I wrote this way back in May 2011.

I’m a little curious.

A few weeks ago, American forces nailed Osama Bin Laden and while I haven’t had a chance to write about this prior to now, something about the whole thing has really bothered me quite a bit.

The problem I’m having with all of it is, while I can acknowledge that OBL was not a nice guy by any stretch of the imagination, isn’t the administration acting a bit schizophrenically?

Wasn’t this the same administration that bandied about the idea (though a bit wrong headed) of bringing captured combatants from Guantanamo Bay up to New York City to hold trials?

Five Guantanamo Bay detainees with alleged ties to the 9/11 conspiracy, including accused mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, will be transferred to New York to go on trial in civilian court, Attorney General Eric Holder announced Friday.

Mohammed, Ramzi Bin al-Shibh, Walid bin Attash, Ali Abdul Aziz Ali and Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi will all be transferred to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York -- a short distance from the World Trade Center towers that were destroyed in the September 11 attacks.

 So one has to ask, what happened?

Holder said that he believes the trials could have been held in New York or Virginia, but that Congress imposed restrictions on where the trial could be held, taking the decision from his hands.

“Those restrictions are unlikely to be repealed in the immediate future,” the attorney general said. “We simply cannot allow a trial to be delayed any longer for the victims of the 9/11 attacks or for their family members who have waited for nearly a decade for justice. I have talked to these family members on many occasions over the last two years. Like many Americans, they differ on where the 9/11 conspirators should be prosecuted, but there is one thing on which they all agree: We must bring the conspirators to justice.”

Now, again I ask if one of the things the administration was trying to reinforce to the world is that we as a nation are about high ideals and following the rule of law, then where I ask does state sponsored assassination fit into the equation?

And anyone who thinks this was anything less than state sponsored assassination is leading a delusional existence.

Further, I again wonder where the outcry is? Where is the cry from civil libertarians? Let’s take this one step further, is this in fact setting a bad precedent?

And this has been something of the hallmark of this administration’s foreign policy, especially when it comes to dealing with the Arab world because it is fairly obvious we are well behind the curve and do not have a cohesive policy for dealing with the nation‘s and people’s involved.

I listened for eight years while people cast all kinds of aspersions on George W. Bush and even though I didn’t vote for the guy either time, I simple could not understand where this righteous indignation swelled from and now to see all that is going on and to witness what is a deafening silence from the very same groups that clamored so loudly against American military action and intervention in various parts of the world... well, it just rings a bit hollow.

I stopped there and this sat in the drafts queue until now.

As the clock winds down on the last few weeks of the Obama administration I have to admit to buyer’s remorse. While it looks like the one truly good piece of legislation I can credit to the soon to be former President may be dismantled in short order (I’m talking about the ACA), a lot of the things I had hoped for the President to achieve fell by the wayside.

While I can ascribe a certain amount of that to the lack of cooperation on the part of Congress, I have to assign equal blame to the President.

Foreign Policy wise the last eight years have been an absolute failure. As a matter of fact, you could look to the President as being one of the people most responsible for the rise of the conservative movement in Europe and Brexit to a certain extent. The hits just keep coming... Ukraine, Crimea, Syria, Libya, Yemen, Iraq, North Korea, China, Iran.

Aside from the fact that this President was likely responsible for more assassinations (through the CIA’s drone program) than any of his predecessors, there has been a remarkable disconnect between public policy and action.

Domestically... feh. A social agenda advanced in lieu of an economic one, it’s that failure that you can point to that prompted people not to vote for a ‘third term’ of Obama.

I look back now and I have to chuckle having watched Hillary try and take credit for the OBL raid and assassination when it was the work of a slew of people for years that made the thing possible.

Of course, it really is a gift no matter how you look at it. The world is a slightly better place without our pal Osama in it and hopefully it did serve notice on a whole host of people that ultimately we will find you and kill you if you should attack us - not a bad message to send no matter who is mailing the envelope.

Reading corrner

This is another one from the drafts queue )

Reading corner.

I’m spending a lot of time reading lately.

So, last week I was extolling the virtues of reading and maybe I can fill some space and drive some traffic here if only by talking about the things that make it onto my reading list.

Last week it was the book about Doug Kenney which was inspiring and disheartening all at the same time. This week it’s more about indulging in cynicism...

You can click through and listen to an interview with the author here as well as read an excerpt from the book.

If you don’t know who Doug Kenney is, I can sum it up for you plainly by saying he was one of the most devilishly clever comic geniuses of the last 50 years and there are a host of people whose work you have no doubt enjoyed who studied under his tutelage. Kenney was one of the people responsible for The National Lampoon which
is the wellspring from which sprang Saturday Night Live, all those John Hughes movies and a host of other great things.

Really, go out and buy this book or take it out from your library now!

The stupidity of Molly Crabapple.

This was a draft I came across and figure to clear the queue...

Perhaps Molly Crabapple’s biggest contribution to society was Dr. Sketchy’s which although I never attended I would have liked to.


I realize not being a women I can’t make up some ridiculous Nom De Plume and trade on my looks to get notoriety. I can’t even get away with making stupid statements like this one here.

Statements that play into the liberal fallacy and paint dedicated men and women with a broad brush.

You know, the very same kind of brush you’re accusing them of using when they encounter people of a certain persuasion.

I call bullshit.

Seriously, grow up.

The really bad joke.

On Sunday, 60 Minutes ran a story about the increasing numbers of murders and shootings in Chicago.

Is this a surprise? Not really.

All throughout the Presidential campaign we heard references made to Chicago and we heard that overall crime had gone down in the country but the funny thing about crime is it hasn’t gone down if you are one of the victims of it. Chicago though is an interesting situation in that it underscores a false narrative that we’ve been fed over the last few years...

You might remember the Michael Brown shooting and how it sparked outrage even though it was later proven that Brown did indeed struggle with the officer in question and never uttered the words ‘don’t shoot!’ after the officer he encountered told him ‘hands up.’

For months though we were regaled to demonstrations were people chanted those words, ‘hands up, don’t shoot!’ It became the chorus that exemplified Police racism and brutality in our country. Admittedly, I watched all of this through skeptical eyes but the problem is that it is such an emotionally charged issue you run the risk of being called a racist if you are a white person who doesn’t buy into the narrative.

I don’t buy into that narrative so I imagine that makes me a racist, right?

I would beg to differ.

I can’t say I grew up well to do. As a matter of fact, I grew up so poor that dirt was rich compared to our household. You may think I’m exaggerating but I’m really not. I grew up in a single parent household where the custodial parent hadn’t graduated high school and worked as a chambermaid and the other parent in question would best be described as a deadbeat dad. This was at a time before we had all these wonderful terms for these things but I can tell you the people I grew up around were people of color. My best friend when I was around 10 was ‘Junebug’ and my other friends were Juan and his brother Carlos so I can’t say we were in the lily white country club crowd.

Being poor though means you live in for lack of a more delicate way to put it, a shitty neighborhood. A shitty neighborhood in the sense that you are much more likely to be a victim of crime or violence than someone who lives in a nice neighborhood.

Now, that doesn’t mean that crime doesn’t happen in nice neighborhoods but the truth of the matter is that the crime that does happen in nicer neighborhoods isn’t the same kind of crime that happens in poorer neighborhoods. Poorer neighborhoods are more subject to robbery, burglary, assault and rape than nicer (read higher income neighborhoods), is that racist or just an admission of economics and what drives some crime?

Anyway, let’s get back to that 60 minutes story on Chicago...

One of the things that Bill Whitaker noted was a less aggressive stance by the Police in Chicago and an explosion in violence that apparently resulted from that less aggressive stance.

Can we really be surprised by this?

Over the last year, every time someone of color has been shot and killed by a Police Officer, the first response has been this is just another instance of institutional bias on the part of Police - this has happened even when the officer involved in the shooting has been Black himself. There has been a rush to judgment, an assumption on the part of the media and the public that the officer is wrong and always this has happened without the full details and scope of the incident coming to light.

