil, but the thought of picking up the paper and reading the headline:"Vulgar Pigboy Found Dead With Needle In Arm" puts a little sunshine in my day.)

So what's the connection?

Tenet and Pavitt, due to the Separation of Powers act, could not testify against the Executive branch while in service.
Spousal privilege doesn't apply after a divorce. I don't know and really don't care what domestic life was like in the $25 million Limbaugh house, but it's a safe bet that Marta knows where at least some of the skeletons are hidden. Now she can: a)Spill the beans ,or, b)Blackmail the hell out of Rush. Marta, avoid flying in small planes and have your brakes checked frequently.

Of much greater significance is the new freedom Tenet has to testify against what is ,quite likely the most brazenly corrupt administration in U.S. history. The quiet little shadow war between the White House/Saudi/Military-Industrial axis and the CIA/State Department alliance may just be about to go public. The CIA has got to be sick of being scapegoated for every mistake, false claim and blatant incompetence of the Bush regime. And the CIA doesn't just know where the skeletons are hidden, they know where the fresh bodies are buried. Considering the level of vindictive and power-mad amorality shown by BushCo. It's probably a slew of mass graves.
Presidents who piss off the CIA tend to fare poorly. Ask Nixon-oh, wait,I forgot. He's in Hell. Bush is worse than a dozen Nixons.
Today's political forecast: Scattered scandals and widespread prevarications with a 60% chance of subterfuge leading to a Bush-deposing shit-storm by the end of October. Cheney won't be able to pardon Monkeypants because he'll be in jail too-if his heart doesn't explode first.
This is all predicated on the assumption that the American citizenry is paying attention. Those,sadly, are long odds.
Bonus prediction: If the man being held really is Saddam and not one of his several look-alikes, he will meet an untimely end before his trial. Saddam has mucho dirt on Reagan, Bush 41 and Bush 43.

A special nod to Buzzflash and Bartcop for the invaluable links.

Japanese Robot Mormon Cold Shower Nightmare

(warning: links may be offensive.especially the second one)

Just imagining what could happen if this thing went haywire ala Terminator robot rampage makes this advice irrelevant.
What happens if it won't let go? You pull the plug, but it just goes faster...OUCH.

I Wish She Was Running

The more I read about Teresa Heinz Kerry the more I wish she was running for Prez instead of her husband. I like the idea of a President who wouldn't drop bombs on children. She'd drop a school on them instead, which in my opinion is a much better long-term strategy for peace than whatever the hell our unelected fraudulent idiot is up to.

"Three limbs and all I could think was, 'What does the Republican party need, a fourth limb to make a person a hero?' And this coming from people who have not served. I was really offended by that. Unscrupulous and disgusting," she said, her reference being an indirect one to President Bush and Vice-President Cheney (referring to the slanderous campaign against Max Cleeland in 1992)

Yeah!

Some Good News

I've been working the same temp job for nine months-but it's almost over.I have mixed feelings about that (I have mixed feelings about almost everything actually), but I got some good news from the temp agency today. They said they have offices all over the world (it's a Swiss-owned company) and with my 'sterling' (Boss Lady actually used that term)work record they can find a position for me almost anywhere. Anywhere includes Chicago-Hot Damn! I have got to get out of this lame-ass red-neck Confederate Fallentown before I go absolutely yahoo apeshit bonkers.
Travel is like a soothing balm for soulful application purposes. Unless John is tagging along(see earlier post).

Anyone want to borrow my cats for a few months?

Be the Book

You're Watership Down!

by Richard Adams

Though many think of you as a bit young, even childish, you're
actually incredibly deep and complex. You show people the need to rethink their
assumptions, and confront them on everything from how they think to where they
build their houses. You might be one of the greatest people of all time. You'd
be recognized as such if you weren't always talking about talking rabbits.


Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

Thanks to Uyanga-stole it from her site-allan

Lifetime of Presidents

I've lived long enough to clearly remember seven American Presidents. Next year I hope it's eight.
The seven:

Nixon: It's hard to say anything nice about ol' Tricky Dickie. I don't like things that require effort, so I'll not even try.
In 1968 Nixon pledged to end the war in Viet Nam. He did this by bombing the shit out of Cambodia and dropping napalm over North Viet Nam on Christmas day. Six years later we finally escaped, without winning and without dignity. He was a paranoid alcoholic who surrounded himself with scheming yes men and war-profiteers. He drew up 'enemies lists' and considered dissenters to be America-hating commie sympathizers. Every day seemingly brought another White House scandal to light. Sound familiar?

Ford:Fell down some stairs. Pardoned many criminals,including his former boss. That's about it for Ford.

Carter: Easily the nicest guy in the bunch. Actually, the only nice guy in the bunch. He tried to be honest with the public, which was a really bad idea. Congress hated him. Iran took hostages and his rescue attempt was a disaster(it was really a pretty gutsy plan).The Reagan GOP made a secret deal with the Iranians not to release the hostages, sealing Carter's fate.Nice guy-lousy politician.

Reagan: Iran released the hostages on his inaugural day. I think the Iranians thought the American public would be suspicious of this 'coincidence'.Boy, were they wrong. Reagan supported South Africa's apartheid regime and fought against AIDS research, calling it the "gay cancer". He spent trillions on the military,allowing us to be safe from Grenada. He used the phrase,"homeless by choice" when explaining drastic cuts to social programs.His cabal traded weapons to Iran in exchange for some other hostages, sold WMD to Saddam, who was at war with Iran at the time, and sent arms and cash to the Contra rebels even though Congress expressly forbid doing so. He pissed off the world by authorizing the mining of Nicaraguan harbors and used CIA C-130's to airlift cocaine into the U.S. His wife's "War on Drugs" made marijuana expensive and scarce, but made cocaine cheap and plentiful. Before Iran-Contra no one had even heard of 'crack'.
He thought ICBMs could be recalled once launched.The Space Shuttle blew up.
We are lucky we survived the eighties.
At least he had sense enough to realize his tax-cuts were ruining the economy, so he reversed them.

Bush 41: Fought in WW2 and almost died. Allowed Saddam to invade Kuwait, then kicked his ass out. Encouraged Iraqi factions to revolt and then withdrew U.S. support for the rebellion he fomented. In all, the legacy of Reagan's "voodoo economics" (Bush's description) proved to be his downfall in 1992. The single worst thing he ever did was have children.

Clinton: Had the intelligence and charisma to be a great philosopher-king and the two-faced slipperiness needed to be a great used car salesman. Congress hated him, but they hated his wife even more. Had a shaky start, losing Congress to the GOP in 1994, but rebounded and turned the Reagan deficit into the greatest budget surplus America has ever seen.
When asked about marijuana use in his youth he replied "I didn't inhale". That lie said a lot about the character of this brilliant but deeply flawed man. When the whole blow-job affair blew open he lied again.
He should have just said, "yeah,I did her. So what?" That would have stopped a lot of his attackers cold. He was chastised for trying to kill Osama bin Laden -his detractors said it was to cover-up Monicagate. Probably could have nailed Osama if he hadn't been so busy getting impeached.
The worst thing he did was give Rush and the ditto-monkeys something to rant about. They're still doing it today.
If anything goes wrong, ever, it's Clinton's fault.

Bush 43: More evil than Nixon, a bigger liar than Clinton, more hawkish than Reagan and dumber than a bag of hammers. As Helen Thomas so succintly put it:"Worst President Ever". This smirking,nasty and un-informed man is little more than a hood ornament for the Military-Industrial Complex war profiteers that created, and now surround him.
In under one term he's managed to severely damage almost every foreign alliance we have, bankrupt the nation, re-distribute wealth upwards to those who need it least and embroil us in a war based on ideology and oil-profits .This war has no end. Has yet to tell the truth about anything, which is the key to his success. Seemingly every day brings a new scandal or exposes a new lie. He's a paranoid alcoholic who surrounds himself with scheming sycophants and corporate criminals , makes 'enemies lists' and considers dissenters to be America-hating terrorist sympathizers. The Space Shuttle blew up. His greatest accomplishment as Preznit was setting a White House record for vacation days taken in a single year. His worst accomplishment is everything else.

