...but, hey, who's counting?

Here's Ed from BNL to sing us out...

Labels: Personal, You Tube

Recovering alcoholics say that you have to take it one day at a time. When that isn't working, take it one hour at a time. And when it gets really desperate, take it a minute at a time.

That advice has been on my mind, though I'm not really sure if it's applicable to present circumstances. Wendy and the kids leave this Friday. I just keep thinking "If I can make it through this week, if I can make it through this week..."

Separating is hard. It's hard on all of us ... the kids and my spouse and me, too. I guess it's obvious that, of the two of us, I'm the one who's more reluctant about this change. Well, hell, "reluctant" isn't the word. "Panicked" is a good word. "Dread" seems to fit in there somewhere.

There's an old Tori Amos lyric that comes to mind, too:

I got a bowling ball in my stomach,
Got a desert in my mouth.
Figures that my courage would choose to sell out now.

The more I think about it, the more sure I am that I'm gonna retire this blog and begin again on totally anonymous terms. A few people have asked me to e-mail them my new URL, and that makes me feel good. (Just keep it on the down low, homie. And I'll use a little more discretion this time with regard to the people I tell about my blogging hobby.)

I've been trying to think of a new URL. I need to do it soon while the terms with my web host will let me get one on the cheap.

I've amused myself with a few ideas that I thought were original and fairly funny ... only to find that they're already taken...

The one that I liked the most was Fear And Loafing.com, but of course it's already registered. No, I won't provide a link. Those bums stole my idea before I even had a chance to think of it, so they can generate their own traffic.

Oh, and here's something I found at Cracked.com, of all places. This really cheered me up some, and it's surprisingly thought provoking. Go check out Cracked's Five Things You Think Will Make You Happy (But Won't). (Language Warning)

I'm trying to focus on positive stuff, like my upcoming summer visits from my son and the fact that I've actually been eating healthier and exercising lately and I feel better for it. I really am trying to stay positive.

But I keep coming back to one thing: "If I can just make it through this week..."

Labels: Personal

There's a lot going on, I might not blog much for the next week or so.

The upcoming week will be difficult. There's a lot of packing that remains to be done and other things to be sorted out. A lot of it is heavy stuff that I don't want to go into here. Writing about my feelings for therapy is one thing ... but writing about someone else's feelings is something else entirely. I don't want to do that.

On top of that, my employer announced some major restructuring and a lay-off today. I think I'll still have my job, but a big paycut is unavoidable.

I have another tumor resection scheduled for the week of the 20th, too ... so that might take some of my time.

Thanks to the friends who keep in touch with me through this blog and have sent me supportive e-mails. It's helped a lot and it means a lot. I really, really appreciate it. I started this blog mostly as a fun way to communicate with three or four real-life friends who've moved away from this area. Having picked up three or four new "blog buddies" along the way has been fun, too. And I'm really grateful for the support that all of you have shown.

But, anyway...

It's come to my attention that a certain busy-body has probably been reading my blog ... someone on the periphery of my life ... and drawing her own conclusions and spouting off. My StatCounter info shows a number of hits from the area where this particular, unpleasant little person lives. Same ISP, too. It's unfortunate, but it's one of the side-effects of this particular hobby. Therefore, I'll very likely change my URL and blogger handle soon, and revert to something completely anonymous. It's the only way to deal with this kind of nonsense from someone who apparently has little else to do. I'll send the new blog info to those six or eight of you who are the only ones I write this stuff for, anyway.

Be well, I'll talk to you soon.

Labels: Personal

You know all that neato, gnarly stuff they tell you about physical exercise? How it is good for you completely, mind body and soul? How you're always glad you did it, even if you went into it dreading it? How it gets easier all the time ... how it just becomes more and more fun and more rewarding over time?

All that stuff is true.

Why do I always forget that? I go long periods without exercise and I get fat ... and then I get disgusted and realize I have to change, and I start exercising again and I find myself thinking "Why did I ever quit doing this?"

It's been rainy and crappy here lately, so I've been riding my exercise bike instead of walking outside. And, man, I'm really enjoying it. I look forward to the weather changing so I can get outside and do stuff, too. I put together a new playlist of heavy, positive, catchy metal songs for my MP3 player, and that makes it all even more fun. And I've come to realize that one of my favorite of those songs, Stealing From A Thief by the legendary NY thrasher's Anthrax, has an awesome message:

So I hereby adopt Stealing From A Thief as my new personal theme song.

That's right, it's my personal theme song. Cheesy, yeah ... but I firmly believe that everyone needs their own personal theme song. If you don't have a personal theme song, then I feel sorry for you.

Check out the awesome, positive lyrics to my personal theme song:

Stealing From A Thief ... by Anthrax

Don't want a life like my parents had.
Don't want a life like my rich friends have.
Don't want to live by association.
Don't want to live the great maybe.

I want a life not a name online,
I want to live in real time.
I want a life just so I can be.
I'll never ask what was in it for me.

Stealing from a thief,
My humanity.
I know my name, I know my pain,
I know my frequency.

As a kid I played "make believe."
As a man I played "Make. Believe."
As a kid I'd do anything.
As a man I've done everything.

I live my life centered and humane.
I live my life like a man insane.
I live my life just so I can be.
I'll never ask what was in it for me.

Stealing from a thief,
My humanity.
I know my name, I know my pain,
I know my frequency.

I get up, I get up, I get up and go!
I grab a hold and reach way down
To find something that I really believe.
I don't need to console myself.
If I don't like what I see, f--- it.

I'll never ask what was in it for me.

Labels: Music, Personal, You Tube

I keep realizing little things; things that emphasize how much I came to depend on Wendy over the past eight years.

I don't know how to work our alarm clock. It's been on her side of the bed this whole time. She's the one who sets it, she's the one who turns it on and off. It's her who always pounded the snooze button. I don't think she's planning to take it with her when she leaves in two weeks ... but either way I'm going to either have to learn to work that alarm clock or I'm gonna have to get a new one and learn to work that one.

I may have never even touched our alarm clock, in fact.

I don't know much about how to work our TV remote, either. Wendy usually always picked what was on TV, and I rarely cared to watch anything other than the news. As far as controlling the DVR feature, setting it to record, etc, I'm gonna have to learn all of that.

And those are the little things. I don't even have the words to explain how it feels to realize that, soon, when I come home every day from work, she won't be here. She'll be gone, my step-kids will be gone. Gone. Except for the weekends and holidays and summer days when I have my son, this house is going to become a void. The silence will be suffocating.

It's been different during the times when I was at home by myself over the past eight years. Those times were infrequent and usually kinda brief. I enjoyed the silence in those instances. Sometimes, during the chaos of day to day life, I thirsted for silence. Soon I'll be drowning in it.

I can't sit in here and stare at the walls. I have to get out and do stuff. I have to visit extended family and see my friends more. If I sit here and listen to all this nothing I think I'll just become part of the nothing.

I start graveyard shift tonight. The kids are at school, Wendy is at work. She gave notice yesterday. I'd planned to get out today, but it's too rainy and cold out to go walk for exercise. Instead, I blew the dust off the recumbent exercise bike we bought years ago and used it for 40 or 45 minutes. It was tiring, but I'm glad I did it.

Labels: Personal

I walked three miles today (Tuesday). OK, I actually walked 2.8 miles, not quite three. I know it was 2.8 because after I walked I got in my car and drove the same distance and measured it with the trip counter. 2.8 miles, pretty much exactly. Not too bad.

This is the beginning of me getting off my butt and getting some exercise and taking off some weight.

I've done this twice before. In the '90's I got fairly thin (as thin as I get) and somewhat presentable and I ended up in a serious relationship, which became a marriage/family, and then I got fat again. And then my wife left me. Not that the one necessarily caused the other, but it sure didn't help.

Then, in the year 2000, right after the end of that first marriage, I got fairly serious about my health, and I started exercising and lost the weight again. And then I started dating Wendy, and we got married and I got fat again. And now that relationship is ending.

So I'm exercising again.

Vicious cycle. I don't really know how to explain it. It certainly doesn't indicate anything good about my mental make-up. Apparently when I actually have a family to come home to I slowly become negligent about everything. The people I love, my own health, everything. And then once I end up single again I take off the weight pretty quickly, rush into a new relationship and begin the cycle again. That ain't good.

I don't really have a point to this post. Just more blogging for the sake of getting stuff off my chest. And I don't expect to solve anything by writing all this down. Just a personal assessment of some kind, maybe.

It's also kinda weird to throw this stuff out there on the net, I guess. But I suppose it's harmless. Basically, nobody is reading this crap. I heard once that more than two hundred million people keep a blog. The sheer number alone is almost an assurance of something even better than anonymity: indifference. Regardless, since this domain isn't a "family thing" anymore, I've been slowly removing all the traces of our full names.

Anyway, I think the thing to learn, here, is that I see a clear pattern in my mistakes ... and now I gotta figure out a better way to live.

Labels: Personal

(This post is a follow-up to the post here.)

This is the point where the blog turns into a therapeutic (I hope) journal more than a political soapbox and joke forum. At least for a while. Nobody reads this blog but five or six real-life friends and family members and three or four "internet buddies." So it'll be alright.

So much to do, God, this is overwhelming.

So much is going to have to be packed. Joint checking account have to be closed, new ones have to be opened, vehicle ownership has to be transferred ... we even have to get the post office involved. Damn.

Wendy and I've spent the day preparing for her and the kids to move, going to banks, the DMV, etc, etc. Staying motivated is tough, considering that I'm helping to do all of this so that my best friend can move ten hours away. Over the past eight year's she was also my girlfriend and then wife, and that makes it all the tougher. Then throw the kids into the mix and, man. Man, oh man.

But it has to happen. For myriad reasons, none of which I intend to go into here, this really is for the best. This is really what makes sense and I try to focus on that.

Still sucks, though.

People are starting to put two and two together in some instances; really figuring out that this has been planned for some months. People say things like "So THIS is why you did (yadda yadda) in January instead of what I thought you'd do." Yep, that's it. Makes sense now, right?

Being single again will be weird. I haven't lived alone for ... something like fifteen years, I suppose. I tried marriage in my twenties and couldn't pull it off ... then I spent my thirties with Wendy and still couldn't make it work. And Wendy, man ... she's the one. Shes THE ONE. She was my best shot at really getting this right.

Maybe in my late 40's I'll try again. Maybe? For now, though, I really have to focus on turning myself into someone that I like to be around. I have got a lot of work to do. I've gotten so damn fat, man. Soooooo fat. I'm absolutely physically miserable. And that effects my emotions and my state of mind, and it has GOT to change. Period.

My son from my first marriage will be with me a lot this summer, and he's grown so much. He's as tall as I am now, and he's really quite the athlete. He knows I used to really enjoy tennis, he's seen video and pictures of a younger, healthy version of his father on a tennis court, and he's always asked me to teach him how to play. He and I will have a lot of time this summer just to hang out by ourselves, and I really look forward to getting on the tennis court with him, cancer permitting. The kid is inexhaustible; there's no way I can keep up with him. But I'll try.

Writing this made me feel better. And that kinda sucks, because you can expect me to do more of this kinda thing. Less laughter and ranting, more personal journal. Blah. I'm not as good at making my personal stories interesting and fun ... the kinda thing MCF does so well, for instance.

But thanks if you waded through this post. I really appreciate it.

Speaking of MCF, I think I'll sum up and finish this post with a video that he linked to yesterday. Hey, who ever had a better grasp on life than the Muppets?

Labels: Personal, You Tube

My step-dad is a good guy. He came into our lives a little later than usual, whatever "usual" is. He and my mom started dating shortly after he retired and shortly before my mom did the same. They've been married for four or five years, I guess.

The thing about my step-dad is that that he has terrible luck with his right eye. For some reason, every time he gets injured in any way, the worst part of the injury is going to happen to that same eye. A few years ago he was running a weed-eater and the weed-eater picked up a stick and flung it straight into his eye. He needed stitches and his eye was all bloody and bruised for a while.

A few years later a nasty case of food poisoning caused him to pass out, striking that same eye on the corner of his bedroom dresser.

If you shot Larry in the foot, the bullet would bounce off and hit him in the eye.

No matter what happens to Larry, the worst of it is going to find it's way to his eye. And he's really self-conscious about it. Whenever he's recovering from his most recent eye injury he always worries that the kids will panic if they see him. He has been known to lurk around the house with the lights off, hiding from visitors and warning them not to look at him. It's as though he thinks he's literally come down with the evil eye: "Don't look upon me! Your milk will curdle, your crops will burn and your women will miscarry! Cast your eyes away!"

So that's how he got the nickname Scary Eye Larry.

Labels: Humor, Personal

Just a bit of news for those of you who've read the blog long enough to kinda "know" me ... and for the handful of real-life friends who use this blog as a way to stay in touch:

I mentioned a year ago that Wendy and I were considering going our separate ways. In fact, I was convinced that it was going to happen. Instead, we took the last year to try to work through our problems and differences.

Long story short, we more or less finally have worked through our differences ... and realized that what we are, maybe what we've really always been, is just a couple of really good friends.

Getting to where we are now has been painful and difficult, but it's probably been inevitable. You guys have had to put up with me posting a bunch of sad song lyrics here over the past month or two just as my way of dealing with it. Sorry, that was lame. But it did help, and for the benefit of anyone who's curious, I'm doing pretty good now. We all are, believe it or not.

So here's what's up ... Wendy is moving back to New York and the kids are going with her. We'll do the summer visit thing and holiday visits, too. Hey, I've made it work for ten years or so with my oldest, and Wendy and I can make it work with my step-kids, too.

Last year when I wrote about these issues, I was fairly melodramatic. I think I said I was gonna stop blogging, take this blog down, etc. This year that's not the case. As weird as it might sound, this split is going to be good for the both of us. And we're going to make it work for the kids. You might see an occasional comment at this blog from Wendy, too, so don't be surprised about that ... I mean, honestly, regardless of everything else, she and I have managed to stay good friends. That's an end-of-a-relationship first for me, and I'm pretty damn proud of it.

And I'm also proud that Wendy and I were able to make our run last eight years, another personal best for me. I think that's amazing: Wendy put up with me for eight years. You gotta understand, dude, I really am the miserable, grouchy miscreant that I seem to be here at this blog. And she put up with me for eight friggin' years. How about a big hand for the lady, huh?

So, yeah, I might not blog as much for a while ... but it won't be because I've "given up blogging" and not because I'm depressed. I think I've come through the majority of the sadness. No, the reason blogging might be light is that it's getting warm here and I plan to spend more time outdoors, getting off my fat ass. Really enjoying my summer visitation with my son from my first marriage ... and the first of many summer visits with stepchildren.

So if you see something here at the blog that references these big changes, don't be surprised. Now you officially know what's going on.

And with that, we now return to the usual: reviewing movies, ranting about heavy metal bands, bashing liberals ... and writing horribly inappropriate and irresponsible things.

Labels: Personal

Lately I've been having a lot of dreams about the dead, and I have to wonder what that says about me, what it says about my state of mind, if indeed it says anything.

I've looked for answers with Google, because, of course, you can believe everything that you find on the internet.

I found a website that belches forth a message about Global Oneness in it's banner, and boasts that it is "co-creating a happy world." As you might imagine, I was damn near overcome with special feelings of warm fuzziness.

The merry band at Global Oneness offer quite a bit of information about dreams of the dead, including:

To dream of seeing the dead, living and happy, signifies you are letting wrong influences into your life, which will bring material loss if not corrected by the assumption of your own will force.

That caught my attention because the dreams I've been having are all just that; dreams of seeing dead friends and relatives alive again, happy and peaceful, not the least bit concerned about the fact that they were dead a while ago.

But I'm not at all sure how to achieve the assumption of my own will force. I can only assume that it involves a light saber. I don't have one. I do have a rake, but you seldom see brave Jedi warriors going forth into battle armed with gardening tools. So I'll have to leave the assumption of my will force for another time.

These dreams are mainly about four different people; my grandmother and grandfather, an uncle who was like a father to me, and a friend who died almost a year ago. In the dreams I'm typically amazed to see them alive and well again in familliar settings, and I usually have the sense that this is a temporary arrangement, but I can never find the words to express everything I want to say to them before they're once again lost to the warm indifference of the void. My dead loved ones are usually happy in the dreams, but I'm usually in a bit of a panic.

At a website called AnswerBag, someone asked the following question, and given that it was posted in all caps I'll assume that there was an urgency about it:

EXACTALLY WHAT DOES IT MEAN WHEN I DREAM OF DECEASED PEOPLE THAT I KNEW WHEN THEY WERE ALIVE BUT THEY DONT AKNOWLEDGE ME IN MY DREAMS? DOES THAT MEAN I'M GOING TO DIE?

A number of people have offered answers, including a few amateur theologists. This one is my favorite:

remember when you pass away, you are in doormat untill jesus returns to earth again.

Emphasis, I suppose, on the word amateur more than theologist.

You know, I just can't imagine my late grandmother waiting for her Savior's return while hanging out inside of a friggin' doormat. A pair of curtains, OK. A toilet-paper cozy? For sure. But not a doormat.

I continued clicking links and found something from a 2007 New York Times piece that caught my attention:

“Back to life” or “visitation” dreams, as they are known among dream specialists and psychologists ... are a particularly potent form of what Carl Jung called “big dreams...”

Later, the article mentioned the research of one Dr. Dierdre Barrett, assistant professor of psychology, Harvard Medical School:

The most common (of these kinds of dreams) was "back to life" dreams, which made up 39 percent of the dreams of the dead in Dr. Barrett’s sample. In such dreams, subjects were surprised or frightened by the appearance of a deceased loved one. Dr. Barrett theorized that these early dreams corresponded to the confusion and denial of early stages of grief.

That seemed somewhat authentic to me. Especially with regard to the death of my friend last year. His passing was sudden and shocking, and since he was a co-worker I have opportunities to think about him almost daily. Maybe I'm still trying to accept that he's gone. Maybe his death has stirred lingering grief for lost family.

I was comforted some by this quote from Roger Knudson, director of the Ph.D. program in clinical psychology at Miami University of Ohio:

"I don’t want to get over my father. That’s not to say that I want to suffer on a daily basis or that I don’t want to understand that he is dead. But I look forward to dreams in which my father will come again. What does it mean to ‘get over’ it? I think that is crazy."

Emphasis mine.

I like that. And I'm gonna leave it at that.

Hey, it beats a friggin' doormat.

Labels: Humor, Personal

Wendy is finally watching the season premiere of Lost. I'm aware that it's on, but I'm not watching it. I'm websurfing.

At one point a moment ago I heard Wendy say "Oh, now that's just not realistic."

I'm peripherally aware of some of the plot elements that Lost has introduced over the years. Polar bears on tropical islands, gigantic monsters, time travel, conspiracies, magical healings, etc. But Wendy has never blanched at anything they've thrown at her before. So I just had to turn around and ask what had finally impressed her as utterly implausible.

Her response: "Someone just opened a dishwasher and the knives where in there blade-up. Nobody would put knives in a dishwasher blade-up."

I guess there's only so much of this farfetched crap that one person can swallow.

Labels: Humor, Media, Personal

Today's surgery was successful, if inconclusive. I got to go home afterwards, it really was outpatient this time. However, I'm going to have a fifth resection at some point in the coming months. I had my first round of chemo today, too, and it's as unpleasant as they say it is. I feel kinda zapped right now.

On the upside, I had a long talk with my mother today and I "outed myself" with regard to the way my feelings on religious faith have evolved (devolved?) over the past year. I was dreading that, but my mom surprised me by being totally understanding and supportive. Concerned, yes, but supportive. Downright Christian, even. She said she'd very likely feel the same doubts that I've been feeling if she'd had to deal with some of the things that have cropped up since early '08.

I was worried that my mom might flip out on me. I've been surprised by some of the reactions I've gotten when I tell the people closest to me that my religious faith seems to be gone. Some people are basically OK with it and want me to know that they're there for me regardless. Other people have made it clear that their friendship is conditional. In some instances that's really been painful. I never know how any given person will react. But I don't really regret having been honest. I'd rather be hated for who I really am than loved for who I'm pretending to be.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal

I'm having surgery again Thursday morning. Another tumor resection. It's possible that I'll be away from the computer for a few days if I need to spend the night in the hospital ... but more likely than not I'll be back and blogging again in no time at all. Talk to you then.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal

Unity is assimilation.

Unity is conformity.

Unity is being a sheep. It’s going along with the crowd and not asking questions. Unity is not making waves. It’s letting someone else do the thinking for you.

Unity is the death of individuality. Unity, in the present context, is everything I've ever opposed. And we're going to have this President's version of "unity" shoved down our throats for the next several years.

Now more than ever, screw unity.

Who is John Galt?

Labels: Personal, Politics

• My stepson, Liam, has a bit of a tendency to speak too quickly and slur his words a little. As a consequence, when he says the name Barack Obama it sometimes sounds like he's saying "Black Obama." This drives me crazy.
  
  I worry that someone is gonna hear him and think that he really is saying "black Obama" and that he comes from a family full of racist scumbags.
  
  Of course, Barack Obama is black and there are plenty of good reasons to be proud to be black. Still, it sounds demeaning when a little white kid says something that sounds like "black Obama." Maybe I should teach him to start saying "President Obama."
  
  First, I suppose I'm gonna have to teach myself to start saying that.
  
  Or maybe we could split the difference and have everyone in the family go around referring to the outgoing President as "Whitey Bush" or "George W. Cracker" or something.



• This world is full of stupid people and a lot of them have money. And you can make a very comfortable living for yourself if you can come up with ways to separate stupid people from their money.
  
  I'm convinced that the guy who did this best was the guy who invented fingerless gloves.
  
  If you're an owner/wearer of fingerless gloves, let me take a moment to explain the whole glove concept to you. The whole friggin' point of gloves is to protect your hands. Most commonly, gloves are worn to protect your hands from the cold. The parts of the body that get cold the easiest are the extremities, and the fingers are the extremities of your hands. Therefore, fingerless gloves are like cars without wheels. Tables without legs. Liberals without latte.
  
  I hope we've cleared that up. Not that I begrudge the guy who owns the fingerless glove factory his ability to continue making money by selling dumb crap to dumb people.



• So the rock-n-roll world is all atwitter about the possibility ... likely one minute and unlikely the next ... that Jimmy Page, John Paul Jones and Jason Bonham will go on tour with some singer who's not Robert Plant.
  
  A lot of people are just about to pee themselves about it. The mantra is something like "It won't really be Led Zeppelin without Robert Plant!"
  
  I got news for ya, pal. With or without Plant, it WILL NOT be Led Zeppelin.
  
  Let's do the math, here, shall we?

  

  There can be no Led Zeppelin without John Bonham. Period, end of story. Jimmy Page once knew that. The presence or absence of Robert Plant is a moot point. Plant has been past his prime since the third album, anyway.
  
  Now, here's the part that some rock fans consider really blasphemous... Led Zeppelin wasn't all that great, anyway. They did two ... maybe three ... albums' worth of really outstanding material. And they did six or seven albums' worth of stuff that was mediocre to bad. The vast majority of the live Zeppelin I've heard has been OK at best. Jimmy Page's meandering, directionless hour-long solos are BORING. AS. HELL. And John Bonham was the only really impressive member of the group.
  
  So there. Zeppelin is over. Get over it. There are far too many superior bands out there on tour right now to worry about a bunch of aging fops.
  
  Sorry, but somebody had to say it and it might as well be me.

Labels: Humor, Music, Personal, Politics

For the next four days or so I'm gonna be busier than a one-armed cat in a room full of paper hangers. Or words to that effect. I don't expect to have much time to blog, but we'll see. I've got some overtime I'll probably have to work, etc. So that's all for now, talk to you later.

Labels: Blogs, Personal

At work, in the break room:

CO-WORKER: "Hey, do you guys still have that old computer you aren't using?"

ME: "Nah, I traded it."

CO-WORKER: "You traded it?"

ME: "Yeah, I traded it to a friend of mine for his daughter."

CO-WORKER: "You gave him an old computer and he gave you his daughter?"

ME: No. I mean I gave it to him for his daughter to use. And he gave me some guitar gear. For my son to use.

CO-WORKER: "Oh. Well, that's nowhere near as interesting."

---

Over a terrible cell phone connection, I'm in the car:

ME: "What's with this big box addressed to you in the back seat of the car?"

WIFE: (Garbled) "...my dad sent it."

ME: "So what's in the box?"

WIFE: (Garbled ... sounds like) "...piss jugs."

ME: "Did you say piss jugs?"

WIFE: (Garbled ... sounds like) "...his trucks."

ME: "What? His trucks?"

WIFE: (Garbled ... sounds like) "...Hess Trucks! Hess Trucks! It's the Hess Trucks that my dad sent the kids for Christmas!"

ME: "Oh. Yeah, your dad gets the kids those trucks every year."

WIFE: "I know."

ME: "The kids hate those trucks. They never play with them."

WIFE: "I know. I've told my dad that a number of times. But he likes Hess Trucks, so he keeps getting the kids Hess Trucks."

ME: "Oh. (Pause.) You know, a box full of piss jugs actually would have been more useful."

Labels: Humor, Personal

The other night at work I had kind of a ... medical anomaly? Yeah, let's call it that.