Is it any wonder the Police in Chicago don’t see much good in being aggressive in Policing? They have been put in a position where they are likely going to be called fascists or racists, so is there an upside for them?

I have known a few Cops over the course of my life and came close to being one myself at one point (hey, a good civil service job with decent benefits was always appealing to people in my economic class). It’s not an easy job. As a matter of fact it’s a pretty crappy job a lot of the time. Think about it for a second, if you get stopped by the Police, you’re generally not happy and if you’re a victim and the Police show up afterward aside from comfort and making sure you receive Medical attention what can they do?

A lot of policing, really at least when it comes to street crime which is prevalent in poorer neighborhoods is most effective as a preventive measure. A preventive measure being a Police presence and a feeling among vertain elements of the neighborhood that the Police are watching them.

Stop and Frisk was a program that was started with that in mind, the idea being in combination with the strict gun laws of New York, if someone is stopped and found to have a concealed weapon on their person it’s one less gun on the street and the likelihood of one less shooting happening and maybe even one less criminal preying on honest people just trying to live their lives.


That was stopped though along with some other things they had done here in New York over the last two decades and wouldn’t you know it, there’s been a rise in certain kinds of crime and certain quality of life issues reverting back to the good ‘old’ days as a result.

The upshot here is that Police are not the enemy. Certainly they are not the enemy they’ve been made out to be over the last year, year and a half. I’m a bit surprised that for every BLM demonstration that has targeted the actions of Police, there has not been at least five times as many that target gangs and drugs.

I guess it’s easier to blame an outside force or presence than to blame the members of your own community. It’s a bit sad really.

I can admit to never being particularly happy when I was pulled over by the Police. Look, it’s not fun. I can tell you though that somewhere along the line one lesson I was taught stuck and that was to roll over like a puppy when the Police stop you. I do everything by the book, it’s all about ‘Yes Officer.’ ‘No Sir’ etc. There isn’t any attitude whatsoever because I know I want this to be as painless as I can make and lip or attitude is going to take things in a direction that likely will have me on the short end of the stick.

Also, there was a period in my life when I sported a full beard and mustache and had a good mane of hair and a ponytail. You know what? I don’t think I ever got pulled over as much as I did when I looked like that before or since.

Appearances count.

It would be nice if that wasn’t the case but that’s a bit how the world works.

So. I am really not sure how to get out of the corner we appear to have painted ourselves into.

Rudy Guiliani was called a fascist (Mussolini) by his detractors because of his very aggressive approach to community policing (and I am avoiding just how offensive it was that as an Italian this kind of a slur could be made without anyone batting an eye) but the truth of it is the people he helped the most were the people in the poorest neighborhoods because they were safer as a result.

Rahm Emanuel is mayor of Chicago, he’s the former Chief of Staff of President Obama and you know, it’s pretty obvious he is in agreement with the outgoing President’s view of Police. It’s one of the things that really bothered me about President Obama but the sad thing is those neighborhoods are more dangerous, more Police have been gunned down than in the last five years and the real problem has yet to be addressed in these communities.

It’s what would best be described as abject failure.

When people get it wrong.

I’m good at what I do. I don’t mean to be immodest but I know that I have a level of ability others lack.

That isn't to say I can’t improve in areas, I am well aware of my shortcomings when it comes to work. I know them quite well and I still want to get better. You’d think after a certain amount of time things just stop but the truth of the matter is if you don’t keep trying to get better at what you do you wind up being behind the curve.

Through the years, I’ve prided myself in knowing as much as I can about the applications I work in. One of the things I dislike about freelancing as opposed to a staff gig or permalancing somewhere is that I am often called in to put out fires.

Putting out fires is not fun and going one step further there inevitably comes a time when you can’t put out a blaze because the client or someone on that end of the equation has let things smoulder for far too long.

I’ve gotten better though about pushback in recent years. Part of it is because I realize as much as I want to please people, I’m doing myself and them no favors putting myself into a lose-lose situation. If I do, it weakens my brand, or put another way, I become the easy object of blame, the fall guy if you will.

I’m not into being anyone’s fall guy anymore. While I will go to extreme lengths to keep clients happy I’m just not willing to destroy my reputation due to someone else’s screw up.

While I do a lot more production than design, I have design chops. I’m not passing myself off as the world’s greatest designer mind you and I’ve worked with super talented people whose skills I am envious of but I do know what I’m doing. I’m better than I was years ago and years ago I was working as a designer more than I do these days. I’ve had a few clients over the last year or so comment on my design abilities and I’m truly flattered greatly when that happens because it’s one area where I really DO want to be better.

Yet, I still run across people who get it wrong...

See, I’m fast.

That is to say given the choice between noodling around with a mouse, I would just as soon use some keyboard shortcuts and do things by the numbers. When I say by the numbers I mean in the sense of moving things around or positions elements on a page or layout. People will watch me work and they’ll be floored by how fast I am BUT that’s all they see.

They don’t get it.

I could be fast as fast can be but if I didn’t have an intrinsic understanding of design and where I wanted things to go when I’m moving them, I wouldn’t be anything other than fast.  Unfortunately, some clients miss that part of the equation. They think my ‘setup’ or my ‘process’ alone is what makes the difference. Let’s put it this way, anyone can drive a race car and make it go fast but only someone who really knows how to drive can win a race. That’s the knowledge and skill that are involved.

So, I have to say work is frustrating at times because of this. I make really good money to do what I do and I am very happpy for it but I would like to get a little bit more credit than some people give me at times, especially given that there have been so many projects and teams that I have been a part of where the work was sos successful it won an award (and I can’t tell you how many times that has happened).

So, one of my big to-dos for the yearr is to think of a better way to market myself to make it clear the full extent of abilities I have.

I have to do a website which I have been putting off forever. That’s the perfectionist in me but I am coming to realize perfection can’t stand in the way of things getting done.

Rogue One... the good, the bad and the ugly.

I don’t take the plunge lately in dragging myself to the theater but the day after Christmas I schlepped into the city to catch Rogue One in all its Imax glory. Here are just a few quick thoughts if you haven’t seen it yet and are still on the fence...

What’s good about the film?

Forrest Whitaker. Hands down, this is one of the few times I have seen Forrest Whitaker on screen where I wasn’t watching Forrest Whitaker. This time, he WAS the character and I forget the actor and I have to give him a lot of credit for that, truly his performance is to be celebrated.

Look, I’m a Peter Cushing fan in the sense that I remember so many films he was while I was growing up. He was one of those Hammer actors (along with Christopher Lee) and without going into detail I was amazed at how they pulled this one trick off. It is a bit creepy and open’s a Pandora’s Box in a way down the road, not just in film but in other aspects of society but really, really amazing to see. And the one cameo at the end too, that was a nice touch as well especially given recent events.

See I’m trying to avoid spoilers here.

What’s bad?

First, save the money. You can likely catch it on TV. Rogue One is IN the Star Wars universe but it’s not Star Wars.

Now, I’ve managed to go to a movie theater to see two movies in the last two months and I may get to a movie theater six times a year if that. The theater experience doesn’t appeal to me so much anymore. I went to a theater with Imax 3-D and the 3-D is okay, not great but okay because it doesn’t add much to a bad story and Rouge One doessn’t overwhelm.

What do I mean by doesn’t overwhelm?

I fell asleep during the movie. Actually I saw Doctor Strange a few weeks before and wound up napping during that too.

Rogue One dragged though... the script isn’t as tight as it should have been and that’s a big problem. Move away from the excitement of a movie set in the Star Wars Universe and viewed as just another SciFi film and unfortunately Rogue One is very lacking.

Visually it’s good, not great.  As I said the pacing is bad, it’s just not as tight as it should or needs to be. Felicity Jones is fine and the rest of the cast is fine too but with the material they have... meh.


The Ugly?

They developed some great characters in Rogue One and let’s just say it was a waste. The movie is a mish-mash and it misses what was the original intent of Star Wars and the films it was based on. Star Wars paid homage to old serials that played in movie theaters long ago, they were filled with action and adventure along with a touch of romance but they did follow some basic rules - Rogue One in it's attempt to be ‘realistic’ moves away from that much to it’s own detriment.

