important statistic & the election

When President Clinton was in office from 1993-2001, the average American family gained $7,500 from the beginning of his term to the end.
While George Bush has been president, the average American family HAS LOST $2,000 from 2001 to the present time.

I can't complain about election coverage or the way the election is going. There has been some criticism of the media for being too positive with Obama and too negative against McCain. They have counted more negative stories about McCain than Obama. However, one journalist said it best, "If McCain is running a lousy campaign and we don't show that or report that, then we are biased against Obama."

If there was one thing that I don't like it's that journalists and everyone else is trying to create false suspense. They are saying that the election is closer than it appears. McCain, they say, could still win it. Yea, right! 1st he has to win Pennsylvania and the polls have him up by over 10% points. Very big lead to overcome. Obama is going into Republican states to campaign while McCain is desperately trying to hold onto those same states. But the journalists have been coming up with all these scenarios that he could win. One is that people don't want to look racist so they tell the pollster that they will vote for Obama and then turn around and vote for McCain. But pollsters are getting wise to that & ask questions that will uncover bias which they then factor into the results.

Anyway, I enjoyed the joint appearance by Clinton and Obama last night in Florida. That's where I got the statistic to open this post. I'm also really happy to hear Obama give Clinton credit to how much better our nation was in the 90s.

I don't know... maybe I should take these reports of a close election seriously. But the problem is that the thought of McCain winning after Obama has opened up this lead makes me too angry to think about. IT's bad to lose elections especially to a guy as devious and underhanded as Bush. But to lose after being ahead is just too much to take. I think if McCain wins, I'm going to go on a prolonged, violent attack against certain conservative targets. It's going to make my pyro escapades the night Reagan was re-elected in 1984 look tame in comparison.

Well, lets just pray that don't happen!! The nation needs a decent president and so does the world!! We deserve a helluva lot better than a Bush retread.

I like this guy

I read a really good article/bio about Keith Olberman a newsman at MSNBC. So, I have been checking him out a couple times ever since. I like hearing what he has to say. I guess I can almost empathize with someone on the other end of the political spectrum saying that they like Rush Limbaugh or Bill O'Reilly. After all, if there is a guying saying things that you really agree with, you will probably enjoy hearing them talk.

I enjoyed what he had to say last night for instance and the cravenness that Fox Network had tried to capitalize on their coverage of the woman who said she was accosted by a black man from the Obama campaign and had a "B" scrawled on her face. This woman finally confessed that this didn't happen, and that she had beat herself up and scratched the B on her face to get publicity (how does someone do that).

Now I hear that he has a "political soulmate" named Rachel Maddow, and since she also agrees with my views, it looks like I will be watching more of them in the future. She comes on right after he ends his broadcast of "Countdown".

The chances are very good that there will be more Democrats in Congress and that Barack Obama will be the next President of the United States. So the "hope" I spoke of in my Intro part of my blog is being replaced by happiness and optimism. I feel like a little kid waiting for Christmas only my day to "open the presents" is going to be November 4! I will right more about this when the results are official.

The kids and I are going to take part in the history and hopefully go to Grant Park for Obama's election rally. The only thing holding us back is trying to get a ticket quick enough, and the difficulty in either getting the kids on the train or downtown by car. It would really be great to take part in history rather than reading about it.

season over

Ted has been playing ball on Sundays for the Oak Forest 49ers since the last wk. of August., and today was the last game of the year. They were winless, the team they played today was undefeated. So they lost 28-0. Ted's team was smaller, slower and inexperienced than that team and all the other teams they played too. They were decent on defense, but poor on offense. They had a very difficult time achieving any consistency on offense. When there was good blocking the running backs would run to the wrong place (they were only 3rd graders as running backs). When they ran to the right place there was no blocking.

But there were some bright moments. Ted played nearly every snap of every game. He did a pretty good job today. They played the same team last week, and he was up against a kid bigger and tougher than him and he ended up hurting his legs and his back. He was so sore he missed school on Monday and missed Tuesday's practice. But today, he came out of the game unscathed.

Anyway, I am showing a picture of the back of his helmet. His awards are either "Pows" or "footballs". He gets a Pow for stopping the ball (he pulls off a flag rather than tackling the ball carrier). He got a football for achievement on offense like snapping the ball back to the QB flawlessly (Ted was the center), the team's only TD or blocking well on a given play.

Ted is reading this too. & he would like to point out that he would have gotten a lot more Pows but they ran out 2 games ago. So he would have received 6 or 7 more than what appears in this picture. Also, he would have had 2 more footballs on his helmet too.

poor MB

I feel sorry for MB, b/c she didn’t get a wink of sleep last night. Her father couldn’t go to dialysis and has been filling up with fluid and that makes it harder for him to breathe. Plus, he’s also got pneumonia so she was up for awhile hearing him breathe then finally she called the ambulance.

It was annoying, b/c the paramedics in the ambulance wanted to ask her dad a bunch of questions to verify he wanted to actually go to the hospital. Then, he made it worse by saying he had no problems breathing. So that led to more questions, finally with MB’s blunt warnings, they concluded it was a good idea to take him to the hospital. It’s usually a good idea to take someone to the hospital if they can actually hear how hard it is for someone to breathe (Don’t you think??? Duh!)

The illness has also made him confused. Maribeth got home at 6:15 after being up all night, then a ½ hour later, she got a call from the hospital. First a nurse talked to her, and then her dad got on the phone. He said, “Guess what Maribeth? I’m in the hospital!”

Resolved

I was upset with my older brother at the content of his political e-mails sent (I think it's reasonable to assume that he agrees with what was said, b/c that's what he said!)

Later, however, he complemented me for the way I presented my view compared to his.

So that was very gracious of him, and I complimented him for that. We promptly changed the subject in our e-mails and talked about my oldest son instead.

So, in the last post in this blog, I was being sarcastic and not trying to take things too seriously, but now it's even less important.

The chances of Barack Obama and a more Democrats in Congress are growing. I am happy about that but I am not too exuberant, b/c it would be foolish to make all sorts of predictions only to see them proven false on election day.

I love my family, but they're wrong

So, Thursday, I receive this political screed from my well-to-do older brother. He forwards something that some idiot from Maine wrote stating that those who give money to Democrats during this election might as well "Fed Ex a grenade launcher to the terrorists".
Then today, I get an e-mail from one of 2 sisters (no, not the one who deliberately ignores me, but the other, more intelligent one). In it, I read from some other political screed that if I vote for Obama, I am going against God. As much as I really hate to admit it, that e-mail hurts worse than the one that my brother sent.
I wrote back to both. The screed that my sister sent also noted that Obama is suspect because he was once supported by Jeremiah Wright. I told her that by that standard, all Catholics should be held under suspicion because our leader, the Pope, idiotically states that married couples who use condoms are sinning.
Yeah, I know, it doesn't make sense to me either.
So one day my brother insults me, the next day my sister insults me, I insult both of them back so I was just thinking about the future.

At the rate I'm going, I'll probably not even get the satisfaction of seeing Barack Obama win the election. No, instead I'll probably get run over and killed after I vote for Obama in the morning of Nov. 4 by one of those asshole cab drivers in Chicago running a red light, then promptly go to hell (hey that's what the e-mail insinuates anyway), then in the final coup de gras, some person will piss on my grave and write TERRORIST with a big black magic marker on my tombstone.
It's been nice knowing everyone. Don't worry, I'll try to avoid all this mess; I'm going to confession within the next 10 days. Please pray for me!
Thanks.
Good bye.

witty speech from insignificant me

A few of you may be here for one of the 1st times b/c I told you to check out my political entry. That would be the entry BEFORE this one.

I belong to the St. Damian Men's Club, we are a philanthropic organization that helps the parochial school and the church groups and the Oak Forest community. So we had a free dinner tonight in appreciation of the members of the group and their lovely wives/significant others/ domestic partners, and Maribeth couldn't go b/c she had the common cold.


It's really amazing how far you can go by just paying attention. The average age of the Men's Club is 65. So the women were that old too. But I was amazed at how many kept themselves "up" and they looked great! So since I am the Vice President of the group I got up. Giving a speech, I said, "I haven't seen this many good looking women in one place since the Miss USA pageant!!!" There's was a big whoop and cheer, and since we got some sharp people in the group, someone yelled out, "What year was the pageant"? That was so funny b/c it was dead on w/ reality.