I haven't written about it here because I'm still trying to sort it out, because it's still kinda hazy, and because it's kind of embarrassing. I did allude to it yesterday, but that was just me being my usual smart-ass self. I haven't really faced it, I haven't even discussed it much. I've only talked about it, as of now, with a couple of my most trusted friends and with my doctor. I'm writing about it now because, if for no other reason, writing helps me think clearly. But also because I do want to pass along something I've learned ... something I learned the hard way ... with hopes that it might be useful to someone.

Here's what happened:

Well, let's start from the beginning. I'm a shift-worker. I work a swing shift. To keep it simple, it boils down to a week of graveyard shift, followed by a week of evening shift, and then a week of daylight. Because of that I have a hard time keeping any kind of regular schedule with anything. That can make life a pain in the ass, but it can be even worse than that if you start forgetting to take your prescription drugs.

I'm on a number of drugs, some to treat the symptoms of bladder cancer, others for other problems, like allergies. I've also been on Effexor (venlafaxine) for several years. Effexor is a drug that's designed to treat depression and general anxiety.

It's been a long time since I've felt that taking Effexor was doing me any good. I've continued taking it, though, because missing doses has caused horrible side effects for me. Most commonly, I have really awful nightmares ... but I've also experienced mood swings, depression, anxiety, etc. It's funny: I started taking this drug to deal with depression and anxiety, and eventually it stopped helping me at all, but did start causing terrible depression and anxiety if I missed a dose.

Sometimes I have to think that Tom Cruise was at least partially right.

Oh, and before I forget, one of the drugs I take for the effects of bladder cancer is oxybutynin, a drug with it's own gnarly list of possible side effects. I've been on that for six months or so.

As near as I can figure, I think I missed taking the Effexor for two days, and I might have taken too many oxybutynin tablets the other day. Oh, I forgot to mention, I'm also on zolpidem for occasional use to help me with the sleep loss associated with bladder spasms, shift work, etc. The zolpidem tablets look EXACTLY like the oxybutynin tablets, and it's possible to take one when you mean to take the other if you're not careful and if you rely too much on one of those weekly pill-box things.

As for me, my daily drugs are served up in a cornucopia.

OK, anyway, enough beating around the bush. The other night I had a splitting headache that was one of the worst I've ever had. (I've been having them for a week or so now, and I've been taking Advil Migraine for them to try to fight them off. More drugs. Yay.)

I'd had one of those headaches all night, and then all of a sudden at work I started having intense pain in my back and my shoulders on the left side. As of now, that's probably been correctly diagnosed as muscle spasms brought on by stress and poor health.

But here's the thing: When I started having that pain in my left side, I was sure I was having a heart attack. I honestly thought I was dying. No shit, man. I thought I was about to drop dead at about 3 in the morning in the damn paper mill where I work.

And so I ended up short of breath, nauseous, and having a full-blown panic attack.

Now, I have had problems with anxiety and depression before, but I'd never had an all-out panic attack before, and I had no frame of reference for it. All I knew was that I was sure that I was dying. I thought I had minutes to live. I ended up being transported to the hospital in an ambulance, with an oxygen mask and an IV and the whole thing. It wasn't until I was in the ambulance, almost at the hospital, that I began to realize that I wasn't really dying.

Anyway, to try to wrap this up, 90% of what happened was brought on by not being careful enough with my prescription drugs. I've been pretty casual about the drugs I take ... obviously too casual. I've been too quick to do stuff like buy and take Advil Migraine pills instead of consulting my doctor when I have a headache for days. And, worst of all, I've been too lax about making sure that any doctor I see knows each and every drug I am on, the exact dosage, and the reason that it's prescribed.

I saw my doctor yesterday and some major changes were made to my prescription schedule. For one thing, I'm being weened off of Effexor. With drugs like that, you can't just stop taking them. You have to have your dosage slowly decreased over a period of months. It'll probably be four months before I'm off that drug entirely.

My doctor also gave me a "put up or shut up" exercise program and diet.

So the lesson I learned is that it is very important to be very aware and very involved in any prescription drug schedule that you might be on. Make sure that every doctor you see knows exactly what you are taking, how much of it, and how regularly. And make sure that you take your pills when you're supposed to take them. And in the correct dosage.

Really, this is elementary school stuff. But morons like me never learn anything the first time.

The older I get, the more likely it is that I'm going to have to take more pills each day, not fewer. So that makes it all the more important. But regardless of your age, regardless of the number of prescriptions you are on, and regardless of how long you've had to take or will have to take any given drug, remember the importance of your prescription schedule. Don't brush it off or be neglectful about it, like I have been. You don't want to have to learn this lesson in the back of an ambulance.

So there's my cautionary tale. I hope it's useful.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal

I wish I had a giant iPod wheel on my forehead. Or even one I could just carry in a small, round pillbox. Some kind of wheel that I could turn to administer mood-altering chemicals, complete with a little soft rock. You know, both kinds of feel-good hits.

I'd trace my finger around the wheel and find just the right mood or the right thought or just the right tone of ambivalence for any situation. It would be so cool to be able to simply spin the wheel and say the right thing to anyone. Say exactly what they want to hear without having to think about it at all. All through the magic of uppers, downers, and DRM protected digital media.

Let's say some friend hit me out of the blue with some serious grievances about my current feelings on religion. I'd spin the iPod wheel, drop a Benzodiazepine, and play The Doobie Brothers, singing that "Jesus is Just Alright." And we'd all share the groovy experience provided by my personal iPod Thorazine Shuffle and everybody would be brothers and sisters, man, and all would be groovy.

Or someone else could confess some recent betrayal or deceit that I'd suspected all along and I could spin my iWheel and get a Benzodiazepine hit ... then call up Don Henley's "Heart Of The Matter" and pretty soon the shrunken, aging eco-Eagle would be pontificating about forgiveness: "There are people in your life who've come and gone / They let you down, you know they hurt your pride / You better put it all behind you baby; cause' life goes on / If you keep carryin' that anger, it'll eat you up inside, baby..." Yeah, Don, groove on, groove on, baby. The way you bring that soft rock groove makes me think everything is just oooooooohh kaaaaaaaay. And, well, the Benzodiazepine helps.

How awesome would that be. In the meantime, we'll have to settle for the iTop, a new laptop from apple that lets the machine do even more of the thinking:

A step in the right direction, for sure. The iWheel solves all. It knows all, it is all, the iWheel is the avatar of peace. But we're not quite there yet. Gov't Mule has just the prescription:

"Stand by to stand by,
Ain't no need to worry today.
The (iPod) Thorazine Shuffle gonna make everything OK."

Labels: Gov't Mule, Humor, Personal, The Onion, You Tube

I don't really remember where I heard this story, but I think it does us all good to reacquaint ourselves with it's lesson from time to time:

An old Indian woman is out one day, looking for firewood in a heavy snow. After a while she discovers a rattlesnake frozen by the river.

Overcome with compassion, she takes the barely breathing snake home to nurse it back to health. Over the course of long winter months, the woman tends to the snake as though it were a member of her family. She feeds it, keeps it warm, nurses it slowly back to health. Eventually, the rattlesnake regains is strong again.

One day in early spring, the old woman is cleaning her tee pee and gently picks up the snake to move him out of the way. As she lifts the snake, he spins in her hands and bites her, injecting a lethal dose of poison.

The old woman lays dying on the floor of her tee pee. Wracked with emotional and physical pain, she asks the snake why it bit her. "How could you do this," she begs. "I saved your life, I brought you into my home and spent all this time tending to you, nursing you and caring for you. Why have you killed me?"

As the snake crawls away, looking for his next victim, he looks back at the old woman and hisses: "You stupid bitch. I am a rattlesnake. You knew that before you saved me in the first place."

I'd really be ahead to remember that lesson. Maybe I'd stop f--king with snakes over and over again.

Labels: Personal

After countless hours of loyal service, my Creative Zen 4 gig MP3 player has done bit the dust.

I think it was a corrupt MP3 of Willie Nelson's Crazy that did it. The MP3 player got locked in a constant loop of that song and then after a few minutes it just locked up and now won't do anything.

For what it's worth, up until this happened, I never had a hiccup out of the thing. It was a darn good investment and I'll miss it.

Labels: Music, Personal

A look back at the year as it closes ... each of the thumbnail pictures below is clickable. Click one and it'll take you to the relevant post.

This is 2008 as I followed it at the blog. The political, the cultural, the personal and the trivial. Mostly the trivial.

Labels: Blogs, Entertainment, Links, Movies, Music, Personal, Politics

MCF kinda tagged me:

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags?

I'm no good at wrapping gifts, Wendy handles that here. If I try to wrap something I usually end up with tape in my hair, on the ceiling, etc. I don't like gift bags, though. I think they're kinda chinsy.

2. Real tree or Artificial?

I prefer real trees, I like the smell. But we've used an artificial out of convenience for several years.

3. When do you put up the tree?

We put ours up last weekend. We usually put it up in the first week of December of so. My mom and stepdad are nuts, theirs goes up before Thanksgiving.

4. When do you take the tree down?

I always want it down right away after New Year's Day. Sometimes it's later than that coming down due to busy schedules, etc. But I can't stand to still be looking at the tree more than a day or two after New Years.

5. Do you like eggnog?

Love it. I love eggnog and fruitcake.

6. Favorite gift received as a child?

I posted this picture of myself on Christmas Day when I was eight once before:

By the way, in spite of the appearance in that picture, I do have and have always had a left eye.

7. Hardest person to buy for?

My stepson, Liam. He's just not a materialistic person. He rarely wants much of anything and we have to try to come up with stuff off the top of our heads. I remember one year when he was four or so, we asked him what he wanted most of all for Christmas and he said "Soup."

8. Easiest person to buy for?

My stepdaughter, Willow. She wants everything.

9. Do you have a nativity scene?

We do, it's behind me this very second. It's a small one, you could sit the whole thing up on a chair, but it's a Nativity nonetheless.

10. Mail or e-mail Christmas cards?

We haven't done either over the last couple of years. We've been busy. I can remember one Christmas three or four years ago when we spent twenty bucks on postage for Christmas cards. I thought that was excessive.

11. Worst Christmas gift you ever received?

Someone I was once married to always got me something last-minute, half-assed and uninteresting. One year I told her I'd like to have the movie Wag The dog and she instead gave me Primary Colors. Her explanation: "Same thing."

12. Favorite Christmas movie?

Every year I have to watch at least one production of A Christmas Carol (the George C. Scott version is my favorite, I'm a big fan of his). I also always have to see the original, animated 1966 television production of Dr. Seuss' How The Grinch Stole Christmas.

You know, it never occurred to me until just now that they are essentially the same story. They're both stories about miserable old men who find redemption at Christmas time. Hmmmm. What's that say about me?

I love Boris Karloff's narration in ...Grinch. To me, that's one of the distinct sounds of Christmas.

13. When do you start shopping?

Wendy and I try to pick things up year round. We keep our eyes open, look for clearance sales, etc. Wendy is especially good at this.

14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present?

Yeah. Once or twice.

15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas?

Homemade Chex mix, eggnogg, fruitcake.

16. Lights on the tree?

Yes. Are there people who don't put lights on their tree?

17. Favorite Christmas song?

I love Christmas but I've never liked Christmas music. Purely for nostalgic reasons, I don't mind hearing this:

18. Travel at Christmas or stay home?

I've never traveled at Christmas and I don't think I ever would. I can see me holing up in my house, REFUSING to travel, and ultimately pissing off members of my family. Christmas traffic? Bah. Humbug.

19. Can you name all of Santa's reindeer?

I thought they already had names. Why do I always get stuck doing someone else's work? Let Santa name his own reindeer.

20. Angel on the tree top or a star?

We haven't used a tree topper in years. We never could find one we liked and at some point someone said "Do we really have to use a tree topper?" The consensus, apparently, was that we don't.

21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning?

When I was a small child we always did it on Christmas morning. Then, once my sister and I were both young adults, my family switched to Christmas Eve for a long time. I don't think there was ever a decision to make that switch, it just kinda happened. Now that I have a family and kids of my own we're back to Christmas morning.

22. Most annoying thing about this time of the year?

Like I said before, I don't dig Christmas music. And cloying, manipulative songs like this one especially get under my skin.

23. Favorite ornament theme or color?

We have Marvel Comics, Simpsons and Spongebob ornaments on our tree. I really enjoy those. My favorite ornament that we have, though, is either our Charlie In The Box misfit toy ornament or our Bumble ornament or our smiling Grinch ornament.

The Island of Misfit Toys was always my favorite thing about the Rudolph Christmas special. And I'm sure that says something about me, too. It always bugged me, though, that they all wanted off the island. They all complain about having to live on the island, feeling unloved, unwanted. I always thought "Why don't you guys love each other?" You wouldn't think misfits would feel rejected by other misfits, would you? And then, at the end, Santa gathers them all up and delivers them to children. But they'd all been complaining just before that no kid could love them because they were all misfits. So what kind of cruel joke is that? Stanta takes them off their island, where at least they had each other, and delivers them to kids who can't possibly love them.

Was he trying to teach them a lesson about how they could have been happier on their island if at least they hadn't taken each other for granted?

What's up with that? Is it, like, Santa's vicious attempt at ironic punishment? Is Santa like a Christmas version of John Doe from Se7en? Sick freak.

I mean, think about it. Santa clearly hated misfits. He even wanted Rudolph banished until his nose proved to be useful to Santa's own purposes. Santa just hated anyone who didn't conform to his rigid standards. His name should have been Saddam Claus. Vicious bastard.

No wonder his wife was trying to kill him with fatty foods. "Eat, Papa, eat!"

You know, this quandary probably made an early contribution to my lifelong mistrust of authority.

24. Favorite Christmas memory?

I can't put it into words. There are sounds, smells, etc, that will cause me to remember something that is impossible to voice, but something real. It's just a remembered feeling of the childhood magic of Christmastime.

25. What do you want for Christmas this year?

This.

Labels: Blogs, Links, Personal

I've talked to other parents, people who've been doing this a lot longer than I have, and they have told me that none of this is unusual.

So I'm not really worried. I'm not. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

But it's become unavoidable that I accept the fact that my son Joey and I are very different people. And the older he gets, the more apparent that becomes.

He's only a few inches shorter than me now, and it seems like yesterday that I had to bend over so that he could reach up and hold my finger while he walked. Why does everything have to change so fast? Nothing else in my life is changing this quickly. I'm still the same fat, redneck a-hole I was twenty years ago. My son, meanwhile, is changing so quickly I feel like I could actually sit and just watch him change.

And, oh boy, are he and I ever different. When I was his age, I was an introvert. He's "Mr. Cool." He's popular. I was a book-worm (and I still am), and he's an athlete. He's a burgeoning musician, I couldn't carry a tune in a bucket. He's got the confidence of Alexander, I was a wallflower. He is fearless. I, on the other hand, didn't start riding roller coasters until I was in my mid 20's. He's smart as a tack, really brilliant. I, in contrast, was smoking a lot of pot by the time I was 14.

He's given me more jaw-dropping moments just with his amazing insight than anything else in the world. He just blows my mind with his perception and his perspective.

So, anyway, I found out today that he's been getting in trouble in school lately. He apparently didn't turn in some of his homework and told his teacher that "this is America, and I don't have to do your homework if I don't want to." Deep down, the part of me that mistrusts all authority thought "Yes!" But that was quickly squelched by the realization that you've got to pick your battles, and deciding not to do your homework just to assert your will is a lunk-head decision.

I talked to him about it, and I hope he understands that I do want him to keep thinking for himself and not to feel that he has to do this or that just to fit in ... but I want him to have the sense to realize that there are things you have to do just to get by. Even if they're boring. Even if they're tedious. Even if you have things you'd rather do. Homework is one of those things that you pretty much have to do. Do enough of the things that you have to do and you get to do more of the things that you want to do.

Whereas, if you don't do the things you have to do, you get punished ... you lose privileges ... and, eventually, other people have to start carrying your weight. You can't remain "Mr. Cool" that way.

I hope I got that one right, and that he's learned something.

Jeez, it's tricky. The thing is, this kid is about ten times smarter and craftier than I ever was at his age. Probably more than I am now, for that matter. Nonetheless, he is, without a doubt, the best thing that's ever come into my life. I just hope I can stay frosty for the next few years ... because he's right on the cusp of the teenage years, and God know's he's gonna keep me on my toes.

Labels: Personal

Man, what a week, huh? My head is still spinning.

Here are some videos to close out a week's worth of fairly active blogging on my part.

This first video is political AND personal. It's a little long, like six minutes, so I understand if you don't want to watch it. My 9 year old stepson, Liam, really followed the Presidential election this year. He watched and read a lot of news, and he asked me a lot of questions about it. And he and I had a number of conversations about Obama and McCain. So I got out the video camera:

Of course, he's been influenced by my conservative perspective. The day will probably come when he and I don't see eye-to-eye on any number of political issues. But I go out of my way to make it clear to all of our kids that agreeing on everything isn't what's important. What's important is that we keep talking and keep listening to each other, and that we share our opinions with love and with respect. We're a family. That trumps everything else. You can disagree with someone in your family on political matters and still love and respect them.

This next one is the latest from the Mighty Zo Rachel. I've been following his YouTube channel for only a few weeks now and I check it daily to see if he's posted anything new yet. In this video Zo talks about the aftermath of Election 2008 and offers some good advice to his fellow conservatives:

Man, we need to goad Zo into getting into politics. I don't know where the hell the man lives, but he needs to start out running for city council or the school board or whatever. And then work his way up to state office, and then on to Federal office and then the White House around 2020. I'm dead serious, dude. He strikes me as a communicator, a leader, and a man with a clear, conservative vision. That's what we need. Zo Rachel For President.

OK, check this next bit out: Presidential dog Barney is taking some hate for having allegedly bitten a reporter:

It looks to me like Barney might have gotten a little snag on one of this guy's fingers. But that ain't the point. Here's the point:

If you know anything about dogs, you already know what this reporter did wrong. A dog is a living animal. An animal, not a toy, and as an animal it has to be approached in a certain way. That reporter didn't know a damn thing about Barney. All dogs are different, some are jumpy, some are territorial, some are nervous, some are just mean. You have to know what kind of dog you're approaching and you have to approach him properly.

Never just put your open hand on a dog. Don't offer your open hand to a dog, either. He might respond well to that, or he might feel threatened by it. Barney seemed to have felt threatened. And he did what dogs do when they feel threatened.

The reporter is lucky. Had Barney been a moody Mastiff or a St. Bernard, he might have taken the ends of two or three of those fingers.

When you approach a dog you don't know, first of all, ask it's owner or guardian if you can pet the dog. If you're given the go-ahead, the first thing to do is to offer the dog the back of your closed fist for the animal to smell. If he doesn't like what he smells, or just generally doesn't like you, he'll let you know with a growl or a snort, or he'll back off. If he accepts your fist with a tail-wagging and general happiness, that would be the time to go ahead and give him a little scratch.

You don't lay your open hand on a strange dog. You just don't do it. You might get bitten. Let's hope that reporter has learned and will remember one of the basic lessons of human - dog interaction.

OK, let's wrap this up with a little raw Anthrax, "Caught In A Mosh" and "Got The Time", recorded live in Sacramento in '98. This was back when 'Thrax had their best vocalist ever, the mighty John Bush. The technical quality of this clip just ain't all that happenin' ... but the energy is there and I'm sure it was a great show.

Coming Tomorrow ... SouthCon presents me hosting my own made-up version of an episode of MTV's Headbanger's Ball. It oughta be a lot of fun.

Labels: Dogs, Media, News, Personal, Politics, You Tube, Zo

MCF's latest round of questions:

1) Do you like Halloween? Why or why not?

Yeah, I love it. I just always have. I do enjoy horror movies, ghost stories, etc ... but probably no more than many other people do. So I like Halloween because the Discovery Channel, the Travel Channel, et al, do all those specials with names like The Fifty Scariest Places In South-West Detroit. I eat that stuff up. That's what Tivo was made for.

2) What is your favorite sound effect?

The Wilhelm Scream is a fun one, if only for trivia purposes. But I have to admit that I'm not that good at spotting it when it comes up in movies.

On a more personal note ... every year, about this time of year, I edit our year's worth of home movies down to one half-hour or so of highlights. Then I put it on DVD with all the amenities: Opening credits, sound effects, background music, etc. We send the finished product out with our Christmas cards.

I've learned from all this editing and producing that you can't go wrong by adding Yakety Sax to the soundtrack of just about anything. Here's a demonstration, a video that prominently features one of our dogs. I uploaded this to YouTube almost two years ago:

Yakety Sax is my go-to music for just about any video footage. If you speed up a bit of video and add that song to the mix, you usually end up with comedy gold.

I thought about this for a while a little earlier, and I asked myself, is there any video footage that isn't improved by adding Yakety Sax to the background? I decided to do a little experiment:

The jury is still out on the results. Nonetheless, for my money, Yakety Sax almost always brings the funny.

3) How do you feel when studios recast roles to different actors in sequels to popular films?

It depends on the reason. If an actor holds out for more money and the studio says "Screw you, pal," I usually side with the studio. No actor is irreplaceable.

Having said that, there are instances where a given studio has gone with a more "bankable" star, and with disastrous results. I'm thinking about the first Batman movie franchise.

And as a Batman fanboy, I'm so happy with Christian Bale in the current films that I'd hate to see him replaced.

But no actor should own any given role purely as a matter of principle.

4) Fire or Ice?

Neither.

SPECIAL BONUS QUESTION: Who is Zsaji?

Uh ... ZsaZsa after a few too many?

Labels: Blogs, Links, Personal, Trivial Matters, You Tube

Hey, look! Somebody took a video camera and went trick or treating at the homes of some of my extended family!

Jack Chick.... (shudder).

Labels: Faith, Humor, Personal, You Tube

This website is pretty cool. It's one of those sites that has a list of historic events, births, deaths, etc, for every day of the year.

Thanks to this website, and assuming that it's accurate, I've just learned that:

• On the day I was born, the Ottawa Rough Riders defeated the Calgary Stampeders, 24-21. That was apparently the only thing of any note that happened on that day.


• On the day my wife was born, Billy Carter, brother of then-President Jimmy Carter, is said to have made a public antisemitic remark. And I think that there's clearly a connection.


• My stepdaughter shares a birthday with Clint Eastwood.


• Ten years to the day before my son was born, Dow Jones closed above 2,000 for 1st time.


• Actor Brian Keith killed himself on the day that my stepson was born! What did he know?? WHAT DID HE KNOW??!


• On the day my mother was born, with WWII raging, U-358 sank in the Atlantic and there were massive strikes in Northern Italian towns.


• Good Karma: I share my birthday with Mark Twain, Jonathan Swift, Winston Churchill, Ridley Scott, David Mamet, and Playboy's Miss May, 1991.


• Bad Karma: I also share my birthday with Abbie Hoffman, Ben Stiller, and GASP! Clay Aiken!

So have fun with Brainy History ... but be careful. Once you learn something, you can't unlearn it.

Labels: Links, Personal

I'm fighting another godawful post-surgery infection. I was supposed to start back to work today, but it didn't happen. Passing blood and having spasms, etc. The usual bladder cancer joy ride.

I'm gonna do a little less blogging for a little while. Part of it is that I don't want to blog while I'm sick. That leads to self-pity, etc. No need for that. But I'll be back at some point, as usual. I'm just gonna take a few days off.

Another part is ... well, you know how it is with blogging. It's like a bungee cord. There's a tendency to stretch down deep into it for a while, then pull back.

If I don't talk to you guys again between now and November 4th, PLEASE VOTE! Even if you vote for the wrong guy! ;) And I'll get this out of the way while I'm at it, since I might not be back until after the 4th: Congratulations to President Elect Barack Obama for getting past one of our country's last major hurdles. Of course, I'm talking about him becoming our first openly socialist President. Ha ha.

I'll wrap on the topic of politics with this. Just watch this clip. If this doesn't sum up Obama and the coming four years sufficiently for anyone, then I don't know what it would take:

The one good thing about the next four years (I really believe this) is that it's going to be a grand education for those young people who actually are paying attention. More new conservatives will be born of the Obama administration than any time since the Carter administration.

It'll almost be worth it.

Oh, I do want to mention this friggin' whacko story, before I wrap for a while, though:

Skinheads held over plot to kill Obama

Two white supremacist skinheads were arrested in Tennessee over plans to go on a killing spree and eventually shoot Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, court documents showed on Monday...

The plot did not appear to be very advanced or sophisticated, the court documents showed...

"The individuals began discussing going on a 'killing spree' that included killing 88 people and beheading 14 African Americans," (ATF Agent Brian) Weaks said in the affidavit...

The men planned to wear white tuxedos and top hats during the assassination attempt, which would have involved driving as fast as they could toward Obama and shooting him from the windows of the car.

It sucks that I feel compelled to mention ... to even provide a link proving ... that I've always hated skinhead Nazi dipshits. God KNOWS I don't want Obama to be elected, but I've resigned myself to his Presidency and I'm gonna make the best of it. Still, regardless of my opposition to most of his policies, I really hope it's apparent that I'm not a racist, not a skinhead, not the devil, etc.

And I want to make it clear that I think these two skinheads who've just been arrested for "plotting" to kill Obama and other people are evil and repugnant and etc, etc.

