Birthday Greetings

This was an email I sent my sister,  

Happy Birthday Anyuta.  I have been thinking about you and your new job.  I have not heard much about it.   This picture is how I feel when I think about going to work so I hope you like your job. 

Anyway, looking forward to seeing you at Synovia's wedding thing.  I will be the grumpy one in the corner.  I have to go buy some nice cloths as not to embarrass and well, yeh, say hello to hundreds of people I do not know or care to know.  I just have to remember that they probably do not want to or care to know me either.  It could be a opportunity for growth.

You are doing well, I hope.  You are an inspiration and a great Aunt to my kids.  How did that happen after being such a shitty sister to your pain in the ass little brother.

love ya,

Fingerblister

Friday Science: Something new

ChemJuice — Draw chemical structures with your fingers

From a review in the March 2011 Scientific American:

This application is for the iPhone and it cost three bucks.  I snipped it from Bookofjoe.com

After thirty  years, personal computing is finally approaching all the  hype.

I am not sure how it works or what it actually does but I know it is cool.  This very creative app will morph into something we all will use but as of yet do not even know is possible.

Grits

My first thoughts of the day are usually about grits. Specifically, Corned beef hash and grits. Actually, this morning it was, “I can see it raining fire in the sky, the echoes from the campfire are softer than a lullaby” as it drummed through my mind.  Swiftly, thoughts of breakfast set up shop with images of bits of mystery meat and potatoes. I may fight the compelshion to eat for several hours only to succumb to the sucking sound of grits and hash.   You can buy regular grits, instant grits or quick grits. I cannot see much difference between quick or regular grits. They both need boiling water, salt and time.

I found this concoction of corned beef hash and grits about a year ago. You can find true love in the strangest places. I now keep my eyes peeled for corned beef hash. Grits are as easy as getting a date in Singapore but the hash is the mystery meat “thing”. The obsession of love transcends logic. I used to talk fondly of fried catfish and grits.  Comparative equals are on a short list.  Fried Catfish is mostly fried stuff with a little bit of farm raised bland fish. In fact, the fried part is mostly cornmeal. There is very little difference between cornmeal and grits so you are getting fried grits and boiled grits with some waste fish. It is good, capable of infatuation but not true love. It does not have a soul or Potassium Nitrate.  (One should not drink anitfreeze after eating corned-beef, you may explode.) 

The John Denver PBS show featured interviews with the love of his life, Annie who was with him while he saw the fire in the sky. Anyway, I do think they had grits that morning while he ignored her and wrote the love song about his love for her. Maybe if he would have said "screw you!” to the songwriting a little more often and “screw you?” to Annie a little more often they would not have gotten divorced. They probably talked of love over cheese grits.  Corned beef hash and grits could be the culinary love of the rest of my life. The exploration of its complexities and textures will take a lifetime. The quality of the corned beef and the potatoes need to be investigated. I need to learn the art of creating the hash. Grits and Corned beef hash is a perfect match of North and South. Grits are smooth like a southern girl's coo. Corned beef hash is blue blood, north of the Mason-Dixon abruptly arrogant and male. Together they battle lovingly like staged drills of a high school band. All those female and male hormones raging yet controlled to create a much finer presentation.

While taking a class in college, one of the questions on the multiple choice test was “What is the main ingredient in grits” 1: wheat b: corn C: rice 5: barley. This was a bird class that I never even bought the course recommended book for review. I picked C: rice even though I had been eating grits for twenty years.  Rice is white and well, you can see how things went at UCF.  I desire grits but I love Corned Beef Hash and Grits. Besides, if I eat a huge volume of rice I have trouble peeing. I am glad grits are made of corn.

Forty days of caribou dung

I have been reading my previous blogs.  Man-o-Man, they are weak, hard to read, poorly constructed, and BORING!  I tried to guilt my kids into reading it but they cannot take it any longer.  They listened to me torture them out of their senses for twenty years. They said enough is enough.  Actually, some of those stories would be OK if I could write.  Words appear on the pages like someone smashed all my fingers with a mortar and pestle. I had to look up how to spell mortar and pestle.   It led me to trituration which means grinding for hell sake.  I tried to find the root or Latin, Greek or Old English derivative of it but it must already be derived because only a pompus dilweed would say "Triturate" instead of "grind".  I checked three on-line dickionaries and they led me to "Trituration-the process of triturating".  Really, ya think.  Now, to use it in a sentence just like in first grade.