Rogue One relies so heavily on the mythology of Star Wars and tries so hard to separate itself from that mythology that it fails on both counts.

At most this is two stars on a five star scale. Star Wars fans may find themselves delighted for more new Star Wars but it’s not anywhere close to the bar set by other entries in the franchise.

Welcome 2017!

So here it is New Year’s Eve and I find that what happens is that New Year’s Eve rolls around quicker and quicker with each passing year, funny how that works. Then again, maybe not so much.

Has life been good?

Yes.

Does that mean it’s been without strife or problems?

Not at all.

Thing is, you really have to put things in perspective and count your blessings. The old saw about counting your blessings really is a truism to use throughout life because if you sit down and start feeling sorry for yourself you can be assured if you take the time to look around there are people in your sphere whose burdens you wouldn’t want to take upon yourself.

I keep looking for a full time gig, I’m really wanting one but beginning to wonder if that is in the cards at all for me. My goal would be to find that one decent full time gig I can score with good benefits and stability that I can use as a bridge to retirement although I am thinking too I am not going to be in much of a position to retire in the classical sense.

This year has been like last year in that there have been moments when it’s been very busy and then I’ve had times when I’ve gone weeks without work.

I hate that.

Life becomes vary hard to make plans when you are living like that but again, at least I’m getting work.

This year a good friend passed well before her time (or at least it seemed that way to me) after battling cancer for about two years. It’s harder to make good friends  as time goes on (at least for me) so the loss hit very hard on a level. Doubly so because I don’t have friends close by who I can count on and that would make life a lot easier if it were the case.

So that absence is felt acutely.

Another friend is going through something that from the outside appears nightmarish as her spouse was involved in a very serious traffic accident and six months in you begin to wonder if Medical Science gives us miracles or just figures out new ways to prolong our torment. There is no quick death anymore, only a slow torment that alternately brings bouts of hope and pain in equal measure. Even from a distance it's painful to watch.

It’s also been a year of people coming back into my orbit like odd comets - I’ve had two clients reach out after not working with them for eight years and 15 years if you can believe it. That’s a bit wild.


And family? Well, what there is of it continues to move farther away which is a bit of a mixed bag as well because should it be disappointment or relief that I feel as I find the tectonic plates of life moving more remotely from their shores.

Each New Year can hold hope which is a good thing. If you look backward you are likely going to find ways to be disappointed but looking to the future brings you upon the precipice of unknown promise.

I don’t want to drone on to the point of boredom but if you’re reading this (and Lord knows I make infrequent appearances in these parts of late), I wish you a New Year that is full of hope and all good things, remember always to look forward because it’s the one place you can actually make change which you can never do with the past.

Happy New Year and wishes for a wonderful 2017!

Saying goodbye.

I’ve been scarce around these parts mainly because it appears as if days have gotten shorter or my energy level is out of kilter and I am just not getting things done the way I used to (and that is kind of scary because it isn’t as if I was some kind of dynamo before).

I’m in a brief pause at the moment though, by pause I mean I’ve hit a slow spell which in some ways is good because I have been fighting something for what seems forever (five weeks now) and finally I am getting back to decent shape.

The important thing though is to keep fighting.

What exactly does that mean?

It means not giving up and trying to push forward even though your heart may not be in it. It isn’t an easy thing to do but it’s a good lesson - things don’t get better when we give up, things may not get better even if we keep fighting but at least there is a possibility of change that does not exist when you just throw up your hands.

Bringing me to what I began to write about.

So, I lost a friend of mine a few weeks back. She passed away and I believe she was only 66 so there was about a decade separating us in age.

The difference though is in those 66 years, this woman packed in more than I could possibly imagine. I met her during another pause in work when I was looking to do something, anything to keep busy and have some money come in and I wound up working for the census bureau. It was easy money and there were times I found myself enjoying the job. It’s hard to argue with something where you can set your own hours for the most part and get paid for working from home part of the time but that’s what the job was.

The fascinating thing here was just how many people seemed to have a hard time meeting those very low standards but it just reinforced a lesson to me that not everyone takes work seriously instead looking at the whole concept of a job as something where you do as little as possible.

The first day I met my friend she was conducting the training for the job and I walked in a few minutes late (honestly anything within ten minutes either side is on time - probably something else I should change about myself) and I found myself immediately called to task for it. Believe me when I say that the harshness of the admonition regarding my tardiness was such that I thought I needed to keep my head down and steer clear of this person.

And wouldn’t you know it, this was the person who ultimately was my boss.

The funny thing is though, I do take every job quite seriously. I don’t know especially know how that happened but I have a pretty good idea that my grandparents and my mom (and maybe even my father) drummed that one thing into me as I was growing up. No matter what you do, do a good job, shoot for excellence, be thorough. It is ingrained in me and probably has been one of the few saving graces I can point to when it comes to any success I have realized over my professional career.

Any my friend, well apparently she recognized that and respected me for that.

So, after the census stuff was over and over the period of several months we came into contact sporadically and my friend did help me in a number of ways. Our friendship grew and I have to say one of the nicest things about it was being around someone who was so incredibly smart, so well traveled and who had moved in such amazing circles.

My friend was a lawyer by trade and a damn good one. So good in fact that she was the county attorney for some time and also was head of a local hospital here too. She met quite a few people over her time in government including a former president and a current candidate for president, a sitting governor, a former mayor and that isn’t even the tip of the iceberg.

She had a hand in writing the constitution for a nation in Asia.

She traveled all over the world, places I could only dream of seeing. To hear her talk about these far off lands just made me yearn to travel.

We would meet up every once in awhile and take long meandering walks several hours in length at a park not too far from where we live and we would spend the time just having meandering conversations about the present and past. It became something I really enjoyed and looked forward to.

Well, about two and a half years ago, she hadn’t been feeling so great and it turned out she had cancer.

Cancer becomes one of those power words spoken only in hushed whispers the older you get because you are likely to have seen the devastation it causes on people. The cure even if it takes which it often does not is more devastating than the disease itself because it amounts to poisoning the body so in the scorched earth nothing will grow.

There was an ebb and flow to her disease though and after the initial tide the seemed to be a pause where it looked like she might have had a reprieve. The pause was far too short though and the demon illness came back with a vengeance.

I was able to help out a bit at the beginning which I was glad to do but as the disease ravaged her my friend found herself less inclined to be out and about people because she didn’t like her illness being the elephant in the room and the last time I saw her was just over a year ago.

We had breakfast at a nearby diner and in keeping with her wishes I did not at all touch on the topic of her illness. I did everything in my power not to allow it to overshadow our time together although afterward I went to my car and sobbed like a child. My friend wrote me shortly afterward to thank me for making it easy for her to say goodbye.

We still kept in contact through text over the last year because I wanted her to know I was still thinking of her - even writing this now I find myself overcome with emotion.

She was a good friend.

But the lesson she gave me was to never give up. Her heart may have been one of the biggest I have ever come across even though it was hidden beneath a prickly shell. I went to the wake a week or two back and that closes the book, she’s gone.

But she is definitely not forgotten.

Marilyn you will very much be missed.

I have become a big blubbering baby.

I am not sure if aging also brings the onset of sentimentality or not.

Certainly age is about loss, loss of vigor, loss of youth, loss of innocence but also the loss of loved ones and cherished things. In one sense, that’s okay. I do not at all embrace this idea of ‘the good old days.’ When people talk about things being better in the past, I call bullshit more often than not because no matter what problems we may confront today and in the future, the world and life in general does get better. In many ways while we might say things are getting worse, we are just forgetting the problems we may have had in the past.

So, back to this big blubbering baby shit...

I find I much more readily succumb to the waterworks than I did when I was younger. I don’t think I am more emotional or more sensitive now than I was in the past but the things I do cherish I guard jealously.

Music can do that to me much more than I may like. I like lots of different music but there are some pieces of music that have stories tied up in them. Stories for me or stories for the artist.