Having said all that, I'll also say this: Their "plan," if you want to call it that, is so pathetic it's laughable. Driving a car as fast as they could and shooting from the windows while wearing white tux's? Who do they think they are, the formal skinhead Starsky and Hutch? I'm wracking my brain trying to think of what moronic movie these dolts were watching when they came up with that idea and I just can't guess. Has anyone ever actually made a movie that stupid? Has Jerry Friggin' Bruckheimer ever even made a movie featuring a scene anywhere near that stupid?

I realize that anyone who makes a threat against a public official has to be arrested, and all of these threats have to be taken seriously. And on general principle my gut reaction to skinhead nazis is that they should simply be taken out behind a barn and put down. But, honestly ... white tuxedos? You just gotta laugh at these idiots.

And I hope it's clear that I'm laughing out of bewilderment, frustration and disgust.

So, anyway, that's enough for now. I'll be back later.

In the meantime, a little bladder cancer music ...

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Obama Watch, Personal, You Tube

In just a couple of minutes you can visit the Jack-O-Lantern animated .gif maker, load up a picture and have an animated Jack-O-Lantern featuring your face or any face you choose.

That's my own big, gnarly head staring at you from the backside of that pumpkin.

Since I got lonely I made pumpkins for all - three - kids, too. Something about the contrast ... or the lack of contrast ... makes the kids Jack-O-Lanterns look especially creepy.

And then I took the goofiest picture of Wendy I could find and turned her into a pumpkin, too. She's gonna kill me over that.

Man, I really enjoy the Halloween season.

Labels: Humor, Links, Personal

Today's surgery was ... well, eventful, I guess that's the word. Two more tumors had to be cut out of my bladder this morning. The doctor really wasn't sure if this was new cancer or if it was cancer that was still there from last time. I got the impression, though, that she was surprised at how much she found.

Jesus. I thought I was getting past this. I don't think it's ever going to end. It's depressing. I just want it to end.

I did get to come home today, though. I'm at home, I'm catheterized, I'm bleeding like hell. I'm having a lot more pain after this operation than I did after either of the two previous ones. That's probably because they let me come home rather than keeping me in the hospital and giving me morphine.

Sitting hurts. Standing hurts. Lying down hurts.

Not a lot beyond that to write about right now. Besides, anything I wrote beyond this would just be self-pity. This just never ends.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal

Back to UVA today for more surgery. I hope to be back to my regular life a little sooner than normal this time. We'll see.

My favorite thing about YouTube is that it affords you an opportunity to track down old songs ... usually in the form of old music videos. Songs you haven't heard in ages. This is an old favorite of mine. The "proper" music video is available at YouTube, but whoever (whomever?) uploaded it decided to add the lyrics as subtitles. And he/she got a lot of the lyrics wrong.

I am NOT trying to say anything about anything by posting this song. It's just been in my head lately, it's an old favorite song of mine. But don't take it as some sort of statement on my part. God forbid I offend anybody....

Anyway, I'm just saying I've always liked this song, that's all, and it might bring back some memories for members of my own generation:

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal, You Tube

I like beer. And as alcoholic beverages go, that's pretty much where I begin and end. I do prefer good beer, Guinness or Bass or sometimes both. I do not enjoy the watered-down, mass produced garbage they sell at convenience stores. But, still, I'm just a beer guy. Wine and liquor are beyond me. And liquor should remain beyond me.

I haven't had good experiences with liquors and mixed drinks. Not that I've been involved in any kind of alcohol related tragedies or anything. It's just that I'm a beer guy, not a liquor guy, and I'm a redneck, besides. I possess all the urbane sophistication of a roadkill squirrel.

Here's the thing:

There's nothing I enjoy more than unwinding at the end of the day with a cold beer before bedtime. Just one cold beer, mind you. I don't overindulge. All I need is one cold beer to "take the edge off." I enjoy it and I feel like it helps me sleep. Or, at least, it used to help me sleep.

But since I've had bladder problems, if I drink a beer before bedtime I can plan to visit the bathroom six or eight times before sunrise.

So, being an idiot with no memory, I got it into my head that I ought to find a mixed drink that I'd enjoy. That way, I thought, I could drink far less actual liquid, but still have the sense of taking the edge off before bedtime and still enjoy the sleep-related benefits of consuming a small, moderate amount of alcohol.

For some damn fool reason I specifically got it into my head that I would enjoy a White Russian before bed. I bet you they taste like milkshakes, I told myself.

That should be a good indication of how much I know about vodka.

But, nonetheless, I went on the internet and found a recipe for White Russians, and I picked up a bottle of vodka and a bottle of Kahlua on the way home from work the other day. Wendy got me some cream when she went grocery shopping.

So last night I decided to fix myself a drink, as they say, and I went on the internet again to get the "parts" right. You know, one part this, two parts that, etc, etc. But on the net there were a number of different recipes for White Russians, and there was a lot of variance between one recipe and the next.

So I ended up in the kitchen with a number of different recipes, and with my assorted bottles and cartons, and a tumbler, and a measuring cup, and there I was, trying to make this damn drink.

So I'm pouring some of this and some of that, then throwing in an ice cube, then mixing in a little of that, then some more of this, etc, etc. And when I finished I had a glass full of something that looked like a White Russian. And then I took a sip and it felt like someone had punched me in the face. So I mixed in more of this and more of that and took another sip and another punch to the face, and then I gave up.

This failure is consistent with my other mixed drink experiences.

One time many years ago I went to a restaurant with an old girlfriend and we ended up at the bar while we waited for our table. She ordered a drink, a Strawberry Daiquiri, and then the bartender looked at me with that "And you, sir?" look on his face. So I said "Uh, oh, uh, ok, I'll have what she's having."

I hadn't paid attention to what she'd ordered and I didn't really know what a Daiquiri was, anyway.

And then the bartender brought each of us these big, bright pink, frozen things. They each looked to be about a gallon of pink slushy stuff, and they each had a mound of whipped cream on top of them. And they each had little umbrellas and swizzle sticks in them, and I think each of them might have had a Barbi Doll stuck in there, too, and all I could do was look at the smirking bartender with that "What have you done to me?!?" expression on my face, because clearly I hadn't known what I was getting myself into when I'd ordered "what she's having."

Man, I could not have felt more embarrassed or uncomfortable if the bartender had handed me a trucker's hat with the word "SISSY" on it in giant red letters and said "Here, wear this for twenty minutes or so."

And, of course, it was right then that the maitre de announced that our tables were ready and I had to parade through the bar and out into the restaurant carrying this gigantic glass drum full of frozen, pink slush ... this whipped cream topped threat to my 21 year old masculinity ... and I was convinced that everyone in the place was looking at me thinking "Look out, Nancy-boy there might spill some of his slushy sweetness on you."

Another time I ended up in this noisy country bar with a buddy of mine and this girl we worked with and a friend of hers, and I had this vague feeling that I was the "wing man," and i really just wanted to leave and go ... somewhere, anywhere ... where there wasn't a terrible band playing off-key George Strait songs.

But instead I went to the bar with the rest of them and when the bartender looked at me I was again overcome by my stupidity, my insecurity, and my desperate need to have occasional mixed-drink related bad experiences. So the bartender asked me what I wanted and I was, in that instant, convinced that it was imperative that I order a mixed drink (but NOT a Daiquiri). By ordering a mixed drink, I told myself, I'd impress everyone with my adroit savoir-faire.

So I asked for a Rob Roy.

In a country bar.

And the bartender looked at me as though I'd asked her for a magical pony. And it was then that I looked around and realized that I would now be the only person in the bar not drinking out of a bottle. And the bartender disappeared and came back and handed me something in a glass, and I don't know what it was because, truth be told, I didn't know what a Rob Roy was then and I don't know now. But, whatever it was, it smelled like paint. And I drank it one painful, grimacing sip at a time ... and to this day I have to wonder if the bartender gave me that glass of something (maybe paint?) just to see if I'd actually drink it.

I don't remember what happened next, but I'm certain that it was miserable. The night may have ended with me sitting outside on the curb, quietly crying to myself and singing along as the band played "All My Exes Live In Texas."

So that's my history with mixed drinks. And that's why I currently have a small bottle of vodka and a small bottle of Kahlua in my freezer, and why I have no interest in ever opening either one again.

And if you're a beer drinker, drink one for me, won't you?

Labels: Humor, Personal

I don't mind that Microsoft owns half the world. Really, I don't. I just don't care.

But in exchange for owning half the world, I think that Microsoft should at least

PROVIDE IT'S CUSTOMERS WITH
PRODUCTS THAT WORK.

I hate Vista. I hate it with a raging purple passion that radiates from my shriveled little black heart and rains down vitriol on everything within a twenty mile radius. I am the Chernobyl of Vista hatred.

Now Microsoft has debuted Internet Explorer 8.0 and, like the abject twit that I am, I downloaded and installed the beta.

I might as well have taken a hammer to this damn computer.

I won't go into details because I'm afraid that thinking to much about it will make my head literally explode. You seen Scanners? Just. Like. That.

Crashes. Crashes and crashes and crashes and hangs and hangs and "Windows is searching for a solution to the problem" and yeah, right, tell me another one.

Avoid IE 8.0 like the plague. Avoid Vista like the plague. Somebody shoot me.

Labels: Microsoft, News, Personal

I'm gonna ask a hypothetical question in this post, and I'm almost certain that there will be people who'll think that even asking this question makes me a racist.

But first, some back story:

I returned to work Monday after having spent two months off the job, dealing with cancer. Turns out, I haven't mellowed any.

Today at work I got into an argument with a racist moron. This guy happens to be a black racist moron. He's one of those guys who thinks that anyone who a) disagrees with him, and b) isn't black, must be a racist. Normally my tolerance of this particular guy is pretty high. He can be fun to be around. But today he was on a soap-box, marking today's anniversary by telling everyone that none of us know near as much about Martin Luther King and the famous I Have A Dream speech as he does.

It seemed that he thought that, merely by virtue of being a black guy, he was somehow better tuned in to Dr. King than anyone else. OK, whatever.

After several hours (literally several hours) of him boasting and berating everyone around him, I had had enough. I asked him if he really felt that he knew more about Dr. King and that speech than anyone else in the room.

He said that he did, and I asked him a few easy questions. Where was the speech given, what was the occasion, etc. Of course he didn't know and ended up looking like a fool.

This made him even more obnoxious than ever and he came over and started shoving a newspaper in my face and ranting about this and that. I told him a couple of times to get out of my face and he just wouldn't let it go.

Unfortunately, I sank to his level. I told him that he was probably the stupidest and most obnoxious person who worked at our facility (it's true, but there was no need to say it), and the back and forth between both of us involved some cursing and name-calling.

Finally he left the room.

A number of people told me that I'd said what they were thinking, etc. By then I was starting to feel a little ashamed.

It doesn't bug me that much, but I am disappointed with myself that I jumped in feet first with him when it came to cursing and name-calling. This guy really is very limited intellectually. I should have been able to make my point and left it at that.

Anyway, I started thinking about the upcoming election and a question crossed my mind. I'm sure there are people who'd call me racist for even considering this question, but I don't care. It did cross my mind and I think it's a legit question considering some of our relatively recent history.

So here's the question: Do you guys think there might be unrest, maybe even rioting, in the "urban areas" if Obama doesn't win the election?

The question crossed my mind because of the pushiness and cockiness of some of Obama's supporters. If asking the question makes me a "racist," then fine. Call me what you want. But it did cross my mind.

Anyway ...

It looks like it's been a weird week in Denver, too. That picture of the stuffed Obama dolls to the upper right is posted at LGF. Those dolls don't look like Obama. They look like Nipsey Russell.

I liked Nipsey Russell. I'd vote for him over Obama any day.

There's been some violence and ugliness at the convention. Unseen posted video of some douchebag named Alex Jones screaming like a madman at all five feet of Michelle Malkin:

At Geekologie I saw this video:

Hey, not for nothing, but if a cop tells you to back up it's probably a better idea to actually back up than to scream "F----ng do it again!" in his face. I'm not saying that the woman in that video deserved to get knocked to the ground. But I am saying that she got what she seemed to want.

What's McCain doing tonight? Thanks to Hot Air I know that he's wasting some of his campaign money with this video:

What's he thinking, recording a gracious, friendly ad? The scumbags at Daily Kos, etc, are just going to question his motives and mock him. Does he think they're gonna give him an even break?

Total change of topic, but I also saw this at Geekologie:

That's right, it's a Christian rock version of Guitar Hero.

Look, I'm a Christian and I absolutely love rock music and this is a family that regularly enjoys the Guitar Hero game. And I can tell you this: 90% of "Christian rock" is just creepy, bland trash. It's neither Christian, nor is it rock. It's just bland elevator music that vaguely references religion.

Is there anything creepier than those commercials for "Christian pop" compilations, with those zombies in the crowd, waving their arms with their eyes closed? Man, I'm getting the willies just thinking about it.

Sure, there are some Christians out there who also happen to be good musicians, and their beliefs are often apparent in their lyrics. But the bands that market themselves that way? As Christian rock? That garbage makes my skin crawl.

I'm all for praising in song, but give me the classics in church. And give me real rock everywhere else.

That reminds me: Someday I'm gonna have to write a post about the time I let someone talk me into attending a "Promise Keepers" rally. It was, without a doubt, the creepiest, strangest, most unpleasant fifteen minutes (I bolted for the car) of my life.

Labels: News, Personal, Politics, You Tube

This is kinda neat, and it gives me an opportunity to borrow a page from Rhodester:

The movie Sommersby was neither a commercial blockbuster, nor a big critical success. It was a post-civil war story about a returning soldier who might not have been who he claimed to be. It stared Jodie Foster and Richard Gere, but apparently star-power alone isn't enough to turn a movie into a masterpiece.

I kinda like the film, but I'm biased. It was filmed in and around the part of Virginia where I live, and the summer of it's production brought a lot of excitement to the area.

A number of local people got to be extras in the movie. That's kinda cool. It's a bit of a distraction, though, when you're watching a movie set around the Civil War and find yourself saying things like "Hey, that's the guy who works the window at McDonnalds!"

After the filming I visited Warwickton, the period mansion where much of the movie was shot, and took a few pictures.

I took these pictures with an extremely cheap 35mm camera. And I scanned them with the first scanner I ever owned, which was about the size of a VW bus. I don't know why I saved such small scans, but these are the only ones I have. I came across them tonight while looking through some old media and deciding what to throw away and what to keep.

Above is the mansion itself, looking exactly like it does in the movie.

The slave quarters weren't authentic. In fact, if I remember what I was told correctly, the actual original owners of Warwickton weren't slave-owners. But some of the people in the story of Sommersby were slave-owners, so period-authentic slave quarters were built and they're still there.

I took this picture from the porch of Warwickton, looking toward the slave quarters.

During the filming of the movie Richard Gere and Cindy Crawford supposedly came into town and saw Sister Act at our local tiny little theater. That's far out, man.

Labels: Movies, Personal, Trivial Matters

MCF posted a link to a manga avatar maker, and we had fun putting together manga versions of our family:

Labels: Blogs, Links, Personal, Trivial Matters

I mentioned on July 23 that there was something about my round with bladder cancer that I didn't think I should blog about yet. I said I was considering a law suit. Well, here are the details, though it's all pretty anticlimactic, and I feel pretty dumb about it.

In 1995 I developed bladder problems that were very much the same as the ones I developed this spring. I saw a urologist in '95 and had two cystoscopies and two biopsies, and the diagnosis at the time was Interstitial Cystitis. This was weird at the time because I don't fit the demographic for that ailment at all, but I took the urologist at his word. So since '95 I've believed that I had IC and I've tried to monitor (somewhat) what I eat and drink in order to avoid flair-ups.

OK, so fast forward thirteen years to last July. I had bladder surgery twice this summer, the second time at UVA Hospital, and the urologist presented my slides to the pathology department at UVA because something about my cancer cells seemed a bit odd. Well, guess what ... the pathologist at UVA remembered my name. He remembered me because he had seen my biopsy slides in '95 and had diagnosed my condition as cancer way back then. The local urologist had sent my slides to UVA all those years ago and the pathology department at UVA had called it cancer and no one had told me.

Well, I didn't remember anyone telling me.

So it's conceivable that I've been walking around with cancer for 13 years. Granted, I have a particularly non-aggressive, superficial, slow-growing cancer ... but as far back as '95 it was recognized as cancer by the good people at UVA.

I was pretty angry when I found out late last month that the pathologist at UVA had diagnosed me as a cancer patient all the way back in '95. I felt that if I'd known that UVA thought I had cancer all those years ago I'd have certainly done something other than go about my business and allow the cancer to grow. So I considered filing a malpractice suit against the local urologist, now retired, who I'd seen in '95.

But as I got my paper-trail together I was surprised to realize that I still had a number of letters and forms from '95. I'd kept track of them all these years. And at least one of them makes reference to a diagnosis of "transitional cell carcinoma" from a pathologist at UVA. Granted, this particular letter, from a local pathologist, disagrees with the UVA diagnosis. But, nonetheless, I was informed (at least informally) in '95 that a pathologist at UVA thought I had cancer. I have the letter to prove it.

How did I forget that? How did that go in one ear and out the other? I don't know, but obviously it did. I guess I was so happy to embrace a diagnosis of something other than cancer that I just dismissed the UVA diagnosis completely.

So the moral of the story, I guess, is that even if a doctor who thinks you have cancer is in the minority, make sure you follow up on it. The Pathologist at UVA recognized my condition as cancer thirteen years ago, and if I'd followed up on that it would have been caught long before it took over half of my bladder.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal

I went back to UVA Hospital again today. The catheter was taken out. Time to test my bladder again and see if it will do anything remotely similar to what a bladder is supposed to do.

And how much does it suck to have spent the past few months dealing with this mess? It sucks THIS much: Gov't Mule was back in Virginia last weekend and I didn't even know about it. And if I had known about it, with my medical bills I couldn't have afforded to go. And if I could have afforded to go, I would have had a tough time getting through the concert.

That sucks a LOT.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Gov't Mule, Personal

McFat XIX, MCF's questionnaire for his loyal readers:

1) Should film critics be genre-specific? Why or why not?

Nah, I don't think so. Movie fans aren't genre-specific, so why should critics be? Well, most movie fans aren't genre specific ... but, now that I think about it, one of my best friends steadfastly refuses to watch anything other than comedies and horror movies.

Besides, just being a film critic kinda is genre-specific. It's not like film critics regularly cross over and review CDs, restaurants, etc.

2) What are some of your favorite movies and/or episodes of television shows depicting time travel?

My favorite is The Simpsons' Time And Punishment from Treehouse Of Horror V. Featuring Homer's immortal line: "Oh, I wish, I wish I hadn't killed that fish."

I also really enjoyed the indie sci-fi film Primer.

Back in the early 90's I thought that Quantum Leap was a pretty good show.

Of course the 1968 Planet of the Apes (as opposed to the crap Tim Burton remake) is a classic, and you find out at the end that time travel is a key to the story. (Ooops! Spoiler in the previous sentence!) The novel is better than either movie, though.

My favorite episode of The Twilight Zone, called Spur of the Moment, kinda dances around the concept of time travel.

I saw and enjoyed the first two Terminator movies, by the way. Never saw the third one and I don't care to see it, but the fourth one looks interesting.

Donnie Darko is a decent time travel movie.

Idiocracy is often hilarious. Mike Judge knows funny.

Slaughterhouse Five is an OK movie, but the novel is much better. It's Vonnegut, after all, and Vonnegut could do things with the printed word that transcended the limits of visual mediums.

I love A Christmas Carol, though I'm hard pressed to decide which production I've enjoyed most. Every one I've seen has had it's charms and it's flaws.

I liked the time travel sequence in the fourth Harry Potter movie.

Does Groundhog Day qualify as a time travel movie? I liked Groundhog Day a lot.

Oh, yeah, and I can't forget 12 Monkeys and Jacob's Ladder, I love both of those movies, and both of them have loose time travel themes.

3) At this exact second, how did you get where you are in life?

Well, my health isn't great, and that's my fault since I smoked for twenty-six years. But I stopped once for three years back in the '90's, so I know I can quit smoking. And as of this minute I haven't had a cigarette in nineteen days.

That's kinda the major preoccupation of my life right now, so I'll leave it at that.

4) Will there be sex in heaven?

You want a serious answer? I'd say that my faith teaches me that the question is answered in the last part of the 22nd chapter of the book of Matthew.

My gut-reaction answer, though, would be something like this: Sex is our earthly way of making a connection that we will make in an even more fulfilling way in the world to come. The idea of heaven without sex kinda sorta sucks ... but that's because we're thinking with earthly minds and we only have earthly experiences to form our context. There's not only more to our existence than we imagine ... there's more to our existence than we can imagine.

I'll throw some song lyrics out there, while I'm at it. I've always thought that the Tool song Parabola is a song about the spiritual elements of monogamous sex. If I'm interpreting the lyrics correctly, then I have to say that I like what the song has to say.

SPECIAL BONUS QUESTION: What is “that” one thing Meat Loaf wouldn't do for love? I'll accept both humorous and serious responses.

That question is answered in the lyrics to the song. The female vocalist sings "Sooner or later you'll be screwing around" and Meat Loaf sings "I won't do that."

By the way, according to IMDB, Meat Loaf's real name is Marvin Lee Aday. But to me, His name is Robert Paulson. His name is Robert Paulson. His name is Robert Paulson. His name is Robert Paulson. His name is Robert Paulson. His name is Robert Paulson. His name is Robert Paulson.

Labels: Blogs, Links, Personal, Trivial Matters

Two disparate items, relevant to nothing:

Some people think that Barack Obama is the next John Kennedy. I personally see him as the next Jimmy Carter. But, then again, this YouTube clip might be evidence that he's really the next George W. Bush:

Total change of topic: I noticed the other day that our cat is pretty well camouflaged when she naps on our desk chair:

Labels: Personal, Politics, Trivial Matters, You Tube

My visit to the UVA Medical Center was somewhat eventful today. For the first time since I was diagnosed I was able to go to a hospital for treatment without ending up admitted for the night. So that much is good, anyway.

I'm trying to decide how much of the most recent events I want to blog about. Some of it is wince-inducing ... and other elements are sensitive for other reasons. But, anyway, I'm back home with a new catheter that I'll have to have for two weeks. Hopefully, my bladder will actually do some healing during that time.

OK, here's a compromise: I'll write the wince-inducing details here in a white font, which you'll have to highlight with your curser to read. So if you want to know gory details, start highlighting here: I mentioned in my post on Sunday the 13th that having my catheter changed was extremely painful. Well, today I found out why. The very end of my urethra was abnormally narrow. It had a stricture due to the trauma of my recent surgeries. It wasn't that my entire urethra was too narrow, just the very end of it. The resident who put the catheter in during my last hospital stay was either too stupid or too indifferent to do anything about it, so he just shoved the catheter in and it hurt like hell. Today my urologist decided that the narrow opening of my urethra had to be corrected, so she corrected it. With a pair of medical scissors. That's right, one quick snip and I no longer had a stricture that caused an abnormal narrowing at the end of my urethra. They didn't tell me what they were going to do before they did it ... probably because they realized that if I'd known what they were planning to do I'd have jumped up and started throwing punches at everyone present. But the procedure was done, the catheter was inserted, and I'm alive and at home. Whew.
So, yeah, I survived that ... although thinking about it makes me sweat, tremble and cry. And hopefully it'll never have to be done again.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal

Well, it's back to UVA tomorrow. My bladder isn't healing anywhere NEAR as quickly as it should, so I'm going back to the urology department to try to find out why. Hopefully, this visit is going to result in something that'll give me some relief from the spasms, pain, and frequent trips to the bathroom.

I also found out something jaw-dropping about my cancer. It turns out that I've had cancer for a great deal longer than I realized. I don't want to say much more about it yet, because I think I'm going to pursue litigation ... but I'll have more details at some point.

Talk to you later.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal

The catheter came out Thursday about 11:00 AM and I've been having a terrible time ever since. Pain, spasms, trips to the bathroom every four or five minutes, lots of lost sleep, etc.

I just haven't felt much like blogging.

I'll be back to the blogosphere as soon as this most recent bad spell passes.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal

I just heard from the urologist at UVA who performed my surgery. The biopsy of my bladder wall came back clean. No cancer in the wall of the bladder.

That means that the cancer that had formed on the internal lining of my bladder was probably the only cancer in my bladder. And that means that, since they believe that they got all of that cancer in my two recent surgeries, the worst is probably over.

There is still some concern about all the bleeding and bladder spasms I'm having, though. Apparently, these symptoms are a bit more than I should be experiencing right now. According to the urologist, right now this is the question: Did my bladder cancer cause all of my problems, or is there something else wrong with my bladder ... something that's causing the pain and the bleeding and that also allowed the bladder cancer to form in the first place?

Beyond that, the urologist told me that there were things about the cancer cells that were unusual. She didn't elaborate, and I'm sure it would have gone over my head anyway ... but she said that she's submitted my case to the oncology board at UVA for review and she'll have more information for me next Wednesday.

In the meantime there is another milestone coming that I'm really looking forward to: I get this godawful catheter out this Thursday.

So there are still some issues to resolve, but in the meantime, my biggest concern has been put to rest. The two operations were successful, and as of this minute I'm cancer-free.

There will be lots of tests, exams, etc, in my future in order to make sure the cancer doesn't come back. But right now things are, for the most part, looking up.

