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 |   On a daily basis... things that bump around in my head and make me go... hummm! |
My new blog:
This is not just a collections of personal musing but it is a place where I can vent. Talking about daily events on the local, state, and national scene is my way of letting off steam so I don't come home and kick the dog! We are all the Captain of our own "Ship of Fools." We go where the current of the times take us and we do what we must to be able to sleep at night. Now this Captain will speak his mind about that current and about the ocean on which we each sail....... ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** {image: ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** PLEASE MAIL ME YOUR VOTE FOR BLOGGER OF THE MONTH OF AUGUST. This is a shot of Me and Mel at our wedding. We were married in a simple ceremony on a deck overlooking Lake Livingston. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** I am so proud of my new Siggy which was made by the very talented vivacious   . Thank you so very much for all the effort that went into this.** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** This was taken from the wall in the Blogville Post Office. If you see this fugitive, please do not approach, he is armed and stupid. Contact the Blogville sheriff's office at once, then take cover! ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** } ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
| This whole "staying home and resting" has driven me to the point of distraction. Yesterday afternoon I could stand it no longer and I decided to go fishing. Now to me fishing is like therapy for the soul. I have this little spot I love to go to wet a hook, watch a sunset and just contemplate life's little vagrancies. My fishing hole is located in the State Park which borders Lake Livingston. My spot is out on the tip of a long peninsula away from the rest of the park and it's normal crowd of campers. This has always been my place of solitutude where I can sit and let my mind go. Many of my stories have come to me while I sat on this spot watching the water. But not today. Today I brought my wife with me. Now don't get me wrong, my wife is a great fisherman. In fact, when we were married she brought not one, but TWO tackle boxes to the union! The thing is though, my wife has a different view on what makes an enjoyable fishing trip. For her the enjoyment comes in doing a running commentary on the local wildlife she encounters......I know about the wildlife, I was raised here...I DON'T CARE! So, there we sat, our lines cast out, and the rods, all four of them, set into rod holders. I was just chilling, watching my lines......letting my mind wander into whatever realm it wished to travel and then it started...... Wife: LOOK, A TURTLE! me, growling: OOOh, call the animal planet! Ten minutes of blessed silence pass in which I am getting "The Look". Then......... Wife: LOOK, A DUCK!! me: Should I have brought my gun? This time the silence lasted a bit longer while she moved her stuff a bit further away from her offending husband. Then, again..... Wife: LOOK A SNAKE!!! Me, (jumping up, alarmed)WHERE???? Wife (sweetly)Oh, nowhere DEAR. I just wanted to find out if you had something SMART to say about that! Well after that a general truce was called and the fishing went back to normal. We had been there about an hour and I was really enjoying the peace and quiet which was, unfortunately, not distrubed by fish biting. We had caught nothing so far and that was a bit annoying. It was about then that I noticed the approach of a family of four, headed our way. A vietnamese man, his wife and two kids came right up to where we were sitting......like there was no other spot on the 84,000 acre lake they could find empty. Man: Are the fish biting? Me: no, not really.(hoping he would move on with noisy kids) He then takes out this dang soft drink can with line rolled up on it and uses it like a rod and reel. He throws his line out and within seconds he CAUGHT A FISH! Here I sit with roughly five hundred dollars worth of rods and reels and another five hundred in lures and stuff and this turkey catches a fish on a damn simple LINE AND SINKER WITH A CAN AS HIS FLOAT!!!! Man: This is good spot. Mind if we stay right here? Me (growling again)You familiar with Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome? You know, where old veterans go crazy and start shooting...... It worked. The whole family went scurrying off in search of a safer fishing spot. I heard the guy grumbling to his wife as they left something about "crazy americans..." Oh well. So, it was back to solitude for me....God I love fishing. It was wonderful....for about twenty minutes. That's when the City people showed up. Much to my chagrin, I see a man and woman walking in our direction. I grit my teeth, I know what's coming. The man and his mate are dressed in matching "outdoors" outfits that looked like they were brand new and right out of a L.L. Bean catalog. These two were a prime example of the harmless breed of traveler whose prime purpose in life is to aggraviate locals. Well off, retired people who have finally found the courage to venture outside the big city in their 100,000 dollar RVs and discover what strange life exists out in the countryside. Sure enough, these two were no different. They walked right up to us and stood watching us fish like