Then I added how happy I was to see so many new faces b/c the only way the group will have a good future is with young men taking the place of a group of men leaving the group b/c they are in their 70s and 80s.

It was a short, concise happy speech which picked up the mood of the crowd of 70 and even picked up my sour mood too after some person insinuated that I was a terrorist just b/c I would rather fall off a 10,000 ft. cliff than vote Republican.

All Reactionaries can fuck off!

an exchange of 2 opposing political views

1st e-mail:

I am very scared for our nation as we have gotten so soft and liberal. I believe if Obama get in for president that we are in the end times. I feel very badly for what we have left our children.

My reply e-mail:

Nonsense, (name withheld) I am damn glad that we are going to have a Democratic Congress and a Democratic President. You make it sound like Obama is some Godless twerp. Bush will go down as one of the worst presidents we've had since Warren Harding. It's not right when his rich friends lobby and make laws that are lax on the environment. Bush was way, way, way behind figuring out that allowing cars to burn gas for the forseeable future is a great thing. The state he led, Texas, before he was president had cities with the worst smog in the nation. The United States, among the world, is not the leader or the beacon in saving the environment. It used to be!!

Reasonable minds can disagree on Iraq. I don't agree with leaving Iraq on January 20, as some would think Obama would (HE WON'T!!). But the Iraq War was a mistake for 3 reasons: we were, in fact, misled to believe that there were weapons for mass destruction, (2) we lost over 4,000 of our finest men and women and that was a shame (3) more effort in Iraq means less effort in Afganhistan. Anyone who pays attention knows that Democrats favor the war in Afganhistan. (THereby proving the idea that Democrats are soft on terrorism is B.S.)

I once was a Republican and believed the bill of goods Reagan tried to sell us. But I stopped in 1982. What I've learned over the years is that Republican presidents favor going billions and billions of dollars more than what this nation needs in national defense all the while deprive poor people programs and opportunities to improve. I will never support a party like that. I will never support a party that hates the minimum wage.

Here's a dirty little secret that you and other Republicans fail to acknowledge. Republican businessmen love to proclaim how hard they worked for the wealth they earned. Well, the fact is poor people work hard too (surprise)! There are many people, as we speak, working 2 jobs, work 50-60 hrs. a week and getting a crappy wage with no insurance. They, their children and their community suffers as a result. & the answer ISN'T TAXING THEM LESS, JUST AS THE PROBLEM OF TOO FEW PEOPLE HAVING INSURANCE IS LESS TAXES. That's the most weak, ineffective solution there is!

You may have heard of a President by the name of Clinton. Oh, of course, you know that he got impeached and lied and committed adultery. Yes, yes shame on him for that. But you probably forgot the part where he raised the taxes of the wealthy in 1993 and then our nation had the longest sustained prosperity in our nation's history. He balanced the budget and that led to the prosperity. But don't take my word for it. Listen to Alan Greenspan, the former Federal Reserve Chairman during the Bush, Clinton and Junior Bush early adm. Oh and by the way Alan Greenspan is a REPUBLICAN!! He gave Clinton credit for balancing the budget and trimming the national debt (which is double; thanks to Bush and the Republicans in Congress when they were in the majority). He said that trimming the national debt led to prosperity. Yes, it wasn't the only reason but it was a MAJOR contributor.

Republican love to deride Democrats about how they tax and spend. Well, I hate the Republican "borrow and spend' policies. Think about it when we buy a tank or a machine gun for one of our courageous soldiers in Iraq on borrowed money, you know & I know the taxpayers pay for the price of the tank and gun and they pay the interest for borrowing the money. With Bill Clinton, we had a "pay as you go" government. You'd never hear that from a Republican. I could go on for 8 more pages, but that would really suck, wouldn't it? Let's face it. You are a businessman who hates high taxes, who believes in morality and capitalism. So you are a natural for supporting the Republicans. I don't hold that against you. What bothers me about you is when you support candidates who believe in borrow and spend policies, who waste billions of dollars to the Pentagon, and their actions show that they don't give a damn for the poor.

You had your 6 years of Republicans in Congress and the White House. In those 6 years, some things didn't go so well did they?? Guess what? it's our turn! Don't worry, someday we'll elect another Republican president. The Republicans are alive and well. I am a natural Democrat as I proudly work in the 3rd largest city of our nation, I walk past homeless people Monday through Friday on my way to work. I have struggled and cut costs trying to balance a budget. I am an employee not a boss.

So (name withheld), if you ever tout your political views to me, I promise you a very spirited response. If you still want to do that, great. I respect, but don't agree with your views. Also, I believe and assume that you are a very good boss. You told me in the past you provide your employees health insurance. Good for you. If more bosses treated their employees like you, _____, we might not have some of the laws protecting employees as we do now. The fact is that there is a certain minority of bosses that ruin it for others and have to be stopped.

Let's clear a few more things up. Not all Democrats believe in abortion. THe Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is against abortion. I am against abortion in most cases. Democrats are for a strong national defense and applaud the policies Bush carried out against Afganhistan until he went to war against Iraq and depleted forces in Afganhistan. There are moral Democrats. Barack Obama is a church going, happily married man. He's a Christian, NOT A MUSLIM, as a few of those redneck Republicans would have us believe. If Obama cheated on his wife, don't you think with how intrusive the media is we would know about it? Clearly Fox's "fair and balanced news" (not) would have dug up something by now. I never thought that Republicans were evil or stupid. I do however, question/disagree with Republicans' policies and their national priorities.

tell Karen Knudsen that I have her card

A few nights ago, I was walking the 2/3 of a mile to the train. Below the curb laying on Adams Street by LaSalle Street was something that looked like a credit card. I picked it up and it was an employee ID. The company was The Human Resources Services Group, and proclaimed that I had some of their property by holding on to her ID.

I want her to have her card back. I googled the above company but the results were not helpful. I guess the thing to do now is Google "Karen Knudsen." Wish me luck finding her. & if you know her please let her know I have her ID and would be happy to give it back. I feel bad for her, b/c I know what it's like to lose something important and all the inconvenience associated with replacing the possession lost. I remember one time I was carrying $200. Now, that was a very, very rare event. I usually carry a sum of $20 or less. Carrying $200 was an event that happens .000001% of the time. I'm not exaggerating that much. I made the mistake of wearing a fall jacket with shallow pockets in it. I was pick pocketed and gone was the $200. My wife understandably raised some hell and even cried about it because obviously to a struggling family, $200 is a lot of money.

& Karen, if we don't meet, and I can't give your ID back, I keenly feel your pain.

sometimes I wonder

I've seen a pattern with blogs and writing on my depression support group. I will be so upset that I'm compelled to write. So I do, and some of the remarks, observations made seem a bit "edgy" maybe even "outrageous".

Then, sometimes as soon as 24 hours later, after a decent night's rest, I don't feel so upset. Then I wonder if what I said was too outrageous, too overwrought. Of course, if I never showed my feelings, this would be a pretty damn boring blog.

For example, two days ago, I used the analogy of a finger being cut off and being upset. It would be a mistake to think that I believe that what I'm going through is as bad as getting a finger cut off. It was just an analogy. I actually know someone who has had their finger cut off, and I know for a fact that man has gone through more horrors than I could ever imagine. & I'm sure some of you knew what I meant already.

Still, I worry that I'm being a bit of a "drama queen". That's not the intention. It's a really fine line that a blogger must deal with anytime he writes about him or herself. If you write about how happy you are and your accomplishments, there are those who think you are "tooting your own horn" and that you are a tiresome bore. The triumphal Christmas card from an overbearing family comes immediately to mind.

Then, if you bemoan your problems, then people think you should get off your ass and stop whining so much (because it's getting annoying).

I don't know if I handle that dilemma very well or not. What do you think?

a story and a money saving dilemma

Here is a story and a problem I often think about.

There was a baseball player named Mordecai Brown. He was a great pitcher and played for the Chicago Cubs. He was so great that the Chicago Cubs won a championship with him. The fans here in Chicago have been thinking a lot about the time Brown helped the Cubs win the World Series for them. It was in 1908, a hundred yrs. since they last won the championship.

Mordecai Brown was very unique, b/c he was born with only three fingers on the hand that he pitched with. They nicknamed him “3-Fingered” Brown and rarely called him Mordecai. Brown accepted the nickname, b/c in those days everyone had nicknames. People marveled that a man with one less finger than others could pitch so well. They used to ask him, “Isn’t it hard to pitch with 3 fingers?!?” He said, “No, because I was born with only 3 fingers on that hand. I’m obviously used to it.”