I don't feel that I've sufficiently expressed my appreciation to my fellow bloggers who've been so supportive and kind during this painful period. You guys have really played a big role in keeping me positive. Your comments, both here and at your own blogs, mean a lot to me. I just hope you guys know how much I appreciate it.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal

I feel like blogging, but I don't feel like writing anything about bladder cancer. I'm friggin' SICK of writing about bladder cancer. So I'm going to borrow a page from MCF and answer the questions from the famous Proust Questionnaire:

• 1) What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery?
  
  If I were to answer this question seriously, I'd say the most miserable thing in the world is the loss of a child. But if I were to answer the question sarcastically, I'd say ... oh, screw it. After bringing up the loss of a child, who can be sarcastic?



• 2) Where would you like to live?
  
  Where I live now. Well, in this state and in this county ... but maybe somewhere more rural.



• 3) What is your idea of earthly happiness?
  
  Spending the day at Busch Gardens Williamsburg with my family.



• 4) To which faults do you feel most indulgent?
  
  Ah, damn. I indulge in a LOT of faults. I'll say I'm most guilty of indulging in compulsive behavior. Anything that can be done compulsively ... smoking, eating, drinking ... I've either done it in the past or still do it today.



• 5) Who is/are your favorite hero/heroes of fiction?
  
  OK, let's see, there's Sam Fisher, Spider-Man, Batman, etc, etc, etc.
  
  
• 6) Who are your favorite characters in history?
  
  You know, that really is an odd way to phrase it: "Characters in history." Nonetheless, my list of mortal heroes from real life would have to include St. Peter, Ronald Reagan, Thomas Sowell, Johnny Cash and Ray Charles.
  
  
• 7) Who are your favorite heroines in real life?
  
  OK, uh ... My mom, St. Dymphna, Loretta Lynn, and of course Mary, Mother of God.




• 8) Who is/are your favorite heroines of fiction?
  
  Holy crap! I never think about some of these things. If I gotta come up with something, I'm saying Flo from the Progressive Insurance commercials. "Surprise! Let's bag these up."



• 9) Your favorite painters?
  
  Damn. I don't have any favorite painters. I'll say The Red House Painters are my favorite painters.



• 10) Your favorite composers or musicians?
  
  Well, Gov't Mule, Pink Floyd, Tool, Tony Rice, Marvin Gaye, Metallica, Frank Zappa, Merle Haggard, Phish, and the artists I listed above.



• 11) What qualities do you most value in a man?
  
  Holy crap, I never even THOUGHT about this. I'll say that what I want in a man is someone who's tall, dark and handsome who'll hold me when I cry.



• 12) What qualities do you most value in a woman?
  
  Honesty, accountability, reliability, virtue, reason, reverence, and big, big boobies.



• 13) Your favorite virtue?
  
  Kindness.
  
  
• 14) Your favorite occupation?
  
  I worked in radio for eight years and had a great time. I didn't make any money, but I had a lot of fun.



• 15) Who would you like to be?
  
  Me, but cancer-free. DOH! I was gonna go without mentioning cancer in this post.



• 16) Your most marked characteristic?
  
  I'm inclined to say sarcasm.



• 17) What do you most value in your friends?
  
  Like MCF, I'd say that I value friends who have shared interests and a similar sense of humor. And who're capable of having actual conversations. And who have big, big boobies.



• 18) What is your principle defect?
  
  Selfishness. It's at the root of everything I do wrong.



• 19) What is your favorite color?
  
  Black. I guess. I never think about it.



• 20) What is your favorite flower?
  
  For real? Geez. Uh ... the ones I don't have to mow around.




• 21) What is your favorite bird?
  
  My favorite bird would be the one Johnny Cash flipped in that famous picture taken during his concert at San Quentin.



• 22) Who are your favorite prose writers?
  
  C.S. Lewis. Thomas Sowell. Elmore Leonard. Chuck Palahniuk. And a number of other writers, all of whom I'm too lazy to code links for.



• 23) Who are your favorite poets?
  
  Dammit, maybe I shouldn't have done this questionnaire. I don't have any favorite poets. I do have favorite lyricists, though ... so I'll say Bono, Merle Haggard, Frank Zappa, John Mellencamp, and Glen Phillips.
  
  
• 24) What are your favorite names?
  
  Does this mean names of mine? I have two informal nicknames, Flounder and Derail. I'll answer to either of them as readily as to the name my mother gave me.



• 25) What is it you most dislike?
  
  People who don't take the time to learn about the issues but still voice their opinion loudly. Childishness. People who won't act their age.



• 26) What historical figures do you most despise?
  
  Well, the obvious ones; Osama bin Ladin, Hitler, etc. But also the Clintons, Margaret Sanger, Richard Dawkins.
  
  
• 27) What event in military history do you most admire?
  
  Operation Overlord.
  
  
• 28) What reform do you most admire?
  
  Well, I was glad when Vernon Reed reformed Living Colour.



• 29) What natural gift would you most like to possess?
  
  I'd like to have the strength of a thousand men. And be able to fly. And shoot lasers out of my butt. Do those qualify as natural gifts?



• 30) How would you like to die?
  
  Well, I came into this world naked, bloody and screaming ... and as long as I don't go out that way, I'll be happy.



• 31) What is your present state of mind?
  
  Distracted and kinda bored



• 32) What is your motto?
  
  "Death to Smoochie."

Labels: Blogs, Gov't Mule, Johnny Cash, Metallica, Personal, Trivial Matters

My second surgery for bladder cancer was done on Thursday and I got to come home from the hospital Friday evening. I'm currently taking some truly heavy-duty narcotics for pain and to control spasms, so I'm sure I'll remember this particular period as kind of a daze.

Rather than try to write a coherent and detailed account of my visit to the UVA Medical Center, I'll just throw out a few random observations and memories, kinda stream-of-consciousness style. That's partly to keep this post from running on for twenty thousand words ... and partly because right now I think in random observations and memories, kinda stream-of-consciousness style.

Anyway...

• Man, I really don't like general anaesthesia. I don't like being totally knocked out for surgery, I'd rather get local or regional anaesthesia so that I don't have those bizarre, jagged, surreal bits of memory after it's all done. I had to have general anaesthesia this time. My hazy memories of everything pre-surgery and everything for the first few hours after surgery have a really bizarre quality to them. Not to get dramatic, but have you ever seen the last few minutes of Fire in the Sky? I'm not saying that it was that bad, but it does make me think of that movie sequence.



• The difference between a good hospital stay and a bad one all comes down to the RNs. I was blessed to be attended by several wonderful nurses who made me as comfortable and happy as possible, and I'll feel indebted to them and remember them for the rest of my life.



• The wonderful nurses who attended to me made me think about my mother and my sister, both RNs. I've been told by a number of people that they're both damn good nurses, too, and my stay at UVA makes me admire and appreciate my mom and my sis all that much more.



• To help control bladder spasms post-surgery I was given Opium And Belladonna suppositories. So I can now say that I've experienced opium. And I've experienced having a suppository implanted by committee. I think everyone from the hospital CEO to the night janitor was in my room during that process. (I haven't checked YouTube for cellphone videos; I really just don't want to know.) Anyway, the suppositories gave me so much relief that it almost worth it.



• My surgery was rough. The surgeon had a difficult time getting to the rest of the tumor and ended up causing some trauma to my prostate, which bled profusely. Apparently, the prostate is very sensitive and will bleed profusely if you give it a harsh look. So don't mess with your prostate.



• In hell, everyone has a Foley Catheter and everyone has to have their Foley Catheter changed once a day. So say your prayers and go to church because you do NOT want to have to go through that.



• Having my catheter changed on the second day was the most painful experience of my life. The physical pain was beyond words. I was reduced to a quivering, bawling mess. Thank GOD this was done early and my wife and son hadn't gotten to the hospital yet. It took the attention of an amazingly patient and kind nurse and innumerable shots of morphine and codeine to get me through it. I think I'd rather be hit by a truck than go through that again. As of now I'd call that half-hour (or so) the absolute low-point of my life.



• One of the people attending to me was a "Patient Care Technician" named Ninfa. Ninfa was an older lady from Brazil with a thick accent, and I found her manner of speech to be somewhat musical and kinda soothing. She spent some time talking to me and she and I got to know each other a little bit. At one point she said "I tell my priest about you." It was one of the most genuinely heart-warming moments I've had in a very long time. God bless you, Ninfa.



• All you people who oppose immigration on any grounds: If you had your way, I'd have been denied the chance to meet Ninfa. I'd be a poorer man for it, too.



• Some doctors know how to treat patients and some don't. If you, by some slim chance, are a hospital doctor, please consider the following: Your patients are HUMAN BEINGS and they deserve to be treated like human beings, not science projects. Don't walk into a patient's room and throw off his or her sheets, exposing him or her to the world, without shutting the door. And take the time to introduce yourself and exchange just a few seconds of banter before you start such an examination. Surgery is difficult enough without you making the patient feel like roadkill.



• One way to make a hospital stay more tolerable is to remember to bring a personal CD player or MP3 player. I've learned over the past couple of months that a dark room and Dark Side Of The Moon will allow me to temporarily escape any amount of misery.



• Having said all of that, I also have to say that I am grateful to the folks at UVA (well, I'm grateful to most of 'em, as for the others, they know exactly what I thought of their behavior) and I feel very fortunate. I won't know until Tuesday after the final lab work and biopsy if I'm cancer free yet, but in the meantime I still consider myself one of the lucky ones. I received just about the best medical care available. My suffering has been minimized to the highest degree allowed by pharmacology and human compassion. And, I have a wonderful family and amazing friends who've made me feel supported and loved. I certainly wouldn't call myself lucky to have cancer, but I'd call myself extremely lucky in every other element of my life, and this experience with cancer has made me realize just how blessed I am.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal

I'm alive, I'm out of the hospital, I'm home, I'm feeling relatively good. I'll write a blog post tomorrow, thanks to those of you who had me in mind during my surgery.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal

Well, I'm going to the the Urology Clinic at UVA tomorrow for more surgery. The plan tomorrow is simply to get the rest of the tumor. What will happen next depends on how well things go tomorrow.

I consider myself fortunate to be getting this done at UVA. It's probably the best option available to me. I looked up UVA's rank among medical centers with department heads specializing in urological oncology, and I found out that UVA does have a rank. And US News And World Report ranks UVA in a bunch of categories with different numbers and such, all of which probably mean something to somebody. So that's good. Right?

Plus, if you go to the UVA Department of Urology website, you're greeted by a picture of a doctor smiling in a way that isn't really that creepy, all things considered. So I've got that going for me, too, which is nice.

Here's an interesting fact about my surgeon: She was part of a committee that authored a study called Complementary and Alternative Medicine Modality Use and Beliefs Among African American Prostate Cancer Survivors. So if nothing else, she can probably talk my tumor into submission.

Seriously, though, I do have the utmost confidence in the good people at UVA. But I don't know how long I'll be away from home. If all goes as well as possible, I could be home tomorrow night. But, if all goes as well as possible, it'll be the first time things have gone as well as possible since this whole bladder cancer thing started! So I'm not holding my breath, but I still remain confident that things are going to turn out OK.

So I'll be blogging again when I get home after this next surgical procedure, and hopefully I'll have stuff to talk about besides bladder cancer. Be good, I'll talk to you then.

Oh, yeah, by the way, the Xbox is working fine, just like B13 said it would. I'll take that as a good omen. And one day I'll invest in the Xbox Live package that let's me game online!

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal

Just a quick note; I'm still alive, still waiting for my bladder to heal post-surgery, still dashing to the bathroom every seven seconds (or so it seems).

Here's a quick list of the distractions that have been preoccupying me for the last few days. Consider these the reasons I haven't been blogging much.

• My doctor changed my medication with the hope that stronger stuff would help me sleep and have less pain. Success! My sleep is still sporadic, but I'm glad to be getting any sleep at all, so I'll take it when I can get it.



• I rented Call Of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, and it might be the greatest first-person-shooter of all time. It's just about the best I've ever played, at least. A few minutes ago I shot down a helicopter with a sidewinder missle! Take that, terrorist scum! Booo-yah!



• Into The Wild, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and Unleashed: Danny The Dog are all OK-to-good movies and all worth reviewing. And In Bruges is an outstanding movie. All of them are worth reviewing and I ought to write reviews of all of 'em.



• Deep Banana Blackout and Umphrey's McGee are both awesome jam bands that I've just discovered. If you're into Phish, Gov't Mule, etc, you should check these bands out, too.



• The kids are all with their other parents this week, so Wendy and I have had a lot of time to catch up on movies that aren't rated G or PG (see list of movies above) and TV shows we wouldn't watch with the kids around. And speaking of TV...



• The Sci-Fi Channel is running an all-day Twilight Zone marathon today and tomorrow. This is the original 1959-1964 series, which I used to watch in reruns growing up, and I just can't get enough of this stuff. I don't think my all-time favorite episode, titled Spur Of The Moment, is scheduled to run, though.

Hope everybody has a good 4th! I'll blog more when I have fewer distractions.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Movies, Music, Personal, Trivial Matters, Video Games

It's hard for me to believe it now, but when I was a kid I had to be FORCED to do two things: eat my dinner and go to sleep. As an adult I'm the exact opposite. Once I do either of those things I basically have to be FORCED to stop.

The worst thing about my current health issues is that I've had a terrible time sleeping for the past week. Between last Monday morning and yesterday evening, I hadn't had more than an hour of sleep at one time. My bladder keeps me in the bathroom day and night, usually three or four times in an hour. There have been a few spells when I've had to go to the bathroom literally every five minutes for two or three hours at a time.


And the pain I'm experiencing keeps me from sleeping, too.

However, last evening I fell asleep and actually stayed asleep from about 7:30 until 10:30. Three hours! Three blessed hours of uninterrupted sleep! I know it doesn't sound like a big deal, but it was a God-send to me last night. When I first woke up again around 10:30 PM, I felt ready to take on the world. That feeling faded pretty quickly, but those three hours of sleep really did me a world of good.

I've been awake since then, though ... like every other night this week. I used to be a night-owl when I was younger, and there was a time when I'd have used this awake-time productively. Instead, this week I've used my surplus waking hours doing things like watching TV, listening to music, and watching YouTube videos and turning them into blog posts.

I've also read about bladder cancer and joined a discussion board for people with bladder cancer ... and I've read a little bit about sleep, sleep deprivation, and dreams.

I took a quiz that's designed to assess how healthy my sleep habits are, and I answered all the questions truthfully, based on my current condition. I didn't provide answers based on my usual sleep habits. According to the quiz, I currently likely suffer from sleep apnea, insomnia, narcolepsy and restless leg syndrome. Whoo hooo! I hit a grand slam!

There are a lot of sites on the net full of interesting info about sleep, such as this one and this one and this one and this one and this one.

Here are some of the interesting trivia tidbits I've learned about sleep, sprinkled liberally with nuggets of BS I made up. Can you tell which of these items are actual facts and which ones are SouthCon hogwash? I'll tell you what's real and what's not in the first comment.

• People who've been blind since birth or very early childhood do not experience sight in their dreams. But blind people who lost their sight at the age of seven or later will still be able to see in their dreams even as much as sixty years after the loss of their sight.



• Sometimes, blind people report dreams in which they've "seen" people or things that they've never seen in real life.



• We all have an internal sleep/wake "clock," though some are more reliable than others. In 1998 there was a study in which scientists shined a light onto the backs of people's knees and this caused them to "reset" their internal "clocks." The scientists still have no idea why they observed this phenomenon.



• Investigations determined that sleep deprivation played a role in the Exxon Valdez oil spill, the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster, and the Chernobyl nuclear plant accident.



• The extra-hour of sleep received when clocks are put back at the start of daylight savings time in Canada has been found to coincide with a fall in the number of road accidents.



• The study that lead to the discovery of REM sleep was done in 1953. It had not been done previously because scientists were literally concerned that the study would be a waste of paper.



• Winston Churchill said "You must sleep sometime between lunch and dinner, and no halfway measures. Take off your clothes and get into bed. That's what I always do. Don't think you will be doing less work because you sleep during the day. That's a foolish notion held by people who have no imaginations."



• The record for the longest period without sleep is 18 days, 21 hours, 40 minutes. Nonetheless, you are still likely to die from sleep deprivation sooner than from starvation. A person can go a few weeks without food but can usually only go about ten days without sleep.



• Sleep deprivation has been shown to be a factor in obesity, high blood pressure, and the onset of diabetes.



• People who routinely don't get enough sleep build up a "sleep debt," which is detrimental to overall health. Sleep debt can't be eliminated by getting extra sleep on the weekend. In short, it is impossible to "catch up" on sleep. The only way to eliminate sleep debt is to adjust your schedule and start getting enough sleep every night.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal, Trivial Matters

I don't go see the urology team at UVA until July 7, but I've been reading a little bit on the net about bladder cancer and the options that are available ... and I've learned quite a lot. Or, at least, I think I have.

There's all kinds of information out there. There are even YouTube videos, like this one:

My urologist had told me that he thought a bladder rebuild would be the best route for me, based on the concern that chemo wouldn't keep the cancer from coming back. But now that I've finally gotten around to doing some research on bladder rebuilds, I'm not so keen on the idea.

Removal of the bladder is called a Radical Cystectomy, and it doesn't just involve removal of the bladder. It also requires removal of the bilateral pelvic lymph nodes, the prostate gland and seminal vesicles. So (if I understand what I've read correctly) all men who have this procedure done are rendered infertile and many of them also become impotent.

I ain't no Casanova ... but I am a normal, red-blooded, heterosexual, married male. The idea of becoming infertile and impotent just a few months shy of my 40th birthday scares the hell out of me. I mean, damn! I didn't think I was even done having kids yet.

And on top of that, many people who've had this procedure done have to use a catheter for the rest of their lives.

I'm kinda confused right now about why my urologist told me that I was a good candidate for a Radical Cystectomy. The thing is, he also told me that my bladder cancer, while substantial, was only on the inner lining of my bladder and not in the bladder wall. I've included a graphic here that I found on the net. If my bladder cancer is on the inner lining and not in the bladder wall, that would be a "Stage 0" cancer (I guess), and not the stage 2 and 3 cancer that usually involves total removal of the bladder. (Again, this is all based on the presumption that I understand the stuff I've read correctly.)

You know, it might not a good thing that I'm reading all this information on the 'net. I might be confusing myself. And, besides, what I'm reading is a mixture of opinion and specific case histories, none of which might be relevant to my case history or to the opinions and/or experiences of the urologists at UVA. But I digress.

The procedure I had done on Thursday (called a Transurethral Bladder Tumor Resection) wasn't entirely successful. They weren't able to get all the cancer. So I'm going to at least have to have another TBTR done at UVA to get the rest of it. After which (if I understand correctly) I'd have the option of beginning the chemo that my urologist doesn't think will be entirely effective.

And that chemo sounds pretty unpleasant, too, since it's administered to the bladder through a catheter. (Man, I never thought the word "catheter" would play such a prominent role in my life at this age!)

Anyway, from what I've read (there's that phrase again), if they're able to get the rest of the cancer with another TBTR, I'll then have to have some chemo and I'll have to go back to be checked regularly. The schedule I saw on one of these websites was something like one check-up every two months for the first two years, then four check-ups a year for the next two years, and then one a year for the rest of my life.

But at least I wouldn't be infertile or impotent ... not yet, anyway. And I wouldn't have to get used to a life-long catheter.

Nonetheless, I thank God that if I had to get cancer, it is bladder cancer. The survival rate is high and gets higher every year. I saw a statistic somewhere on the net tonight that said that a quarter of all men diagnosed with cancer these days are specifically diagnosed with bladder cancer. Who knew?

One survivor I came across has put together an informative YouTube video and has also started a blog about his own experiences with bladder cancer. There is a lot of information out there and even a growing support network on the internet.

I guess I better add a "bladder cancer" label to this blog, by the way. Looks like I'll be preoccupied with this subject for a while.

Oh, yeah ... there's basically no denying how I ended up with bladder cancer in the first place:

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal, You Tube

I had two topics I was going to blog about this evening. Well, I was going to blog about one of two possible topics.

If I had a serious frame of mind when I sat down I was going to write something about having to deal with chronic pain. The cancer/surgery process I'm going through now involves a great deal of constant physical pain ... and I don't do well with pain. My preference is to deal with physical pain by way of a constant stream of narcotics. But doctors don't like to give you a constant stream of narcotics these days. Marcus Welby, where are you when I need you?

These days, you're supposed to deal with chronic pain through any number of processes known collectively as "pain management." Like "anger management" and "self esteem," "pain management" is one of those new-age psycho-babble concepts. It makes health-care administrative types feel good about themselves because they're creating fewer Vicoden addicts, but doesn't really do anything for the guy with the hot coals burning in his lower abdomen. It's difficult to concentrate on closing my eyes and "going to my peaceful place" while running to the bathroom every ten minutes to bleed into the toilet.

So I'm dealing with my pain by taking twice as much actual Vicoden as I'm supposed to. Eventually my prescription will run out and I'll have to figure out something else. Boy, THEN I'll be screwed! But I'll worry about that then. Whoo hoooo!

Anyway, the other possible blog topic for tonight was going to be something about comic-book inspired movies. I've actually written some of that post and saved it as a draft and I thought I might sit down and finish it this evening.

But before I did any blog writing I decided to do some blog reading. And after a few minutes of surfing I noticed that for some reason I couldn't get streaming video to work this evening.

It turns out that it was apparently a Firefox problem, because when I loaded Rhodester's blog into Internet Explorer I was able to finally watch his "Vlog" video.

And when I loaded The Cubical Reverend's blog in Internet Explorer, I was able to watch the three YouTube videos that he posted on the 18th. The three videos were of a shared theme; something to do with irreverent reverends.

I was so effected by those three videos I decided to post them myself. First, there was this old chestnut, the farting preacher:

OK, clearly somebody monkeyed with the audio in that clip. But then there's this guy. The audio on this video is pretty low, you'll have to turn it up to hear it. And if you do so, about a minute and ten seconds into the praise chorus you'll here the preacher just flat out LOSE. HIS. EVER. LOVIN'. MIND.

And then ... there's this guy. Let me make it clear that this video comes with a HUGE LANGUAGE WARNING. I don't know what this guy's denomination is, but I'm guessing it's something like The First Church Of The Divine Gangsta.

Wow. Wow. Just ... wow. Kinda makes Jeremiah Wright come off like Jerry Falwell, huh? I just, I ... uh ... man. What was THAT?

I mean, I was half way through my second viewing of that before I even noticed the haircut.

I'd write more but I just flat out don't know what to say. And besides, it's time to crawl to the bathroom again.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Blogs, Faith, Humor, Personal, You Tube

I'm sure you guys are getting sick of me talking about my bladder situation, but it is my main preoccupation right now, so bare with me.

I have to go to UVA on July 7th to meet with a urologist down there and figure out what the next step is going to be.

Today my urologist removed the catheter I'd had since my surgery on Thursday (good riddance!) and gave me a disc with digital copies of the pictures from my CT scan to take with me to UVA. I couldn't resist making a copy of the disc for myself and taking a look at the images.

The images to the right are the ones that my urologist showed me before the surgery so I could see the problem for myself. I marked them to indicate where the problem was.

As the image indicates, the big white blob is my bladder and the bright part to the right is the tumor.

The doctor told me that the tumor was taking up 45 percent of my bladder, but it didn't appear to have gotten into the bladder wall yet. I get the idea that this is important with regard to metastasis. Apparently that's not as big a concern because the bladder wall was in tact. You go, bladder wall!

Also the cancer wasn't in the part of my bladder where the kidneys feed into it. Which means my kidneys weren't at risk, either.

I have pictures (taken during the surgery) of the kidney ducts, too. Wanna see 'em? Wanna see 'em? I'll post them at the slightest provocation.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal

Morphine, Morphine, what made you so mean?
You never used to do me like you do.
Where's that sweet gal I once knew?

--Gillian Welch, My Morphine

I had my first experience with morphine the other day, after my bladder surgery, while I was in the hospital. I was given a spinal anesthetic for the surgery, and it took several hours to wear off. So while I was still numb from the chest down I felt no pain at all. But when the anesthetic wore off, the pain came on all at once.

All of a sudden, my bladder was on fire with pain.

I asked the nurse to bring me something for pain and she wanted me to rate the pain on a scale of one to ten. I couldn't really think in those terms, so I simply said "Well, it's WAY above a five." That must have been enough for her. She brought a syringe and injected it into my IV tube.

I asked her what I was getting and she told me that it was "synthetic Morphine." I had just enough time to think "Oh, wow, I'm gonna really feel this stuff..." and then WOOSH!

It was like I had hyper-warped across the entire universe and back to where I started in a about half a second. And I felt REALLY weird. I don't know how to describe it, really. I didn't feel like myself, for one thing. And my speech and hearing was strange. It felt like there was some sort of time-gap between when words would form in my mouth and then leave my mouth and then travel to my own ears.

My wife, mother and step-dad were visiting me when I got the morphine and they seemed to be slightly ahead of me in time. It was like I was struggling to keep up with what was going on around me and lagging behind. I kept apologizing and saying I felt like I'd been drugged. Mom reminded me that I had been drugged. I'd asked to be drugged.

For the rest of the afternoon, until the morphine wore off, I constantly felt like I was out of sync with time. I was either slightly behind time or slightly ahead of it. I know that sounds weird, but it's the closest I can come to describing what I felt.

I was also itching all over. Especially my nose. I could NOT get my nose to stop itching.