Breaking News

The 9/11 commission just realized what any informed person has known for years.
Three years isn't so long.
It took the Vatican 400 years to admit that the Earth revolves around the Sun, and not the other way around. They did this in 1992.

Guess what? The State Dept. released a report showing terrorist attacks to be at a 30-year low. Huh? How can that be ? Shit is being blown up everywhere, all the time-how can terrorism be on the decline? I'm not sure how they worked this miracle , but the Bush administration took credit for it.
Oops. They had it backwards. Terror is at an all time high instead.I wonder if Bush will take credit for that? He should-it's his baby.
Colin Powell said it wasn't political book-cookin', it was just a result of incompetence.How reassuring.
I suppose the State Dept. can't afford to run a Lexis/Nexis search or hire a fact-checker. I imagine some anonymous clerk will get fired in yet another display of Bush-league accountabilty.
Don't they realize that releasing poorly scrutinized information and brazen falsehoods can lead to really bad stuff?
Like pointless and costly wars overseas and giant steps towards a Police State at home.

You bet they do.

Passion

Like most good things, we tend to take our passions for granted until they leave us.
I don't mean raw lust or crucifixion-based passions, I refer to the creative and/or romantic spirit that drives us to write songs and stories, carve figures out of stone, stay up all night painting, fall in love and write poetry about it- that kind of passion.
Now I know why I quit the last band I was in. It just didn't excite me and I couldn't put my heart into it-even if it's a punk cover band, it's still a cover band.
I'm a song-writer-I can't get into playing an entire set of songs that I have no creative input towards.
I'd been trying to rationalize why I left-too busy, practice is far away and late at night etc. etc.
The truth is that it just left me unsatisfied, not because I wanted more, but rather because I want different. If that sounds selfish, it probably is. So be it.
I am happier recording my own songs, alone in my bedroom/studio, than I am playing in a band I don't care about. It doesn't matter if anyone ever hears these songs or not,that's not the point. It's just something I have to do.
If you are reading this, you most likely have a blog;if you have a blog there's a good chance that there are one or more things that you care deeply about. You might not even know it now, and some passions change as you get older, but if you reflect a bit I imagine you'll go "A-HA! Without(fill-in-blank) existence would be hollow and aimless!"

Not a hobby-we have a large part in choosing our hobbies. Our passions tend to choose us.
That good thing or things that you would keep doing even if you received a letter saying, "We ignore you"-signed,The World.
It's nothing to be ashamed of, quite the opposite.

Tonight, turn off the computer and work on that painting, or finish that song that needs a new chorus. Touch up the dialogue on that short-story-it's pretty good,but it need a little revision.
Unless your passion is blogging, computer graphics or you use the PC to write.
In that case keep hands away from the 'off' button and let it all out.

Don't Take John With You

The next time you need to travel and think it would be nice to have someone along to help with the driving, don't take my buddy (I'll call him John, since that's his name) John with you. Unless your idea of travel involves driving off a bridge at 90 mph,in which case please take John with you.
A few years back I was ready to make my annual pilgrimage to Chicago and really didn't want to make the seventeen hour drive alone. My pal John , an unemployed('natch) actor volunteered to go, which seemed to be a good idea at the time.Off we go!
I soon found out that John is the guy who spends thirty minutes describing a five-minute Saturday Night Live skit.His one-man re-enactment of Monty Python and the Holy Grail lasted for the entire trip across Ohio. I'm sure you've met John- everyone knows one John, I'd wager. Everything he says is a quote or quip from a movie or TV show. He's seen them all-and if you tell him you haven't seen something, he'll tell you all about it,including the really clever twist at the end,thus ruining any potential future viewing.
Driving through Indiana sucks enough without having a passenger who likes to do Jack Nicholson imitations. Really, really likes to.
Anyway we got to Chicago without violence, but just barely.
It was a working vacation for me (another comic show) and John went with me. We were on the 'EL' (elevated subway)to the convention centre when John suddenly became even more agitated and manic than usual.
"Hey man, that girl over there is checking me out", he said, indicating a cute young woman who, like everyone on every subway anywhere, was looking at nothing. It's an art really, being able to see nothing, yet maintain the awareness needed to know when your stop is reached. Never make eye contact with anyone-ever.
To paraphrase Robbins ,"the song Love is a Many Splendored Thing was not composed on a Chicago subway".
The object of his hopeless affection just happened to get off at the convention centre stop, so John spent the entire 3-day show wandering around a convention the size of small town looking for El Girl.I have no idea what he would have done if he'd found her, but at least it got him out of my hair for a while. (I have a friend here who is,shall we say, 'generous with her favors'-I believe she's slept with every boy and half the girls in town- and she told me that she turned John down.Twice.) He didn't stand a chance with El Girl.
While we were in Chicago he ate all my brother's food, drank all our beer and didn't do a goddamn dish or take out a single bag of trash. I actually encouraged him to start with the booze early, so he'd pass out early and we could go out without him, but this just made him more annoying.