a pair of scientist observing a heretofore unknown life form. They busily conversed to each other about what WE were doing, as if we could not either hear or maybe understand their speech. I was about to reach my admittedly low boiling point. How could this get any worse? I soon found out. My wife, bless her heart, never meets a stranger. She will talk to anybody...anytime.....anywhere. So why should now be any different? She quickly engaged the female of this pair in conversation and was well on her way to learning their life story. While these two chatted happily I just pulled my hat down lower, hunched my shoulders forward and hoped the man would not try to do the same with me......yeah, right! He started in on me then..... Him: What are you fishing for? Me: Fish. Him: What is that you are using for bait, little minnows? Me: SHAD! Him: What is shad? Me: Baby shark. Him: YOU MEAN THERE ARE SHARK IN THIS LAKE? Me: No. This caused him to pause and scratch his head trying to puzzle that one out. This pause gave me just enough time to reel in my lines, gather my stuff, grab my wife and head out to my SECOND best fishing hole...a little pond behind a high fence and a locked gate. I stopped off at home to grab my Rottweiller in case anyone made it over the fence! Fishing is great....its PEOPLE that makes it a chore! |
| Good morning everyone, its blog time!!! Well my project is done and now I can turn my attention to other things. You know, it should be against the law for me to watch television. It never fails, everytime I subject myself to the boob tube for any length of time I tend to suffer third degree rants. For me, the news, both local and national, are the biggest offenders and the one thing that will trip my trigger faster than anything else. The news never fails to remind me what a swamp of mediocrity we have sunk into. What? example? You want some examples? Well I just happen to have a few. News two days ago: NAAFP considers bringing suit against the new Kersi Ally show. Now here is a prime example of things that make me want to throw a shoe at the TV screen. It seems that there is a group that doesn't like this new show because it deals, in a humourous manner, with the trials and tribulations of its main character who happens to be caloricily challenged (see I can be politically correct when I want to be). They take offense to the humor used on the show. Oh yeah, that group is the NAAFP, or: National Assocation for the Advancement of Fat People! When I first heard the name I thought it must be a joke, but noooooo, this is a serious group. Their spokesperson, a lady who must of tipped the scales at over 400lbs, had this horrible whinny voice and she was snotting about how fat people don't need to be nagged about their weight, they need to be "Empowered". Empowered? NO, what they need is to get their butts off the couch and spit out the twinkie! Look, I know that being overweight is not a bed of roses. I could stand to lose thirty pounds myslef and my wife is fighting a battle to lose a lot of weight, but that's just it-she is FIGHTING and she is winning, slowly. The lady lives on 900cals a day now and she does a workout that would make a drill sargeant proud. But, what she doesn't do, nor ever will do, is ask to be empowered for her weight! People who have decided that it is impossible to lose weight are the ones who want to be considered as somehow special. What do they want us to do, pass a law like the Americans With Disabilities act and have us mandate that all hotels be fitted with block and tackle gear over the beds to help them get in and out each morning? Will they not be happy until businesses are forced to install wider doors, airlines cut the number of passengers they can carry and have extra wide seats? Where will it end? Just the other day, after my doctor visit, we stopped and had lunch at a cafe that has a buffet. We were sitting there eating our lunch when this lady comes whizzing in on her motorized cart, that, by the way, was a big as a small Motorcycle and she almost ran a guy down getting to the buffet line. Once there, she filled not one, but TWO plates up with enough food to feed a family in Ethiopia for a month. Should this person be considered "special"? Should she be given preferential treatment because she doesn't have the willpower to NOT eat? Sorry, not in this lifetime. Look, if a person is overweight and they are OK with it, then I have no problem with it either. I don't care if my friends are overweight or not......I just don't want them whinning and demanding special treatment for something that is within thier grasp to do something about. Actual news headline on NBC news: History will be made tonight on "The Apprentice"! The "history" that they are talking about is the fact that the two finalist on that show are both women and this will be the first time a woman will be named as Donald Trump's Apprentice. That's historic????? The Battle of Britian was historic. Man first walks on the Moon, that's historic. The Civil Rights Act is passed, that's historic.....WHO THE HELL CARES IF A WOMAN GETS TO WORK FOR THE DONALD! Junior High School student "moons" his buddies in the school hallways and as a result, is suspended for three days from school. HIS PARENTS HAVE RETAINED A LAWYER AND WILL SUE THE SCHOOL FOR THE SUSPENSION! Here, in a nutshell, is what is wrong with our school system. Parents refuse to disipline their children and when the