Oh, yeah, the morphine knocked the pain out completely.

I didn't get morphine again for the rest of the time I was in the hospital. They brought me lower-grade pain-killers when I'd ask for something for pain. And I'm glad, really. I can understand how morphine would be addictive for some people. If you like the experience of having reality chemically altered, you'd REALLY get a sense of that with regular use of morphine.

Here are some fun facts about about morphine from the net:

• German pharmacist Friedrich Sertürner discovered how to make morphine from the poppy. He named the drug after Morpheus, the Greek god of dreams.



• The most common "synthetic morphine" is OxyContin. So I'm guessing that's what I was given in the hospital. I wish I'd asked to be sure, just for my own information. Nonetheless, if it was OxyContin, I can understand why so many people get addicted to it.



• According to FunTrivia.com (and if you can't trust them, who can you trust?) opium and heroin are derived from the same poppy plants as morphine. Heroin is one and a half to two times as strong as morphine. They refused to bring me heroin in the hospital. The nurse was so surprised when I asked for it that I got the idea that they didn't even have any heroin.



• The American Civil War produced so many morphine addicts (over 400,000) that morphine addiction became known as "soldier's disease."
  
  
• In the late 1800's, morphine was marketed as Mrs Winslow's Soothing Syrup, which new mothers were supposed to rub on the gums of teething infants. It promised to settle them down. I'm pretty damn sure it must have worked.



• Actor Bela Lugosi, jazz great Charlie Parker, poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning, and the inventor of Coca Cola were all morphine junkies.



• The known side effects of morphine include respiratory depression, constipation, pupil constriction, and that itching I mentioned earlier.

So there you go. I can now add morphine to the list of drugs I've experienced. And I honestly hope to never experience it again. Partly because it's so disorienting. Partly because of that itching. But mostly because I hope I never have pain that's severe enough to warrant the use of morphine again!

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal, Trivial Matters

Well, OK, no, not really. I do not intend to try to get hold of any prescription pot. But I did have surgery yesterday and it did turn out to be an eventful day. Here's the info, for those of you who are curious ... and let me say right up front that there is more good news than bad here.

So let me get the ugly part out of the way first: It turns out that I do have cancer.

So there it is, the "C" word, which seems to be little more than an eventuality in my family. My mom and my maternal grandmother both got cancer when they were each about five years older than I am now ... and there's been plenty of other cancer cases in my family. So it was really little more than just a matter of time.

And I did bring this on myself, to a large degree. I have bladder cancer, and bladder cancer in men is caused by smoking more often than not. I've smoked for 26 years, so there's that.

Had I admitted on the blog that I'm a smoker? No, I don't think so. I'm ashamed of myself for smoking. I've quit for fairly long periods a few times, but I've always come back to it. Looks like this time I have to quit and stay quit. Period.

And being so out of shape has made things worse, too. Fat guys who smoke are prime candidates for ... well, for a number of ailments, including bladder cancer. And so you get what I have here.

Now the good parts: One, this was caught before it could kill me. My urologist talked to my wife while I was in post-op yesterday and he told her that it's a damn good thing I came in when I did. If it had gone much longer, the prognosis wouldn't be very good. The cancerous mass in my bladder was taking up about 45 percent of my bladder space.

And another good thing to report is that my surgeon was able to get (these are his numbers) 95 to 98 percent of the cancer out of my bladder.

Now this next part isn't really clearly good news ... but I do think it's neat. My urologist says that chemo isn't really practical in my case; he's sure that it wouldn't keep the cancer at bay. What's probably going to happen now is that they're going to remove my bladder and build me a new one. Really! They're going to take a little piece of my intestine and build a new bladder out of it. So I'm gonna be kinda like Steve Austin. Except my new bladder won't technically be bionic. But I do expect it to give me super-human peeing powers.

I spent last night in the hospital and MAN and am I glad to be out of there. There was an old man down the hall from me who apparently needed to talk to his nurse every few minutes AND who apparently couldn't figure out how to push the "Call" button. So what he did was lay in his bed and shout "LAAAADY!" over and over and over and over and over again. After three or four hours of that I was ready to go down the hall and beat him with my catheter bag.

Right now, the worst thing about my situation ... at least, the part I keep focusing on right now ... is that I'm going to miss the next three weeks of work, which means no paycheck. And after the next surgery to replace my bladder I'll miss another long period of work. I hope they're able to do the next surgery soon so that the recovery time will run together instead of being two separate periods of missed work.

But on the other hand, I will get to sit around and be waited on hand and foot for a few weeks. And you better believe I'll milk this for all it's worth. Just don't tell Wendy I said that.

So there's the update. The news was bad but the prognosis is good and the situation will ultimately lead to unavoidable lifestyle changes that will make me healthier in the long run. The smoking has to go and it's time to get serious about exercise.

But not this week. I'm sitting here with a catheter that I'll have to have for the next five days at least, and it is pretty uncomfortable and just plain gross. So, this week I plan to spend some quality time with my couch, putting on my most pitiful face and asking anyone within shouting distance to PLEEEEASE bring me a root beer.

If necessary, I'll resort to shouting "LAAADY!!"

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Personal

Hold on a minute before I review Intensity, I need to ramble for a few paragraphs first. I assure you, it's relevant.

I don't read a lot of fiction, I prefer non-fiction. I used to love fiction, but I think I've mostly lost my taste for it. I probably read fewer than ten novels a year, and most of 'em make no real impression on me. (That's novels, long works of fiction, as distinct from books in general. I have no idea how many books I might read in a year.) But, as I said, fiction seldom resonates with me and I usually go back to the biographies, histories and essays that entertain me the most.

My favorite novelist is probably Elmore Leonard. His books go down like candy and I try to read a couple of titles from his catalog every year. Leonard's work is just pure, escapist fun.

Sometimes I'll read fiction if it's by a favorite writer primarily known for non-fiction. C.S. Lewis is probably my favorite writer of any kind, and I raved at the blog the about how much I loved his novel Till We Have Faces. But Lewis's fiction is something else altogether. Lewis used fiction as a vehicle by which to advance the same theological themes and ideas that he put forth in his non-fiction.

And now and then I'll read a Chuck Palahniuk novel if I just want a visceral jolt. Palahniuck's work is seriously weird, but his voice is unlike any other and his best stuff is creative, thought-provoking and rewarding. I admit that I didn't enjoy the last Palahniuck novel I finished, a gruesome satire of reality television called Haunted, but I'd recommend most of his other books (especially Diary and Fight Club) to fans of subversive prose.

Now and then I'll check out a fiction genre that I'm not typically interested in, and that sometimes results in pleasurable reading. When the National Review raved about the sci-fi novel The Mote In God's Eye by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, I went out and got a copy. I was glad that I did. I enjoyed it quite a bit.

I mentioned all of that to explain why I decided to read Intensity by Dean Koontz ... and why I enjoyed it so much.

And I did enjoy it. Very much. In fact, if I'm honest, I turned the last few pages with a huge lump in my throat and immediately told my wife "You've got to read this, I think it's the best novel I've ever read."

I'd always thought of Dean Koontz as a pulp novelist, one of those guys who churns out two or three crappy horror novels a year and never really writes anything worth reading. Then the National Review profiled the guy and I read that article and found out that Dean Koontz

• is a Catholic convert


• is a conservative


• is a dog lover

.
Hmmm, I thought. Sounds like my kinda guy. I oughta read one of his books. The novel that National Review seemed to recommend most was Intensity, so I picked up a copy.

Here's the plot summary from Amazon:

A young woman staying as a guest in a Napa Valley farmhouse becomes trapped in a fight for survival with a self-proclaimed "homicidal adventurer", and races to warn his next intended victim. Unrelentingly terrifying, this book lives up to its name...

Koontz tamps down on his usual libertarian soapboxing to let the story race; which it does fast enough to give readers whiplash as they hold on to what may end up being the most viscerally exciting thriller of the year...

Turns out that Intensity is EXACTLY the kind of book I like to read. In fact, it's pretty much the perfect book for me.

Intensity is a solid, all-consuming page-turner, like Leonard's best work. Man, I could NOT put this thing down. I know that's a cliche, but it was literal in my case. I carried this book around with me for the past three days and read every time I had a few free moments.

But Intensity is also a book with a lot of theological and philosophical substance. If you like to think about what you're reading, Intensity will give you a lot to like.

The narrative tells us about the two primary characters, the killer and his hostage, primarily through internal monologues. These sequences reveal two characters at diametrically opposite ends of the spectrum when it comes to issues like love, hate, human nature, and the meaning of life.

Consider what Koontz reveals about his heroine ... and about the world view that her story promotes ... in this passage from Intensity:

For a long time ... she'd known that being a victim was often a choice people made. As a child, she hadn't been able to put this insight into words, and she hadn't known why so many people chose suffering; when older, she had recognized their self-hatred, masochism, weakness.

Not all or even most suffering is at the hands of fate; it befalls us at our invitation. She'd always chosen not to be victimized, to resist and fight back, to hold on to hope and dignity and faith in the future. But victimhood was seductive, a release from responsibility and caring: Fear would be transmuted into weary resignation; failure would no longer generate guilt but, instead, would spawn a comforting self-pity.

Contrast that with the perspective of the killer she's up against:

The Big Lie is that such concepts as love, guilt, and hate are real. Put Mr. Vess into a room with any priest, show them a pencil, and they will agree on its color, size, and shape. Blindfold them, hold cinnamon under their noses, and they will both identify it from the smell. But bring before them a mother cuddling her baby, and the priest will see love where Mr. Vess will see only a woman who enjoys the sensations provided by the infant...

All men and women, in Vess's view, are fundamentally nothing other than animals--smart animals, indeed, but animals nonetheless; reptiles, in fact...

This is the philosophy of Mr. Edgler Vess. He embraces his reptilian nature. The glory of him is to be found in his unmatched accretion of sensations. This is a functional philosophy, requiring its adherent to endorse neither the black-and-white values that so hamper religious persons nor the embarrassing contradictions of the situational ethics of the modern atheist and those whose religion is politics.

While the story is, on the surface, a cat-and-mouse game between a killer and his intended victim, there is much more under the surface. Intensity is also the story of a woman who survived a traumatic childhood by learning to repress, to avoid, to cut herself off from feeling ... and who finds herself forced to assert herself, to risk everything, and to learn to trust in order to save her own life and the lives of others.

And, Intensity is the story of a self-styled pantheist, a man who recognizes that when all is sacred, nothing is sacred. A man who sees life as nothing more than opportunities to experience sensations, and who equates all sensations, with no experience having any more value than any other. Koontz's villian is someone who will literally kill someone to watch the expression on his or her face change. What's interesting about him is that he justifies his homicidal tendencies with a lot of the same language that today's pseudo-bohemians put forth as "enlightenment." There are a lot of "WOW!" moments to be had while reading this book.

The visceral thrills to be had in Intensity are enough to recommend the book on the face of it. But there is much more here if you want it. Intensity is a book with much to offer the amateur apologist, the arm-chair philosopher, and the casual reader who's just looking for a good, tight thriller. Intensity is an ambitious book that achieves everything it's author intended. The book choked me up with a powerful ending, raised goose-bumps on my skin a number of times, and left my mind swimming with thoughts about God, mankind, and the purpose of life. I've never read another novel that satisfied me on so many levels. Intensity is one to own and read and reread. It's a keeper.

Labels: Books, Personal, Politics

I'm still alive, everything is cool. Just busy at work and getting ready for surgery Thursday. The golf ball size mass that has been living in my bladder is going to be evicted. Good. I don't like it.

On the urging of a reviewer I trust I'm reading the first Dean Koontz novel I've ever read, Intensity. I have to say, much to my surprise, this book is really, really good. Good on a number of levels. It's an actual book, not pulp, with subtext and character development and an engrossing plot and subtlety and a lot to recommend it. I look forward to writing an enthusiastic review when I finish it, as long as it doesn't come apart in the last 80 pages.

Labels: Books, Personal, Trivial Matters

We went to the National Zoo in DC yesterday. We had a groovy time. If you're inclined to do so, you can see the pictures we took at our Picasa page.

It was really hot yesterday. Dear Lordy, Lord-A-Mighty was it ever hot. Which is why, after we left the zoo, when we stopped for some McDonalds, this incident seemed kinda funny:

Labels: Humor, Personal, You Tube

A few weeks ago I allowed the pro-feline lobby here at the house to talk me into getting a cat.

I'm not a cat person. I'm a dog person, as I've made clear at the blog. But Wendy and the kids like cats, and so it was put to a vote, and then it was vetoed, and then my veto was overturned. A small, gray, year-and-a-half-old cat was adopted from the local humane society and added to our two-dog home.

The cat's name was changed a number of times. First it was Makoto, a name given in honor of an athlete from a Japanese TV show that Wendy and all three kids love. That name didn't stick for a number of reasons. For one thing, Makoto is actually a male name, and this is a female cat. For an other thing, I could never remember the name and often referred to the cat as Kimono, Komodo, Tornado, etc.

Then the cat's name became Sophie, a name that always seemed kind of "Eehh" to everyone here.

For the record, I wanted to name the cat Turnip. I lost that bid in a debate that went something like this:

Me: We should name the cat Turnip.

Everybody else: Why? That's a terrible name for a cat.

Me: It's a perfect name. After all, she is a gray cat.

Everyone Else: But turnips ARE NOT gray!

Me: They are eventually.

I thought the logic was bulletproof, but Wendy and the kids shot it down.

So the cat's name became Sascha, for reasons I'm still not sure of.

After the initial period of adjustment as Sascha and the two dogs got used to each other, she eventually got comfortable in her new home and got in the habit of coming upstairs and depositing herself on my belly as I reclined in front of the TV.

So I got used to the tiny, gray ball of fur sleeping on my belly, purring quietly. I got used to it, and I kinda got to like it.

Now I look forward to it.

Sascha is still a cat, clearly inferior to dogs ... but she'll do.

Labels: Personal, Trivial Matters

Just a brief note for the two or three "blog buddies" I have who check this blog from time to time... and for The Governor, Jamie and other real life-friends who surf by.

Last week sucked. Absolutely S-U-C-K-E-D. The last while, in fact, has been very stressful ... and the stress seemed to culminate last weekend with the sudden, unexpected death of a good friend. It hit me like a train.

As of my last post, I'd decided to stop blogging for a while for a number of reasons. I can't really put it in words, though. Something to do with the desperation and sadness of trying to have relationships on the internet while the real relationships in your life remain neglected. I have known people ... and I ain't naming names ... who honesty care more about the people they "know" on the net than they do about spouses, friends, family, etc. It's sad to see the effect that has on families. I know someone who's going through something like that now and it's just sad.

And then, just as that feeling was coming into sharp relief, my friend died. His death has had a lot to do with my current train of thought ... This guy was someone I'm truly fortunate to have known. I loved him like family and I never told him that. I felt some disgust with myself and I guess that staying away from the blog this week has been kind of an act of penance.

But I do feel a bit of a compulsion to blog. And I think that ultimately that's because this blog is little more than my personal diary. This is my sounding board and I do think it does me more good than ill. It's not as though I've disappeared into some sort of "second life."

So, anyway, I'm blogging again. My thoughts aren't just going to sort themselves out, I suppose.

Labels: Blogs, Personal

Cleaning windows on the first warm day of spring is always a lot of fun. Especially when the dogs help.

Man, the winter was really hard on my lawn and bushes.

Thanks for the assist, Chester.

Labels: Dogs, Personal, Trivial Matters

We had ravioli for dinner tonight. It was tasty. But Willow, who raises hell whenever she's served anything that isn't in nugget-form, insisted that it was the "grossest thing ever."

That's right, a child who turns her nose up at ravioli. Couldn't you just box her ears?

Instead of doing that, we got on the subject of some of the foods that are far nastier than ravioli. As usual, the internet proved a valuable resource. Here are some of the culinary nightmare's we've just read about:

• Black Pudding is also known as Blood Pudding. It's a sausage that's made by cooking pig or cow blood until it congeals and then ... doing something else, but I keep turning away from the screen as soon as I've read that first step.



• Scrapple is simple to make. Take pig liver, heart, head, and basically any pig parts you might have around, and boil the hell out of them. Boil them with the bones attached. Then take the goop and mix in cornmeal and allow it to gel. Then begin the costly, prolonged therapy sessions that you're going to need in order to get over having made scrapple.



• Livermush is considered by many to be a mild and preferable alternative to scrapple. Personally, I consider hari kari to be a mild and preferable alternative to scrapple, but that's just me. Anyway, the primary difference between livermush and scrapple is that livermush, in order to be official livermush, must be made of at least 30% hog liver. The secondary difference is that "Livermush" would actually be a far crueler and more memorable grade school nickname than "Scrapple."



• Mountain Oysters is a dish that's also known as Rocky Mountain Oysters and Prairie Oysters and Tendergroin and Bull Balls. Bull balls is the most accurate name.



• Souse is also known as Headcheese and is a sort of lunch meat loaf that's made of scraps of meat from the head, heart and feet of a pig and is sometimes pickled in vinegar. Why pickle it in vinegar? Why the hell not? Pickle it in kerosene for all I care. I ain't eatin' it.



• Balut, which is a delicacy in Vietnam and Cambodia, is the kind of thing that one should only eat in public, on stage, as a form of angry performance art. Balut is a fertilized duck or chicken egg that has been allowed to develop until the chick inside is almost ready to hatch ... and then boiled and eaten in the shell. It's considered to be an aphrodisiac and is sold by street vendors in the areas where it is available. The drug "ecstasy" is also considered to be an aphrodisiac and is also sold on the streets ... and I bet it's far tastier.



• Chitterlings is pronounced "CHIT-luns." But since chitterlings are the boiled, stewed and/or fried intestines of a pig, it is pronounced around here as infrequently as possible.



• Haggis is the Scottish queen mother of repugnant foods. If you don't know, haggis is made by taking the heart, liver and lungs of a sheep, mixing them with suet, onions and oatmeal, and boiling them for hours in the sheep's stomach. The recipe was conceived of by a Scotsman who, having killed a sheep, felt that he needed to somehow further degrade the animal. Haggis is traditionally served with potatoes, turnips and unconcealed spite. If you're tempted to try it for some reason, the Food Network's Alton Brown has posted his favorite recipe for haggis. Clearly, Alton Brown has joined the terrorists.

So, see? Ravioli really isn't all that bad. Hell, spoiled ravioli sounds pretty good right now.

Labels: Personal, Recipes, Trivial Matters

The Hardees down the road has a new burger on the menu ... but it doesn't seem like even they find it very appetizing.

I dunno ... a Jalapeno burger sounds pretty good to me. They must know something about it that I don't.

Labels: Humor, Personal, Trivial Matters

I intended to do an Oscars post today, even though I'm generally ambivalent about that whole dog-and-pony show. I thought I'd write something this year, though, because I actually saw a number of the nominated films this year ... and because I thought that the big Oscar-sweeping movie this year really was the best movie I saw in 2007.

But it ain't gonna happen (the post I'd planned) and I'll tell you why:

For one thing, I decided for some reason or another to sit here tonight at the computer and listen to Bruce Springsteen ... and it seems that the Springsteen songs that I enjoy most (like this one and this one, by far my two favorites) all come off like suicide notes if you actually pay attention to the lyrics ... which I don't recommend because it'll really throw a wet blanket on your good friggin' mood.

And for another thing, we bit the bullet and got a new computer and it runs Windows Vista, which is clearly an operating system that was created by crack-addicted, satan-worshiping monkeys. Rather than write a whole blog post about how much I hate Vista, I'll just cut and paste from the haphazard e-mail I sent to the Governor and Jamie earlier today:

I just want to say, totally off topic, that WINDOWS VISTA SUCKS. That calls for all caps, too. We got a new PC yesterday and I've spent the past twenty four hours trying to use Windows Vista and it is the worst OS I've ever used. Windows ME was better. This damn thing locks up every couple of minutes. This compuer came with three gigs of memory and it's like I'm trying to run Doom 3 on an old 32 mghz system. Plus, for some damn reason, It will only allow file names that are fewer than a certain number of characters. This TOTALLY f--ks up my MP3 file naming system. I really despise Vista after one day of use and I'm thinking about going to get a copy of XP and installing it on this thing. This PC has three gighz of memory and a 320 gig hard drive, it would absolutely HUM with XP. Vista seems to be far more trouble than all it's pretty little bells and whistles are worth.

Thank you, Bruce and Bill Gates, for screwing up my evening. Clearly I'm the victim of some sort of Redmond-via-Asbury Park conspiracy.

So I guess what I'm trying to say, as I do this time every year, is screw the Oscars.

Labels: Entertainment, Microsoft, Music, News, Personal

I'm home, sick, from work today (really sick, not Oscar sick), and thinking about how attached we get to our pets and how much it sucks when they pass on.

The topic has been on my mind lately. The Unseen One and Rhodester both recently lost well-loved pets, and MCF recently had a close call.

Pets are important to many of the bloggers I read. Lorna has her cat and B13 and Cube and Otis have their dogs, and here at Darwen.us headquarters we're a two-dog house. We have our principal dog, Tilda ... and in the event that Tilda is for any reason unable to fulfill her canine duties, we have our relief dog, Chester.

Wendy would probably insist that I have the order backwards; that Chester is the principal dog. She'd be wrong for a number of reasons. For one thing, Tilda was here first. She has seniority. And besides, Tilda understands what the garbage truck is for.

Chester, on the other hand, has a terribly dysfunctional relationship with the garbage truck. He's figured out that every Thursday morning these guys in a big white truck come down the alley and ... gasp! ... STEAL OUR GARBAGE. He's bound and determined to put a stop to this weekly theft, so every Wednesday night when we take the trash out, Chester insists on sleeping outside, just inside the fence from the trash cans. Then every Thursday morning when the garbage truck comes, Chester goes into full scale terror alert mode, doing everything he can to get us to come outside and catch those garbage-stealing bastards in the act. And every Thursday morning after the truck is gone he comes back in the house and spends another day formulating a better plan for next week.

The other day I came home from work and showered, and then sat on the couch petting Tilda while Wendy used the PC beside me. Wendy asked me "Why do you love that dumb dog so much?"

"Well," I responded in my most self-pitying voice, "Tilda is the only body here who's ever happy to see me when I get home from work."

Wendy was indignant: "Oh, you KNOW that's not true! BOTH dogs are happy to see you when you get home!"

And she's right. So I have that going for me, which is nice.

Really, it is nice. And if you're not a pet-owner, you'd never understand. On the other hand, judging from the pet-lovers in my blogroll, I'd say I'm in pretty good company.

Labels: Dogs, Humor, Personal

Congratulations to the Dawson Ford Garby team, who've been named the best team of the season in the Lynchburg area's Timbrook Youth Basketball league.


The team finished with a league best 9-1 record, and featured a number of fine players, including the young man in the picture to the left. I happen to be that young man's dad, and I'm pretty darn proud of him.


My son had one particularly memorable game, scoring the basket that put the game into overtime and then scoring the game-winning shot while in overtime. Wow!

Labels: Personal

Virginia's primary is Tuesday. I'm probably gonna vote, as soon as I figure out who I want to vote for … and why.

In Virginia, you don't have to register as a member of a political party. When primary time rolls around, you can vote in either the Democratic primary or the Republican primary, but not in both.

I can see pros and cons to a number of options.

I could opt to vote in the Democratic primary and vote for Hillary Clinton. She's plainly the weaker Democratic candidate, and would be easier for the GOP Candidate (read: John McCain) to beat in November. A vote for Hillary is, in a way, a vote for an easier November battle for McCain.

But what if I vote for Hillary in the primary and then she ends up in the White House? And I have to live with it on my conscious that I played a role in that? I don't know how I'd hold up under the guilt.

I could opt to vote in the Democratic primary and vote for Barack Obama. The big advantage of Obama winning the Democratic nomination is that his victory would surely be the political death of the Clintons. It would be such a relief to finally be rid of those people. Plus, I like the idea of helping to get Obama nominated. Even though I disagree with him on damn near everything, I can't help but like and respect the guy. He deserves to be his party's nominee because he's easily their strongest candidate.

But, then again, what if I vote for him and he ends up in the White House? As far as I can tell, I only agree with Obama on two things: He's opposed to the death penalty, and he believes that Americans (specifically, Christians) have a moral obligation to welcome decent, hardworking immigrants to this country. I agree with him on both counts. But I disagree with him on pretty much every other issue, including most of the hows, whens and whys of welcoming those immigrants. I like the guy, I really do … but I just can't bring myself to support his candidacy. He's just too far to the left for me.

I'll say this, though: If it comes down to McCain and Obama in November, either way we'll end up electing a president that I admire and trust. It's just that one of them has more bad ideas than the other.

Ah, McCain. I could vote in the Republican primary and cast my vote for John McCain … but why? He's already got the GOP nomination locked up, he doesn't need any help from me. Voting for him would be sending the message that I support him and that I'm more enthusiastic about his campaign than I really am. He's only marginally more conservative than Obama. I'll vote for him in November because he's tougher on terrorism than any of the Democrats and because I respect and admire much about John McCain. He is, after all, a war hero. But I disagree with him on a number of issues, too, and I can't come up with a reason to go vote for him in the primary, considering that I think Romney was by far the better candidate.

Then again, if I vote for McCain on Tuesday, I'm actually voting for the guy that I expect to vote for in November. So I suppose it would be the honest primary option for me.