We made it home without violence, but just barely. I haven't seen him since. He still owes me money, but it's not worth talking to him in order to get it. Don't take John with you.

Two Weeks Notice

This morning I found out I've got two weeks left at work-maybe less. I guess I should be worried, or sad, or making decisive plans for the future, but I just don't seem to feel much at all. Nothing I can can clearly define, at least. I can no longer tell the difference between apprehension and relief. Maybe there isn't one.
I'm hoping things work out so I can be in Chicago for July 4th, perhaps with a stop in Baltimore to see a couple of old friends who have new children. I've not even seen the latest addition to their family, so I know it's been a long time since my last visit.
I'm going somewhere and when I get there I'll do some stuff and stay for awhile and eventually go home or re-locate. When I feel like it or the money runs out,whichever comes first. That's about as well-defined a plan I can come up with at the moment.

Something Happened

I used to work at these comic shows because I needed the money and it's a good excuse to travel on the cheap, but the thrill is gone. Very, very gone.
All my old friends seem like they're being crushed under the weight of adult problems-marriage/mortgage/children/infidelity/addiction/divorce/arrests- all while being immersed in an industry that can, at best, be called 'Juvenile'.I feel awful, worse than before I left.
Imagine seeing an old friend, someone you truly love and admire, for the first time in years-petty cool, eh?
Thirty seconds into the reunion, he drops a Nagasaki-scale confession(about his girlfriend) on me and eventually asks me for advice on how to deal with this issue( i'm not sayin').
I can give advice about setting up your stereo, NFL teams to bet on or how to cook the perfect omelet, but never ask my advice on relationships. Anything I could say would be wrong.
This went on and on- even this girl at the pizza place I was grabbing subs and beer at told me about her problems. Her boyfriend worked there , so I gave him a free pass to the show and he 'comped' the food/bev. I love the barter system!
As I write this , it strikes me that she just really needed to talk to someone who was completely outside her circle of friends and family,yet gave a shit. It was kinda touching (i can be a sappy guy sometimes)and made me feel like I helped put a little good into the world.
I was planning on writing a sarcastic account of the Comic Show, but I don't feel angry or cruel ;I feel drained and conflicted.I used to vent my aggression on the buying public and they would buy tons of stuff. This year I told my boss I was leaving early. He was ok with it. He has a high threshold for insubordination.

I was feeling melancholy... 

Cats Hate Suitcases. 

...on my mind

Good-Bye 

Mercenaries, De-regulated

Contractors who carry automatic rifles, wear body armor,operate in combat zones and conduct interrogations inside military prisons aren't really contractors at all. The correct term is mercenary.
The de-regulation of industry and the privatization of the public sector, especially when applied to the military, can lead to some harsh and unforeseen consequences.
Bush's war against Iraq could lead to the mother of all class-action suits.

Question: If this war is so 'just' , and has such overwhelming support at home, then how come the military recruitment offices don't have young Americans lined up around the block,waiting to enlist?

Question: We are paying Halliburton billions of dollars for (among many other less mundane things) truck-drivers,janitorial workers and cafeteria help. Aren't there any Iraqis who can drive trucks,mop floors or flip burgers?
I realize there are certain dis-advantages to hiring people who hate you and wish you were dead, but if we had put the 70%-90% of innocent "detainees" into Burger King uniforms instead of Abu-Ghraib hoods and hand-cuffs, maybe they wouldn't hate us so much.Maybe they'd hate us more,but I doubt it. In any case, we'll never know.