school tries to impose some sort of disipline, the parents run and get a lawyer! The damn parents should have been suspendended along with the kid. Hell, what the boy did was a silly, juvenile stunt and he got busted.....as he should have. The school was right. My old daddy taught me from a very early age: Do whatever you feel you have to do, but be prepared to pay the price if you get caught. And that "price" included not only punishment from the school or cops (depending on what I did) but also HIS punishment when I finally come dragging home. KIDS NEED TO BE TAUGHT TO BE RESPONSIBLE FOR THIER ACTIONS...NOT HOW TO HIRE A LAWYER. Ok, take a breath, I am nearing the end of the rant. I only have one more for the day and though it also is heard on the news, this is not about any ONE instance. I know you hear this term all the time on the news when they are reporting on a crime. "The police are searching for John Doe, a 'PERSON OF INTEREST' in this case." A Person of Interest? Why can't they just say, "We want this guy because he is the man we think did the crime." I will tell you why. It's because the police are afraid to name the man as a suspect because if something happens and he turns out to not be the one they charge for the crime then they are left open for a lawsuit. In other words it's the lawyers fault! Lawyers have convinced us that no matter how slight the real or imagined insult is or the honest mistake, YOU CAN GET MONEY FOR IT! They tell us that we are ALL VICTIMS. This has resulted in people actively looking for a chance to get on the lawsuit gravy train and make some money. Personally I call it legalized extortion. Which brings me to the joke of the day: What is the difference between a lawyer and a catfish? One is a bottom feeding scavenger and the other is a fish! All of the above has led me to one unescapable conclussion: We need to shoot the lawyers! Well now, I feel much better. I love getting all this out for the day. I think now I will go back and watch the news some more!! ROFLMAO! |
| Good evening my friends, Did ya miss me today? It is late, 9:30pm and I am beat. This morning I discovered, to my great pleasure, that MayLee was wading through my novel that I was in the process of getting posted. I told you already about the trouble I was having with that. Anyway, It dawned on me that I only had 14 chapters entered so far (it takes almost an hour per chapter)and at the rate MayLee was reading and Reviewing she was going to reach the end of what I had real fast. So, I decided to finish it today...and I did. 10 chapters and it took me 11 hours to finish, working straight through. Now it is done and MayLee, you can start reading again! LMAO. Oh, and please, anyone else who staggers in here, please read the thing too. Here is the link (hopefully)
This was the very first time I ever tried to write anything of a novel length. It is roughly 390 pages and 275,000 word count. It is designed to be the first of a trilogy that completes the story. If you are brave enough to read this beast you will understand why I have stuck to SHORT stories after this. I promise to do a better job blogging tomorrow...this project just had to be DONE! Good night my friends. |
| Afternoon my friends, I am back from the land of the voodoo doctors. My mind is mush. Forgive me if I ramble today...lol. A note to PlannerDan: You were right, the test was not nearly as bad as my fevered imagination had made it out to be. Unfortunately they were either unwilling or unable to tell me anything at the time of the test. I have to go to my doctor's office friday so that he might enlighten me. Oh Joy! I was totally blown away today. I opened my mail to find out that I had recieved my very first Cnote!! And, I also recieved a very nice note from Nada. Thank you so very much. The note and the Cnote made my day! As I said above, I sailed through the test, no problems and the icing on the cake was that I had this little nurse doing the test who was not accustomed to someone coming in with a sense of humor, I kept her in stitches the whole time! First, she is hooking me up to all those eletrodes that monitored my heart rate and BP and stuff. Well, they were not fitting very well or something, and she was having trouble getting a good reading. So she came over behind me and started adjusting the things on my stomache and back and I guess she suddenly got a good connection because the heart rate reading jumped about twenty points. "Oh my." she said. "I must have done something right." "No, hun." I told her. "It was just you running those hands over me...made the dang heart rate JUMP!" She cracked up. I asked her why they call this a "stress" test when they should call it a running test. "Look," I said. "If you really want to put me under stress, bring my WIFE in here." I love it when they are not sure if I am kidding or not! All told it took about five hours to complete the thing then we headed home. So, there is where I stand now. Friday I go back to heart doctor to get results of the test, then monday I go back to my family doctor, then, at long last, Tuesday I plan on going back to work! Ok, that's it for me for today...I am going to get horizonal and I promise to do better with the blog tomorrow! Looks like you guys are stuck with me! Have a great night! |