Anyway, this is a crappy, crappy video but I really feel something for this song and I thought I might share it on a Saturday:

This happens to be the last new Beatles tune to be released and it came so long after they had broken up it was a big treat for everyone who thought they would never hear a new Beatles tune. While the Beatles were ubiquitous when I was a very young child, I never really was subject to Beatlemania because 1) I was a boy and 2) they skewed slightly to older fans.

Now, Wings? That was my band, I was a big Wings fan for a brief period of my mid teens. And later on I developed a love of all that came before. I think people will always feel cheated that John Lennon was taken away so abruptly, so violently and so senselessly from us but hearing this only makes one wonder what might have been and how much there was a very special alchemy in the joining of four musicians from an industrial part of England.

By the by, anyone who doesn’t credit Jeff Lynne on this is missing the boat. If there is one person on the planet who took up the mantle of the Beatles after they broke up it is Jeff Lynne and if you don’t think so go back and listen to 1977’s Concerto for A Rainy Day put out under the banner of ELO.

Sometimes all you need is a good laugh...

So on the heels of snowmageddeon whic managed to gobble up a weekend I find myself winding down on a Sunday night. A lot of my time can be spent idling away on flights of fancy and certainly I spent the majority of blizzard day binge watching Game of Thrones.

After performing my requisite post snowstorm shoveling duties (which was surprisingly not too bad although I was dreading it) and after some clown took the mirror off my car in the parking lot of the supermarket and left with nary a note.

I found myself perusing some of the entries at the Urban Dictionary, always good for a laugh, today’s belly laugh was the result of looking at the definitions for an Angry Pirate and a Cleveland Steamer.

What will they think of next! (talk about mistake by the lake)

Speaking for the 47 percent. - Another unpublished snippet.

It’s kind of fun watching Mitt Romney run for President. He has this refreshing tendency to shot first and react to questions later.

In shoot first I’m referring to a unique quality of speaking without thinking through the ramifications of what he’s uttered. I really can’t remember someone with such a ham-handed mastery of language since perhaps

Dan Quayle
Throughout his time as vice president, Quayle was widely ridiculed in the media and by many in the general public, in both the U.S. and overseas, as an intellectual lightweight and generally incompetent. Contributing greatly to the perception of Quayle’s incompetence was his tendency to make public statements that were either self-contradictory and confused (“The holocaust was an obscene period in our nation's history.… No, not our nation’s, but in World War II. I mean, we all lived in this century. I didn’t live in this century, but in this century’s history”), impossible and confused (“I have made good judgments in the past. I have made good judgments in the future”) or confused, as when he addressed the United Negro College Fund, whose slogan is ‘A mind is a terrible thing to waste,’ and said, “You take the UNCF model that what a waste it is to lose one’s mind or not to have a mind is being very wasteful. How true that is.”
 
or maybe even Norm Crosby.
Norm Crosby (born September 15, 1927) is an American comedian sometimes associated with the Borscht Belt who often appeared on television in the 1970s. He is known for his use of malapropisms and is often called The Master of Malaprop. He was born in Boston.


In just the last few weeks alone Mitt Romney managed to upset the Arab world, the British but his coupe de grace would have to be his recent comments about how almost half of America is suckling at the government teat.

In the meantime while we have commentators on the right such as Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannitty trying to paint the current head of the executive branch of government as a Socialist because he dares to say that everyone should pay their fair share when it comes to taxes...

*    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *

So, I started writing this some time back. It says 12/8/12 but it’s likely I wrote this before the election and revisited it trying to get it out of the drafts queue after.

We are on the cusp of another election cycle and it seems all too familiar. Same, same. The same hackneyed language about what is bad and what is good. The same shit shoveled onto the American electorate in a desperate attempt to get them to buy a bill of goods that more likely will do them harm.

Now, that’s the cynic in me.

We are lucky in this country, lucky in ways people often don’t recognize. It is because for all the faults we have as a nation, we more often than not get it right.

Not that it isn’t a painful process, not that it doesn’t happen without some bumps and bruises along the way, not that it doesn’t happen in fits and starts but it does happen and we are still here.

And we can be stupid (and often are) and it doesn’t destroy us.

In the rear view mirror some of the things Romney said are almost prescient - especially about Russia. Others though are truly offensive - especially when it comes to embracing some kind of attitude that any social spending is a bad thing.

In some ways though, it is too bad Romney has been discarded by the members of his own party because he might in fact be a much more palatable option to moderates in the Republican party than the current roster of candidates.

What we have before us in this election year is emblematic of what is wrong with our political system and what needs to be fixed. We have POLAR opposites, extremes and our nation is really a nation at the middle.

Even though I seem to have gotten off track here... I know before this is over, this election year, we will see many more instances of a candidate shooting first (with his or her mouth) without thinking - maybe it means there should be a different type of gun control.

Hello world.

There are things I don’t do anymore...

Blogging is one of them unfortunately. I haven’t been active on Flickr either lately. Life just has been too much of a struggle it seems and instead of things getting easier as I get older they actually seem to be getting harder.

It just doesn’t make sense to me.

*    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *

 I started writing that some time ago, I can’t even tell you when.

But like most of internet land, I’ve stopped blogging if for no other reason than I find myself so overwhelmed by life, I cannot carve out enough time and presence of mind to do it.

But maybe I can change that.

I sure hope I can because time is precious and I want to do those things that are creative while I can. I hope you’ll join me.

Free is good.

I have progressed to that part of life where I cannot tolerate spending money on things when I don’t have to. I believe in some way this is a telltale sign of my descent in senility and decrepitude. Next thing you know I’ll be making my way to the local chain for the 5 o’clock senior’s special.

But really, there is so much that I have wasted money on through the years... why bother.

And the other thing is I now no longer have the urge to get that latest and greatest gadget as a showpiece or status symbol.

Anyway, what started me off on this whole diatribe was this... my library is the greatest thing in the world!

I have a friend who lives out in California. He’s a good guy but he has a definite problem and it’s the same problem I have seen other people I have known who have shared it to his degree and something I too shared to a much lesser extent.

This guy... he has to buy books, or pickup books, or just amass the damn things. It’s so bad he has a storage space for the fucking things. This is besides the books he lives with, he has a storage space for books.

He could stop everything else in his life today and he would never be able to read all the books he has gathered.

Ouch.

He is actually in the process of being evicted because of it. Really.

And his ‘girlfriend’ is none too happy at the prospect.

Which makes me wonder how fucked up I must be that I don’t currently have a woman in my life.

Anyway, once more I digress.

Back to the library here... besides being able to take out all sorts of books and read them, or not read them, or halfway read them. I have just fallen in love with the library. If anything I don’t take advantage of it enough. It is a beautiful building and beautiful space with awesome views and very comfortable to linger in. Perhaps the only thing good I can say about where I live is that the library is so very nice. I’m not at all crazy about the village but man, that library is really special.

Anyway, along with access to all these great books in such a wonderful space, I can also download music for FREE!

FREE! FREE! FREE! FREE!

I can download up to five MP3s each and every week that are mine to keep. I love it!

You know what I was able to download recently? David Bowie’s newest album! So, it’s not as if you can’t get anything good! I am in the process of downloading The Wall now. If you don’t know about this, check out your local library’s website and see if you have access to Freegal. All the libraries in Westchester have it as well as all the ones in New York City.

Just amazing!

Also, through my library I have access to the Lynda.com website. If you don’t know what that is, I can tell you it is one of the most valuable resources for training in computer programs and other topics too.

That library... man what a great place!

Be sure you use yours!

Remember, you are in fact paying for it whether you realize it or not.

My confession

Alright... I’m going to fess up.

I watch Fox News.

I don’t know why I watch it because every time I spend more than 15 minutes or so watching the channel I find myself getting really angry. I mean, I realize they go on and on about ‘Fair and Balanced’ but that’s sounds like something Josef Goebbels could have come up with and is so far from the truth that the irony of it is almost painful.