Question: If being commander-in-chief during the "war on terra" places Bush above domestic and international law, is not the same privilege extended to all heads-of-state? What if North Korea declares "war on terra" and flattens Seoul? When 'Glorious Leader' is dragged to the Hague for his war crimes trial, could he use the 'Bush Defense' to exonerate himself?

Packing List-Then and Now

What a difference fifteen years makes. This year I'm packing for an upcoming road trip two days in advance. In 1989 I would pack two hours in advance. The contents are a bit different as well.

MUSIC:
Then:Guitar, Bass, amplifier, many cables, extra strings, picks and FX pedals.
Now: Punk rock mix CD's to help keep me awake

TRANSPORTATION:
Then:Call "Shotgun!"
Now:Change oil,check tires,make insurance payment.

SUITCASE:
Then:One clean tie-dyed t-shirt, two pairs of clean underwear, four clean socks. Forgot my damn toothbrush.
Now:Two changes of clothes for each day of travel,at least one clean tie. Forgot my damn toothbrush.

AMUSEMENTS:
Then:1/4 lb. weed,1 oz. magic mushrooms,1/2 oz. cocaine,100 hits of acid,1 bottle Jaegermeister, 2 cases cheap beer,travel bong,case of condoms.
Now: 1 refill Tylenol #3,1 plastic 'travel bottle' Smirnoff vodka,3 library books,1 fifteen year-old condom.

VARIOUS:
Then: Polaroid camera, spiral-bound notebooks,demo tapes of current band.
Now: Digital camera,spiral-bound notebooks, updated job resume.

Sex, Jobs and Obsession

Everyone needs a hobby, but I'm afraid that we are forced into having at least two universal American obsessions: Jobs/Work and Love/Sex. (If you were born into a wealthy family and are enjoying a blissful arranged marriage, just stop reading right now and go away. You wouldn't understand.)

Jobs and Sex.

By the time you're old enough to have either one, you'll be under pressure, having doubts and wondering why no-one likes you. Better get used to it.
True, you can get by without a job; and sex isn't a requirement for survival, but if you go too long without either you will eventually find yourself begging for both.
Being a beggar means living off of things no-one else wants, which makes you a sort of metaphorical cannibal, because you have become one of those unwanted things.
Even if it's going good for you now don't get comfy. It's just a matter of time until you find out that the only reason you got a raise is 'cause the Boss feels guilty about sleeping with your wife/husband/whatever. While you're at work.
Before you know it you'll catch them in the act, and then it's Help Wanted ads and seedy bars for you.
Endless nights of drunken self-pity loom as you collect letters of rejection and bogus phone numbers. Job interviews during the day,at night it's awkward advances on people who don't want to date you because you don't have a job. Which is also the reason employers don't wish to hire you.
If you're lucky, you'll get a temp job and/or a 3-night stand. It'll end abruptly and badly, leaving you wondering just what the hell you did wrong. The answer: Nothing.Everything. It doesn't matter. It really doesn't-you knew it was hopeless right from the start anyway.

Because all the good ones are taken. And you're not.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: This is excerpted from the Commencement speech I gave at my old High School.

Twenty Questions

Here's a interesting quiz by Maureen Farrell demonstrating why building a well-provisioned cabin in a remote wilderness location may not be such a bad idea.
How many did you answer correctly?
I got a perfect 20 of 20. Obviously ,I have too much time on my hands.
Clearing up a common mis-perception: Wearing a tin-foil hat does not protect you from mind-control- it's more like wearing an antennae on your head. Take it off right now!

Much Better Now, Thanks

Ha Ha. Instead of hate mail I got this movie instead.
If you've ever wondered what a 30-second version of The Shining (the Kubrick version) starring a cast of animated bunny rabbits would look like, now you know.
I hope they make A Clockwork Orange next!
Thanks to my old pal Jerky for the much needed silly laughing fit!