Last night while doinking my girlfriend over the incredibly smooth end of a cobblestone wall, she moaned. "That was some fine triturating". 

I am better at using words in a sentence since I figured out that  most everyone else was not even listening and I could define the word any way I wanted. 
Prignos is a Latvian word that extremely loosely translated means "Peace".  Derived from prigit which means "to faint with excitement". Like, in a sentence, After seeing her beautiful bare butt shining in the moonlight, the only other thing he could do was prigit.  During the dark ages it was a swear word meaning "orgasm" and only whores and witches where lucky enough to have orgasms in the Eighth century.

Now, you see, that last paragraph was complete bullshit.  It may have been more interesting and less boring.

Civility

I am quite sure that by observing the driving habits of a society, community or region, a reasonable summation of the culture itself could be constructed.  Civility while driving demonstrates a civil approach to society.  Roads, roadsigns and stop lights are a mere suggestion in most countries.  In central America, stopping is optional.  The local man I was riding with slammed on his breaks where two kids came running out of a shack with a crowbar and rushed toward the car.  I wondered if the smell of defecating on myself would keep them from bashing my head in for my gringo money. They started changing the tire.  The driver handed them some money and off we went.  We were in the middle of the road for maybe three minutes.  Cars were just zooming around us honking and swerving.  Someone did steal the mirror of the other side of the car though.  

Responsible driving and responsible behavior in general are in danger of being a lost art in America.  Just drive through a Walmart or mall parking lot and you will rarely see civility.  You will see shopping carts everywhere although there are cart corrals every eight rows.  You will see people walking down the middle of the parking lanes, people not stopping for others or being courteous in any way.  It is not even a zoo.  It more closely resembles a penal colony. When did lack of civility and poor behavior become so acceptable.  I know that the government, the drug companies, the oil companies and the airlines have decided common courtesy is not required in business.  Maybe everyone is just in a bad mood and they forgot the next person in line may need some real assistance and compassion.  If you wanted a good piece of chicken, maybe you should go to Kentucky Fried instead of the local grocery store. If you do not like something, do not buy it.  Do not demand anything or act like a rude five year old. My dad used to say that if you act like a child, you will be treated like a child. 

Civility is necessary in a free society. 

"Civility is to human nature what warmth is to wax."

—Arthur Schopenhauer[1]

 I cannot say it any better than Wikipedia says it. (I changed the word editors to people) Stated-simply, People should always treat each other with consideration and respect. In order to keep the focus on improving the society as a whole and to help maintain a pleasant environment, people should behave politely, calmly and reasonably, even during heated debates.

Texting and Driving

I had to watch a safety video yesterday that was made in Australia.  It showed all kinds of car accidents as a result of drinking.  It was very graphic and sad.  The remaining  time was spent watching videos about the evils of texting while "trying to drive".  I have to say, I have driven after two beers but I never text while driving.  I also do not even answer the phone while driving. One of the girls who died was the class texting champion.  She averaged seven thousand text messages a month.  I have never sent a single text message.  I did go on-line one time to send a note to my daughter's phone.  I did that once.

I have to look straight ahead while I drive.  I cannot look at the babes walking to and from Ron Jon's Surf Shop.  I cannot enjoy the scenery while I am driving.  There have been times I have pulled into a parking lot to enjoy the view.  If I turn my head sideways to look at something I drift off the road. That is a fact of my driving life.  I rarely use a cell phone anyway.  I am trying to escape the world most of the time so why would leash myself to a world who does not give a squirrel's testicle about me.  Dr. Mike Sweeney  was teaching us about antibodies and his pager went off. That was  the year of our Lord  Nineteen Seventy Nine.  In those days, a pager was the size of a fireplace brick and almost as heavy.  Doc stopped in the middle of his lecture and said, "See this thing, don't ever get one.  You cannot get away from them!".  He taught me a great deal about immunology and even more about some important stuff.