| Only time for a short blog this morning. It is six thirty a.m and I am on my way to take my neuclear stress test. I will be gone all day with this adventure but I will try to make a more complete entry this evening when I return home. Have a wonderful day and I will be thinking of you all. |
| LOL....ok, here we are, time for the second daily installment of Tor's Tortured Brain Spasms. I just finished watching Sideways.....Holy cow what a good movie! It was funny yet sad at the same time and I like the way it ended, with a note of hope. The scenery was fantastic. I fell in love with those little towns featured in the movie and the beautiful vinyards. The movie just reinforced my dream of one day making that same drive....one day...thru the California wine country and up its coast. Ok, time for the main event. This morning I read a couple of really great blogs dealing with online friendships and it has moved me to throw my own two cents in the ring. I had a friend, his name was Ed Bailey and we had been friends for almost four years. Ed died of a brain tumor a few months ago and he is the perfect example of an online friendship. We met through a MSN Community called the 40s Bar & Grill. The community or "group" as they call them now, had over a thousand members at one time. It also had its own chat room which I was the manager of. Ed was one of my hosts. These are like monitors who sit in the chat room and make sure no one gets out of hand. ' Unlike MSN owned chat rooms, ours was strickly regulated by the managers and the hosts. It was a safe, fun place to come in to and chat with friends and make new friends. Over the four years Ed and I were friends we met, maybe three times. Ed lived in Fla. and I live in Texas. But, even before we met, we had spent hours talking on the computer. We talked about everything under the sun. No subject was safe with us. We told each other our life stories and we discovered we had a lot in common. There was rarely a day that went by that I didn't sit at some point in time, and talk to Ed. Then Ed got sick. He battled with his illness well over a year before he reached the point of becoming bed ridden and unable to get to his computer. Ed was divorced Before all this happened. He had moved back with his elderly parents in order to take care of THEM...they were both in their eighties and frail. He was that kind of guy. This worked out well. Ed continued to care for his parents even while fighting his own battle with the tumor. Finally Ed bacame so sick he had to be moved into a nursing home. When it was plain that Ed would not be coming out of the hospital this time, my wife quit her job and flew to Florida to help Ed's parents care for him. She stayed two months. Finally the Hospice workers told her that he had reached a point and he may linger, semi-conscious and unaware of his surroundings for many more months, so she decided to come home. Not long after she came home Ed passed away. We both flew back to Florida to attend his funeral. To my surprise, his mother and father approached me and asked me to give the eulogy at Ed Funeral. Now, as close as Ed and I were, I had only known him four short years and the small town he was from was full of family and friends of his who had known him all his life, so you can understand how shocked I was that they asked me to do this thing. The day of the funeral I stood behind the podium in the chapel and I looked out into a sea of faces (over three hundred attended) all of which were FRIENDS of Ed's or family members. As a part of my eulogy to this man I read aloud the names of Ed's other friends from online who couldn't be there but had asked me to send their well wishs and regards to Ed's family and to say their last goodbyes for them. After each name I read off, I gave their state or country of orgin. The list covered almost every state in the union and four different countries. Now you have to understand, this was a small country town made up mainly of farmers who didn't know the internet from a fishing net. Yet they found themselves listening to this long list of people from all over the world who had known and loved Ed just like they did. They were amazed. I had quite a few come to me after the service to shake my hand and tell me they had no idea Ed was so well known and loved. A few asked me to explain the whole chatroom/community thing to them. Many told me all they knew about the internet was the horror stories they had heard of kids being lured by pediphiles and stuff like that. They had no idea anything good was there. Now, I tell you this story to show you that, in some cases, online friendships can be just as real and just as fullfilling as any you find out there in the world. It depends on what you are willing to put into it and how honest the other person is willing to be. Ed was my friend...online and off...the computer allowed us to meet and we took it from there. I guess, what I am saying in my over simplistic, country boy style is this: You can find friendship online, you can find love online. You can reach great heights of joy and you can have your heart broken into a million pieces.....Just like you can every day when you walk out your front door. You can not find love and you can not find friendship anywhere unless you are willing to accept the pain if and when it goes wrong. |