This story points out a very important lesson. You don’t miss what you never had. How many of you miss not living in a mansion? Not very many of you. However, if you have something and it gets taken away, then we really miss it!! I would like it if our household got rid of cable TV. The problem is that Maribeth and my 3 kids would definitely miss cable TV.

I’m in a dilemma, because as much as our household saves money, we still come up a little short when we pay for bills. We rarely go out to eat, and on the rare occasion we do, it’s to McDonalds. We always do our laundry at my father-in-law’s place rather than pay $2 for laundry at our condo. (bless my FIL’s heart! He’s helped us in so many ways!!) We don’t order out for pizza. We don’t rent movies like we used to. We don’t subscribe to as many magazines as we used to. We make our meals at home and then we eat them at work, we don’t go and plunk down $10 to eat lunch somewhere. We NEVER go clubbin’ and haven’t for well over a decade.

But if that’s not enough, the idea is to do more cost cutting. If we got rid of cable TV, we would save $50,$60 a month (enough to pay another bill). But if we got rid of cable Maribeth and our kids would raise holy Hell! They wouldn’t get to watch Cartoon Network and Maribeth wouldn’t be able to watch The Closer and Law & Order. I wouldn’t give a damn whether we have cable or not. But MB pays the cable, so I don’t have the power to get rid of it. Plus, it’s probably still not enough to solve our bill-paying problem.

So how far does one have to go to live an ascetic lifestyle? Should we all go around eating peanut butter sandwiches for most of our meals? Should we walk everywhere within 1 mile to save on gas (even when it’s raining)? Should we skip all snacks to save on the grocery bill? Should we avoid all plays, school productions, Market Days to save all sorts of money? Should we both work 60 hours a week and stop seeing and parenting our kids so much, but we’ll earn a lot more money? Should we stop our subscription to the Chicago Tribune, and get the same paper out of the trash for free? Should we go “dumpster diving” like some families do if it meant that we no longer suffer the anguish of overdraft fees and late charges?

Now you and I know the answer to the last 3 questions, but it still makes me wonder. We are used to living an easier, more pleasant lifestyle. It’s hard to cutback, so how much will we sacrifice?

I often come up with analogies about a certain situation or a certain plight.

I finally came up with one about the problem that bothers me most, my family’s financial situation. It’s a well known fact that many people are struggling to pay their mortgages, pay their bills, go into debt, lose their ass, etc. Here’s what it’s like:

It’s like a bunch of people walking around with diabetes, and the diabetes is the severe form because if we don’t make all the right moves we lose a limb. (That’s analogous to all the people with money problems.) So, I try hard and make 85% of the right moves, but since I haven’t made 95-100% of the right moves, then I’m forced to lose my right pinkie finger. But people come up to me and say, “It’s sad you lost a finger, but I know so many people who are losing arms, legs, one person I know lost all four limbs!!” Yet, I don’t agree with them at all. I feel bad that I lost my finger. I’m staring at my little lost appendage and thinking, “Damn, this is terrible! I tried hard not to lose this but I still did!”

The people who lose arms, legs, all 4 are analogous to the people who lose their cars, who are thrown out of their houses, go homeless, begging on the streets, are bankrupt. Yet, as hard as I work, it seems like I don’t deserve to lose my house. But then again, what did they do to deserve this?

Some updates

Wanted to give a few updates:

I have announced at the last meeting that I wouldn’t run for another term on my condo complex’s board of directors. After November 24, I will no longer be the President of the Board. It will be nice to not worry as much on how the condo is doing and there was stress when we had to pass a special assessment or had to raise assessments. I am happy that I was on the Board, and I think that I have helped a lot of people while I was first Secretary and then President of the Board. The proudest achievement was getting a very corrupt administrator of the complex out of there when we first started back in 2003.

Andy, my oldest son, is doing OK in school and we will continue to watch his progress and make sure he is doing his assignments in school. This will be vital, because it seems like 7th grade is more difficult than 6th grade was. He will definitely need to work harder than last year.

Ted is doing well in football and continues to play every minute of the football games. His team is younger and smaller than the other teams that they play, and they have not won any games yet. I hope they continue to learn and improve. They have 2 more games to go. They are playing the 1st place team and they will play the same team in the tournament. I doubt that they will win, because they other team is bigger and stronger. Hopefully, Ted and his teammates will not get hurt against this tough team.

Brianna and Ted both celebrated birthdays this past week. Brianna is now 7 and Ted is 10. (On December 4, Andy will be a teenager and celebrate his 13th birthday.) Brianna & Ted had fun celebrating their birthdays at the Hollywood arcade, a place where kids can have birthday parties.

Lately, things seem all right, and there is not as much reason to complain. I am also happy with the way the upcoming election is going for the United States. It looks as though November 4 will be a happy day as the candidates running for office have good chances in winning. But nothing is guaranteed and we won’t know until Nov. 4 what the outcome will be.

update on Andy

After reading the last post, I realized that I left out a very important part of Andy falling off the balcony. When Andy fell off the balcony, he was wearing his bike helmet. He was not trying to commit suicide. What he told me was that he was upset with MB & I, b/c we had disciplined him for lying to us about his homework. After I disciplined him that morning (& mind you it wasn't anything really harsh, I just made it clear that I wouldn't tolerate lying), he wanted to find out how much or if we cared about him so he jumped off the balcony.

Andy, in 4 days of hospitalization (psychiatric) and a week and a half of outpatient counseling is learning better coping skills.

Andy will be back to his normal school schedule on Thursday. His last day (& it's actually only less than 3 hours) at Children's Memorial Hosp. is tomorrow. Yesterday and today he has gone to the Arbor Park Middle School (his normal school) for an hour and then the rest of the day at Children's Memorial.

I was going through the coursework he missed in the 2 1/2 weeks he was out. It was multiplying decimals, dividing decimals and long division. Math is unique because skills you use 1 week are applied the next week. That's not really true of other subjects.

I discovered that Andy doesn't know long division. He can do problems like

72 divided by 8 =9

36 divided by 6 = 6

But he can't do problems like

723 divided by 8 = ____

452 divided by 2 = ____

So, I've been teaching him this. It's going to take awhile. I wonder how long it will take him to learn this??

I can't figure out why he didn't know this!! When I was ten and eleven, I worked on long division in both 5th and 6th grades. He told me that they worked on it some in 6th grade but he didn't do very well. He's in a good school district. I don't understand how this happened.

At any rate, he is going to be all right and we will work very hard to see that he does well in school.

be back later.....

I have been very busy and can't really blog hop and stay in touch with my dear blogging buddies or write any new posts.

The biggest problem is that my oldest son, Andy, jumped off our balcony at our condo. It was over a 20 ft. fall. He has no broken bones but they are trying to prevent such an incident from happening again. He is still in the hospital and will go 2 weeks to a transitional place before going back to school.

One of the problems is that he's having a tough time w/ 7th grade and his grades are worse than before. The other problem is that bigger kids bully him every now and then, but that's been going on for several years. It goes away for months, then it comes back. Then it goes away and comes back again. The transitional school will directly address better coping mechanisms and how to deal w/ bullying.



So I may cover this situation more later or I might talk about something else in a week or so.

Ted's in FOOTBALL!!

Ted, my 2nd son, has been doing very well in football. He's the biggest kid on his team. He was moved to center and got an award for snapping the football back to the quarterback without any fumbles. He plays everything: offense, defense and special teams. He plays every single minute of the game!

I hope he continues to improve. His team is not very good. They have the smallest team in the league. Oh well, Ted is doing well. He is very competitive. So when they lost 26-0 Sunday, he was very upset. I agree with him. I don't think it made any sense to console him or make him feel better. I want to encourage him to be competitive and hate losing. That's the type of attitude that will get you off your ass when bad times strike. That's the type of attitude that doesn't merely want to do a good job or average job, but an excellent job. That's the type of attitude that EMPLOYERS WANT!!

People say that in high school or grade school sports the object is not to win but to have a good time. I understand that view. But tell me something.....raise your hand if you ever enjoyed getting your ass kicked in a sport by over 20 pts. No hands? Yeah, I didn't think so.

It's fun winning, it's fun scoring and doing well. IT ISN'T FUN when you are losing, playing poorly, and getting your ass kicked!!