Actually, I have a few people in my orbit who I care about who watch Fox News with zeal and as a result it opens the up to a certain amount of teasing... so when Hurricane Joaquin made its way up the coast and we had rain last weekend, the dialogue with them went something like this:

“Saw that hurricane last weekend”

“Yeah, really ruined the weekend! Saturday was so cold, rainy and dreary.”

“I know... Obama’s fault.”

Because really when you get right down to it, everything is Obama’s fault. I even said to one that if the President figured out a way tomorrow to clear the national debt, give the nation full employment, free healthcare and put $10,000 in every American’s pocket to boot, Fox News would be going on and on about how it was a huge problem that the American public didn’t know where to spend this money and how the President screwed up.

Anyway, I’m the one usually flipping between channels to see what each of the news networks is covering and what their slants are. If you really want to get yourself up in arms, try Al Jazeera America or NewsMax – you think Fox News is bad?

Ah, but I digress.

Anyway, I watch with fascination the parade of people Fox news trots out all day long - it’s a bit of a tennis match bouncing back and forth between the corpulent or stone faced older white guys and the blondes. I guess this is Fox News magic formula to appeal to their demographic.

There are some associations that come to mind every time I see certain people on Fox News. I don’t know why my mind if making the leap, I just know it makes watching Fox News when I do watch it a little less stressful to watch and maybe by sharing it will make it less stressful for you as well or make you laugh at the way they are so over the top.

If you take Fox News seriously there is nothing to do but get mad but if you watch it as some kind of performance piece it becomes hilarious...

*  *  *  *  *  *  *

I started that entry above so very long ago... maybe two years or more.

I still watch Fox news from time to time but I find myself succumbing to the urges of Iraqi journalists
and wanting to throw a shoe at my TV.

Ted Cruz talked about New York values recently... to take a line from Al Goldstein, ‘Ted Cruz,
Fuck You!’

If we talk about a liberal media, where is it we find Shaun Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, Brett Baier, Mark Levin, Megyn Kelly and a host of others? Or the NY Post and the Wall Street Journal? These are the ‘liberal’ media?

This is one of the big fallacies foisted upon the American public, the thought that the media is so totally controlled by one extreme or the other.

Yes there are places like the New York Times or NPR or MSNBC but they all have counters in the media universe.

It’s just this idea that somehow the conservative agenda is the subject of victimization which in the process makes their message more palatable - get over it! Stand behind your convictions and your words! Start to approach the world in a fashion that is assertive.

Probably the biggest appeal Donald Trump has to Republicans and Americans overall is that he takes a position and stands behind it. He doesn’t apologize and when confronted about something if anything he pushes back even harder. A lot of people like that.

Flip side, stop blaming the current President for shit that isn’t his fault. Recognize the areas where he has done a good job. Stop making this a zero sum game. You know, out nation isn’t so much a nation of extremes as much as it is about a nation of those people in the middle. People will find it a lot easier to embrace someone’s message if they don’t make out their opponent to be... well, the only thing I could think of immediately was a Sith Lord.

I don’t even know why I waste my time on this crap anyway, no one reads it.

Let’s face facts...

I’m old and I’m fat and I really am not what I would consider all that appealing to the opposite sex and I have the most incredible crush on Kim Deal.

She has the voice of an angel.

I could listen to her sing for a very, very long time and be quite happy.

There are times when I listen to the music she composes and I find myself just dumbfounded. I am either close to weeping, or banging away at any surface nearby.

She lives in Ohio and there are times I think to myself it would almost be worth it to take a trip but I get the sense she is not the most patient of people but that makes my heart swell for her all the more.

Fuck Charlie! Do you know I went to a Pixies concert recently (sometime within the last two years) and there was no Kim Deal! That’s like seeing the Stones without Mick Jagger, seeing Aerosmith without Steven Tyler or seeing Nirvana without Kurt Cobain. Frank Black may not think it but, that’s where it is.

I was crushed (and I had to sit through a concert where I was worried about the contact high and how it might affect any drug test I would be taking for employment in the future).

Yeah... It’s Kim Deal for me.

It sounds so damn ridiculous but what I wouldn’t give to meet her.

I need more of that in my life.

Is Donald Trump the Ronald Reagan for the new millenium?

I can’t stomach the debates these days... if that’s what you can truly call them. Election season has started so damn early and the Republican field is so overwhelmingly vast that the debates just boil down to an infomercial by the Republican National Committee more than anything else.

Certainly we aren’t seeing any discourse of substance here.

And really when we get right down to it, at this point in time are there people we see up on the stage we really believe have a snowball’s chance in hell of being president (cough... Ben Carson... cough, cough... Chris Christie cough, cough, cough... John Kasich).

The scary thing to contemplate now is that Donald Trump has a very real chance of winning the election!

And while people are probably ready to pooh-pooh the thought, I am old enough to have come of age in the seventies when Ronald Reagan was a punchline for jokes on the first season of Saturday night live. Believe me when I say stranger things have happened.

I saw Hillary on the Tonight Show the other night and I was struck by one immediate thought...

She is very vulnerable. Very beatable.

Now, you would think I don’t like Hillary but I do think she would be a good administrator and while many would ascribe regal powers to the office of the President basically out President is more of an administrator than anything else.


Problem is, Hillary didn’t look good on that show, she looked tired and the truth is she showed a disdain for Trump that could wind up being very much a part of her downfall. Trump actually plays very well in some quarters. His slogan of ‘Make America Great Again’ is just as amorphous and compelling a campaign statement as Barack Obama’s ‘Change’ was in 2008. Unfortunately, truth be told out fellow citizens have a very short memory so things like this go over very well.

Ronald Reagan spouted much the same refrain and isn’t it all too uncomfortably familiar that before the latest debate the talk was about sailors that were taking hostage? Sjades of what happened way back in 1979 with the Iranian Hostage Crisis!

The difference here is that the current President actually has laid the groundwork with the Iranian Nuclear Deal to move forward and open relations with the Persian Shia state. I realize that is hard for some people to swallow but maybe it was long overdue and now that the crisis was defused so readily via open dialog this could be a good sign and show that some moves in foreign policy of opening dialog can make sense.

But then you wouldn’t know that by listening to the bullshit being slung about at the Republican debate.

Here’s the rub... I was recently catching up with a friend long distance who has over the years become a conservative and expressing her fondness for the aforementioned Mister Trump. One of the things she thought he was accurate about was sending troops into Syria...

Which would be fine if the U.S. reinstituted the draft.

But you won’t hear too many Republicans or Conservatives talk about that because it is much easier to send poor white, brown and black people far away to foreign lands and to spill their blood to prove a point.

You know, I am a Republican and Conservative (in some ways) but I have a real problem with that. You never use the military or military force as your first option. You use it in concert with diplomacy and you use it when you have very identifiable and concrete goals that are achievable. It appears that the people who are currently running for the Executive office have ignored that.

The bigger problem here is whether or not my fellow Americans are willing to recognize that we are just past the longest war in our nation’s history (yes, Iraq was the longest war we have ever been in but you wouldn’t know it by the coverage of the supposed ‘liberal’ media).

It’s sad really...

Think about it for a second, we sent young Americans into two countries (Afghanistan and Iraq), we paid a high price and after all this time what do we have to show for it? Nation building is not a job for the military. The problem is that our country is so naive as to believe everyone the world over would readily accept our values and way of life? We approach our foreign ppolicy from this standpoint at our own peril.

And no one up on that stage the other night, no one who apparently had the intelligence and education was ready to do anything other that shovel the same pablum upon the America electorate.

Really it’s a shame.

And in that environment, an environment all too similar to one I remember all too vividly back in 1979 when another candidate was talking about making ‘America Great Again’ would up being elected to the nation’s highest office.

Wow, such a scary prospect!

In different circumstances, I might turn towards the American electorate and utter the simple phrase...

‘You’re fired!’

Got to love those budget conscious Tea Party Conservatives.

I really think these Tea Party folks are spot on in their views.

I mean, I can agree there should be less government, right?

But then, how can one explain the seeming wild indulgence in spending and use of government for what amounts to be a political motivated hatchet job?