| Good Morning my friends, pass me the coffee and let's get down to today's business at hand. As I have mentioned in a few of my last blogs, I am in the process of putting the first full length novel I ever wrote into my port. When I started doing this I didn't realize what I was getting into. I had the thing saved to "word" on my computer and I figured it would just be a case of copying and entering each chapter into port and that was that. WRONG. I think I should state here and for the record that HTML sucks copious amounts of bog water!! It seems that when I would paste a chapter into my brand new folder that the HTML format would take away all my paragraph spacing. The chapter would come out all in one continuous block. So, of course, I have to go back, after pasting it, and respace each paragraph. Well you can imagine how time consuming that is. Hell, I have some chapters in that novel that are twenty pages long.....it's taking forever! This is basically like going through another rewrite...ewwww! The novel is 24 chapters long and as of right now I have 12 chapters finished and posted. I am going to make a big push today and see how many I can get in. It would be nice to be able to finish it today so I can get back to the novel I am currently working on. Ok, I need some info on a subject. Yesterday I caught just the tail end of a news report that I found very interesting. It seems that there is a prisoner on Death Row (don't know what state) who is going to be executed in 8 days. Now this prisoner has a sister who is in dire need of a kidney and he has asked if he can donate his kidney to her. Have any of you heard of this case? The state (whichever it is) has denied his request because the operation could prove fatal to the prisoner! HELLO! You're going to kill the man, why are you so worried about his safty? They said it was "against the law" to endanger a man's life before you kill him.......uh? To make matters worse, the kidney cannot be harvested after the execution because the chemicals used in the lethal injection will poison the kidney. I'm sorry, I don't see the logic. The state wants this man dead so what do they care if he happens to die while actually doing a good thing or not? This whole episode points up the single minded way in which bureaucrats flee common sense. By denying this request the state stands to kill not one person but two. Where is the logic in this? No matter where you stand on captial punishment, this action has to strike you as not only illogical, but irresponsible. Personally I am for the death penality, but I find it very hyprocritical the length the courts go to, to give the impression of "humane" death. There is nothing humane about death, no matter what kind of rituals you dress it up in. As far as I am conserned, the Chinese have the right idea. They do it honestly and in a forthright manner. A bullet to the head and then they bill the dead man's family for the bullit. They make no pretense of worrying about carrying out the sentance "humanely", they just get the odious job done. If you are going to kill a man, be quick and as painless as possible and just get it done. Forget all the ritualistic steps, forget trying to make yourself look better. Just kill him and move on. That would be honest. Don't end up killing the guilty and, by your silly rules, maybe killing an innocent also. |
| Well, here I am again. I bet you guys will be glad when I go back to work so I won't be in here posting two blogs a day. But I can't help it. I post one in the morning, then I go about my day and it never fails, something will happen which I have to share with you. So here is blog number two for today. I was going to town today to take care of some insurance business and turn in some papers at work. I was minding my own business and I pulled from my road, onto the busy highway that leads to town. Right after I pulled onto the Hiway, I noticed this little old blue haired lady driving in the right lane and doing about twenty five miles per hour. As my front bumper was about to pull even with her back bumper, I noticed, with some horror, that she had just put on her LEFT blinker. I hit my brakes thinking that she has not seen me and she is about to change lanes and cut me off. I was wrong. She was not going to change lanes, she was trying to TURN INTO A BUSINESS ON THE LEFT SIDE OF THE ROAD! She was about to cut across three lanes of busy traffic! SHE WOULD DIE....and I might too. So I hit my horn once just to get her attention. Sure enough, she twisted the steering wheel hard right and swerved back into her lane. I pulled on up beside her, wanting to get around her before she did something else stupid. As I pulled up even with her I looked over to see if she was ok and this sweet little old eighty-something, wrinkled, blue haired lady SHOT ME THE FINGER!!! OMG, Grannies, you gotta love em! Now, all of this brings me to the thing I wanted to talk about and that is OLDER Drivers. I swear, after the age of 75 or 80 these people need to give it up. They are a menace. Its not their fault. Let's face it, with age our reflexes slow down. Our hand/eye coordination lessens dramatically. None of us can do things with the same dexterity that we could in our twenties. You know, grandpa may have been a hell of a tank driver during WW2 but today he is libel to do much more damage with his 77 caddy as he drives twenty miles per hour and straddles the white line dividing the two FAST lanes of a freeway. Every few months I see a news report of some poor old geezer who has mated his car with a store front because he thought he had the car in reverse but actually had it in "drive". I really do think there comes a point when these folks have to face the inevitable and put away the car keys before they end up killing themselves or someone else. Ok, Ok.....I am done now. Well....I do have another issue but I will save it for my morning blog, you lucky people you. HA! Have a great evening and, if you are driving, watch out for the blue hair brigade! |