I could vote for Ron Paul or Duncan Donut or Mike Huckleberry … but I don't like any of them and I don't trust them and I don't even agree with them about many more issues than I agree with McCain about. So why waste my vote by voting for one of them?

Or I could stay home and say "screw it." Just veg on the couch and play the 360.

Hey, I think I found my option.

Labels: News, Personal, Politics

So here I sit, scratching my head about this tax refund deal. Just a few elements of the Associated Press story that got me thinking …

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Congress would act on the agreement — hammered out in a week of intense negotiations and uncustomary bipartisanship — "at the earliest date, so that those rebate checks can be in the mail."

Nancy Pelosi and congressional Democrats are in favor giving tax money back?? Already things don't sound right.

The rebates, which would go to about 116 million families, had appeal for both Democrats and Republicans. Pelosi's staff noted that they would include $28 billion in checks to 35 million working families who wouldn't have been helped by Bush's original proposal.

Individuals who pay income taxes would get up to $600, working couples $1,200 and those with children an additional $300 per child under the agreement. Workers who make at least $3,000 but don't pay taxes would get $300 rebates.

Workers who don't pay taxes will be getting a rebate on the taxes that they didn't pay. Alright. Can someone explain to me how this isn't a handout? And can someone explain to me where the money will come from to cover this so-called rebate handout?

Bush wanted to give a bigger refund to those of us who've actually paid taxes, but Pelosi and the Dems want to earmark some of that refund money for people who don't have a dime in the system.

Ahhh…. OK. Now that is starting to sound more like Democrats as I know them. I wonder what they think they're buying for their money. Can't you just hear the campaign ads this November? "Attention poor people … remember those checks you got over the summer? Well, keep in mind which party came through with that summertime mad money for you…"

The principal players in pulling the deal together were Pelosi, House Republican leader John Boehner and Paulson. The package would allow businesses to immediately write off 50 percent of purchases of plants and other capital equipment and permit small businesses to write off additional purchases of equipment.

Democrats who want to help businesses? OK, I'm scratching my head again.

"I do not understand, and cannot accept, the resistance of President Bush and Republican leaders to including an extension of unemployment benefits for those who are without work through no fault of their own," Rep. Charles B. Rangel, D-N.Y., the Ways and Means Committee chairman, said in a statement.

Gosh, Senator Chuck, could it have something to do with the idea that unemployment benefits were never intended to be a long-term substitute for finding a damn job? I don't know, maybe that's just my take on it. And as someone who was laid off a number of times "through no fault of my own" during the lean Clinton years, I can tell you that it is possible to pull yourself up by your own bootstraps without ever collecting that first unemployment check. But, again, maybe that's just me.

Bush has supported larger rebates of $800-$1,600, but his plan would have left out 30 million working households who earn paychecks but don't make enough to pay income tax…

Ah. In other words, Bush gets it. One of the few times in the last few years when I've actually found reason to think that he does get it. But the congressional Dems want to make sure that I get back less of my rebate so that they can give a rebate to people who aren't paying taxes to begin with. But I'm beating a dead horse by now.

So if you're one of the lucky ones who will be enjoying a rebate this year on the taxes that you didn't pay, I'd just like to take this opportunity to say "you're welcome." Enjoy some of the money that the government collected from me over the past year. I would have just spent it on something stupid like a mortgage payment anyway.

Labels: News, Personal, Politics

Just out of curiosity, I pulled up some famous faces from politics, government and history on the computer ... and asked the kids if they could identify them. They surprised me with the ones they could identify, the ones they couldn't, and some of what they had to say.

Just so you'll know, Hailey is in 5th grade, Willow is in 4th, and Liam is in 3rd. Here are the pictures, along with their guesses. And if, by chance, you're unsure who someone is, you can click the pic and go to the respective Wikipedia entry.

Hailey: "Bill Clinton."
Willow didn't know.
Liam didn't know.

---

Hailey: "A guy who's running for president."
Willow didn't know.
Liam didn't know.

---

Hailey: "Barack Obama."
Willow: "Oprah's husband."
Liam: "The weatherman."

---

Hailey: "George W. Bush."
Willow: "George Clooney."
Liam: "George W. Bush."

---

Hailey: "Hillary Clinton."
Willow: "Someone from Dancing With The Stars."
Liam: "Kelly Clarkson."

(After we told Liam that this was actually Hillary Clinton, he said "Oh, yeah, I always get those two mixed up.")

---

Hailey: "The terrorist guy."
Willow didn't know.
Liam didn't know.

---

Hailey: "John McCain."
Willow: "George Clinton."
Liam didn't know.

(Willow's answer is all the funnier if you actually know who George Clinton is.)

---

Hailey: "Rudy Giuliani."
Willow didn't know.
Liam didn't know.

---

Hailey didn't know.
Willow: "George Washington."
Liam: "George Washington"

---

Hailey: "Abe Lincoln."
Willow: "Abe Lincoln."
Liam: "Abe Lincoln."

---

Hailey: "John F. Kennedy."
Willow didn't know.
Liam didn't know.

---

Hailey didn't know.
Willow didn't know.
Liam didn't know.

Labels: Personal, Politics

It's time for SouthCon to go on hiatus for a little while. There are a number of reasons.

First of all, I typically spend a while each November devoting my free time to editing the past year's home videos and compiling them in one fairly brief DVD for distribution among the family. This requires taking a break from blogging, which I've done every November since I started blogging.

I also think I ought to take a break because I'm just not inspired to write anything lately. Since I was a kid, writing for my own amusement has been my hobby... and, like every hobby, my interest waxes and wanes. If I'm not interested in writing at the moment, why force it? I mean, honestly, all I can come up with lately is a series of lame one-liners ... like, for instance, are they sure that that's Shia LeBeouf's mugshot and not his junior year class picture?

Also, I've been in a bit of a funk lately. Nothing major; just the same kind of funk that everyone goes through from time to time. I've learned two things about being in a funk: one, funks pass. Two, trying to force myself to blog while I'm feeling kinda blah isn't a good idea. I might end up writing something that I just want to take down later.

Anyway, I'll be back, and probably sooner rather than later. Meanwhile, I encourage you to read any of the fine blogs you'll find blogrolled to the right.

Labels: Blogs, Personal

I came across this blog and found it fascinating. It's a running list of the last-meal requests of death row inmates.


It makes for compelling reading ... and it does put human faces on those waiting for execution. It makes you consider the complexities in surprising ways. It's not every day that you think about the fact that a murdering rapist is also a guy who likes cheeseburgers and Jell-O.

I found myself especially effected by those entries that provide no information other than the details of the meal itself. The reader is then left to fill in the particulars with her or his own imagination. Including the questions "What did this guy do?" and "Could he maybe have been innocent?"

Most of these guys aren't innocent, of course. Most of them are murdering scumbags. But murder is murder, even when the victim himself is a murdering scumbag, and if you're a Christian, I think you ought to realize that there's no asterisk after the words Thou shalt not kill. Nor is there support for the death penalty anywhere in the New Testament. You can find "Christian" ways to justify the death penalty all day long ... I used to do it myself and I know all the tricks. But, ultimately, that's all they are: tricks.

And, if you live in a state that sanctions the death penalty (as I do), then murder is being committed in your name every time someone is executed.

The death penalty is one the few political areas where Wendy and I disagree. I oppose it, she supports it. When I showed her this blog, her immediate reaction was "That's depressing. I don't want to think about it." I don't blame her.

It's a lot to digest, you might say.

Labels: Faith, Personal, Politics

I really do want to write something, but the write-stuff-thingy in my head hasn't been working lately.

I have a few ideas for blog posts pop into my head from time to time, but none of them pan out. Some of the ideas I've thought about include:

• We need more celebrities with nicknames in quotation marks in the middle of their real names. I like that trend. We need more celebrities like Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Billy "Crash" Craddock and John "Cougar" Mellencamp and Andrew "Lloyd" Webber.



• Last night when we took the kids trick-or-treating, I saw a kid dressed as Sanjaya. I'm sure the kid was every bit as good a singer as the real thing.



• My knee-jerk reaction to John McCain's health care plan: Sounds pretty good to me.



• My knee-jerk reaction to the Barack Obama National Anthem flap: who cares. It was a brain-fart on Obama's part. It HAD to be. No presidential candidate in his right mind is gonna do that on purpose. There are a thousand better reasons to attack Obama's campaign. Lets focus on the real reasons he's a bad candidate.



• Wendy and I recently saw two movies that I enjoyed a lot and want to review: Men Of Honor and World Trade Center are both good and worth your time.

Someday I'll come up with the words to blog about some of this stuff.

Labels: Entertainment, Movies, News, Personal, Politics

Happy Halloween ... to all of you from all of us.

Labels: Personal

I haven't had a lot of time to blog for a few days ... more importantly, I haven't had time to read (and comment at) the blogs I enjoy, so my apologies to those I've neglected.

I've been working some trades so that I can have Sunday off so that Wendy and I can go to Richmond to see the amazing Gov't Mule in concert. I'm sure I'll write a concert review after the show, raving about how great they were. Here's just a little sample of what I look forward to enjoying on Sunday:

Labels: Blogs, Gov't Mule, Music, Personal, You Tube

I've been goofing around with the stuff that Google provides for it's users today. Yeah, Google is becoming a monopoly, Google is the AOL of this decade, Google is evil, blah blah blah blah.

But Google also provides its users with a lot of cool stuff, like Picasa, which enables you to do fun photo albums and slideshows and stuff:

(Yeah, no new pictures ... but new web toys, which are always cool.)

And since I switched our domain base over to a Google "partner page," I got lots of fun gadgets and widgets for it, too... like that same slideshow and RSS blogfeeds for both mine and Wendy's blog and yadda yadda yadda.

All of which is fun for a sophomore level codemonkey like me.

Labels: Blogs, Personal

Just a few pictures for Sunday:

We had a picnic yesterday, probably the last warm-weather outing for our family for the year. Here our kids and my nephew enjoy the amenities at the local state park picnic area.

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This view will soon be a collage of grays, oranges and browns instead of greens, blues and purples.

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The recent mountain fire in our area left burned, dead patches along the ridges. It's kinda stomach-turning, although it could have been far worse. Don't play with matches, kids.

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The stores already have Halloween fare on the shelves and I couldn't resist blowing a buck fifty on a package of zombie-eye glasses last evening.

Labels: Personal

MCF recently mentioned the B13's bad car accident in '92. I'd seen the pictures before and they always make me cringe.


I'm something of a paranoid passenger, as Wendy can attest, due to my own history of car accidents. I'm one of those guys who sits in the passenger seat maniacally clutching the dashboard, eyes wide, mouth agape, screaming "SLOW DOWN!! And that's before the driver even puts the key in the ignition.

My first car accident occurred shortly after I got my driver's license. I was a junior in high school. As MCF says, "kids are crazy," and I was one of many who had to learn lessons the hard way. One lesson I learned the hard way is that you should pay attention to the road, the road signs and the traffic signals when you're driving ... instead of haphazardly bopping down the road over the speed limit, eating a McDonalds cheeseburger and blasting Metallica's Disposable Heroes, paying no attention to traffic lights. I ran a traffic light at a busy intersection and crashed my mother's Ford Escort into a Chevy Blazer. I totaled the Blazer I hit and did something like $3,000 worth of damage to the Escort; shockingly it wasn't the other way around. Upon impact I flew forward (nope, not wearing a seatbelt) and spider-webbed the windshield of the Escort with my head, then flew to the left and embedded the window crank into the door with my left arm. Pretty scary. And to make matters worse, I knew that it was my fault. Thankfully, nobody was hurt beyond my few bumps and bruises, but I was terrified to tell my mom what had happened. Long story short, I got a year's driving probation and a good scare.


A few years later I was driving home from work one afternoon, once again blasting Metallica but this time paying attention to the road, when an old man ran a stop sign and I hit his station wagon with my car; that same Ford Escort which I'd since bought from my mom. This time the accident wasn't my fault, and I was fortunate in that a police officer witnessed the whole thing and testified on my behalf when the case went to court. Nonetheless, in this second instance there was more damage done to me and the car. This time the Escort was totaled, and I had to be cut from the car with the jaws of life and taken to the hospital in an ambulance. I was strapped to a flat surface of some sort by paramedics and x-rayed and cat-scanned before I was allowed to get up because I'd had a neck injury. Thank God the injury turned out to be just a bad strain/sprain and not something more severe.

When that case went to court the old man who'd ran the stoplight told the judge that it wasn't his fault, but the police officer who'd seen the accident testified differently. The cop suggested that the old man have his license revoked since he had a history, but the judge didn't take that suggestion. Sadly, a few years later, the old guy got on the interstate near here going in the wrong direction and hit a big truck head-on. The truck driver wasn't injured, but the old guy was killed.

Then, a few years after that, I was on my way to visit a girlfriend who was going to college at James Madison University, about 90 minutes away. It was a winter night and an icestorm blew up from out of nowhere. I didn't realize how quickly the weather had gotten bad and I didn't adjust my driving in time… so I hit an ice patch on an interstate bridge going at least sixty. My car spun three times at that speed, and it seemed to take about a half an hour. You know how people say that time slows down during those kinds of things? It really does. I can vividly remember having time to pray that God would just make the car stop spinning. And I can vividly remember the headlights of other cars all around me. They seemed to be coming from all directions. Finally, my car came to a stop on the shoulder of the interstate, facing in the wrong direction. I wasn't hurt and the car itself was unscathed. I sat staring at the cars passing me as I faced them pointed in the wrong direction, wondering how in the world I could possibly be perfectly fine. It was the most uneventful of my car accidents but it was easily the most terrifying.

So, yes, I'm a bad passenger. I always assume that the "other guy" is going to run a stop sign, that there's some unseen hazard on the road, or that safes and pianos are going to just start falling out of the sky.

Unless I'm driving. Then, I find that I often feel secure enough to drive and play air guitar at the same time.

Labels: Blogs, Metallica, Personal

This is a true story about the stupidest decision I ever made while I worked in radio.

The event in question took place in the late '80's, or maybe around 1990, when I was the "Music Director" at a local small-time radio station. My title of "Music Director" was a dubious one, since I did a little of everything at the station, but nothing without the manager's approval. I was just one more 20-something kid at one more small town radio station where I wrote and produced advertisements, had a daily on-air slot, worked weekends and rotated music in and out of our on-air library. Sine I really was doing a lot, and for little money, the manager decided to indulge me by giving me the title "Music Director" instead of just calling me, more accurately, "Busy Kid." I was the "Music Director," and I made minimum wage, and sometimes I had to clean the toilets. There was just nothing like small town radio in the 80's.

In the late '80's there was one of those regular, mercurial surges in the popularity of country music, and a number of record labels signed a glut of country music acts and sent these new artists out to promote their debut albums in small towns all over America. If there was anything like a concert venue in any given small town, then the touring artist might perform a set, usually for free. If the small town in question did not have a concert venue (and this small town did not), then the artist would set up at a local discount department store and spend a few hours signing autographs and shaking hands. The record labels all hoped that under those kinds of circumstances there'd be a local radio station that would help with the promotion by doing an on-air interview, playing a few songs, and just generally making a big deal because "Such-And-Such Record Label's new artist, Joe Cowboy, is in town…"

My manager found out that Capital Records was sending one of their new recruits through our area and that he'd be spending a few hours at the local K-Mart one day, signing autographs and stuff. So he asked me if I'd be willing to go down to K-Mart, interview the guy on air, play a few of his songs, the whole shootin' match. After all, I was the "Music Director," so who'd be better for that job?

My gut reaction was "hell, no." And, really, why would I want to? I worked for minimum wage and doing a live broadcast was a lot of work. I'd have to haul the equipment down by myself and then spend a few hours hanging out with some current-and-future nobody … asking him the usual mundane questions and playing his songs … and then haul the equipment back and put it all away, and it just sounded like a lot of bother.

Besides, as I assured my manager, I'd listened to this guys new single and it sucked. It was boring. He was just one more also-ran in a big field of "hat acts" and there was no point in bothering with him. He'd never take off. My manager acquiesced and I forgot about it.

So the day of the big appearance came and went with little fanfare. The local newspaper showed up at K-Mart and took the guy's picture for the weekend edition, but beyond that, nobody noticed. I heard later that the guy had shown up at K-Mart alone, tired and hungry in an old station wagon. He'd had a flat tire, which he'd changed himself, and he then spent a couple of hours signing autographs for kids and shaking hands with grease on his shirt. He left and, I suppose, continued his small-town tour and I didn't think about him again.

Until he started having hits. Big hits. And lots of them.

The artist in question was Garth Brooks.

As you probably know, Garth Brooks was the biggest selling country music artist of the '90's and one of the biggest selling recording artists from any genre of all time. He is, in fact, America's second best selling solo artist of the entire twentieth century, just behind Elvis. Really.

And I now work a low-level job at a paper mill. I think they call that "karma."

Now, the whole reason I mentioned this is because Bucky Covington is coming to town to do a concert this month. We now have a concert venue in town … and the name of our town is "Covington," so the idea of Bucky Covington comin' to Covington just delights everyone with the wonderful serendipity of it all. It's like if Hannah Montana played a concert in Montana! Or if VH1's New York did an appearance in New York! Or if Hillary Clinton did a campaign stop in Hell, Michigan!

Who the hell is Bucky Covington? I had to ask that myself. Well, it turns out that he's a country music singer who didn't win American Idol and got a record deal to do country albums anyway. You know, a nobody. Right? Well, given my history with branding the wrong people "nobodies," maybe I should think about that.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to the Bucky Covington concert. His kind of music isn't what I enjoy. But, honestly, I wish him the best of everything and all the success in the world. Bucky, if you're out there, when you hit the big time, say hi to Garth for me.

Tell him ol' Darrell always knew he'd make it.

Labels: Entertainment, Personal

There are a lot of good reasons not to do crystal meth, but the main reason that I don’t do crystal meth is that I don't want to end up on an episode of Cops.

Is Cops still in production? The IMDb page for the series doesn't have an end date listed, but I'd been under the impression for a while now that the show was just in eternal syndication rerun. All the episodes I see seem to be a few years old, anyway. And, I admit, I see quite a few episodes of Cops.

You know, for all my holier-than-though ranting against reality TV, I'm always willing to kill an hour with two back-to-back episodes of Cops. Granted, there has to be absolutely NOTHING better to do at the time, and I have to be on the verge of boredom induced hemorrhaging, but under the right circumstances I will watch the show. I don't call it Cops, though. I call it The Crystal Meth Comedy Hour. If you've ever watched it, you know why. If not, here's a brief explanation: Every episode of Cops features one to four crystal meth junkies being busted for doing something stupid, like trying to buy crystal meth, trying to steal crystal meth, or trying to sell his or her vital organs in order to obtain crystal meth.

I've learned a lot from watching Cops over the years. The main thing I've learned is that you should never, ever, ever, ever run from a cop. Because they will always eventually catch you, and when they do they're going to friggin' SLAM you to the ground. I don't mean knock you down, I don't mean push you to the ground, I mean SLAM you like you were a football and they were Deion Sanders.

Not that they'd have to chase me very far. Maybe ten feet. I admit, I'm so hooked on ice-cream that it might as well be ... uh, crystal meth. I can't remember the last time I had to run for any reason, and I'm darn sure not gonna run a few feet just to have some cop SLAM me to the ground so close to my car I can still almost touch it.

Not every Cops viewing experience in my life has been positive, though. Remember a several years ago when they came out with that Cops: Too Hot For TV video series? Don't rent those. Just don't. Here's what happened: It was a long time ago, before I was ever even married for the first time, and me and a buddy were hanging out, looking for something to do. We decided to go rent a movie and since we couldn't agree on a movie we ended up deciding to check out one of the Cops: Too Hot For TV video tapes that the rental store had.

They shouldn't call those tapes Cops: Too Hot For TV. If they were a little more honest, they'd give them a title like The Naked Screaming Drunk Fat Old Man Show. But I guess nobody'd rent them then. That's pretty much all the video we saw had to offer, though. Naked, screaming, drunk, fat, old men. I suppose we expected to see some cool cop show-downs at strip joints ... or maybe some nekked chicks being arrested for being, oh, "too hot for TV" or something. Noooooo. That's not it at all. It's all naked, screaming, drunk, fat, old men:

• COP: We've received a call to a nearby bar, where a patron is creating some kind of disturbance ... OK, we've arrived at the bar now, let's go inside and see what's going on.



• NAKED, SCREAMING, DRUNK, FAT, OLD MAN: Heeeyyy! Heeeyyyyy!



• COP: Sir, could you calm down? Calm down, sir. Where are your pants?



• NAKED, SCREAMING, DRUNK, FAT OLD MAN: Heeeeeyyyy! F*%k!



• COP: Sir, you have the right to remain silent. If you choose to



• NAKED, SCREAMING, DRUNK, FAT OLD MAN: Heeeeyyyy!!! (takes off running)



• COP: (SLAM!!)

That's another thing I've learned from Cops. When a cop gets a call to arrest a naked person, it's never someone who looks like a famous celebrity.

Well, maybe Benny Hill.

Labels: Entertainment, Humor, Personal

In October, Wendy and I are going to see Gov't Mule at a club in Richmond. Gov't Mule is the first rock band I've heard in something like 15 years that I've actually liked enough to plan to see live. My last rock concert was Nine Inch Nails in Winston-Salem, NC, in November, '94. Since then I've only seen one nationally touring act (Lyle Lovett, an adult-contemporary/folk/jazz/country performer).

In the 80's and early '90's I saw a buttload of bands in concert … mostly hair metal bands since it was, after all, the 80's and early '90's and I was a teenager and hair metal was my thing.

I figured that since this blog is the closest thing I'll ever have to a diary I'd go ahead and post a brief "concert diary" while I can still remember the bands I've seen live. The following is a list of the bands I can remember having seen in concert, along with a brief memory or two about the acts.

AC/DC
One of the best bands I've ever seen live. I saw them in '88, I think. AC/DC is always reliable as a fun, energetic, good-time rock band. I was thrilled with how much of their older material they performed. I remember being giddy with glee when they played the opening riff of "Whole Lotta Rosie."

Aerosmith
I saw Aerosmith around '92. The most memorable thing about this show was that it was the only concert I ever attended with a girl with whom I was on a first date. It was kind of a distraction. Aerosmith was OK, I guess.

The Allman Brothers Band
The Allmans put on a great show when I saw them in the early '90's. Interestingly, their lead singer and guitar player at the time was Warren Haynes, the singer and guitar player who impresses me so much in Gov't Mule. So although I don't remember him, I'm 99% sure that I've already seen this remarkable musician play live.

Tori Amos
I saw Tori on tour in support of her Little Earthquakes album. She didn't have a band, just her and her piano. It was a really great show. She's an outstanding entertainer.

B.T.O.
I saw the "Taking Care Of Business" band in the late '80's. I remember someone threw a full "Big Gulp" size cup of soda and ice and hit Randy Bachman in the chest. Uncool. He brushed it off and kept playing. Very cool.

Clint Black
A popular country artist from the early '90's, Clint put on a decent show. His opening act was Lorrie Morgan. Anybody remember her?

Bon Jovi
The main thing I remember about Bon Jovi is that they are one of only two rock bands I ever saw live who didn't curse or use any vulgarities at all during their performance. Even in my teenage years that impressed me. It made them seem confident in their music.

Garth Brooks
I gotta say, Garth went out of his way to entertain his audience, and judging from the way my girlfriend at the time reacted, Garth did a good job. I wasn't much of a fan, but I don't remember having a terrible time at this show.

Cinderella
The main thing I remember about Cinderella was that they were a tall band. The average member was probably 6'. Maybe 6'3" with hair, 6'5" with hair and heels.

The Cult
This band produced one of the best and most underrated, underheard rock albums of the '80's. When I saw them their drummer was Matt Sorum, who went on to later fame drumming for Guns N' Roses. The Cult was a good live band, playing crowd-pleasing, competent, note-for-note reproductions of their live tracks.

Disposable Heroes Of Hiphoprisy
Remains the only hip hop band I've ever seen in concert. They were pretty good, I enjoyed their set. The cool thing about Disposable was that they played live music rather than just rapping over prerecorded tracks. Their guitarist was Charlie Hunter, who has since made quite a name for himself in the world of jazz.

Gibb Droll
I'm including Gibb here even though he's a bit of a regional artist and most of you have probably never heard him, except maybe through his work with Keller Williams or as a performer at The Gathering Of The Vibes. Gibb is an electric guitar player in the Jimi Hendrix/Stevie Ray Vaughn tradition, and he's really very good. He does a lot of session work now and occasionally produces a solo album, but back in the day he used to tour as the guitarist and singer in a three-piece band. I saw Gibb and his band play, damn, I don't even know how many times. I never saw a bad show. This guy is a great entertainer, a damn good songwriter and musician, and an all-around nice guy. I've been waiting for him to finally get his "big break" for more than ten years now.

Dokken
I saw Dokken in '88, I think. I have absolutely no memory of their set. You know, it's probably better if a band makes a bad impression (like Poison) than no impression at all.

Foreigner
I saw Foreigner during the height of their "I Wanna Know What Love Is" popularity, back when they had the original members of their classic line-up. They had a lot of lasers and dry ice and a big choir with them. This was the first rock band I ever saw live, I was maybe 14 or so. I was quite impressed.