What am I referring to?

The United States House Select Committee on Benghazi.

How much have these bozos spent? Well, there’s a calculator where you can go and watch the number go up. The great thing about this is it is akin to throwing money away on something that has already been done - this is not the first investigation into what happened in Benghazi.

Then again, it’s fairly obvious this has never been about Benghazi at all, not when the person who is in charge of the committee makes statements like these:

“The question I think you really want to ask me is how am I going to be different?” Mr. McCarthy said. “What you’re going to see is a conservative speaker that takes  a conservative Congress that puts a strategy to fight and win.”

“And let me give you one example. Everybody thought Hillary Clinton was unbeatable right? But we put together a Benghazi special committee, a select committee. What are her numbers today? Her numbers are dropping. Why? Because she’s untrustable. But no one would have known any of that had happened had we not fought to make that happen.”

What I love is that these are the selfsame people who have been responsible for shutting down the government a few times now, saying they are really concerned about the burden they are leaving behind for future Americans.

Doesn’t this make it all ring hollow?

Just watch this:

V-D broke my penis.

Shocking title for an entry in a blog, no?

Probably no more shocking than ‘Comics Broke My Vagina’ and just about as accurate too.

The aforementioned Ms. D’O didn’t break anything, anymore than comics was responsible for any damage to her own anatomy but, here two years later, V-D (weird coincidence there, no?) is on the precipice of being announced as the new writer of an ongoing Cloak and Dagger manga series.

I imagine I shouldn’t really be all that surprised a society that plays into the whole victim mentality can have people who are so readily capable of making themselves into celebrities over their own bad choices.

What I’m trying to wrap my mind around is whether or not this is the materialization of some kind of analogous battered wife syndrome, because if comics indeed did break V-D’s vagina she seems all too eager to immerse herself in the field.

Maybe, though, that isn’t it at all.

Maybe, it’s more a question of not getting the kind of response a person wants and having to create a framework where failure is attributable to some force beyond the person themselves. What happens I wonder if Cloak and Dagger fails to do numbers? Will it be, ‘Cloak and Dagger’ broke my vagina next?

See, V-D lost me a long time ago. I read the diatribe about her experiences and was fascinated by the remarkable way she walked away from the incident. An external force mysteriously was responsible for the damage she suffered, basically as it was written it comes down to, ‘Well, someone else should know my body better than I do!’

Go read it, and come back here if you want and leave nasty comments. Or maybe you’ll agree with me.

V-D lost me when she wrote the following:

It is colossally f**ked up that it is 2007 and my gender hasn't produced an Alan Moore or Grant Morrison yet.

No, what’s colossally fucked up is, in one sentence you managed to take a swipe at Louise Simonson, June Brigman, Bobbi Chase, Marie Severin, Glynis Oliver, Christie Scheele, Wendy Pini, Rowena Merrill, Dale Messick, Lynn Johnston and a host of other creators just because they don’t measure up to your skewed value system.

 * * * * * * * * * * * * *

You know I started this a long, long time ago(must have been around ’09) and truthfully I walked away from comics a long time ago too. At the time, I really thought the better of posting it because any discussion about this topic or this person is like touching the third rail.

Shitty things happen in this world all the time.

That’s not excusing them, it’s more a statement of fact. At the time I was reading this whole thing, I realized that it played into something of this perception of women as victim and men being crap. But, the question that I keep coming back to is: if you view all of your experience through the lens of sexism, how much of what you are bringing to the dynamic shapes the course of events?

What if people are just nasty because they don’t like you? What if they’re nasty because they find you disagreeable? What if you’re a person who seeks out conflict?

I don’t know if that is relevant to V-D or not.

Simply put. the one statement she made that’s in italics there... that REALLY bothered me.

It bothered me because it just failed to recognize the contribution of a lot of women who came before. Maybe that wasn’t what she meant but, I’ve got to say there are a few names I listed there whose work really ranks up there, whose work is pretty high on my list for their contribution to the medium.

Marie Severin... let me tell you, I met the woman. You could not find a nicer person on the planet, and further she had chops to stack right up there with anyone in the comics pantheon. I think she is long overdue for some kind of book about her or something that will recognize her contribution to comics. Her contribution to comics dating way, way back in a career that streatches across decades is simply incredible.

June Brigman is another person whose work I loved (and I can remember trying to tell her that at a NY Comicon not too long ago before Jim Steranko interrupted like a dick because he has to be the center of everything).

I’m thinking of Amanda Conner, Anne Nocenti...

I look at VD’s production of work and from my standpoint I’m... meh.

Maybe failure has less to do with gender?

I understand comics as far as the big two (or whatever) historically had been a very male dominated industry, I will concede that but that is changing. Then again, looking at the output of those companies, it’s not as if it’s hard to understand with the product they have been putting out.

You know what is interesting to me though?

If you go beyond the universe of the big two and drag your ass over to something like the MoCCA festival you see a much broader and more representative spectrum of people working in the medium - people who are concerned about for lack of a better description... their ‘art.’

And there is some amazing, incredible work there.

Comics as a two headed beast of Marvel and DC is a very outmoded view of the medium - more outmoded with every passing day and I am saying this as a person who stopped the weekly walk to the local comics store - even that mode of delivery is going away too and we should be celebrating that because it means there will be an infinite number of voices and creators finding new ways to reach an audience - ways that weren’t available to them even 5 years ago.

Back to the subject at hand though... surprisingly enough, when I did do a search again for V-D, I found more sturm and drang about cyberbulling, sexism, etc. Another big internet fight, very public, very much to draw more attention to someone who is dying for all the attention they can get.

Maybe you should just focus on the work?

Your work.

Fuck these other people, if you do really good work they’ll just have to suck it up now won’t they? There is this quote I think applies in this circumstance: “Love art in yourself, and not yourself in art.” 

Or how about this... sometimes people just don’t like you, your gender is secondary and if you don’t want it to be an issue stop bringing it up. I keep thinking about all the creators on the internet who have had all kinds of flame wars and things thrown their way (John Byrne and Peter David both come to mind) and they didn’t suddenly cry cyber-bullying or anything of the like, they just dealt. The world is a crappy place, people are assholes myself included on lots of occasions  - likely exemplified by this post as viewed in some quarters. Just do good work and fuck ’em.

Again, my biggest beef was someone who was so wrapped up in their cause (or maybe it wasn’t about any cause as much as it was about them) that they roundly managed to slight all the people who came before them in one careless throwaway statement that took the legs out from their argument.

But what do I know, I’m a guy.

And then sometimes...

I do things like this... taking a photo and screwing around with it in Photoshop just seeing what I can do with it. I used to do more of it when I was feeling slightly creative but unfortunately for whatever reason I haven’t been feeling much of the spark lately (for the last couple of years actually which is not good).

I did something like this for someone once and got accused of all sorts of things... which amazed me no end and reinforced the lesson that there really are some f*&^%d up people in this world. Admittedly that will put you off of doing something (or even put you off of people).

Still I like how this came out.

Voting for dummies.

In an effort to produce content, I”m cleaning out my drafts queue, trying to finish all those snippets and the like and somehow keep you mildly entertained...

I started this nugget back in ’09 sometime.

America’s rude awakening.
Maybe it’s the cynic in me but, I’m really amazed by the level of stupidity in people.

I understand people are excited and everything about it being Election Day and all that but the thing I find astounding is this gleeful, boastful attitude of I VOTED!

...AND?

So you voted, big deal! What, you want a medal? You exercised a privilege a lot of people usually take for granted.

Oh... wait a sec! I’ve got it... you voted in a Presidential election!

Moron.

Yes, moron.

Moron because for many Americans of voting age, the only way they can be motivated to get their ass down to the polls is for a Presidential election.

One of the odd ways I’ve made money over the last few years is by being a poll worker. This is perhaps one of the easiest ways a person can make money - why?

Because you fuckers just can’t bring yourselves to get off your lazy assess and vote. Or, better still, you wait until we are about to propel the next ineffectual clown into the White House because you think somehow President equates to king in our nation and the guy who moves his family into the nice address on Pennsylvania Avenue can do anything and everything he or she wants.