Don Rumsfeld: Mr. Sensitive

Read the very last thing that this horrible man says at the bottom of this story.I imagine that Nick Berg's family must feel reassured. Or maybe it was a confession by way of Freudian slip. I long ago gave up on trying to understand anything this guy
says.
I hope his wife is putting arsenic in his martinis.

Serves Him Right

Who says there's no justice in life?

Music

Music makes life bearable. I went home early from work yesterday ,turned up the volume to an un-neighborly level, changed clothes and bounced around my apartment like a manic monkey. London's Calling! Jump up and down!
Then I plugged in my guitar and felt even better. I hurt my thumb a few weeks ago and haven't been able to play at all, which has been driving me (even more) insane. Played for a long time. So long that I missed the the midnight beer-sales deadline.
Wound up drinking those wine coolers that've been sitting in the back of my fridge since my last date, which I think was around 1989.
Bad idea.
This damncube is a bad place to be hung-over.
I wish I could bring my guitar to work. Next weekend I will, since I'm the only person in the entire office and I literally have nothing at all to do except wait for the phone to ring.
It never does.

This is News?

Ronald Reagan Died.
Am I supposed to cry or something?
The first vote I ever cast was against Reagan. I went to Washington DC for Rock-Against-Reagan demonstrations .
Iran/Contra. Huge deficits. A swollen, pustulent and corrupt Government ,wars in tiny dictatorships to raise campaign funds and fill the coffers of war-profiteer corporate cronies. Does this sound familiar? There's been an exponential increase in GOP corruption and greed-fueled bloodlust since Nixon was in office.
Nixon got caught on tape, resigned and was pardoned by Gerald Ford.
Reagan got caught, over and over, and got re-elected. Oliver North got a talk show and a book deal. Bush #41 granted pardons.
Now it seems that an evil necromancer has resurrected Bonzo , removed Reagan's brain and transplanted it into the vacant skull of that poor dead chimp.
Creating Bush Junior.
There's a 48% chance you voted for this Frankenstein-like mockery of a president. If you voted.
But you didn't,did you?
If you don't vote this year, don't complain to me when you get drafted and sent to 'liberate' Syria.
Eisenhower warned us of this. He's dead and I'm not. So I'm passing on the warning.
Ignore it at your own peril.

Blue Damncube Walls

Blue Damncube 

Proof of Puppetry

Just watched the Bush/Chiraq speech. Bush was obviously wasted on one or more substances- I suspect cocaine and alcohol, perhaps with some Xanax to
'take the edge off'. I have a good eye for these things.
He lip-syncs his speeches! A CNN A/V tech seems to have patched his earphone teleprompter's audio feed into the main broadcast output. You heard him speak ,with mouth shut-about 500 ms later you saw him speak and heard him speak the same lines.
Proof of Puppetry!
Meanwhile:
You can buy an AK-47, but not a functional sword.
You can spend 25 years in prison for less than a joint of weed, but you can steal billions of dollars (Enron) and get a wet-noodle lashing.
Speaking of wet noodles, there's a huge market for drugs that "cure" impotence, but we still haven't cured AIDS or cancer.
Just thinking about AIDS and cancer makes me flaccid.
But that's the plan, isn't it?

I Got (Another) Death Threat Today

I must be doing something right, because I'm getting hate mail and death threats again.I don't think the person sending them is a blogger-person,more likely it comes from something I've posted on some obscure political site. I don't know where because they didn't say what they were responding to.
Some of what they did say :"...IF AL GORE HAD WON YOUD BE SPEAKING IRAQI IN SADDAMS JAILRIGHT KNOW..." ,"...YOU DUMOCRATS SHOULD ALL DIE...", "...BUSH IS A HERO KERRY IS A COMMIE!", ad nauseum.
Hmm...let me guess here-are you a fan of Rush Limbaugh? The caps-lock 'on' is a solid clue , the utter lack of written English skills is another, and your disgraceful ignorance cements the case. Speaking Iraqi?
Are you ,perhaps, the person calling itself "BIG TEX?" If so ,I apologize for calling you "Tiny Dick". I meant to say "Spineless Eunuch", but I didn't think you'd know what that meant.
I don't know who you are- because you didn't sign the email you sent me from a bogus address. I suggest you find the person who showed you how to turn on your computer and get them to find this blog for you.
I'd enjoy having a lively discussion in a public forum. You can pick the site-and please,feel free to pick the subject, because I sure as hell don't know what you're talking about. Invite all your friends. You'll need all the support you can get.
your pal,
Allan

Return to Sender

He probably got tired of watching his drunk ass pedal through town on a tri-cycle and firing his cap-gun at cars.