Distractions of any kind while driving is dangerous.  I remember while heading up the Cumberland Parkway on our way to Ohio.  My dad was trying to reach the back seat of Nineteen Sixty Nine Impala Station Wagon so he could beat my sister and I.  He almost left the front seat while holding on the steering wheel.  Luckily, those wagons had more cargo room than a Conestoga wagon. We just climbed in the back with the reverse facing seats.  Even dad knew it was unsafe to beat and drive at the same time.  He stopped the car and we knew we were dead when we saw the power window open up into the roof of the car.  He beat us right there on the highway with the entire state of Tennessee watching while mumbling something about, "so you think you can get away form me......"  We could hear him mumbling for the next thirty miles or so. He did not seem distracted.  There was no texting going on but he communicated very well to everyone in the US Interstate system that we would be quiet and stop touching each other.

Friday Science: A List

   Name                                     Generally considered


Golgi Bodies          --     shipping and receiving body in a large company
Bundles of His       --      Telephone from one side of the heart to the other
Organelles             --      little organs
xyphoid process    --      bottom part of the breast bone
blastoma               --      Cancer of more immature cells,    
angina                   --      severe pain in the heart, you are most likely having a heart attack              
corpuscular           --      free, unattached, like floating in a river
cloaca's kiss          --      A form of reproduction in birds that can align the  sex organs with a "kiss- quick touch" while in flight.
Malpighian tubules --     waste plumbing system in insects.
Oligochaeta           --     earthworm



That is about it.  Weak I know.

Player's card: Part 1

Three of us who had worked together for some odd twenty years were having lunch in the cafeteria.  One friend was hanging his head low.  The other friend, a Player for many years said, 
"Ace, whats up with the face"?
He always calls him Ace, I know not why.  Ace said,
           Remember last week, I told my wife about it.
What? you told on yourself, you did not even get any.  What did you tell her?
            I told her that we were in our hot tub.
AAAAce.
            She asked if we were naked, I said no, we had bathing suits on.  She said, The bitch brought her bathing suit! So you have been planning this.  I said, No I loaned her one of yours!


The player and Ace were hanging their heads in shame.


Ace, Ace, you never tell on yourself man, what else did your wife say?


Now it was clear Ace was not finished and I was laughing out loud.


The brother is hurtin, lets support him.

       She asked me, Which bathing suit? I said, The nice yellow one.  
       The one I had on this morning,    Your whore had her pussy in my favorite suit?


The Player was looking around and very fidgety.

Ace, Ace, I am sorry to tell you this but we are going to have to pull your Player's Card.  Telling on yourself just will not sit well with The Boys.  I gotta do it.


I had to visit the restroom before returning to work.  I was laughing so hard I could no longer control my sphincter.

confusion

Every morning I wake up to a different tune in my head.  This usually classic song plays most of the day.  Here is a list of the last few days.

Hey, Joe
When I'm Sixty Four
Knights in White Satin
Smackwater Jack
Dust In the Wind
Private Eyes  -- No offense Daryl and John but get the hell out of my head and get your hair out of my mind.   Your have left the cranial door open to Laura Branigan. No offense to Miss Branigan, she just does not belong on this particular list either.  I used to make fun of her music because it was played on a loop for most of the nineteen eighties.  I try to never make fun of anyone who dies of an aneurysm.

We can revisit my insensitivity some other time.

I had Barry White in my brain for three days.  Each song has to be replaced by another jammin tune.
The Kingston Trio got in there and the only way I could get them out, all three of them was to read about them and realize that The Reverend Mr. Black was not really their old man.  I heard a Trini Lopez song the other day and it had my toe a tappin. The blessing there was that I have almost no short term memory function remaining and NO musical ability whatsoever.  The song did not stick in my brain, Thank the Carpenter. 

One time, Elvis's Blue Christmas was churning in my brain far into the month of March.  Can you imagine the damage to my neurons after nearly four months of "blue, blue, blue Christmas".  It was like Battle of the Bands trying to stop that one.  "Kpve raom pm ,e" or with my fingers on the correct keys "Love, Rain on Me" kicked Blue Christmas to the curb.  I just figured out the Russian language.  Cyrillic conversion is actually just putting your fingers on the wrong anchor keys. Go figure that one out!