PS. In case you were wondering why Ted had black under his eyes, that is used to make you see easier in the sun. The idea is that when you rub that black stuff under your eyes you can see better even when the sun is in your eyes. I don't know how exactly, but hundreds of ball players use it every weekend.

The Beauty of a Deep Cut

How many of you out there have the Rolling Stones album LET IT BLEED? The 3rd track on it is a song you never hear on the radio called "Country Honk". It’s the earlier version of the better-known song "Honky Tonk Woman". Obviously, "Country Honk" is a country western version of "Honky Tonk Woman". All the things in this song are things I despise in Country Western music. My opinion is that Country Western music sucks. I used to have wake up at fuckin' 5:00 am and go to the barn & milk cows. & our local radio station that was barely worth a "fiddler's fuck" played Country Western music in the morning. "Country Honk" actually has a fiddle on it. The fiddle is DEFINITELY NOT my favorite musical instrument. But the fiddle played by Byron Berline in this song puts a sweet ole' shit-eatin' grin on my face. I LOVE THAT FIDDLE PART ON "COUNTRY HONK". Where fiddles usually suck on all those hayseed songs that I heard milking cows, well it works like mad on "Country Honk". You can just imagine them doing this song in the studio. The great fiddling virtuoso, Berline, standing there fiddling his ass off, while Mick is singing glibly and right along side him is "Keef" Richards playing acoustic guitar and a 20 yr. old guitar virtuoso, Mick Taylor (who just joins the band that year, 1969) playing SLIDE GUITAR alongside them all.

I love this song so much! & few people know about it b/c it never gets played on the radio unless it's some special program like "Midnight Album nightly special: LET IT BLEED by the Stones" or some program like that.
My favorite music is the deep cut. I will come back to this subject from time to time. There are some great deep cuts. "Let Me Take You Home Tonight" & "Party" both by Boston. "The Rover" by Led Zeppelin, "Different Strings" by Rush, "Glass Onion" and "Baby You're a Rich Man" both by the Beatles. the beauty of the DEEP CUT is that it's like a beautiful secret shared among only a few people. No one knows about the DEEP CUT except you and the few that also have that album. (I guess in the Beatles and Stones case it's not really "few")
The DEEP CUT plays into and proves my theory about mileage and songs. (Part of the theory is that some popular songs are played so much that they sound worse and worse b/c like an old car they deteriorate from overuse.) The DEEP CUT is like that car that is shined and polished and only driven a few hundred miles so that sweet beauty is in MINT CONDITION! & the sweetest, most sublime part is YOU ARE ONE OF THE FEW PEOPLE WITH THE PRIVILEGE OF DRIVING THE CAR!!

Nice work, now go out & fight!

You won the nomination, gave a very good speech, now go out there and tell everyone the failed policies McCain wants to implement and how your plan is better.

We need this election bad, the nation is doing not so well. It's time to run a very effective campaign!

Nice job, Hillary!!

That's the best speech of your life (& you couldn't have picked a better time to give it!) We need you & Bill this fall so that Obama wins in November!

I truly enjoy watching the Republicans fall all over themselves at Hillary Clinton. There motivation is as transparent as quality glass. If they keep flattering her, they will keep certain voters away from Obama. Look at last night. After Hillary hit a home run with an outstanding speech last night, the conservative pundits were saying, "Wow, great speech! Gosh, I just can't see why Obama blew it and didn't pick Hillary. You know if I had voted for Hillary, I would be upset after that speech!"

These days, Republicans and conservatives have been blowing a ton of smoke up the asses of Hillary's followers. Most of them have finally seen the light and are joining the ranks of Obama's campaign. (Thank God). But cameras go searching for jilted, bitter Hillary supporters and it's not very hard to find them. So the coverage has been hanging on their words, and McCain's minions are putting their arms around them and trying to get them to vote Republican in November. & some of them actually will. What idiots! As Hillary explained, voting for McCain doesn't help Hillary, it doesn't change the direction of this nation and in my opinion, won't help the country.

One of the reasons I didn't vote for Hillary was b/c, other than Ted Kennedy, no one gets the Republicans angrier and more unified like Hillary Clinton. I actually think if elected, she would have made a good president.
But it's amazing! You have a convicted WAtergate felon on talk radio talking about a good way to literally BEAT Hillary UP PHYSICALLY and his followers love hearing that. The experts knew that if Clinton had won, the Republicans would have galvanized next week much stronger than they will now. Republicans still and will continue to have problems getting the Evangelical, conservative wing of their party to back McCain. Had Hillary beat Obama, there would have been no problem at all getting Evangelicals to back the AZ Senator. Hillary is anathema to conservatives; everyone knows it.

& let me tell you something. If she was the Democratic nominee, they wouldn't be praising Hillary the way they are now. Hillary would be depicted as the Antichrist and the very being that St. John wrote about when discussing the beast of 666. If Hillary had won, the Republicans would have been courting blacks and telling them about how Obama got "jobbed in the primaries". Anything to divide & conquer.

our future First Lady!

GREAT SPEECH TONIGHT, MICHELLE! KEEP UP THE EXCELLENT WORK!

some encouragement on my hobby

I really am interested in getting more information about rock n roll onto Wikipedia. It's basically a 2 step process. You have to join one of the subgroups in Wikipedia and if you develop a consensus, your article will stick and stay there.

I really think it's fun and important to write/contribute in Wikipedia because thousands if not millions of people may read it. After I joined Wikipedia, I was told that over 7,000,000 people have joined. So you know a lot of people read Wikipedia!!

My 2 contributions are on these 2 websites:

The entries are at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mick_Taylor
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jagger/Richards

My big point is that the entries relating to the Stones should use more of Mick Jagger's Rolling Stone interview of 1995, and they should use more of Steve Appleford's book about the Stones songs. So where you see the Rolling Stone article footnote, that's where I contributed with the help of another guy from Jamaica.

Saturday morning not as fun for awhile

I used to absolutely, positively love Saturday, b/c it was the one day I could linger in bed until about 10:30. NOW, I can't do that anymore until the 2nd Saturday in Nov. My son is in the community flag football league, and he has practice on Saturdays from 9-11.
So this was my 1st Saturday not sleeping in, and it wasn't pleasant. I thought that maybe his practice started at 9:30, but when I checked this paper, I was wrong. Ted was about 15 min. late to practice. He didn't play much of the scrimmage that they had (he was sick the last practice and since he was coughing at the start of practice the coaches probably didn't think it was a good idea to play him much). Ted's team got their buts whipped 24-6 in the scrimmage. I wish Ted would have played some defense. The other team realized that his team had no way to stop a right side sweep, and they ran that play on them over and over and over. They scored 3 out of their 4 TDs on the right side sweep.

aftermath of yesterday

It's funny how you feel and act completely different when you are no longer upset. Then you look back at when you were angry and wonder if it was all really worth it. The fact is I never lost my cool around the co-worker that left.

I knew for certain that she was friends with the other 2 co-workers in our little office. In fact one of them criticized her, and I think she was trying to get me to say something worse about her. But I didn't take the bait. I just agreed and kept working.

Another point that I find very interesting is that once the co-worker was gone, then the other 2 workers talked more to me and initiated more conversation with me. We actually ALL felt like we were in the same group. It was no longer "The 3 Young Clerks and the Older Guy". We were given extra assignments b/c she had left and I volunteered to do one of them. So, the hope is that we will continue having good times working among ourselves, and that soon they will get more help.

glad she's gone, damnit!

I am glad that a clerk at our law office left yesterday. She was nice, very smart and did her job as clerk well, but I couldn’t stand her personality. She basically acted like I wasn’t in the room. She never spoke to me, but at the same time would speak for hours to the other 2 clerks in our small, little office space. Of course, the other 2 clerks were about her age, and I am old enough to be her father.
Still, that’s not a good enough explanation on her part. We had clerks here that would talk to me, in fact some of the clerks became good friends with me (but not so close that we maintained a friendship after they left, which is fine).
I know that at work, you’re not supposed to be there to socialize, but to be excluded like that on a regular basis was tough to take. Also, bear in mind, I only teach them how to be clerks. I am NOT paid to be their supervisor or be their mother hen. & I won’t do that except in only the most extreme circumstances.
There was also an incident between her and I that really pissed me off. She would share her Werther’s Carmels with her other 2 clerk/friends. I really like Werther’s so I asked her for a carmel one day. She stood up and practically threw it at me (all the while glaring at me).
I felt like saying to her, “BITCH! I WON’T ASK YOU FOR ANOTHER FUCKING THING IF WE WORK TOGETHER 40 YEARS!” But, of course, I didn’t do that. & I am very happy I won’t be working with her another damn minute!

absolutely, positively funny

Ok, stop and think about the following ? right now!!