Fast fact: Your vote? That one shining moment when you have the chance to really influence what goes on in our country, a rare privilege a lot of people the planet over don’t get a chance to exercise? Well it has a helluva lot more influence in a primary or local election than it ever does in a Presidential election.

In the last Presidential election, 129,235,000 so think about your vote, 1 in a 9 figure number.

You know how many people voted at our polling place in the last primary election?

4.

So if you voted in that primary election at least at my polling place you carried with you an incredible 25% of the vote!

But... people are stupid. Hence the word moron.

And even if people do find the wherewithal to drag their asses down to their local polling place, chances are more than likely they have done little or no research on the person they are pulling the lever for.

No, time and again they’ll just yank on the lever (or at least they used to yank on the lever before we got these crappy new voting machines) of the party to which they most ascribe. Even then, there is no nuance, it’s just an emissary in most cases of one of the two major parties - groups which have these somewhat amorphous qualities that the person in question attributes to themselves, whether or not they have any actual basis in reality.

Now, you can park your ass in front of the TV and watch Fox news or CNBC (again along whatever party you have aligned yourself with) and work yourself into a frenzy about what the ‘other’ guys are doing to take this country down a wrong path, make manifest everything that is wrong with our country and you can do this because it is easier, easier because parking your ass there doesn’t really require even the smallest effort on your part.

Back when I was a teen, I read Robert Heinlein’s Starship Troopers - it has been roundly criticized in many quarters but one of the interesting concepts put forth in it was that only those who did some form of volunteer federal service had the right to vote (the federal service need not be military).

Something in that even back when I was reading it struck a chord in me and I found there to be logic in the idea of people who had a vested interest in a society, who had proven this through a form of sacrifice and a willingness to be involved should be the very same people who guide that society.

Sounds crazy but if only those who served in this manner were allowed to run for office or vote do you really think we would so readily be talking about war and putting Americans in harm’s way?

In the meantime, the uninformed voter is as bad as the no-show voter - do yourself a favor before voting in any election by visiting this site: http://lwv.org/

My recent fascination.

Not an embarassment of riches just an embarassment.

Watching the Republican debate is like watching a beauty contest with nothing but ugly around. I should preface my comments by saying I’m a registered Republican (there, the cat’s out of the back) but, I would imagine those who fall lockstep in with the party line would call me a RINO.

There’s a great subtext that goes on in these things at least on the Republican side..;

And part of that is intoned by the endless repeating of the same platitudes over and over and over again and again.

First:

I will make America strong!

This is somewhat silly to me. Are we a weak nation? Last time I checked we weren’t, did something happen and I missed it? Usually making America strong involves lots and lots of military spending. As a matter of fact, among the 14 or so people who trotted out onto a stage built in front of an old airplane, I don’t think there was nary a one who saw any kind of military spending they didn’t like. You almost get a sense that there is something sexual in nature to this obsession with the military. As if it bestows an immediate woody (or a gush in the case of one candidate), the mere thought of being able to spend, spend spend to build up an army.

But, then again, these are the same fuckers who conducted a war over the last decade and then did everything in their power to cut the funding to the VA’s around the country. You’ve got to love that kind of blatant hypocrisy - that takes true balls.

Oh and lest I forget the same people who are ready to have us send young people of this country (mainly black and brown) are not sending their own sons and daughters. Even if I don’t have kids I feel like that deserves a big Fuck You.

Second:

Jobs, jobs, jobs!

The whole jobs thing is usually wrapped around the gem of government deregulation.

Stupid government! You just need to get out of the way of business!

We don’t need a higher minimum wage! We don’t need a progressive tax rate! We just need government to stop regulating business!

Um... guys? I’m thinking of the last few Republican administrations and back in the eighties (under that stalwart and elevated to almost godlike proportions Ronald Reagan) we had this thing called the Savings and Loan crisis? You may not realize it but it cost the American taxpayer $160 BILLION DOLLARS to cover the cost of your little experiment in deregulation. I’m sure a lot of your pals got rich but it wasn’t fun for the rest of us to be left holding the bag.

Oh and then on Bush Jr’s watch we had the great recession, again the result of deregulation and the advent of people getting rich off of mortgage backed securities. That one cost us  12.8 TRILLION!

Maybe government shouldn’t be so ready to surrender the reins to business when it comes to guiding the economy? And if you’re talking about jobs, jobs, jobs, how come not a single one of you talked about federal spending to shore up the aging infrastructure in this country? It impacts out economy in a slew of ways but none of you seem to want to talk about spending on that as opposed to military spending

Third:

I will let you take my gun when you pry it from my cold dead hand!

How many more people need to die in this country from gun violence before you get serious about gun regulation? People want to hunt? Hey, more power to them! I’m a city kid so I never grew up with that but for hunting you use a rifle not a handgun, no?

Isn’t it about time we start looking more at where guns are going? From the second they leave the factory? Background checks are all fine and good but what about secondary markets? What about assault weapons?

You want to hunt sure thing... I’ve got to take a course and a test to drive, I’ve got to get insurance to own a car, I’ve got to register my vehicle annually and get it inspected. Seems to me putting the same kind of framework in place for weapons wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world.

Fourth:

Abortion!

You know... I was talking to someone about this the other day. This whole dialog about abortion is a bit of a joke. I’m a man, I’m not crazy about abortion but I really don’t feel I have the right to tell a woman what to do (maybe we need to shove a bowling ball up a couple of men’s asses so they get a sense of what childbirth is like).

But, let’s go further here for one second... abortion is a young people’s issue or poor people’s issue.

Old people don’t fuck. And if they do fuck, it’s not like they are looking to get abortions. As a matter of fact there are a lot of women that I’ve run across over the age of 35 or so who were desperate to have a baby and went to great lengths (some successful some not so) to bring a baby to term.

So that leaves young people and let me tell you, if Suzy Creamcheese comes up pregnant and she is a member of the lily white, country club set - dealing with her delicate condition isn’t much of a bother. Money kind of helps things along.

And that leaves us with poor people so we don’t want any shortage of them to exploit and violá! Anti-abortionists!

Everything else built up around this, abortion in cases of rape, blah, blah, blah... all smoke and mirrors around this crap.

Anyway those are the four biggies... I’m not missing some. There are some I kind of agree with but there are a lot of others that are just more of the same laughable platitudes trotted out every four years.

Watching these ninnies though parade around on stage is a bit insulting to one’s intelligence.

Especially watching them talk about specific justices on the Supreme Court. Last time I checked there were three branches of government and they were set up the way they were for a reason. It seems to work for the most part.

There were a couple of moments when I just cringed it was so painful (Carly Fiorina plays the Sarah Palin card in that she can recite the Pledge of Allegiance) and then there were a couple of moments when I was surprised (Ron Paul actually nailed a few on both his stance on legal marijuana and also on use of the military). Jeb Bush proved that three times likely isn’t the charm. Marco Rubio underlined just how dysfunctional Washington is very much a no show job (umm... let’s see you were a Senator in absence and so we should reward you and make you President?). Scott Walker wants to bring back the good old days... Calvin Coolidge will be pleased.

Man... the thought of suffering through another 14 months of this though is just painful.

Draft king!

HA! You probably thought that was some kind fo spam or that the blog had been taken over somehow...

The truth is I was looking at the blog (something I’ve done rarely of late) and then looking at my ‘drafts’ queue and seeing that there are 249 snippets sitting there unfinished.

This means, if I was to take each and every snippet and complete and post it, I could have content for the next 8 months or so daily. Maybe I should do just that!

Whatever happened to the blogosphere? Seems like it may have gone the way of AOL.

Worst music video ever...

For one of the best songs ever... there is something about youth and being overly self indulgent that just doesn’t stand the test of time.

Things I really, really like.

Is it nostalgia? Certain things have a place in my heart for reasons I am at a loss to explain but the music and title design here are just so much fun!

A year...