I am going to investigate some  Nick Gilder tune.  Oh the humanity,  Hot child in the City, du, du, du, Help!  Runnin wild and lookin pretty, du, du, du,  Hasten annihilation!

Why Can Not We All Just Get Along?

Some decisions can not be settled with a compromise any more than a man can stop sinning.  In Egypt and many other places in the Middle East, an educated man has greater chance of being unemployed.  That is a completely opposite cultural situation that I have been experienced with concerning education and  a future. Gross misunderstandings of these kinds make compromising seem impossible.   In our country, we constantly worry about illegal immigrant labor taking jobs from the hard working people of America. Could there be a real compromise on the immigration issue.  Compromise is actually a solution yet many people are already clicking off this blog because they really do not want a solution, they want it how they want it.  ( well,not many are clicking off.  No readers, no judges)

Research has indicated that suboptimal compromises are often the result of negotiators failing to realize when they have interests that are completely compatible with those of the other party and settle for suboptimal agreements. Mutually better outcomes can often be found by careful investigation of both parties' interests, especially if done early in negotiations   ^ Thompson, Leigh; R. Hastie (1990). "Organizational Behavior & Human Decision Processes, (Issue 47)" Social perception in negotiation. Academic Press. pp. 98–123. Retrieved 2009-08-17.


".....Negotiators failing to realize......."  Are these negotiators all pig headed, stubborn, selfish, fascist, revolutionary zealots.  Some of them may be just that.  There are parasites and there are symbiotes in nature and in society.  Humans have the capacity to dominate nature in social ways as well as physical coercions.  We do not have to accept the doctrine of survival of the fittest.  After all, it is fairly clear that humans may not be the fittest animal on the planet for continued domination.  Could not the amount of time, money and effort be spent on social adjustments instead of physical rearrangement of materials and body parts.  If we really wanted oil from the brown skinned people of the middle east, would it not be cheaper and friendlier for out government to literally buy  it from them than to have Boeing, Raytheon and the General Dynamics build weapons and sell it to them.  Would it not be cheaper to "teach them to fish" than to wage war?  


"What" just be nice and help them and they will give us oil? Then who will be greatest?  Years ago, The leaders and the people of Egypt and Israel  realized the completely compatible issues in their societies.   These leaders believed  the commonalities and goals would outweigh the differences and two countries could live in some sort of harmony.  Go figure,  The process of compromise requires effort and understanding.   The people of Northern Ireland found some kind of peace when the people, not the governments and the political fascists decided that if they were going to live together and wanted to watch their children grow up, there would have to be some kind of compromise.   


I think compromise is learned and rooted in trust.  Not just trust in the enemy or the other person but trust in the possibility of compromise.  Love and compromise are expressions of the same God.   "All we are saying, Is give peace a chance".  


Yes, we can all get along. Really.  

Friday Science

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2NlwaNi_YtU

The video link is an octopus in a bottle.  Remarkable.  The other day I watched a show with all these monkeys and primates doing all kinds of junk.  They were fighting each other one minute, protecting themselves and other apes from giant monitor lizards another minute.  I read an article about a possible Bison roundup in Yellowstone National park because they are worried about Brucellosis that can be transmitted to cows. Come on guys, this is the Twenty First century.  Have the Buffalo not suffered enough.

 I think we need to add Octopus to the intelligent species that should not be exploited list. Is there not endless knowledge we can gain from all species but especially the intelligent ones.  I read a book where people were objecting to war crimes criminals being executed.  We need to know why they did the horrible things they did so maybe we can prevent similar atrocities in the future. 

I am not saying we should not harvest animals for food.  We need to give them respect as living creatures.  A humane life and death is not too much to ask for any species.  Why do we not treat animals more humanely?
Why was the octopus in the bottle in the first place.  I think most octopi are stoners anyway.  Maybe that is why.

How I do it

I have been writing for over a month now and I have some of my own conclusions to list out.