Explain ,Please...

My Blogger ads are for suppliers of prosthetic limbs and contain links to "love song lyrics". What's the connection here? Whatever it is I'm missing, it, mercifully, is not a limb.
The last time I checked, the only body part that needs replacing is my heart -in a metaphorical, not a medical sense.
If you are one of the nearly half-dozen (OK, quarter-dozen) people who have read any of my ravings without clicking away in abject horror,chances are you have as little use or interest in "love song lyrics" as I do-which is none.
Many years ago I had a short fling with a really cool woman, she could play guitar with me and everything. Cat's meow! We were jamming together one night when I started playing this really (i thought)sweet love song I wrote for her.She put her guitar away and ran out the door faster than I've ever seen anyone move. She moved to San Francisco a couple days later and I've never seen or heard from her since.
A few years later a very similar incident occured;since then, just typing "love song lyrics" is nearly enough to cause me to break out in hives.
Letters of recommendation,birthday cards and notes of encouragement are as close as I'll ever come to making that mistake again.
Until the next time .

SMACKS SELF ON HEAD: Duh. The ads must use the same type program that G-Mail uses to read your e-mail and decide what products are right for you. How very reassuring.

Weasels Ripped My Childhood

The only good things I remember about growing up are: great music, lots of sex and getting fucked-up enough to forget some of the truly awful other things. (I'm talking about high school and after, not grade school, so don't get any sick ideas)
Now I've got:Elvis Costello and Bob Marley Muzak piped into my cube,the hell of listening to the couple next-door fucking all the damn time and the ever-present fear of having to take a drug-test.
How did it come to this?

Conspiracy Isn't Fun any more

Remember the good old days-when conspiracy theory meant reading the Illuminati trilogy or discussing why the du Pont corporation helped make weed illegal? The number 23? Weishaupt or Washington on the dollar? Was Klaatu really the Beatles recording anonymously? Convincing stupid people Proctor and Gamble paid Gary Gygax to spread devil-worship? (I just made that one up, sorta)
Even Watergate eventually ended.
As far as I know, Nixon was never recorded forcing naked men into "simulated" sex acts, much less sawing their heads off. Audiotape can hide a multitude of sins, but I'm pretty sure he let you keep your clothes on and skull attached while he fucked you in the White House.
He should have done the hood-over-head thing though, as it would have helped muffle the voices.

Today we're presented with an ever-lasting vision of an evil network of concentric ,nebulous circles. An evil, segmented and expansive network of separate (with various levels, if any, of connection) guerilla groups, corporate profiteers and secret foreign government intelligence agencies that co-operate with their professed
enemies more than their own people , fundamentalist religious factions, joined by an unknown number of imported mercenaries and militants , all purportedly working towards the same goal, dished out by zealots gorging on the self-serving , eat-all-you-can-and leave-nothing-for-the-next-person buffet of tyranny and terror. They convince themselves of an unshakable center , but the the center is notorious for it's inability to hold. Extremism and intolerance thrive.
Back-stabbings and betrayals are becoming common-place in this network, one I once feared would remain hidden, deadly and invincible. Dissenters are returning from various forms of exile ,raising their voices in a call for democracy and liberty, but the nation is so fractious that civil disobedience is repressed and civil war hangs like a National Scimitar of Damocles .
This is true here and it's true there.
We really do need a score card to tell the teams apart , but if you buy a counterfeit ticket from a scalper -and then buy a souvenir program from his cousin- you can be damn sure you'll sitting in the bleacher seats with a flag-pole blocking your view.
With so much in common , you'd think we'd all get along much better than we do.
Cheers,
Allan