What is the funniest music video you ever saw? All you awesome people who read this blog and never comment, I want your "Comment" on here too. Ok, if it's easier to just e-mail me w/ the answer I guess you don't have to leave a comment. But I really want you to!!!!

The funniest video is about a subject that isn't very funny and has often led to sadness, heartbreak and all sorts of bad things. Henry Rollins (lead singer in Blag Flag) when he went solo had a song on MTV back in the 90s called "Liar". It's funny, he starts out that he is all nice and friendly and would love to be your friend & he especially wants to be your friend b/c you're lonely and need someone.
Then the scene totally changes instead of wearing something nice and respectable, Rollins is nearly naked except for shorts and is all painted (especially the face) GREEN. He's jumping around and screaming and saying how much he likes hurting the person he lied to.
But then he changes his mind and notices that you're hurting and promises to never lie again.
ALL OF THE SUDDEN HE'S LAUGHING, 1/2 NAKED, & PAINTED ALL GREEN AGAIN. (This is the part where I laugh really hard) Part of the humor is that it was shown on the old MTV show "Beavis & Butthead". When Rollins starts screaming, they are both shouting a very high pitched, "Yes, yes!!!!" to everyone of his shouts and rantings. The video is so incredibly outrageous that how can you do anything but laugh.
The other part of the humor is that anyone who is an awful, manipulative liar like the one depicted by Rollins wouldn't be quite so honest. In "Liar", Rollins explains that he feeds off the negativity the sadness, the disappointment that the recipient of lying suffers. No liar will ever be so upfront as to tell you that.
Good video!! Go to Google with the key terms and you can probably download the video.

Blood pumping in the morning

I wasn’t all that alert this morning until someone wrote an e-mail, sent it to a bunch of people (including me) about politics. My name here relates to how I feel politically.
The e-mail was very sympathetic to the other side, so I wrote a very spirited e-mail to return the favor. I have some very strong views on the subject.

I do think that more people should talk about politics, and don’t necessarily agree that it is one of the "3 taboo subjects" (for those who don't know, the saying goes, "Never argue about sex, politics or religion" But it's ok if you mix all 3 together and have a participatory discussion) . It’s easy to see why arguing politics is not so great: one is often pretty emotional about their political views. Even w/ someone who doesn’t give a damn about politics, they are still interested in some of the issues (abortion, Iraq War, taxes, gas prices)
I think there should be more discussion about politics b/c it has benefits. For those who debate it gives clarity to your views and you have to think, crystallize your views and put it into words, then debate and counter the other persons' points. That’s a lot of thinking going on! It sometimes stimulates your own interest as if you want to know more about a topic (so that you can win the next debate or win by a larger margin than the last time) you will sometimes take the time to learn more. Now this may not happen too many times, but it still does happen to some people.

One of the bigger problems in politics is too much apathy. Americans’ are notorious for not participating in politics as much as their European counterparts. It’s even bad where I am president. As I noted before, I am president of a condo assoc. There are over 250 people living in the condo. There were a lot of people who didn’t even vote when we voted on levying a special assessment. Can you imagine not voting on an issue that so directly affects your money? How stupid!

I love my boss

First a little background, a little exposition.

I work at a law firm. No, I'm not a lawyer (so no "kill all lawyers" jokes). I'm a paralegal.

The way a law firm is set up is as follows:

The highest on the ladder are the partners. Partners own the law firm. They make the most money, they make personnel decisions, some partners do other work, but it varies. Many (if not most partners) insist that you do not call them by their first name. After all, they are "higher" than "you". I have never called the current partner "Allan" only "Mr. B______" I have to leave his name anonymous in case some employees (ex or otherwise) read this blog.

Next are the lawyers. They are the ones who work on the cases. One of the lawyers work on files before they become lawsuits. My 2 bosses are lawyers.

Then there is "support staff": paralegals, clerks, helpers of the office manager, secretaries, special projects people. At one point, I am above clerks as I am their teacher. I am 20 yrs. older than these clerks as they are law students wanting the experience of working at a law firm. Also, I am not just any support staff person, because I train the clerks, produce my and clerks' schedule to the partner, tell the partners that they better get going and hire a lot more clerks as I am doing now b/c we have 3 clerks leaving by mid August.

Of special note is the office manager. An office manager is definitely below the partners. But it's iffy where his level of power is among lawyers. (& obviously he is above support staff). I don't see our office manager higher than the most senior lawyers. But I definitely see him higher than the lawyers w/o much experience. It would be tricky for him to be lower than those lawyers that came after Nov., 2006, but it's possible if they bring into the firm a ton of money due to settlements and won trials that they could be, I'm not sure. I don't sit in on those types of meetings. I do hear them talk but that's only limited information.

Anyway, I have 1 boss that I don't know too well b/c he just got out of law school. I'm old enough to be his father. He is very excitable and enthusiastic. So far so good.

The other lawyer has been a lawyer for at least a few years. Like me he is sad because he is unhappily married. We sometimes commiserate. He is a wonderful boss. He praises me when I do well (which is "usually") and doesn't yell at me when I make mistakes. (NOTE: IF YOU HAVE A LITTLE TIME, COMPARE THIS POST TO THE FIRST POST I EVER MADE WAY BACK IN 2005, THERE ARE OTHER POSTS ABOUT THAT "BOSS-FROM-HELL" IN 2005 AS WELL) . He is great to work for and working for him makes me want to work harder for him. He even said to me (GOD BLESS HIS SOUL!!), "Vince does not work for me, we work together!" That was the same way it was with Adam (my ex-boss of 2006&7) and Brad (ex-boss of 2007 and early this year).

Adam taught me a lot and was simply a great lawyer. He left to start his own firm.

Brad was great. Brad left a few months to start his own firm, too. When I got sued he was my lawyer for free. He didn't have to do that; he just said he wanted to do that for me. Also, Brad was very forgiving of my mistakes. He just never got mad at me. If I was with a client and accidentally shot them b/c we were looking at a gun, the conversation would go like this.

Vince: Brad, I accidentally shot one of our clients

Brad: Really? (wouldn't even ask how it happens). Well we bettter go appoint a special administrator and keep the case going.

Brad was remarkably unflappable. Maybe the most unflappable person I ever met.

I like my firm b/c I have worked for 3 great bosses and only worked for 1 who gave me a tough time.

an expensive misadventure in May

I thought in the last weekend of May (the beginning of Memorial Day weekend, no less) that there was a possibility I was having a heart attack. I have had consistently good marks cholesterolwise and I have had intensive heart tests before (more on that later). But on May 23, I woke up with chest pain, and it decreased to a feeling like someone was touching me on the chest constantly.

We know that people can have a heart attack and not even feel it. Some have even died that way. & since I am overweight, heart disease runs in my family and I had this "sensation" (after the pain decreased it wasn't even "pain" anymore), I very reluctantly went to the local ER.

Well, since the Dr were scared of getting sued and saw the same risk factors as I wrote in the preceding, he said "we are taking you by ambulance to the hospital, because every other ER doctor in the US would do the same thing". So, I had an x-ray and a bunch of tests, even a treadmill test where they had some nuclear material injecting in my veins which better allows them to see blockages better.