Four Non Blondes
I saw them open for Aerosmith. They sucked. Their lead singer was Linda Perry, who is now a producer and songwriter responsible for a number of bad current hit records. Apparently she isn't through messing up my life yet.

Giuffria
Who the hell are Giuffria? I was asking that when I saw them live and I'm still asking that. OK, thanks to the internet, I do have a bit of interesting trivia about this band. Giuffria's lead singer was David Glen Eisley, who I remember cursing an excessive amount during their show. Even if you've never heard of him, you have probably heard him sing if you're a Spongebob Squarepants viewer. It seems that Eisley is the singing voice of Spongebob in the Band Geeks episode of the show. He sings the song "Sweet Victory" in that episode. So when I saw the little known rock band Giuffria in concert, I was entertained by the spectacular vocals of Spongebob Squarepants.

Great White
The best thing I can say about the Great White set I saw is that I survived it. After the band's irresponsible use of pyro lead to a fire a few years ago, I considered getting an "I Survived A Great White Concert" T-shirt. The second best thing I can say about the Great White show I saw was that they were the best unofficial Zeppelin cover-band I ever saw.

Merle Haggard
A true legend of country music. I enjoyed his set, although I remember that the guy had this really crazy looking glint in his eye while he was performing. Merle might be a little touched in the head.

Indigo Girls
I've seen the Indigo Girls play live twice, and both times I had a great time. One time they played a few requests from the crowd, including one song they didn't know ("Me and Bobby McGee") that they tried to work out for the first time on the spot. I've never seen another nationally touring band do that. The Indigo Girls are the best lesbian folk-rock duo I've ever seen in concert (though not the only one). In fact, the Indigos are probably one of the top fifteen lesbian folk-rock duos in the US, right up there with The Murmurs, Tegan and Sara and Tenacious D.

Kingdom Come
A Led Zeppelin wannabe band that opened a rock festival I saw in the late '80's.

Little Feat
Like the Allmans, who I saw after the death of Duane Allman, I saw Little Feat after the death of their founder and leader, Lowell George. Nonetheless, Little Feat was still made up of a number of damn good musicians, and I remember that I thought that they were very good live.

Lyle Lovett and His Large Band
Lyle Lovett and His Large Band is both the name of one of their albums and the name of Lovett's touring outfit. They're a remarkable assembly of players and singers. Wendy and I saw them three or four years ago, and they sounded great. We were both a bit disappointed, though, in Lovett's decision to play mostly brand-new material.

Marilyn Manson
Apparently, Marilyn Manson failed to shock or scare me since I saw him and his band open for Nine Inch Nails and have no memory of their performance.

Metallica
I saw Metallica three or four times in the '80's and early '90's. They really are one of the most consistently entertaining and worthwhile rock bands I've ever seen. I never saw them have an off night. They always sound good and always play for a long time. Plus, when they play live, their songs have a kind of loose groove that isn't there on the albums. They're awesome live, well worth seeing.

Motley Crue
I saw Motley Crue two or three times in the '80's. They were fun live, but extremely cheesy. For instance, one of the conventions of rock shows is that the band will come out and play for a while and then say "Thank you, good night!" They'll then go back stage and the crowd will stay in place and the house lights will stay down and the crowd will chant and the band will come back out after ten minutes and do a few more songs. It gives the impression of an "on demand" encore, but it's conventional. I've never been to a rock show where this didn't happen. Anyway, one time when I saw Motley Crue they did the "Thank you, good night!" bit and went off stage … and then a big electric sign behind the stage started flashing the word "CRUE CRUE CRUE CRUE," which, of course, prompted the crowd to chant for ten minutes. Then the band came back on stage and Vince Neal said something like "Boy, you guys must want some more, huh?" Gimme a break.

Nine Inch Nails
My ears rang for weeks after seeing NIN in '94. They were the loudest band I've ever seen and may have been violating noise ordnances when I saw them. They were also very good live. I thoroughly enjoyed their painful set.

Ozzy Osbourne
The most interesting thing about the Ozzy Osbourne show I saw was that, at the time, Ozzy was touring with Geezer Butler on bass guitar. Ozzy and Geezer were, of course, founding members of Black Sabbath. Now, at the time, guitarist Tony Iommi was the only original member still in Black Sabbath. So when I saw Ozzy, I saw more original members of Black Sabbath than I'd have seen at a Sabbath show. Also, Ozzy's guitarist on that tour and at that show was Zakk Wylde, a good musician and bandleader in his own right. Zakk's guitar playing during "Paranoid" produced the best version of that song I've ever heard.

Poison
Poison may be the worst band I ever saw live. Bad singing, bad playing, bad sound, bad showmanship, bad songwriting, bad make-up, bad costumes, bad conduct and bad hair. Other than that, fine show.

Primus
Primus had the worst sound mix of any live band I've ever seen. The music was one loud, fuzzy throb. I didn’t enjoy their set.

R.E.M.
I saw them touring in support of the album Green, on election day, 1989. This was the day that Virginia screwed up and elected the likable but incompetent Doug Wilder, which I thought was a good thing at the time. I drug my friend Jamie to this show and he had a miserable time. I had an OK time. REM's opening act was some band I've forgotten (it was the band Pylon, thanks for the reminder, Jamie), and their lead singer was visibly pregnant. She remains the only visibly pregnant singer I've ever seen open for R.E.M.

Ratt
I'm not even sure how many times I saw Ratt in the '80's. Maybe four times. They were a reliably middling-to-awful band. Their singer sucked. Their guitarists sucked. I thought they were awesome at the time, though, because I was easy to please.

Tony Rice
The best musician I've ever seen play live, and my favorite guitar player of all time. I saw him do a set with Peter Rowan, another legend in the bluegrass arena, but I hardly remember Rowan's presence. Rice is the man as far as I'm concerned. After the show Tony came out and socialized with the fans, so I got to meet him and thank him for the positive difference his music has made in my life over the years. He seemed genuinely touched by my gratitude. Tony Rice is the coolest guy in the world.

Sawyer Brown
Another of the country bands I saw in concert during my years working in country radio. You get the tickets for free, so you figure, heck, I might as well go. I have no memory of their set.

The Scorpions
I saw this band around the time of their mega-popular live album, World Wide Live. They sounded very good live. This was a band that had been touring, recording and performing for some fifteen years by the time I saw them, and they were tight and talented.

Shenandoah
Shenandoah was a popular country band in the '80's and '90's. If you weren't listening to that kind of music at that time, you don't remember them. They were, in all honesty, the best country band I ever saw in concert. (Notice I said "country," not "bluegrass." I've seen a bunch of better bluegrass players.) Anyway, Shenandoah played their hits along with a number of James Taylor and Dan Fogelberg covers and ended their show with an impressive (and utterly unexpected) cover of Led Zeppelin's "Heartbreaker." I went home happy. I think my girlfriend at the time (the Garth Brooks fan) was a bit baffled by their song selections.

Slayer
Slayer was really outstanding live. I saw them in a club in Hampton Roads, Virginia, touring in support of Seasons In The Abyss. They opened their show, if I remember correctly, with "Raining Blood," one of their heaviest songs. The played hard and fast and loud and never made a misstep. The Governor saw that show with me and has since seen them a number of times, and he has never reported a bad show. If you like loud, aggressive thrash metal, Slayer is the band to see live. And, by the way, Slayer is the only other rock band (along with Bon Jovi) that I've seen play live who never uttered a single swear word or vulgarity during their set. Instead, their singer, Tom Araya, kept saying things like "I trust that everyone is enjoying our performance this evening..."

Testament
I saw this thrash metal band open for Slayer. I remember thinking that they were good and that their singer was a huge, scary guy.

Toad the Wet Sprocket
Toad was a popular alternative rock band in the '90's and they were pretty good live. I saw them with special guests Everything, a one-hit-wonder from that time. I think I remember that Everything was pretty good, too. The main thing I remember about Everything was that they were selling t-shirts that had their logo on the front and the words "Poor. Ugly. Happy." on the back. I thought those were pretty cool shirts.

U2
On the Zoo TV tour at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh in the early '90's. Best show I have ever seen. U2 is a stellar live band, and they had all the bells and whistles, props and lights and lasers, that a stadium-size show will accommodate. Man, what a great show. They sounded great, they thoroughly entertained several thousand people, I went home exhausted and happy.

Van Halen
I saw Van Halen three or four times in the late '80's, during the Hagar era. They were a solid band live. Eddie Van Halen once threw a guitar pick right over my head; the guy behind me got it. Dammit. I also remember that during one show Hagar spotted security roughing a guy up and stopped the show mid-song and told them to stop. Very cool.

Vixen
Vixen was an all-girl metal band that was popular for six minutes in the late '80's. After they broke up, the guitarist briefly taught guitar for a living on Long Island, New York. She was the guitar teacher for a guy my wife used to date before she and I ever met. Six degrees of separation or something.

White Lion
They didn't suck.

Whitesnake
I saw them twice. They were prompt and professional, as is befitting a group of veteran British musicians. I saw them during the years when lead singer David Coverdale was still dating Tawny Kitaen. This was the '80's when she was still young and hot, as opposed to nowadays when she looks like a transvestite.

Labels: Gov't Mule, Metallica, Music, Personal

It's kind of surprising how many pop and rock songs about abortion have managed to slide in under the radar ... some of them even receiving radio play.

The best example is probably the one hit by the Ben Folds Five, "Brick". In 1998 it was almost impossible to turn on the radio without hearing this delicate piano ballad. According to Wikipedia, Ben Folds has said that he had a difficult time writing the song because the lyrics spoke so literally about the pregnancy that he and his girlfriend aborted in high school.

Of course, once they'd aborted their child, the couple's relationship was changed forever. The lyrics are frank:

"Driving home to her apartment,
For a moment we're alone.
She's alone.
And I'm alone.
And now I know it."

For whatever reason, embedding is forbidden for the YouTube music video, but if you click the still below the video will open in a separate tab or window.

---

Del Amitri's 1995 album Twisted featured an awful hit called "Roll To Me" and eleven other pop-rock songs, at least eight of which were brilliant. The best track on the album is "Driving With The Brakes On" a song that appears (to some of us, anyway) to be about the helplessness of a man who's significant other has decided to abort their child. The lyrics seem to speak volumes, including lines like

"Driving through the long night,
Trying to figure whos right and whos wrong.
Now the kid has gone.
I sit belted up tight,
She sucks on a match light, glowing bronze,
Steering on.
And I might be more of a man if I'd stopped this in its tracks
And said, 'Come on, lets go home.'
But shes got the wheel,
And Ive got nothing except what I have on."

The YouTube video is rough, it seems to have been uploaded by someone who took the time to aim her video camera at the TV screen. But, then again, if it weren't for this, I'd never even have known that there was a video for this song:

---

A thrash-metal song that condems abortion in no uncertain terms? Sure, and only the awesome Slayer would have the balls to pull it off. I'd probably heard "Silent Scream" fifty times in my life before I actually listened to the lyrics and realized that the song castigated abortion with extreme prejudice. Of course, with brutal music, shocking imagery and horrific lyrics as their bread and butter, Slayer had no reason to pull any punches when they sang about abortion:

"Silent scream,
Bury the unwanted child.
Beaten and torn,
Sacrifice the unborn...
Scattered, remnants of life,
Murder, a time to die."

---

It's a damn shame that so few people know about the awesome rock band King's X from Texas. They've been around for ages, they've turned out one solid album after another, and it seems like there are ten or twelve of us who know who they are.

If I had to put King's X in a pigeon-hole, I'd call them "Beatles-inspired hard rock," although they really defy classification. They do all kinds of music, and they do it all well. Plus, they're one of the few bands that's unashamed to explore spiritual themes in their lyrics. They're not a "Christian rock" band, they're a rock band made up of guys who happen to be into Jesus. My favorite King's X album by far is Faith Hope Love, and not just for it's reflective, spiritual lyrics. I have to admit, though, that the album's last track, an open and honest song about abortion called "Legal Kill", is a big favorite of mine for it's moving lyrics:

"I know your side so very well,
It makes no sense that I can tell.
The smell of hell is what I smell,
and you hand it out with handshakes everyday.
I have trouble with the persons with the signs,
but i feel the need to make my own...
I can feel
The fight for life is always real."

---

Janet recently mentioned the song "The Freshmen" by The Verve Pipe, and it brought back memories for me. This song was very popular the year my son was born, and the way it rages and laments an abortion really effects me. My son came along at a time and under circumstances that wouldn't fit any one's definition of "ideal," but from the minute I first saw him I knew I'd belong to him forever. I'm blessed that I have never had to live through the kind of post-abortion regret that "The Freshmen" admits to:

"When I was young I knew everything,
And she a punk who rarely ever took advice.
Now I'm guilt stricken, sobbing with my head on the floor,
Stop a baby's breath and a shoe full of rice..."

Labels: Entertainment, Music, Personal, You Tube

If you were moved by Otis's tale of a rescued tortoise (and I admit, I certainly was), then you have got to check this story out:

Larry Thompson first noticed his 14 year old dalmatian was missing on Thursday night. Over the weekend, he heard noises and realized the dog, Alex, had fallen in a storm drain.

For four days the Thompson family and friends used a backhoe to dig a hole ... nah, not a hole, a thirty foot crater ... on the Thompson property with the hopes of rescuing the dog. When digging got dangerously close to the storm drain, the Thompsons continued digging with their bare hands.

Larry Thompson says, "A lot of people wouldn't give it the time of day or even attempt to get the animal out. I wanted to get him out alive or dead, either one. The effort was worth it both ways."

How'd the story end? Watch this video and see:

Now, you may be asking yourself, why would a reasonable person tear up his property to save a fourteen year old dog? I can't answer that question, but I can tell you this: If Tilda or Chester were stuck in a storm drain, I'd tear up my property and yours to find 'em. Mine and yours, pal. And that's no joke.

Labels: Dogs, News, Personal

The Splinter Cell video game series is the greatest video game series of all time. It qualifies for that honor by having met these important criteria:

• I've played all four Splinter Cell games all the way through.


• I dearly loved all four games, with the third one being the greatest single game ever made.


• Even though the third one is the best, the other three games have been damn fine, too.

Therefore, since I have enjoyed these games more than any other games ... more than most other things, in fact, including ice cream and respiration ... I am proud to name Splinter Cell the greatest video game series ever. So let it be written, so let it be done.

Now comes advance hype for the fifth game in the series, Splinter Cell: Conviction, and my heart is all aflutter.

The amazing thing about this game is that Sam is no longer in the dark. Over the course of the last few games Sam has gone from special agent to double agent, and now to fugitive from justice, hunted for crimes he didn't commit. Now, without his ubercool spy gadgets, Sam has to move by day, finding new ways to be stealth. The new Splinter Cell game will not be about finding shadows and staying hidden. Now, as Sam, players will have to hide themselves in crowds in broad daylight, create diversions and use their environment for defense and offense. Sam's access to spy tech is gone. It's all about wits now.

This video shows that some of the game will still take place in the shadows, but Sam no longer has night vision goggles, heat sensors or toys. The enemy has the same advantage and disadvantage as Sam now:

I didn't watch too much of that video, I don't want to see too much of the game yet. It's like peeking under the wrapper at the present, you know? But one thing got my attention: practically no HUD. It's all about paying attention now. Sam is really on his own.

I'm thrilled to see, though, that some of the game takes place in one of my favorite places in the world: the elaborately reproduced National Mall in DC.

I want this video game so much I can practically feel it in my hands ... but it won't be out until first quarter '08; and, besides, it's exclusively for the Xbox 360, which we do not have and can't afford.

But someday... someday... Meantime, I guess I'll have to plan a trip to the National Mall and spend a day sneaking around, playing pretend Sam Fisher, like an idiot.

Labels: Personal, Video Games

I read Janet's Tell It To Me Tuesday regularly, but don't usually contribute because I just don't often feel like I have anything worth adding. Better to keep your mouth shut than to add something pointless, right?

But this week's topic happens to be a subject I know a little about: songs that invoke anger. Or, as I interpret the topic, songs to listen to when you're good and pissed off.

I've mentioned before that music therapy is the only thing that works for me when I get highly aggravated, and what I often do is listen to good anger-music to get it out of my system. Once I've heard a few tunes ... good and loud, mind you ... and maybe let out a couple of primal screams ... I tend to feel better. Here are some of the songs that help me bring the anger to a head, dissipate it, and get on with my life.

Pantera: "Regular People"

There are a ton of good Pantera songs when it comes to lettin' off some steam, including B13's outstanding choice, but the one I'd pick is "Regular People", a song about having had it up to here with somebody's BS. As heavy metal goes, Pantera was one of the best bands ever ... and their music was the kind that perfectly suited aggressive, angry lyrics. Each and every track on Pantera's amazing "Vulgar Display of Power" is a monster, and "Regular People" is one of those "critical mass" songs for me.

Sample lyric:
I’ve trampled on that road
That you think you own.
You and that ’smart ass’ attitude,
It’s time to stop the fiction.

Some YouTuber has put together a music video for the song, featuring video from some video game. I have no idea why, the video adds nothing to the music ... but you can sample the song here:

Metallica: "Wasting My Hate"

Of course, the worst thing about being good and mad at someone is that when you get mad and stay mad at some idiot, you're giving them too much of yourself. When you're mad at someone, you're giving them your time, your energy, your mind and your body. And most of the time, when you think about it, the person you're mad at isn't worth the sacrifice.

Metallica's "Load" features a song called "Wasting My Hate", and it really puts it all in a nutshell. The band's James Hetfield wrote the song after hearing a story from country and western legend Waylon Jennings: Jennings was sitting in a cafe having a cup of coffee when he noticed a guy sitting in the parking lot, in the passenger seat of a truck, giving him the evil eye. Jennings looked away, but when he looked back, the guy was still looking at him. So this time he tried to stare him down, but the guy didn't budge. The longer he sat there, the angrier Waylon got, and finally he decided to walk outside and really give it to the guy. And when he got outside and approached the truck, he realized that the guy was sound asleep, head cocked back on the seat, and actually staring at no one and nothing. "Man," Waylon is reported to have said to Hetfield, "I was just wasting my hate on that guy."

Sample lyric:
Good day, how do,
And I send a smile to you.
Don't waste, don't waste your breath,
And I won't waste my hate on you.

Again, the YouTube video features unrelated and irrelevant video, but you can hear the song here:

Johnny Cash: "San Quentin"

Johnny Cash didn't write protest songs to be trendy or to attract attention. If Johnny wrote a song in protest of something, it was because he was good and pissed off. Such was the case in 1969 when Johnny visited San Quentin State Prison in California to perform for the inmates and saw them living in conditions not fit for human beings.

According to the liner notes from Cash's legendary live album "Johnny Cash At San Quentin", Johnny wrote his classic song entitled "San Quentin" during the first hours of his visit to the penitentiary. That was the thing about Johnny Cash... when he converted to Christianity, he took the call seriously. Including Christ's call to His followers to visit and minister to those in prison. Cash believed that people who'd committed crimes should pay their due to society, but that they shouldn't be reduced to something less than human. What he saw at San Quentin appalled him. During his concert that day Cash asked for a drink of the same water that the prisoners drank and found it filthy and disgusting. Later, Johnny debuted the new song for San Quentin's inmates, stirring them to the point that he had to perform the song again, immediately, to satisfy them. Imagine that. Imagine being one of the guards or the warden in that infamous hellhole, watching as a pissed-off country rocker got your whole prison population all worked up, all at once.

Sample lyric:
San Quentin, I hate every inch of you.
You've cut me and you've scarred me through and through.
And I'll walk out a wiser weaker man;
Mister Congressman, you can't understand.

And here's a clip of that very legendary performance:

Tool: "Bottom"

The heavy progressive rock band Tool just gets better and better. Their 2001 album "Lateralus" is possibly the finest example of heavy progressive rock that's been turned out by any band ... but each of their albums is good in it's own right, and 1993's "Undertow" features a number of great songs, including "Bottom".

"Bottom" is a song about wallowing in your own spite ... and let's face it, we all do that from time to time. But "Bottom" is an honest song; a song that admits that when you're wallowing, you're doing nothing more than celebrating your own failure. Still, wallowing has it's appeal. Sometimes when you're good and mad you just want to be left alone to enjoy your anger. And there's nothing wrong with that, as long as you get it out of your system and move on. Have a good wallow, then get up and get on with it.

Sample lyric:
I have swallowed the poison you feed me,
And I survive on the poison you feed me.
Leaving me guilt-fed. Hatred-fed. Weakness-fed.
It makes me feel ugly.

Again, ignore the animation that some YouTuber has attached to the song and just enjoy Tool's groove:

Billy Joel: "Pressure"

Is there anything worse than some jackass who just can't wait to tell you what you should be doing when things fall apart? Not much. And we all know the type, too. We all know some blowhard who just lurks in the background, waiting to see if you're going to fall on your face, not caring what you're doing or what you're learning or how hard you're trying ... just waiting for that chance to waltz up and say "You know, if I were you..."

Billy Joel has obviously dealt with those kinds of people before, and his 1982 album "The Nylon Curtain" contains a track that sums them up to a tee. Billy even sings "Pressure" with a voice that's about to crack from anger, making it obvious that he's not singing about a hypothetical lunkhead. Some smart-ass actually inspired this song. I hope he knew that it was about him when he first heard it on the radio.

Sample lyric:
I'm sure you'll have some cosmic rationale.
But here you are with your faith
And your Peter Pan advice.
You have no scars on your face
And you cannot handle pressure.

And here's the classic music video from the '80's.

Labels: Blogs, Entertainment, Johnny Cash, Metallica, Music, Personal, You Tube

The forest fire in our back yard is still blazing, although fire fighters and the forest service are working as hard as they can to put it out. The latest information indicates that the fire is slowing, although there hasn't been an update in the local news for a few days.

I'm grateful for the hard work and dedication of those who're fighting the fire, although I do wish that the local media would update us a bit more frequently. The smell and sight of smoke is still strong, as indicated by these pictures and video that we got this afternoon:

Here's another YouTube video, this one from another user. It's better, closer, and more informative than the brief bit above that I shot with our digital camera.

This YouTube user must live in the same area that we do; he or she also has some nice video of a waterall that's about ten minutes away from where I work:

Labels: News, Personal, You Tube

I got an e-mail from a lady the other day who'd done a random Google search for "Lamppost Tattoo" and found my post from the day when I got my The Lion The Witch And The Wardrobe tattoo. She got a real kick out of that and sent me a picture of her own Narnia tattoo, which is on her arm and features the same lamppost that I have on my leg. I'm glad to see that there is at least one other person out there with a Narnia inspired tattoo ... here's hoping that this is the beginning of a trend!

Also, I mentioned the wildfire in my backyard yesterday. Not much news today, except that the fire is thought to be "partially contained" ...

Firefighters continue to battle a wildfire that has burned about 120 acres on Waits Mountain in Alleghany County, an official with the National Forest Service said Tuesday.

Firefighters have contained about 10 percent of blaze, but officials estimate more than 400 acres could be at risk, forest service spokeswoman Barb Stewart said.

Nearby homes and Alleghany Regional Hospital, which is about a mile and a half from the fire, are not in danger because the fire is spreading away from that area, a news release from the forest service said.

Still hoping for the best. Firefighters seem to still be optimistic, for the most part and everyone is hoping for the best.

Labels: News, Personal

For some reason, YouTube won't let me upload video tonight ... Well, as of Wednesday afternoon, I was able to upload the video to YouTube. So you can watch it below, a brief local news segment about a nearby forest fire.

If you watched that video from last night's local news, you heard the fire described as a "brush fire." Well, it's gotten worse over the past twenty four hours and they're currently calling it a "mountain fire". I call it "bad news." A 100 acre patch of land is currently burning and authorities are projecting a fire of up to 400 acres before all is said and done. They're also saying that they don't think it will effect the nearest buildings, which include my mom's house and the hospital where she works as a nurse.

If you heard my brief narration at the end of that embedded video, you heard me describe how close the fire is to the the house where I grew up. The neighborhood I live in now is only about two minutes away from there, and the smell of smoke is pretty thick in my back yard right now. Hopefully, this thing will be contained before too much longer.

Labels: News, Personal, You Tube

I've been pondering writing a post about how much I love Pink Floyd for a while now. What's kept me from doing it is that I realize that such a post would really be a masturbatory exercise; of little interest to anyone else.

So I decided to try to come up with something at least marginally interesting. Rather than a long, rambling, needless post about how super cool Pink Floyd is, I'll post something segmented and fairly brief. I'll try to keep the personal meanderings short and few, and try to pepper this post with enough trivia, general interest, and "things that make you go hmmm" about the Floyd to hold your interest. Deal? Deal.

• Remember When You Were Young? You Shined Like The Sun...
  
  Of course, I'm going to begin with a personal story. When I was in high school I discovered pot at some point in tenth grade. You might think that my interest in Pink Floyd came right along with the marijuana, but you'd be wrong. By the middle of my senior year I was smoking so much pot and neglecting my studies to the point that it became obvious that I might not graduate.
  
  In an effort to get my act together that surprised even me, I stopped smoking pot and changed the crowd I hung out with. One of the new guys I started hanging out with was a very studious guy who was also a big music fan. His name was Mike. I noticed one day that he'd written the words "Pink Floyd" on one of his notebooks, so I said "Yeah, they're that 'brick in the wall' band, right?" Mike said "Oh, they're so much more than that." The next day he brought me cassette copies of two Pink Floyd albums, Ummagumma and The Wall. I've been desperately hooked on Floyd ever since. So you might say that my Floyd addiction replaced, rather than enhanced, my drug addiction.