1.  I cannot spell for crap sake.
2.  I have unique grammar, maybe lousy.
3.  I have had three visitors so far, wife and daughters.
4.  My plan was to write blogs at work while I was not doing anything.
5.  I am too busy at work to write.
6.  I need to continue reading other blogs and stuff to help with my writing.

I have all of these writing ideas and I am going to figure out how a blog can help bring those ideas to reality.

A Player

I was at Tony's Bar watching an awkward looking guy dancing with an average looking lady.  Tony's place had about six epoxy top tables with a heavily varnished wooden bar and several different types of chairs.  The cigarette smoke was thicker than the local drunks.  Tube Snake Boogie was just finishing up and I heard Awkward say to Average,

Awkward:  You look nice while you dance, I am sure that song was not made for dancing.


       Average:   What was it made for? How do I look while I am not dancing?


Well, It is not like I am going to take you home to screw ya.


        What?


No, well I have standards, (short pause) I can do ya on a car or in the bushes.  But you are not coming home with me.
    
The slap made a loud smack on his cheek and the guy sitting next to him just busted out laughing.  Awkward did not seem surprised.

Average grabbed her drink and started to run off when she said,
        Look dickhead, I am not some slut you can just dance with on the floor and then expect to    dance with in the back of a car.

Wait, I think you got it all wrong.  You also make me look better on the dance floor.  Hell, all these bitches want me now. And not in the back of a car, you can not get any thrusting going in the back of a car.  On the hood with the moon on my ass. It says it in the Bible "In the shadows is where all the naughty stuff is". You can keep you shirt on and I will do my best to keep the mosquitoes off ya.
    
          You are fucked up.

Average was crying now and Awkward felt bad.

Hey, let me buy you one more drink and have one more dance to make it up to you. Then you can go home and cry.


       Is that an apology?

 I  started talking to the bar tender about chicken fingers and boiled peanuts.  After ordering another drink, I noticed Average was gone and Awkward was paying his tab with a handful of crumpled bills. I looked at him expecting to see a dejected soul going home alone.  What I saw was a Player of the extraordinary kind.  As I started my walk home, I did not see Awkward leaning on the hood of a car. He was in the bushes on an Average night..

Testing

I lost one of my best stories while trying to post.  I posted another one and it showed up as a Saturday post.  What the?

I have enough trouble writing this blob, I can not stand incompetence, only in myself sometimes.  And while I am at it.  I am very poor at spelling and grammar.  I hope that through writing every day, I will get better.

I want to!

Writing

I just need to write, I want to write. I get such a sore neck when I write. Headaches follow. It is my posture and my eyesight. I try to sit up straight and I make the type larger but before I know it, I am hunched over with my eyes three or four inches from the keyboard and screen. The brightness of this remarkable screen makes it impossible to see the keys or anything else near my computer. I squint tightly like a cat's bung hole. Writing is not as bad while at work.  I am supposed to be working while at work, go figure.

My shoulders started burning while trying to hold my posture. I searched for the mouse to correct some misspelling and I cannot see it. I pushed over my cup of watered-down orange/pineapple cool-aid.

I really enjoy writing, just not at this moment in time.   

Grits

My first thoughts of the day are usually about grits. Specifically, Corned beef hash and grits. Actually, this morning it was, “I can see it raining fire in the sky, the echoes from the campfire are softer than a lullaby” as it drummed through my mind. The tune loops through my mind with bits and pieces of the PBS show about John Denver. Swiftly, thoughts of breakfast set up shop in my mind. I may fight the compelshion to eat for several hours only to succumb to how much grits to mix with how much water. You can buy regular grits, instant grits or quick grits. I cannot see much difference between quick or regular grits. They both need boiling water, salt and time.

I found this concoction of corned beef hash and grits about a year ago. You can find true love in the strangest places. I now keep my eyes peeled for corned beef hash. The grits are easy like a date in Singapore but the hash is mystery meat “thing”. The obsession of love transcends logic. I used to talk fondly of fried catfish and grits. The comparative equals are a short list. Fried Catfish is mostly fried stuff with a little bit of farm raised bland fish. In fact, the fried part is mostly cornmeal. I think that is grits so you are getting fried grits and boiled grits. It is good, capable of infatuation but not true love. It does not have a soul.