Going to the hospital had weird twists. First, it was my first ambulance ride. Secondly, I worked at the same place THE SAME EXACT FLOOR as I was going to be treated! So I knew everyone who was treating me. "Hi VINCE, HOW HAVE YOU BEEN?"
"OH, EVERYTHING IS JUST PERFECT, FAITH, THANKS FOR ASKING"
That was a typical, repeated conversation I had. Thank God none of my former co-workers saw me naked. That would have really sucked.
So I leave hospital in less then 20 hrs after I first came. Yes, I was a lucky man when they told me no heart attack, no arterial blockage and no diabetes either. They have known for awhile that my blood pressure was "borderline" high. Not real high but enough to take notice, so my Dr. decided to put me on Atenol.
But I had a terrible sense of foreboding. I was scared shitless of the hospital bills. When you go to an Chicago-area hospital, you get more than 1 bill. Drs. don't work for the hospital. So when you go to the hospital you get 3 or 4 bills. One from the hospital, one from the ER doctor, one from the radiologists (if you get an x-ray) one from your regular dr., one from the janitor who cleaned your room......... (oops made that last one about the janitor up)
My total bills to find out that I was just fine and didn't have a heart attack was over $11,000. Thank God and thank Maribeth for insurance!! My bill that I had to pay for myself was around $600. One could make the argument that I "got off light" . The worst part of what I had to pay was the ambulance bill, not the hospital bill (that was $10,000 of the $11,000 total, for the hospital, I only paid $100).
I had surgery for a deviated septum in 2002 (the year from hell). Standard procedure is to find out if your heart is strong enough to take such a surgery. They did an EKG and thought that I might have had a heart attack. So I had a treadmill test with nuclear material shot through my veins that time too. & the results were that my heart, my arteries were just fine. The cardiologist reminded me, "But to make 100% sure we should do an angiogram. That's really the 'gold standard'" No, 'gold standard' for me, thank you. & besides I don't want to have a needle poking me in the balls and have a wire run from my groin to my chest. That sounds like it would hurt.

Anyway, if I ever have real chest pain, I"ll go to the hospital. But if I only have a touching sensation on my chest, I'll never go to the hospital again. Screw paying even $600!! I DON'T need to pay that amount just to be told I"m ok.

we're going to get our ass kicked

Last year, I was in my law firm's softball team. I played outfield. Even at the age of 44, I led the team in walks (maybe b/c I can't run very well, he, he, he) There were some moments in softball where I had some fun and came home from the game with a smile on my face.

We had a decent team, but still there were very good teams in our league and we were only 1-6. Yes, readers, we only won 1 damn game!

Now, the woman in our law firm who organized our softball team is suffering from cancer. She won't play but she wants the rest of our firm to play. 2/3 of our outfield is gone. 2/3 of our power hitters - gone. We will field a much poorer team than last year. I reluctantly joined the team this year as I didn't want to be a weasel, but man if we win even one game, I think I'll hop all the way from Chicago to my town Oak Forest (that's 25 miles). Plus, I know that our co-worker, the organizer with cancer needs all the happiness she can get, and I didn't want to disappoint her by saying "no".

Oh well, I know I will have fun. But that's not the point, going out there and getting your ass kicked as a team is kind of lousy.

Walgreens disappointment

Most people know what Walgreens is. IT's a store where you can buy medicine that the Dr. prescribes you. But it's a lot more than that. You can get food, over-the-counter medicine, make up, toys, vitamins and minerals, toiletries, and many other things.

Maribeth and I used to love Walgreens because when you wrote a check out, they wouldn't cash it until much later. For example, if you wrote it on Monday it wouldn't cash until Friday. & that was on a regular basis. Well, like so many other businesses, they have gone with electronic transactions. So instead of it taking 5 business days it only takes a mere 2. It's been a painful adjustment complete with a few $35 overdrafts. But we have figured out their new policy so we are adjusting.

It's amazing how a simple, almost minor change can have such noticeable effects. It hasn't been fun for me. I had gone into the hospital due to chest pain. I didn't want to go but was afraid that there was a small possiblity for heart attack. Anyway, the total charges just to be in the hospital overnight, run some tests and then be told I was, "fine, no heart attack and no arterial blockage", was $11,000. Yes, the bill was $11,000, and then my primary doctor said the ER doctors should have sent me home instead of the hospital and they shouldn't have panicked.

Well thank God for insurance (specifically Maribeth's insurance, let's be thankful for her!) Out of the $11,000 I have to pay about $600 of it. That's still hard and I will be down financially for a few months, but if I would have been saddled for the whole $11,000 I would have had to file bankruptcy for the 2nd time.

I want to write more about my hospital experience later. Sorry, if you feel like you are "left hanging"/in suspense.

a couple of topics

I enjoy being in my new support group on depression. I enjoy an unexpected benefit. I have an e-mail account on Yahoo, and I hate all the stupid porn offers I get. Now, since I joined the group, I get alerts from the support group that someone is writing to me or responded to one of the things I said in a forum. I'm getting so many alerts that they are crowding out the porn offers. Which is really nice, because I hated the fact that those porn offers made up a majority of my e-mails. So I opened up my Yahoo e-mail this morning, and the alerts crowded out the porn offers, but one of the offers was better mannered than the rest of those offers. It's header was "Let's be friends with benefits". Usually the offers don't speak in code. I think we all know what "friends with benefits" means (& if you don't, I'll explain), back in LaCrosse they were called "friendly friends". So I deleted that offer as I do the rest of the porn.

I continue to be surprised about all the people on the support group that want to commit suicide. There sure is a lot of sadness/melancholy in the world! It also points out how many dysfunctional relationships people have with their parents, and how much sex abuse goes on. It's appalling! I'm really thankful that I grew up in a stable household.

Maribeth came up with the idea that we should make more money. We could use it. So she gave me a phone number to join a team of mystery shoppers. Here's what happens when you are a "mystery shopper".

1. you are told to go to a store, you may or may not have to buy something
2. you are instructed to evaluate the store for its cleanliness, friendliness of the employees in the store, helpfulness of the employees, how organized the products are, and other criteria.
3. after you leave the store, you write a report and get reimbursed for what you bought at the store and get an additional fee, anywhere from $5-30.

Sometimes, you can shop on line, then your criteria is a little different. There are some mystery shopper groups that are bogus, so I'm going to be very careful. It certainly would be nice to make a little more money.

Maribeth & I are volunteering to be pool attendants for the condo's swimming pool. By not paying for the pool attendants, the condo saves over $9,000. This year that saviings will be less because we had to repair the pool and instead of opening Memorial Day weekend, it opened up last week. Maribeth said she enjoyed doing that. Which made me happy because when she's happy, it seems like the whole family is happy.

problem solving/desperate people

Not sure if I mentioned, this but I have depression. I was diagnosed about 7 years ago. The approach I have used in the last 2-3 years is to go to a Dr. who prescribes me medicine for this illness. He basically manages my medicine, but I don't see him for counseling. Our sessions last only 10 min. and anyone who has ever been to counseling will tell you that 10 min. doesn't accomplish very much. Most sessions of counseling are either 1/2 hour or 1 hour.

Again, the arrangement works pretty well. But there are times when I'm really upset that I need to talk to someone or vent or express myself. Well, why not do that here? I have discussed problems that I have had. But, there is some editing going on. I equate talking about your problems or confiding to taking clothes off. If someone told you truthfully that last month they tried to commit suicide by swallowing razor blades, figuratively, they are standing before you naked. Now, I have never made an active attempt to take my own life, and I sure as hell won't be doing it with razor blades if I ever were. But still, I don't feel like being too revealing or being too naked on this website (again this is only an analogy, not something literal!!)

So I decided to join a group for those with depression.
It has been a very eye-opening experience. Can you believe that one of young adults in that group really did swallow razor blades because she was so wanting to commit suicide? What goes through a person's mind when they grab the first blade and place it in their mouth? I mean I have been down, but holy shit! Razor blades!
Another teenager heads a counseling group, and she feels so bad for some people in her group that she, herself, wanted to commit suicide. Gotta wonder about that arrangement.
Well, needless to say, this has been a very good group to belong to because it has given me a mega dose of perspective. & it has also been a place to vent but usually, I'm sitting there gob-smacked at some of the really tragic stories going on.

Expectations and frustrations

The Milwaukee Brewers have had the best record in baseball since the last part of May. Monday, they made a very bold, decisive move and traded for CC Sabbathia, an excellent pitcher from Cleveland (the one in the picture). What does this do? It creates excitement, optimism. There's a belief that this will be the first time since 1982, a damn lifetime that they'll go to the playoffs. The higher expectations lead to more disappointment when the Milwaukee Brewers lose. They lost last night 8-3 to Colorado. They lost to a team where the opposing pitcher hasn't won in 2 @$#@@%^& years!! They lost to a pitcher who has continued to play lousy. But the Brewer batters stunk so badk they made this pitcher look like an All Star.