| I am getting Cabin Fever. I have been off work too long and its starting to have an adverse effect upon my usually sunny disposition. I am reminded of Jack Nickelson in that movie where he is a caretaker at a lodge and goes nutso and attacks his family with an ax. I have been watching way too much television during this down time. On the plus side though, I have yet to be reduced to watching any reality shows. Well...uh..that's not totally true. I have been watching one of those shows. But, in my defense, it is not like the other stupid reality shows. THE CONTENDER is the show in question. What I like about this show is that after a stupid compitition, each week, it always ends with the only fair way to vote anyone off anything....two guys climb in the ring and beat the stuffing out of each other! Winner stays, loser goes home. Now that is what I call a reality show....it actually has some REALITY involved in it. Besides, I love boxing, always have. The sweet science of fistacuffs, with its visions of smokey gyms, sweat and grime and maybe the ghost of Damon Runyon flitting about in the background. What's not to love? There is something so simple and honest about two men climbing into a ring and putting it all on the line for a win that is very compelling to me. I love this show because there is none of that silly, aliances, or strategies, or mind games played. It is simple and straightforward....much like life should be but rarely is. Ok, time for me to get busy. I have to go to town and turn in some insurance paperwork at the job. Afterward though it is back here and back to the keyboard. I hope to have the rest of Time of Troubles in my port by tonight. I will check in later......maybe bore ya somemore. Why should I be the only one bored? Have a wonderful day. |
| After reading my blog favorites yesterday and today I am truely humbled. You guys are really great at this thing and I salute you. As I sit here this morning thinking about all this I got a picture in my head of a fictional round table discussion where the participants are Aristole, Socrates, Plato, and Jed Clampett. Well, now its time for Jed Clampett to add his two cents worth here in his own blog/journal/rant page......... When I am wrong I like to admit it and today is no different. Twenty or so years ago, when I would walk into a convience store and see some asian man or woman behind the counter I would just naturally tense up. I didn't care for it. I often wondered just how it was that I had gone from fighting these people to buying twinkies from them. Well, over the years, thankfully, I have changed. I have nothing but respect for these people now. I have come to understand their struggle a bit better. More often than not, they came to this country knowing little or no english and having almost no resources. But, with hard work and sacrifice these people have flourished. They have raised families, become successful and have contributed to their communities. I wonder now how I myself would have fared had I been forced by war or economic upheaval to flee America and relocate to a country where I did not know the language. I am thinking I would not have done nearly as well. I wonder what kind of social programs Vietnam, Thailand, the Phillipines, or Mexico have in place for starving expatraite Americans who can't speak the language? I can just imagine proud Mexicans cursing my kind for taking some menial job once held by their countrymen. "DAMN GRINGO"! The Asian people who have come to our shores have done nothing but better their adopted homeland. We could all stand to take lessons from these people. They have a strong work ethic and a respect for education that drives them to be the best they can be. So, all those years ago, I was wrong. There, I feel better already. Oh, did I mention that May is Asian American Appreciation month? Thus my topic for today. See, I can do topical stuffage when I really, really, try!! Have a wonderful Sunday my friends. I gotta go clean the cement pond now! |
| Hey you ladies out there. C'mere a minute, I have something I need female type input on. I'm a guy, I see things from a guy point of view and I rarely give much thought about the differences between men and women in everyday, trival stuff. But, today is different and all because I was just doing a little expermenting in the kitchen. Why do women get so dang possesive about that room in the house? Wait, let me set the stage for you. My wife was doing some reading in writing.com today and since we only have the one computer, I had to find something to occupy me while she enjoyed the site. So, in all innocence, I decided to do some experimentation in the kitchen. I love to cook. And, even more than that, I love to experiment with new dishes I have never done. What can be so wrong with that, I ask you? Well, today I decided to make a dish I had never tried before, oh you can just imagine the fun of that, I am sure. The dish was a "Blooming Onion" For those of you who might not know about this, it is a battered, deep fried onion. You have to have this little cutter made especally