The John Denver PBS show featured interviews with the love of his life, Annie who was with him while he saw the fire in the sky. Anyway, I do think they had grits that morning while he ignored her and wrote the love song about the love for her. Maybe if he would have said :screw you!” to the songwriting a little more and “screw you?” to Annie a little more they would not have gotten divorced. Corned beef hash and grits could be the culinary love of the rest of my life. The exploration of its complexities and textures will take a lifetime. The quality of the corned beef and the potatoes need to be investigated. I need to learn the art of creating the hash. Grits and Corned beef hash is a perfect match of North and South. Grits are smooth like a southern girl's coo. Corned beef hash is blue blood, north of the Mason-Dixon abruptly arrogant and male. Together they battle lovingly like staged drills of a high school band. All those female and male hormones raging yet controlled to create a much finer presentation.

While taking a class in college, one of the questions on the multiple choice test was “What is the main ingredient in grits” 1: wheat b: corn C: rice 5: barley. This was a bird class that I never even bought the course recommended book for review. I picked C: rice even though I had been eating grits for twenty years. I desire grits but I love Corned Beef Hash and Grits. Besides,if I eat a huge volume of rice I have trouble peeing. I am glad grits are made of corn.

Friday Science : Teach a man to Fish Part 1

"Give a man a fish, Feed him for a day, Teach him to fish, feed him for life"  Or something like that. Another wisdom I heard was "Study any subject for one hour a day, each day for one year and at the end of that year, you will be one of the world's experts in that subject."

I wanted to start backyard fish farming.  I am not sure why although it seemed like a cool thing to say at a party. "Yep, I grow them in a pool in my backyard, you should come over to see my success and make yourself feel less than me!"  I read everything I could read about aquaculture.  I read about fish in baskets in the ocean.  I saw ditches filled with Tilapia and plenty of smiling faces holding up ugly fish.  After about a year, I felt I was an expert on the methods of fish farming.  I was going to grow fish in a pool in my back yard.  A few small problems did exist.  I did not have a backyard, I did not have the correct kind of pool and I had not briefed my wife on this "latest" scheme.  Maybe I should have been reading about how to communicate with a wife. 

I actually did have a backyard.  It was small and filled with a trampoline, a playhouse, a flower garden and a large, cunning dog that I rented out to Mexican drug lords to assist them in their tunnel digging.  This dog could did through roots and hardpan without breaking a toenail.  He could move a yard of dirt from under the patio in minutes.  I was in the kitchen when I heard Bruno barking.  It sounded like he was in the bathroom.  He was under the bathroom.  I decide to put together a fish farming plan and look for investors.  My neighbor Tim was single and had a backyard and no dog.  He was always up for a this kind of scheme so I presented it to him. He wanted to know if beer would be required.  Most definitely I assured him.    "The pool is $200 and it comes with a pump and a filter. I have everything else WE need including the cooler to keep the beer cold.  I can get the fish from the pet store.  They breed like rabbits so in no time we will have lots of fish.

I must have covered it all because Tim did not ask any other questions, he just game me the 200 and off I went in quest of the perfect backyard fish farming pool. 

the writer

I responded to an advertisement for a part time staff writer with the local weekly newspaper. The interview went something like this.

Editor:  Why should I continue with this interview for a writer's position if you do not have examples of your writing to review?

     Me:   Ah, You like the direct approach. My Grandpa used to say, Direct is usually best cept you have to keep your balance cause you are gonna get slapped once in a while. He also used to say, “Always keep a good hole handy” so you had to receive his wisdom slowly, well like,  pumpkin soup and think about it later.

Your Grandpa drank a little?

         Some.

Do you drink a little?

       No, I said, I have a hole in my lip and it always drips on my silk ties.

Hole in your lip?

       From getting slapped.

Like to eat?

       I think I am Veggan.

I think that is a foreign car.

       My mother was a car.

Hmmm, (looking distracted,short pause) I need someone to write reviews of local eating and drinking establishments. This writer needs to provide an approved copy once a week and is also responsible for postings on several Internet sites. Once a year there needs to be a review summary and post winners in various categories. For each accepted review, the pay is one hundred dollars.