It's become so hard for so long since the Brewers did well that some fans have a website call "Pee Your Pants for the Brewers!" 7,043 people have taken the pledge that if the Milwaukee Brewers make it to the playoffs for the 1st time in 26 years, they will go to their backyards and pee in their pants. The rules say you can't wear a swimsuit either. I'm not making this up. The URL is http://peeyourpantsforthebrewers.com/

Pretty crazy isn't it? But frustration, anxiety and "living and dying by your team" will make 7,043 people do crazy things. & I am absolutely safe to say that by the end of July the number of people will be nearly up to 7,100 people.

But everyone's underpants will be perfectly dry if the Brewers continue to play as bad as they did last night. Then they'll have to wait 27 or more years to make the playoffs.

Pictures & then some

It's summer, and we decided to put Brianna in ballet class. Here she is complete with her lovely little ballet uniform.

The same Sunday I met Geddy Lee (go a few posts back to read about that), we also went to Buckingham Fountain. The Fountain is another wonderful, touristy place in Chicago.

Last weekend in June, for the first time in many years, Maribeth, the kids and I went out of state (& not just to Wisconsin either) to Minnesota. We went to my nephew, Scott's wedding. Here is the lovely bride and groom, Jennifer & Scott. We stayed in a wonderful motel (which we hadn't all done since 2000). Luckily, my younger brother and his kids were all able to be at the same place at the same pool and have some fun. Kelly, my brother, & I played pool and it was nice to "shoot the breeze" some which is something we hadn't done together in a long time. Yes, I see him several times a year, but being together in a family setting and having fun poolside are 2 completely different things. Glad we were able to do the latter 2 weekends ago.

Here's a rather unfortunate mystery. Above are 2 firecrackers. As you can see, the fuse for each are roughly the same length. So why is it that when I lit 2 firecrackers very similar to those in the picture, 1 firecracker went 20 ft. and blew up (good) and the other son-of-a-bitch went only 6 inches and exploded next to my fingers and left my ears ringing (very, very bad).

Brianna's kindergarten graduation. Funny, they didn't have kindergarten graduations in the late 60s when I was going to school.

Today, we went to OakFest. OakFest is my city's 4th of July celebration. They have all sorts of festivities: amusement park rides, pro wrestling, pie-eating contests, rock music, and plenty of beer drinking. & Brianna got to ride a horse which she thoroughly enjoyed!

This picture says it all, the love between dog and co-owner: Maribeth with Faith.

My Imaginary Travels (I think I'm doing this right (?)

Insert picture of World here. You can find one on Amel's Realm which you can click on in the right side of my column. Sorry I didn't do that part of it but I'm at work, & I've been on too long already.

• ~Begin Copy~
  Rules :
• 1. Start Copy from "Begin Copy" until "End Copy".
• 2. Put your blog's name and url write in which continent you live, add the country you live in. Example : My Imaginary Travels (Netherlands)
• 3. Leave your url post in here and I'll add you to the Master List.
• 4. Please help spread this tag by tagging your friends as much as you can.
• 5. Don't play unfair! If you have more than 1 blog, you can participate all your blogs for this tag. BUT you will have to post this tag to all your blogs as well. So, please. Don't cheat!
• 6. Please come back again to copy the update of the master list, often. This process will help new participants to get the same gains as the first participants.
• 7. Don't forget to use the banner at your post, you can save as or you can just copy the code in here.
• Master List :
• A. Asia : 1. Moms... Check Nyo (Philippines) 2. Aeirin's Collections (Philippines) 3. Jenny and Belle(Philippines) 4. Hailey's Beats and Bits (Philippines) 5. your turn
• B. Australia : 1. your turnC. Afrika : 1. your turnD.
• North America : 1. Simple Life, Simply Me (USA) 2. Pinaymama's Diary (USA)
• 3. 3 Garnets & 2 Sapphires (United States) 4. What Happened to Vince? www.vince-s-ithaca.blogspot.com
• F. Europe : 1. My Imaginary Travels (Netherlands) 2. Juliana's Site (Netherlands) 3. Picturing of Life (Netherlands) 4. Amel's Realm (Finland) 5. your turnG.
• Antarctica : 1. your turn NOT! NOW YOU KNOW DARN WELL YOU AREN'T GOING TO FIND ANYONE IN ANTARCTICA (How many scientists do you know???)
• ~ End Copy ~

Perspective

As much as I complain about things, there are some things that remind me that things could be worse. Yes, I know that sounds cliché also. We have a client that was in 3 car accidents between February to April of 2006. 3 of them! & the response is “why is she such a poor driver?” She wasn’t! The accidents were caused by the other drivers! How do I know that? I have the car accident report and the other drivers were given traffic tickets (arrests) for slamming into our client's vehicle.

It got worse for her. She had her teaching degree delayed as a result of missing so many days from student teaching. She suffered severe neck pain, bulged vertebrae discs, back injuries, knee injuries. She ended up going to over 30 different hospitals and clinic as a result of her 3 car accidents. The lawyer told me yesterday, that at this time, 2 yrs. after the accidents, she is still treating. I’m preparing written answers to opposing attorney’s written questions. Instead of it taking less than a day to answer the questions, it’s taking me about 3 days. With so many different treaters and clinics, I've had to read 100s of pages of medical records and bills.

Also, I want to write about my cousin, Brendan Scanlon (a/k/a Solve). Brendan was born in 1983. He went to college in Chicago as an artist and had a really good job at a marketing firm applying his artistic skills. He also was in a pretty big community of street artists and was very well known. Last Saturday, he got into an argument with another man about his age. He ended up being held down by 4 men and stabbed to death. My heart goes out to him for the horror that the last minutes of his life brought to him. I was really amazed at how well known my cousin was. There were so many people writing in that paid their respects, so many memories and good times he created with/for other people. It was just staggering. My heart also goes out to his family. His family was extremely close knit. In fact, their family and my family gets together each August, and we have a great time. I wasn’t really close to him and unfortunately, didn’t keep in touch with him. I saw him every year at these family gatherings. I remember a few years ago, giving him bottle rockets which I had a large supply of and wanted to give away. He was very happy to get them.
There are a few websites to check out regarding his very untimely death:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-graffiti-artist-killedjun16,0,4570734.story

http://www.madison.com/tct/news/291765

& there is an especially good one which shows you how many people paid respects to him from the Chicago street art community and shows you a picture of the memorial built for my cousin. My kids and I saw the memorial Monday evening.

http://www.flickr.com/groups/chicagostreetart/discuss/72157605605470754/

No matter how bad it is, someone else is having it worse.

Lesson LEARNED

Sunday was Father’s Day. It’s 1 day set aside during the year to honor fathers. My day was ruined when my dear mother of my kids thought I was sleeping and told her dad something I really didn’t want to hear.

It all started Sunday morning. There was a Father’s Day card sitting on top of Maribeth’s dresser. It was just sitting there for hours during the morning. Deep in the back of my mind, I felt that I shouldn’t open it until Maribeth presented it to me. But, I couldn’t wait. So I picked it up and opened it.

It really made me feel happy. It touched my heart. The card said, “Thank you for taking such good care of our family. You are loved and appreciated more than you know”. Amid all the differences that Maribeth and I had (we’re still divorced, after all) the message felt really sweet. It seemed like the work I've done with my kids was really, sincerely appreciated.

So, that morning, I told Maribeth how much I appreciated the card. She asked, “Really?” “Yes!” I replied. I felt like asking her if she really meant it, but that would have been wrong (until I learned what happened later!).

Then she took me to breakfast (McDonalds), and I enjoyed brunch with her and our 3 kids and 2 girlfriends of Brianna. Then we went to her Dad’s place. She bought her Dad ribs from the Patio. Then I reclined, and she thought I was sleeping. So she said to her Dad, “I actually got you a card, but Vince picked it up by mistake and thought it was his.”

Then while I was writing this post I was even more upset. Because if I even had the presence mind to read the whole card, I would have noticed that Maribeth signed my name to her dad’s card. But I was too stupid. That made me even more angry then I already felt.

This is one Father’s Day I would love to forget, but won’t be able to. But the lesson is learned: never pick up and open a card that isn’t presented to you.

After reading the very nice message in the other father's card, I'm also reminded of 2 other sayings/lessons: If you feel good, don't worry, you'll get over it. If it's too good to be true, it usually is. By the way, I asked Ted (my son) later in the afternoon, "Ted, how many Father's Day cards did you sign?"

"One" (the same one I "signed").