for the dish. It cuts the onion, about softball sized and sweet, into segments. Then, after it is cut, you gently pull apart the onion petals with your fingers. When this is done you have to mix the batter, using cold water, and then dip the onion in that. When that is done you place the onion in a deep pot full of very, very, hot oil for just a few minutes until the onion is golden brown. It is best to use thousand island dressing as a dip when eating the onion. Not only is this a great snack, but it is a challenge to make....that should have been my clue I guess. Anyway, everything was going swimmingly. I had peeled the onion, made the batter, heated the oil. After that, I cut the onion and spent a while gently peeling back the petals to make it "blossom". After battering the onion, I was standing there, holding the dripping onion, and I realized I would need help or a spatula or something to get the thing into the hot oil. I looked around, didn't see anything right off, so I just said "to heck with it." and DROPPED the onion into the oil. To my credit.....no one had ever told me to watch out for boiling oil splashing out on the burner. It did. In no time at all I had this really nifty little fire going on the stove top! Smoke was billowing, the fire alarm was screaming its head off and the damn cowardly dogs were trying to scratch a new opening into the closed front door to escape! Now I could have handled it...given a while to asses my options, but nooooooo, just then the wife comes storming into the kitchen yelling, "Mother of God, what have you done to MY kitchen?" I tried to point out that the strident screech in her voice was really not very attractive but she was too busy playing Freddy Fireman to listen to me. Well in no time at all, the fire was out, everything was ok. Well, not everything, in all the excitment I had forgotten about the onion and it was kind of crispy....on the outside...doughy on the inside. Well it was a total loss really. Now why did she get mad when I pointed out to her that if she had not distracted me, the onion would have turned out perfect? So there she was, standing there raving about "Her poor kitchen." and "How did you manage to dirty every square inch of this room in fifteen minutes"? and "Go. Just leave MY KITCHEN!" So of course, I did what she wanted....I left HER kitchen. I got my chair at the computer back and went on with my writing. Here's the thing...she had the gall to yell at me for not cleaning up the mess. She wasn't the least mollified when i answered her calmly that I had left the kitchen at her request so how could I clean it? Note to self: When a man trespasses in the kitchen, women can not be reasoned with. I need my own kitchen. Now I wonder what its going to take for me to get her out of MY recliner? Better let it go.....for now. |
| I heard an interesting thing on the news this morning. Seems an American has purchased a soccor team called The Manchester United and Brits are up in arms over it. I had to chuckle. This sort of thing has been going on in the colonies for years now. Arabs and Japanese have been buying up chunks of America as fast as thier Gold Cards will allow them. Of course, when it first started happening here we too were quite upset but we got use to it. All they get for their money is property, or a business, so what. Look, its like this, if my team wins the championship, I could care less who writes their paycheck. They are MY team, in my heart and they won......everything else is just irrelavent. Personally I can't wait for Mavis to weigh in on this topic in her Blog. It should be entertaining, to say the least. Lastly, I would like to touch on the subject of Media coverage on Iraq. There was an interesting thing that took place last week. I was watching the National news one day and their first report was on the trial of the soldiers accused to "mistreating" the POW's. The commentator told us in a grave voice that the actions of these people have terribly undermined the moral of the troops in the field over there. He hinted that moral over there was at an all time low. Then, ten minutes later they aired a report about a group of Medal of Honor winners who toured Iraq to visit with the troops. These men didn't talk to the generals or the politians. Instead, the group asked to be taken to the infamous Sunni Triangle where the worse of the fighting is taking place and they talked to the soldiers in the field. Upon their return they reported to Congress that the moral of the common soldier was, in their words, "over the top". The leaded of the group, a man who won his Medal of Honor in Vietnam and was well aquainted with moral problems, said he had never seen such high moral in any group of soldiers and was impressed with their determination to get the job done right. Now I wonder if I was the only one who caught this contridiction? The commentator had just told us moral was at an all time low....then this group reports just the opposite to Congress. The commentator never seemed to notice that it flew in the face of the words he had spoken just a few minutes before. This whole thing pointed up to me the danger of relying too much on the word of the Media. They tend to paint the picture they WANT you to see....not nessarilly the truth. Maybe I am too sensitive on the subject, having seen how easily the people were swayed by the media during Vietnam. I am always afraid that history will repeat itself and our young troops will have to pay the same price, not in battle, but after they return home. |