       I will take it!

I did not offer it to you?

      Are you sure?

I thought I was sure but you seem pretty sure yourself.

       Hmmm. Ok, Do I get a desk and a pencil, after all, I am a writer.

Are you sure? No pencils, no paper. Everything is electronic.

       Do you pay for the drinks and the food, electricity?

No.

       Not much of a job!

Not much of a writer.

      You got that right!

My Mother the Car

Most people younger than fifty will not remember this short lived TV show.  All I remember is Jerry Van Dyke's mother  reincarnated as a Model A Ford or something like that. He would turn on the radio whenever he wanted to talk to her. Excuse me, a car? There was F-Troop, My Favorite Martian (That means they knew more than one Martian) and one of my all time favorites, It's About Time. Those caveman jokes are timeless.

These shows were for kids to watch and parents to tolerate and were created in the middle of the British Invasion and the invasion of Vietnam War. Kids were dying, doing Acid and smoking Pot everywhere. There may have been political correctness, but I never heard it. I did hear that the Beatles were ruining our youth. What about Dick Van Dyke jumping in and out of chalk pavement pictures or his brother talking to a glove compartment in a rusty car?. I am sure the writers of those shows were doing serious drugs.  Was it biblical to have cavemen and dinosaurs and reincarnation?  Was it correct to send high school kids to southeast Asia and not correct to let them hang out at Haight-Ashbury or Woodstock?

My Mother the Car and shows like it had a premise, go with that and the rest was easy and enjoyable. Mr. Ed was a funny show. Gomer Pyle may not have been everyman but a little bit of Sargent Carter was in all of us. I read today about a new show on some cable network that has teenagers doing all kinds of stuff like sex and drugs. Really, did my kids do those thing?.  The show does not let parents throw a half dressed boy out of  their fifteen year old daughter's  window or kicking their ass when they get caught lighting up. Consequences of unacceptable behavior could be found on Andy Griffith and Leave it to Beaver. You can say whatever you want about Time Tunnel or even The Outer Limits, but they still had values of honesty, consequences and love. Deviancy and crudeness were portrayed as just that, deviant and crude. My Mother the Car did not advocate reincarnation, the show wanted you to laugh at something ridiculous and forget our kids were dying from drugs and bullets.  I was ten years old, I did not know about Vietnam or Haight-Ashbury but I laughed at Mr. Ed. 

Reality Shows

If I have to wait through a commercial for one more tribal council I think I will shoot the TV with a registered firearm.  It was a real kick in the testicles when I learned that the stars, if that is really possible, get crap loads of money.  People complain when a professional athlete get used up and thrown away before thirty years of age and receive large sums of money yet they do not flinch at some talentless bimbo getting millions to yell at her kids.  The reality is there are too many morons in the world.  I do not blame the stars from taking the money any more than I blame a broken down athlete for taking money.  I rarely watch professional sports and that includes college and I do not watch reality television.

I am not sure what makes a show like Amazing Race watchable for so many years.  Why would anyone care to watch Bachelor, it is not EVEN well written.  Well, it is probably better written than this sludge you are currently reading  but I am not getting millions of  dollars for it either.  When I do watch Steven Segal mangle people's scrotums with a tire iron or when Jackie Chan slides down the side of a skyscraper, at least I know it is probably not any more real than Championship Wrestling.  Network executives are not trying to prove Buffy really did slay vampires.  Our lives are much more interesting and tragic than any reality show.  They do not have more love, hate, lying or cheating.  Now, Cheaters is a great reality show.  It is better than Cops, just much harder to watch.

Watching a man, a stupid man try to talk his way out of some skank's pants while his wife and girlfriend are jack slapping his ass is as close to reality as you can get.  In a recent news story, a lady poured gasoline in her boyfriend's lap and set his crank on fire.  Real enough for me. A week later, he told her that he would not press charges and wanted to continue seeing her.  Now that is reality.

She said, Sorry, your junk was only SO, SO in the first place and now it is all shriveled and shit.   Na, not interested. 

 I had tears in my eyes from the sadness and the laughter.