Yesterday was the first time in almost a year I posted anything to the Flickr stream. I still have been taking photos occasionally but like the blog the Flickr stream has fallen by the wayside.

There have been bad things but there have been good things too over that year.

Mainly work has been steady. People may think that it is odd but I am ever so thankful work has been more or less constant over the last year. Not that things are better but they could be infinitely worse without work.

And as more time goes on, the whole work dynamic just gets ever more strange.

People don’t take lunch anymore it seems... when did that happen? Who gave that back? Was there a memo that circulated that nobody told anyone about?

Years ago when I was working staff I clearly remember that the workweek was 35 hours with an hour for lunch each day (7 hour day with 1 hour ‘paid’ lunch break). That’s gone now. People just bring lunch or go our and quickly grab something and eat at their desks.

And there is another thing... desk space. At least in Manhattan where price per foot is so high, desk space is diminishing so that more and more people are packed into smaller space. It’s less private too - THE NOISE LEVEL IS THAT MUCH HIGHER BECAUSE OF IT.

And though some people would try to sell you that it fosters ‘collaboration’ I just see more people with noise canceling headphones trying to block out the ambient noise around them so they can think. The irony is that I work in what might be considered a creative business and the environment is set up to do all it can to negate creativity.

I like working... well, maybe I should qualify that. I realize that work is not fun often but I’m okay with that because like Red Forman the dad on That 70s Show once said to his son Eric that if work was anything but not fun they would come up with another name for it, something like ‘Happy, Fun, Playtime.’

This always gave me a laugh.

But really, I like doing a good job and I don’t shy away from work. It seems that the bar keeps getting raised higher in terms of the amount of time allotted to do a good job and that bothers me.

But I have work.

And while I have had work, the truth is that it takes more out of me than it used to. There is no more burning the candle at both ends. I have a shrinking amount of energy in reserves and it seems like the days are getting shorter.

Nobody told me that getting older was about getting tired but I guess that’s it.

Anyway, I’m rambling a bit... I worked for a client today that it’s just sad to see how much the company has ‘fallen.’ How many good people have left and how things appear to be dying on the vine and yet the same tripe keeps getting trotted out on a regular basis. The same tired old corporate clichés that no one believes and only insult the intelligence making people leave.

It’s sad.

Next week I may not have work for the first time in a long time and I am very afraid of what that means because even with all the things that are wrong about work and working, like a junkie I still need my fix, I still need to push forward.

Seems to me like I’m not the only one in that position.

I’m a millioinaire!

Great news! I just helped out this dude who is overseas...

Seems he got into a bit of a jam and had a boatload of money tied up so I put my house up as collateral and now am getting a bunch of cash deposited into my bank account!

Talk about luck!

No guarantees.

Fuck!

It’s great to come back and immediately call up and expletive (just shocking of me I know). I haven’t been writing asmuch as I would want or like these days being caught up in just trying to stay afloat. A lot of my time is built around the stress of trying to keep working, paying the bills, surviving and in that trying to find the time to simply take care of myself and make forward progress.

And there are days, and there are DAYS.

Days when I find myself feeling beaten down. Days when I am tired or feel lonely. Days when it seems like I am being swallowed by the monotony of it all. It’s as if I am wading in this morass, this quicksand that doesn’t let me get any further but I am just that small step away from going under.

Then there are things that put it in pespective...

Case in point - my friend is dying. It is highly likely she will not be here at the end of the summer if she is not gone sooner. When I think about it it doesn’t seem real to me although I know that I myself have been in a similar position in the not too distant past where I was wondering how much time I might have left and what that meant and how scary it is.

You don’t know fear, really deep fear until you are confronted with the very real prospect of your own mortality. And it isn’t as if you get a definite time of when you’ll clock out just a vague knowledge that your number will be up soon. The curtain will be falling and your not quite ready for the show to end (wow, could I throw some more clichés into the mix for you).

I’m a little selfish at this moment because as I grow older, it seems to me that very good friends, people who count, people you can rely on, people who matter, are harder and harder to find. If anything, a lot of friends just fall by the wayside as you get older.

Maybe this is part of getting older too, getting more particular, more ready to find offense, more attuned to the things that are different between you and other people, the areas you don’t agree as opposed to the areas where you do agree.

So, my friend, who has been a good friend, a true blessing to me in so many ways is going to be gone soon.

I hate this.

I hate that I can’t do anything to help her. I hate that she is in pain. I hate that she is going to be gone soon. I hate that once again something (someone) that I love, that has been so good for me and that has had such a positive affect on my life will not be there. And I am angry at myself because it feels so very selfish that I am thinking of how it will affect me when I should be doing more for my friend.

The last time I saw her was around Christmas and she wasn’t doing well then really. I knew it, she knew it but to spend too much time talking about it would just ruin the time we had to spend with each other. And when I left I had to pull down the road and pull the car over to the side of it and I cried for a good 20 minutes.

Crying doesn’t do you much good though except give you a clogged nose that you have to blow and you still wind up feeling shitty afterward.

Today, I was trying to write something... I want to send along something to her but everything I put down just rang so hollow. I want to comfort her, I want her to know she matters that she is important that no matter what she has made a difference not only to me but to a lot of other people here on the planet and at the end of everything her mark is going to be one that is lasting for a lot of people but then the question comes to me is that any comfort after all when you know you are facing the end?

We just don’t get any kind of an idea of how much time we have.

When we’re young it seems as if life will go on forever and then slowly it dawns on us that really isn’t the case as we see the people we love taken from us one by one. Each day matters and I have to remind myself of this when I am sitting around watching the time just run past.

We’re all dying... you’re dying as you read this. You don’t know when but you are on that inevitable march to the grave. What you do with what you have matters and whether or not you are like me (wasting time) or like my friend (who I have to say, lived quite the life) is entirely up to you.

I miss my friend already, I’ll probably see her one more time before but the biggest thing I’ll have to do is to manage not losing it. That and figuring out if there is anything I can do to make her smile, if I can give her any kind of final gift at the very least I want to give her a moment of laughter because I can’t seem to do much else.

Hi there!

Remember me?

Too much going on...

But I did want to share something that will amaze you!

I have a soft spot in my heart for Calvin and Hobbes the comic strip that Bill Watterson so masterfully produced for a decade. I had come across an article, and then did some internet meandering and came across this amazing preview for a movie they’ll never make but I wish they would!

See if you don’t agree! Watch the preview for Calvin and Hobbes The Movie:

Never was a big MJ fan after the Jackson Five.

But I have to admit this is a great cover...

The Irish in me.

From the moment you are spit out of your mother’s hole you are on the long march to the grave. It takes decades though to recognize that fact and Mao isn’t there to guide you along. There is no cause you have taken up on this journey and it is a path taken by many before you. It is only as you get closer to the end of your steady, plodding, step after step road that you begin to take note of how long it has taken you to get to the end but even then you are amazed because you can’t recount all the moments that led you here as they raced by you so quickly that you didn’t savor each moment. It is a curse and a blessing because any wisdom you may have accumulated is offset by the myriad of ways you find parts of yourself falling off by the wayside. It’s not the one big thing, rather it’s the accumulation of each small thing, each bruise, each scrape, each bump, each ache that builds up and takes its toll on you. You wonder at times how you might be able to take even one more step but still you keep going, somehow pushed forward inevitably propelled by what you cannot know. How is it that you have arrived here? How can you find yourself at a destination you couldn’t begin to imagine and wouldn’t have believed you were pointed towards. Where did it all go?

Daredevil’s flatuence problem...

Sometimes things just show up in my inbox, like this image sent to me by my friend Mark who observed:

What genius thought up this cover?

I don’t know about you, but I’d think really long and hard about putting out a cover with “FWOOSHH” coming out my hero’s ass, leading to a billowy cloud.

Epiphany!

I had a bit of an epiphany today... I realized that FOX News is The Weekly World News for conservatives.

Where that Malaysian plane wound up...

Bad taste I know but hasn’t the thought occurred to anyone else the thing wound up on the Island from LOST?