• We're Gonna Find Out Where You Fans Really Stand...
  
  MCF had Pink Floyd on the brain today, too. Did you know that Andrew Lloyd-Webber apparently more or less cribbed the tune of "Phantom of the Opera" from the Floyd's "Echoes"? It was news to me, I'd never heard mention of it until MCF mentioned it. Of course I've managed to avoid most of Lloyd-Webber's work like the plague, so I really didn't have any idea, although Roger Waters has accused Lloyd-Webber of plagiarism.



• We Don't Need No Education...
  
  There are really four distinct period's of Pink Floyd's career, and the Wikipedia entry on the band really gets the details right.
  
  The first period of Pink Floyd history might be called the Syd Barrett years, as Barrett was the band's primary song writer, vocalist and de facto leader. Barrett, however, was heavily into hallucinogenic drugs and his experimentation eventually got out of control, rendering him unable to function for all intents and purposes. Guitarist David Gilmour (a man with godlike talent, if you ask me) joined the band to augment their sound as Barrett's contributions diminished, and shortly after Gilmour joined Barrett left the band in 1968.
  
  The next phase of Pink Floyd's career was a collaborative period with no clear leader taking the helm. Early efforts from this phase were spotty and sometimes crude, with the band's fifth album, Meddle, the first to really show their potential without Barrett. The collaborative period culminated with Pink Floyd's two best albums, the masterpiece Dark Side of the Moon (1973) and it's follow-up, the equally brilliant Wish You Were Here (1975). Those are, in my opinion, two of the very best albums to be produced in the rock and roll era, and which one I think is the better always depends on which one I've heard most recently. At the moment I'd say "Dark Side...", but that's probably because I listened to it with headphones yesterday. Man, what a wonderful, wonderful piece of music.
  
  At some point after Wish You Were Here, the band's lyricist and bass player Roger Waters began to assert dominance over the rest of the band, and he encountered little resistance. Under Waters' direction Pink Floyd produced Animals (1977, a seminal hard-rock effort) and the legendary theatrical concept album The Wall (1979).
  
  After The Final Cut (1983), burnout got the better of Waters and he left the band exhausted and bitter. It seemed that Pink Floyd was over, but the remaining members decided to continue under the direction of guitarist David Gilmour. Waters was unhappy with that decision, and a long and bitter suit and public feud followed... a feud which wasn't really resolved until 2005 (more on that later). The Gilmour-lead period marks the fourth and final phase of Pink Floyd, and it produced two good studio albums (A Momentary Lapse Of Reason, from '87, is a fine effort. The Division Bell, released in '94, is even better.) Also released during this period were two live albums, one of which is only OK and one of which (P*U*L*S*E, 1995) is simply gorgeous.



• Haven’t you heard? It’s a battle of words...
  
  After Waters left the band, the remaining members' decision to carry on without him proved somewhat controversial. Many people felt that the name Pink Floyd should be retired since Waters was gone, and chief among that contingent was Waters himself. Waters sued the remaining members of Pink Floyd, and the suit was settled out of court in meticulous, ridiculous fashion.
  
  Under the terms of the agreement worked out between Waters and Pink Floyd, Waters retained the rights to almost all of The Wall and Pink Floyd retained the rights to continue being Pink Floyd. Other details of the agreement lead to some funny arrangements. For instance, one of Pink Floyd's most famous touring props was a huge, inflatable pig which was usually filled with helium and floated above the stage and/or audience during concerts. Waters' claimed ownership of the pig in his settlement with Pink Floyd, insisting that the idea for the pig had been his, and that the pig was, in fact, a sow named "Algie." As owner of the Pink Floyd pig, Waters insisted that the band owed him a royalty if they were going to continue using the iconic image. To get around this issue, Pink Floyd had a new inflatable pig manufactured, this one with pronounced testicles. Since this new pig clearly wasn't the sow Algie, no royalty was owed to Waters.
  
  His bandmates aren't the only people Waters has feuded with over the years. When director Alan Parker turned The Wall into a movie, Waters was involved in the creative process. However, Waters is reported to have interfered with Parker to the point that Parker was ready to abandon the film on numerous occasions. Parker is is also said to be thoroughly unhappy with the completed film and has referred to it as "the most expensive student film ever made." As a whole, the movie is a somewhat confusing experience, although not without it's own visceral power. It basically serves as a music video for the album as a whole, with very little spoken dialogue, animated and surreal sequences, and an indistinct ending. It's not an awful film, but Pink Floyd's legacy wouldn't be harmed a bit if it didn't exist.
  
  
  
• The evidence before the court is incontrovertible...
  
  It's commonplace on the internet to see David Gilmour refered to as "Sir David Gilmour," but it technically isn't correct. That's kind of a bummer to people, including me, who thought that Gilmour had been knighted by the queen of England when he received the title of Commander of the British Empire (CBE) in 2003. Gilmour was given the honorific title in recognition of his philanthropic charity (he has personally given more than six million dollars to causes that benefit the homeless). Nonetheless, the title of CBE officially falls just short of knighthood, and while it is proper to refer to Gilmour as "David Gilmour, CBE," he is not "Sir David Gilmour" since he has not officially been knighted.
  
  Big deal, right? Being knighted these days doesn't really mean diddly squat anymore, since everyone from Bono to Paul McCartney to Mick Jagger has been knighted. And, besides, the list of people who've spurned the title is far cooler, including David Bowie, John Cleese and Kenneth Branagh. So why am I so bummed about it?
  
  Well, because until a few minutes ago when I decided to look for a link, I thought that Gilmour had been knighted. I thought he was "Sir David," and I assumed that he's been busy since 2003, riding around the English countryside on horseback, wearing a suit of armor and rescuing damsels from Spaniards. That turns out to not be the case. And that kinda sucks.



• The Time Is Gone, The Song Is Over...
  
  Pink Floyd's reunion of all four members of the classic line-up (at London's Live 8 concert on July 2, 2005) is probably the last time we'll see them all on stage together. And this is probably a good thing. Full-fledged reunion tours and albums are almost always pointless, disappointing affairs, and it's better to let the legacy of Pink Floyd rest, untainted by attempts to drag it on beyond it's natural life.
  
  The reunion came about because Live 8 organizer Bob Geldof appealed to Roger Waters and the remaining members of Pink Floyd and found them all generally amiable regarding the idea of reuniting for a brief performance. (It may have helped that Geldof had an existing connection to the band; he'd played the lead in Alan Parker's movie based on The Wall.) Pink Floyd's classic lineup hadn't played together since 1981, and Gilmour and Waters had famously (and publicly) feuded for years, but Gilmour saw the reunion show as an opportunity to close the book on Pink Floyd on a positive note. Waters was receptive, too, and the performance became a reality.
  

  

  
  Since then, the four Floydians are said to have mended their relationships. They are all reported to be on generally good terms with one and other.
  
  Since that concert, Gilmour has released his third solo album, and his touring and recording band includes Pink Floyd keyboardist Richard Wright.
  
  Roger Waters has enjoyed a prolific solo career, focused on the kind of theatrical and conceptual work that Pink Floyd turned out during his turn as the band's leader. Of his solo work, the album Amused To Death is certainly the best; in fact, it's as good as or better than his last efforts as a member of the Floyd. In recent years Rogers' has embraced his history as a member of Pink Floyd more enthusiastically than ever, and plays a great deal of material from the Pink Floyd canon during his concerts. Roger Waters is on tour in North America right now, in fact.
  
  Drummer Nick Mason published a book about his experiences in Pink Floyd in 2004. Mason's reflections are particularly relevant since he is the only member of the band to have been present during every phase of the band's history (Gilmour joined after the release of the band's first album, Waters famously departed officially in '85, and Richard Wright was fired for a few years in the early 80's and doesn't appear on the album The Final Cut from 1983.) Mason has expressed hope that the classic lineup of Pink Floyd might again reunite for a charity performance.
  
  Syd Barrett died last year. A tribute concert was organized, and it featured a solo performance by Roger Waters and a separate performance by Pink Floyd in the form of Gilmour, Wright and Mason. It's speculated that Waters and Pink Floyd performed separately so that the focus of the event would be on Barrett and not on them.

There are a number of good sources for Pink Floyd information, downloads, pictures, etc, on the internet. They include:

The Official Pink Floyd Website.

A Fleeting Glimpse.

Floydian Slip.

Brain Damage.

And ten SouthCon bonus points will be awarded to anyone who can name each of the Pink Floyd songs that feature lyrics from which I drew headers for this post.

Labels: Entertainment, Personal

Liam has begged for a mohawk for months. His mom and I talked it over and, what the heck. It's only hair. A month from now a new haircut will easily hide the fact that he ever had a mohawk. And so we're proud to present ...

My parents fought me tooth and nail when I wanted to grow my hair long when I was a kid. Now that I'm raising kids myself, you know what I realize? My parents really were wrong. It's only hair. Give in on the small things like this and maybe they won't want to rebel later when it comes to the big things.

Labels: Personal

After considering my options for a while, I've closed film geeks. the site is still up and will remain so, but I think of it as a dead blog. If Wendy gets interested in blogging again, who knows? In the meantime, I'll post film reviews here from time to time when I get the urge. I've even come up with my own new format for reviews, and the first one is immediately below this post.

Labels: Blogs, Personal

Today we spent the day in Lynchburg, Virginia, where we saw not one but two astounding things.

The first astounding thing we saw was a sign, which I took a picture of with my crappy cellphone camera:

I don't know if you can quite make it out or not; like I said, it's a crappy cellphone camera. It's picture of a Biscuitville restaurant sign and it reads "Fried Bologna Is Back."

I know what you're thinking. You're thinking that the sign simply has to be the most wonderful thing we saw all day, right? I mean, come on! A message heralding the second coming of fried bologna in Lynchburg, Virginia? Forget about it! There's nothing cooler than that, right?

Wrong. We also saw the Transformers movie and we all enjoyed it thoroughly. All of us, adults and kids, men and women, the whole crew. I have to say that Wendy even enjoyed it more than I did. She actually got emotionally attached to the big robots and actually cried.

I'll try to write a review in the next day or two. In the meantime, suffice it to say that the movie made me feel like a ten year old kid again for all but the slow first hour. During the second hour and a half I had a great time. I laughed, I sat on the edge of my seat, I cringed, I hooted on the inside, etc. Three and a half stars and a hearty recommendation for this movie. It was the big, fun summer blockbuster that Spidey 3 really should have been.

Labels: Entertainment, Personal

Today is the fourth of July. On this day in 1776, the first Continental Congress of the new United States of America approved a Declaration of Independence from Great Britain. It was a bold, risky, dangerous move ... but in spite of the odds against the revolutionaries, that July day gave rise to a great nation that changed the entire world.

This evening my family and I celebrated the anniversary of that day by standing in a Wal-Mart parking lot with a bunch of slack-jawed rednecks, watching gobs of aluminum, magnesium, charcoal and titanium explode in the sky.

There's a continuity in that, but it's faaaar to complex to explain to those who don't understand it instinctively.

Happy Fourth, everyone.

Labels: News, Personal

I think I might take film geeks down soon. Wendy has lost all interest in blogging, and assures me that she'll likely never blog again, at least not at film geeks. I haven't had the drive to write reviews for film geeks in a long time. The heavy metal blog I started a while back is languishing, too. I've learned about myself that I will occasionally get the urge to start new blog x, convinced that it will be a fun hobby, and then I lose interest as soon as I've set it up.

Wendy and I saw two good movies over the last several days. Right now we don't have any of our kids, so we've had the chance to see some movies we'd otherwise not get to see.

1408 turned out to be a pretty good, somewhat scary horror film. Have you noticed, by the way, that the best horror movies of the last several years have been PG-13 films? The R rated horror films are all gore and gratuitous nonsense. The horror films that actually involve good acting and interesting stories end up rated PG-13. 1408 is a good example of that trend, like The Exorcism Of Emily Rose and Signs and The Sixth Sense. John Cusack pulled of a compelling performance, which was pretty important in a film that amounted to a one-man show about regret and redemption. I'd give 1408 three out of five stars. It's nice to see that there are still people in Hollywood who realize the difference between genuinely frightening stories and pointless gorefests.

The movie I have to enthusiastically recommend, though, is Knocked Up. Oh, it's not for everyone. There is a fair amount of raunchy humor, the movie earns it's R rating. This is the new film from the folks who made The 40 Year Old Virgin. Knocked Up kept us laughing for the whole duration of the film, and the story was really enjoyable. The best thing about the movie is that the characters were all likable people who were celebrated in the film for doing the right thing. They weren't perfect people, and some of them had to make major changes over the course of the film, but they were believable and likable characters. Without realizing it, I found myself really rooting for them, hoping that the story would treat them well. The story was about a guy and a girl who managed to get themselves pregnant on a one-night stand, and then were faced with the difficulty of doing the right thing over the next nine months.

I really enjoyed the film, and not just because it was funny. The two main characters never considered abortion, and the people in their lives who suggested abortion were portrayed as immature, selfish or just plain mean. Instead of aborting the child for convenience's sake, the new mom and pop decided to try the old fashioned thing; getting together for the kid's sake and trying to make it work. It might seem unbelievable to some people that something like that is even possible, but it really played believably in Knocked Up. It isn't that far fetched, after all; I mean, two people who share the same priorities when it comes to the really important stuff already have a head-start on other couples. I liked both of the main characters a lot, and Seth Rogan, the slacker Albert Brooks of his generation, is emerging as an unlikely but highly likable movie star. As a film that kept me laughing and just generally made me happy all the way through, I have to give Knocked Up five out of five stars.

Labels: Blogs, Entertainment, Personal

Oh, dear Lordy Lord the stories I could tell about the day I've had:

• The crappy day at work


• The stepdaughter who decided it would be fun to play "go-hide-for-half-an-hour-at-Wal-Mart"


• The mother-in-law who showed up from Florida UNANNOUNCED


• The cashier at McDonalds who talks to himself (not mindless muttering, but full-on violent conversations) and needs the order repeated again and again and again and again


• The unbelievably FOUL Men's Room at the bowling alley

Someday I'll find humor in all of this.

Labels: Personal

I'm ready to kill our basset hound, and I might try to do so if it hadn't been made clear to me over the past eighteen months that it's impossible to actually harm a basset hound. They're impervious to pain, they have no concept of "no," and based on some of the situations I've seen Chester get himself into over the last year and a half, they seem to be indestructible.

Here's what happened.

Wendy and I watched an old John Wayne movie last night after the kids got to bed, and decided afterward that it was too warm and gorgeous a night to let pass by without sitting on the porch and sipping a beer. While we were enjoying our beer, Chester was in an absolute frenzy for some reason. He was running around the house, running back to us, barking his head off and trying desperately to tell us something.

I'd have investigated, but some of the terribly urgent situations that Chester has tried to alert me to in the past have included the following:

• "The neighbors are getting laundry out of their car!"


• "There's a cat just outside the fence!"


• "There's a rock just outside the fence!"


• There's air just outside the fence!"

So I ignored him.

But when we came in and decided to get ready for bed, Chester was still absolutely all to hell.


A little background on the two dogs might be relevant. Tilda, our brittany, is going on five years old. Tilda is a registered purebred Brittany and she's a bit ostentatious. She's been fixed and she's generally disinterested in most things that happen outside the fence. Tilda sleeps beside our bed and, if she had her way, that's what she'd do most of the time. Chester, our basset hound, is almost two years old and has not been fixed. We tell ourselves that maybe we'll breed him someday. He is the most stubborn dog I've ever seen. He refuses to sleep anywhere other than one of two places: My recliner or his crate. Since he's been known to leave "surprises" in the living room if he's trusted to spend time there by himself, we have him sleep in his crate at night.

But Chester refused to sleep in his crate last night. Wendy put him in his crate and he sat and barked and barked and barked. After a short while we decided that he probably had to go to the bathroom again, so Wendy let him back outside. Once out there, he sat at the back fence and barked and barked and barked and barked.

I decided to get the flash light and go see what was going on. Heck, maybe this time something serious was in the works. Maybe something was really wrong. Once I got outside, I figured out what was up pretty quickly. See, on the other side of my back yard there's a vacant lot with a creek that cuts through it. Beyond that is my neighbor's house, and my neighbor keeps hounds. Coonhounds. He hunts with them and he breeds them and, I'm pretty sure, one of his females has gone into heat.

At least, that's what I was picking up on from Chester. Now, as you can tell from the picture to the right, Chester doesn't seem to be a full-blooded basset hound. (I think his breeder was less than scrupulous.) Chester looks like he has some black-and-tan in him, and I can't help but believe that he was able somehow to pick up on love in the air, coming from the female hounds across the creek.

Chester was running along the back fence, looking toward the neighbors dogs and howling his head off. There's a Hardees about a quarter mile from here in the small town 'round the bend and I'd bet you anything that people in the parking lot could have heard him. I became convinced at that point that there had to be a female hound in heat across the creek and Chester was in the throes of passion, howling the hound equivalent of "How YOU doin'? You live around here? That collar is YOU, baby. How's about I come over to your place?"

We brought him inside and waited for him to calm down, hoping that he'd maybe fall asleep beside Tilda in our bedroom. Nothin' doin'. Wendy and I laid in bed trying desperately to fall asleep while Chester sat beside the bed barking his fool head off: "You can't keep us apart! You can't stop our love! This thing is bigger than all of us!"

Finally, we stuck his butt back in the crate where he howled for another half an hour and finally dozed off. As I write these words he's asleep about four feet from me. He seems to feel dejected. Crestfallen. Defeated. Alone.

It's amazing, really, that we had the energy this morning to get up and try a breakfast recipe that's been going around the blogosphere for a while. We got it from B13, circa Jamie Dawn (who posted it in his comments section), And Jamie Dawn got it from Alison. If you look at Jamie Dawn's picture and B13's picture, it's obvious that Wendy and I did something wrong. I'll tell you what we did wrong: For one thing, we were unpleasantly surprised to get up this morning and realize that we were out of all purpose flour. I only had bread flour and tried to make the recipe with that. It obviously makes a difference. For another thing, both B13 and Jamie Dawn doubled the cooked apples in the recipe, and we didn't have enough apples to do that. So our version of the Oven Apple Bake doesn't look quite as tasty as Jamie's and B13's … but, trust me, it was lip smackin' good.

Between Wendy and Liam and me, we almost finished it off. There is, however, a nice, big section left. I don't know who's gonna get it … but I know one hound dog who I ain't sharin' NOTHIN' with.

Labels: Humor, Personal, Recipes

It's been an interesting, fun packed few days. The department where I work at our paper mill has been shut down for at least eight days for some urgent maintenance, so to get ahead of the work hours I'd miss I worked as much overtime as possible last week.

Today Wendy and I decided to get to work in the yard and try to make our house look like people actually live here. So we went to the local Wal-Mart to pick up a few things and while we were there I saw a guy with the most amazing, intense mullet I've ever seen. This mullet was a thing of beauty. I'd never seen anything like it in my life and I couldn't resist the urge to grab a couple of cellphone pics to share with the blogosphere. I'm telling you, this guy is the undisputed Dark Prince of Mulletvania. I really wanted to walk up to him and say "Dude, you totally RAWK." But, of course, he knows that he totally rawks, so it would have been pointless.

I gotta say, I actually kind of admire guys who walk around with mullets in this day and age. They have got to know that mullets are the single most unfashionable, frowned-upon hairstyle in the world right now. You can't log onto the net, for instance, without coming across website after website after website dedicated to mullet mocking. So to wear a mullet these days is the ultimate way to thumb your nose at modern culture. I almost wish I had the nerve.

After our Wal-Mart trip, Wendy and I went to San Juan, a local Mexican restaurant that has, in our opinion, the best food of any kind in a sixty mile radius. I'm a huge chimichanga fan and rarely order anything else, so Wendy was amazed when I got adventurous and ordered something from the unchartered parts of the menu. I asked for a combo plate, and although I was pretty sure I knew what I was ordering, when my plate arrived I was perplexed to see a taco, an enchilada, and what appeared to be a deep-fried human heart.

Since I couldn't identify it and since Wendy seemed simply amused by my predicament, I ate my taco and my enchilada and kept an eye on the "heart" in case it started beating. Once I got the nerve to try a fork full, it turned out that it was, in fact, a stuffed Poblano pepper. It was stuffed with cheese and rice and covered with a spicy sauce, and it was delicious, just like everything at San Juan always is.

Mmmmm.

So I guess the point of today's post is: be adventurous. Don't let society's expectations or your own habits cause you to get stuck in a rut. The happiest man in the world, I'd imagine, is the man who has the nerve to grow the back of his hair half way down his back and sit in a restaurant eating what appears to be a deep-fried human heart.

Labels: Personal

No posts for a while; I have a lot of overtime to work over the next four days. I'll be back to my regular annoying self somewhere around May 21.

Labels: Blogs, Personal

I'm in the lurch between finishing the graveyard shift and starting second shift, so for the last few days I've had little time and/or energy for blogging. My apologies to everyone I usually visit with comments, it's just been a crappy, groggy couple of days.

The rainy season seems to be on temporary hiatus in this neck of the woods, which meant I found myself with a lawn in desperate need of mowing ... or a hayfield in desperate need of baling, depending in your point of view. I just got done with all the mowing I'll have time for today, since I start second shift this afternoon.

I wonder if it's possible to ride a Segway while pushing a push mower?

Meanwhile, if you have to mow grass yourself this weekend, and if you're looking for a good "mowing mix" for your MP3 player to help pass the time, I heartily endorse the following tracks, and in the following order:

Foo Fighters: Everlong

Amy Winehouse: Rehab

Ministry: N.W.O.

Modest Mouse: Dashboard

Stone Temple Pilots: Sex Type Thang

Soul Asylum: Black Gold

30 Seconds To Mars: The Kill

Queens Of The Stone Age: Go With The Flow

Bad Religion: Leaders And Followers

Better Than Ezra: In The Blood

Corrosion Of Conformity: Vote With A Bullet

Everclear: Heroin Girl

Filter: Hey, Man, Nice Shot

Jane's Addiction: Pigs In Zen

Jet: Cold Hard Bench (I think that's what he's singing ... it's a song about Little League and not getting to play much, right?)

Local H: Eddie Vedder

Incubus: Megalomaniac

Paw: Jesse

The Ataris: San Dimas High School Football Rules

Weezer: Hashpipe

Have a good weekend, everyone.

Labels: Personal

Yesterday I gave up a chance to try to win ten thousand dollars:

It's raining here, it has been for days, and the front yard is a giant mud bog. It's impossible to get through it without getting mud somewhere you don't want mud. It's pretty bad. I’m talking Woodstock '94 level mud.

I'm working the graveyard shift this week, which means coming home around 7:00 AM and sleeping, if I can, until the early afternoon. Yesterday I had to make sure I was awake in time to greet the kids when they got off the school bus, since Wendy is finishing up the semester at school, and she had to be gone all day. That meant that while I was here asleep yesterday, with Wendy gone and the kids in school, Chester and Tilda had to spend the day outside. In the mud.

So the alarm goes off at 2:45, fifteen minutes before the school bus is supposed to drop off the kids at the front gate … and I stumble to the living room and look outside and see two muddy dogs, both of whom are staring intently toward the corner where they'll first glimpse the approaching school bus.

See, we have a daily tradition at our house. Every afternoon, Willow and Liam get home from school and come through the front gate … and, every day, Tilda and Chester greet them like returning war heroes. This involves a great deal of jumping up by both dogs and a great deal of yelling by both kids, neither of whom enjoy having their bookbags knocked into the dirt by the delighted pooches.

So it occurred to me yesterday that the best thing I could do would be to get the video camera and simply tape the fun as the two kids came through the gate into the mud bog and the two dogs, literally trembling with glee, knocked them into the mud. I couldn't imagine anything funnier than the sight of the four of them rolling around in the mud and the pouring rain together. I was sure that, if I videotaped that, I'd have the greatest guaranteed money-winner in the history of America's Funniest Home Videos.

But then reality set in. The thing is, the videos that make me laugh on AFV are never the ones that win. What kinds of videos make me laugh? People jumping out and scaring each other. People falling down. People falling off boats. People farting. Show me a video of someone scaring someone else so badly that he farts and falls off a boat and I'd literally laugh for days. I'm a simple man, I have simple needs.

Of course, the videos that actually win on AFV are never the ones that make me laugh. The ones that win usually involve babies laughing or babies with spaghetti in their nose or toddlers singing the Mickey Mouse Club theme or toddler's acting up. Look, I like those kinds of videos just fine … but those videos aren't funny. Those videos are cute. They're endearing. They're even valuable in terms of what makes life wonderful. They just ain't funny. You want funny? This [click here] is funny.

So I realized that my hypothetical video of the kids and dogs in the mud wouldn't win on AFV unless the kids, while rolling in the mud, were simultaneously screaming "M-I-C!! K-E-Y!! M-O-U-S-E!!" and shooting pasta out of their noses.

Crestfallen, I just did my best to de-mud the dogs and get the kids through the door without incident. I still feel, though, that I missed out on a wonderful opportunity. If nothing else, I'd have had a video clip that would have kept me in stitches for ages.

Labels: Entertainment, Personal, You Tube