Lately, there's a song that I have enjoyed listening to. It's by Nine Inch Nails, and it's called "Every Day Is Exactly the Same". The chorus definitely fits my mood. For the lyrics, go to www.nin.com/with_teeth

a bit of instruction about the ads

as you know, I run Google ads on my blog.
Just a little bit of instruction. You will see ads on a wide variety of subjects like car anti-theft devices, the Milwaukee Brewers, and the Blues. When you see those ads, click onto them. It helps me out.
However, if you see the ad for "Barack Obama Exposed", do NOT click onto it. Give it the Finger.

Meeting a celebrity

To be honest, I did not want to put up a new post this soon. I wanted my leading post to be about Barack Obama for about a week. I was hoping to irritate at least a few conservatives and encourage a few liberals.

Then something happened Sunday, that I just had to report to all of you. I met Geddy Lee, the lead vocalist, great bass player and keyboardist for one of my favorite bands of all time, Rush. I was with my family at Millenium Park, the nice, touristy park off of Lake Michigan. We were sitting there and along came Geddy Lee who walked right in front of us with 2 older women and sat about 10 feet away from us. Then I wondered if I should even say anything to him at all. Once I realized that I should actually say something, my biggest emphasis was not to disrupt his good time. He wasn't there to be hounded by some goofy fan. No autographs, no taking pictures of me and Geddy (although my dear readers would deserve to see such photos, again, I wasn't going to put this man out while he was relaxing in Chicago).

So here's what I did. I watched him furtively. When he stopped talking (I didn't want to interrupt him while he was talking to the 2 women), I walked up to him and said, "Mr Lee?"
"Yes?"
"Hi, I just wanted to let you know I really enjoy your band's music"
"Thank you"
We shook hands. Then I walked away. For some reason, I just wasn't nervous. I still don't know why, but can only guess. I can't stop comparing it to meeting the famous Green Bay Packer, Jerry Kramer. When I was 10 yrs. old, I met this legendary offensive right guard, and when I got back to my seat, I was so awestruck my teeth were chattering. Meeting Geddy Lee was definitely a wonderful surprise, but I didn't even feel a fluttering heartbeat.

Quite frankly, I was happier with the way Maribeth reacted. We had been arguing before, because I told her before, that if we walked fast we would make the train and be able to go to church. She said no. She wasn't willing to walk fast or run. She didn't come to downtown Chicago to hurry, but to relax. We wouldn't be coming down there again for awhile. So there was no sense running to the train when the kids wanted to be at the park.

So after I met him, she had a big smile on her face. She must have said about 12 *+*times, "Now are you glad you didn't take the 4:30 train home??" She was just pleased as punch at the turn of events. She really felt vindicated. Seeing her so happy was a little like a beam of sunlight poking through the clouds, or hearing Geddy Lee singing "Dreamline" or "Tom Sawyer".

*+*Not an exaggeration!

This is what I believe

In my background part of my blog, I lightly touch on hoping that things go well in the 2008 election. It’s high time to discuss that vital subject area some more.

With Hilary Clinton now out of the race, I am going to state loudly and unequivocally that I truly hope that Barack Obama wins the U.S. Presidency on November 4, 2008 and frankly, the only person that’s going to beat Barack Obama is himself, not John McCain.
Why do I think that Obama is favored?
Very simple. When it comes to the issues, a majority of America agrees with Barack Obama.

Do a majority of Americans want American troops to stay the course and stay in Iraq?
HELL NO, AND NEITHER DOES SENATOR OBAMA!
Do a majority of Americans think that the economy is getting worse with prices high in gas and food, a nation too dependent on petroleum, and a nation too far in debt?
HELL YES AND SO DOES SENATOR OBAMA!
Does a majority of Americans think that the incompetent man holding the US presidency now has done a poor job as president? Did this same man come into office with a surplus and will retire (thankfully!!!!!!!!!) in January with a staggering deficit? Did this same man squander the good will of the rest of the world after 9/11/01 with his dreadful foreign policy? Did this same man say to the Iraqis “bring it on” to which these Iraqis did resulting in the deaths of over 4,000 American young men and women? Is this the worst president we have had since Warren Harding and can our nation do better?
HELL YES AND WE CAN DO BETTER WITH SENATOR OBAMA!

If a majority of Americans back Obama on the issues, how is he going to lose? Lots of ways, actually, but it will be because of poor, mistaken tactics leading to a disappointing loss, not because the Republicans have a better man.
Some conservatives like to talk about how Americans have, in the past, trusted Republicans more when it comes to foreign policy. That trust has led to ruin. We fight a war in Afghanistan with one hand tied behind its back, because we have to fight in Iraq. We aren’t any closer to apprehending Bin Laden fighting in Iraq. Republicans loved to talk about how Bill Clinton made the armed services weaker in his 8 years as president. Guess what most experts think of the armed services now compared to 2001?? THEY SAY WE ARE WEAKER!! Why? Because we are overextended and soldiers are on their 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th tour of duty in Iraq when they need to be in Afghanistan fighting terrorism. & get this, don’t trust my opinion, listen to the retired generals and admirals saying the very same thing!! There was a reason why Donald Rumsfeld had to quit after the Democrats crushed Republican in the congressional races (as they will this year). There’s a reason why even McCain thought Rumsfeld was the worst Secretary of Defense this nation ever had.

I know I’m a partisan Democrat, and I won’t hesitate to say that anyone who thinks that Senator Obama is “soft on terrorism” is a stupid, ignorant redneck. Senator Obama will take the resources wasted in Iraq and put them to better use in Afghanistan. Senator Obama knows that domestically there is still a lot of work to be done in making this nation safer from terrorists. Senator Obama will repair all the relations that Bush damaged with other nations (oh wait a minute, weren’t the Republicans better in foreign policy than Democrats?) so that the free world can wage a more effective war against those who believe in totalitarianism, growing heroin and oppression of women and take a much larger step towards and take a much larger step towards beating those terrorists.
But don’t take my word for it.

Listen and read the findings of the blue ribbon commission appointed by our current president regarding terrorism and 9/11/2001. The blue ribbon commission stated that one of the things the United States needs to do is sit down with our adversaries LIKE IRAN, because they stated that, “you don’t negotiate with friends, you negotiate with adversaries”. So all those people agreeing with John McCain about how terrible it is for Obama, as president, to talk to the Iranian leader, weren’t paying much attention to the blue ribbon commission of very well respected leaders (people like Lee Daniels, Republican, long time committee member and chairman of the House Foreign Relations, James Baker, Republican, chief of staff during the Reagan administration, Secretary of State during the better Bush’s presidency {that’s the father of the current presidential joke for those not reading the papers}). Don’t trust my words, listen to a couple of Republicans on the commission with brains!

Let’s say a few things about Hilary Clinton who made news today dropping out of the 2008 campaign. Senator Clinton wasn’t my first choice on who I wanted winning the presidency. I think she would make a very good president, but I think that too much of the country, especially too much of the South hates her, and wouldn’t vote for her. Newsweek magazine said it best that Republicans aren’t very united this year because they have a hard time uniting the evangelists and religious zealots of the party with the more moderate wing of the GOP. But if there was one person who could unite both factions together it was a Hillary Clinton candidacy for president. With her out of the picture, it won’t be quite so compelling nor detrimental (in the conservatives view) for some rednecks to stay home November 4. The election thumping that Republicans will get on November 4 in the congressional battles won’t be so difficult to stomach if it’s “President Obama” rather than “President Clinton”.
I truly hope that before or after Senator Obama heard the news of Hilary Clinton dropping out he looks in the mirror and says, “I’m going to run the best presidential campaign ever, because the only person who is going to beat me is myself!”

Oh & by the way, I would recommend NOT getting the book advertised in the above Google ad. The Real Obama or whatever the hell the title is, is fiction. It's probably written by some stupid bastard who will try to convince you that Obama is a Muslim.

interesting experience

On Satuday night, something happened to Maribeth & I that hasn't happened in about 13 years. There were no kids with us overnight. Better yet, we didn't even fight. Andy was at his grandpa's place in Tinley Park, Brianna was at her friend, Bella's place. Ted was at Nate's place. Nate and his family lives downstairs from us.

So what did we do? It began uneventfully doing things we loved doing. Maribeth watched Law and Order; I read my beloved New Yorker magazine with the White Stripes playing in the background. In the morning, we had an even nicer time.

How would I describe the whole experience? Nice and sedate, good "change of pace". I wonder if it will happen again this summer?