Good evening friends. It is now offical, my brain is jelly. I have spent the last three hours creating a new folder and placing the Prolouge and chapter one of a novel called "Time of Troubles....a complete novel"  . I wrote this novel back in 1992, long before Weapons of Mass Destruction worries or 9/11. Hopefully I will have the rest of it in there and fixed up tomorrow. Many thanks to 4ps for his help getting me started. Its not where I want it yet but should be tomorrow. Please, if any of you have time, please stop by and read what I have in there so far. Stick a fork in me...I'm done! You folks have a good night. |
| Good morning everyone. I hope you all had a restful night and are all ready for another productive day in writing.com. It is now five a.m. and I have been up and awake since three this morning. Sleep seemed to evade me last night, we all have those from time to time. Speaking of time, I do find it so confusing, trying to keep all the varied time differences of the members here straight. For instance, I think it is Friday afternoon over in England....am I close? What is it over in the land of Oz, Saturday morning? Time. It is so subject to man's interpertation and division. When you get right down to it days, weeks, months, even hours and minutes are all man-made measurments. All of this brings my wandering mind to one burning question: What is "Anytime minutes"? I mean, really, think about it. There are sixty seconds in minute, sixty minutes in an hour and twenty four hours in a day. Now that means there are 1440 seconds in an hour. So which of these minutes are "anytime" minutes the cell phone people are always talking about? This whole idea of anytime minutes just points up to me how much of a rip off cell phones are. I am sure that in any other business this type of price structure would never be accepted. We would rightly refuse to do business with anyone who tried to charge us more for certain minutes on certain days. Why do we let them get away with this kind of "voodoo" price structuring? Have we been brainwashed into believeing that ownership of a cell phone sets us apart, makes us different? Twenty years ago owning a cell phone was something for a few, well to do, high octaine businessmen and they loved taking their phones (which were the size of military walkie-talkies) and be SEEN making what HAD to be very important calls. Now the kids of twenty years ago are all grown up and they have been convinced by great advertising, that they HAVE to have a cell phone to be successful. Today I see people of all ages and income brackets carrying around a cell phone strapped to their waist or in their purses. Kids as young as ten years old carry tiny little phones that can not only connect them with friends, but take pictures, video, and are internet compatable. Hell, I have seen men and women in their eighties come hobbling into my store, pushing shopping carts and talking on cell phones. You see, that is the secret. First they convince you that you have to have a cell phone, that you can't function without one and then, after they have you hooked, they can afford to set any kind of price structure they want.....you will pay it...you have to have it! Well not this puppy! I neither want one nor do I need one. There are times in my life, on almost a daily basis, when I DON'T WANT to be reachable....this is my time, and I refuse to wear some damn instrument on my belt that allows anyone to "reach out and touch" me. Ok, ok, I will end my rant now. I need coffee. Maybe later when I am sure my brother is in a meeting, I will call him on HIS cell phone and interrupt his day....God I do love doing that to him! |
| Well so much for being through with doctors. I was informed today that I have to undergo something called a Neuclear Stress Test. To do this I have to travel to Lufkin, the nearest town bigger than a mudpuddle from where I live, and go to ANOTHER specialist THERE. It really sounds like fun. They pump this crap in my veins and then try to induce a dang heart attack. Looking on the bright side, after this test I should be able get a side job as a bug light at garden parties. And this doctor had the gall to tell me I need to cut down my stress. HA! I told him to look up stress in the dictionary and he will see a picture of a Walmart supercenter. Well needless to say, I didn't get another chapter done today...I was bummed out after all that. But, on a brighter note (there is always one of those) I finished True Believer by Nicholas Sparks today. If any of you get the chance, please read this book, it is wonderful. He also wrote The Notebook and Message in a Bottle and this latest book is as good as the other two. I know what I need now....its time for the campfire therapy. I need to go out to my fire pit, build a nice big fire and sit and watch the stars tonight...that would be the perfect stress reducer. Of course the best thing in the world would be to get a whole roll of bubble wrap and sit and pop the bubbles all day. I know.....I need help. Oh well, onward and upward...I promise tomorrow we will deal only with topical subjects. |
| Well today marks my last trip to a specialist. Today I go to a Cardilogist. If this latest witch doctor gives me a clean bill then I can finally go back to work. I have discovered that I am just not built for staying home and taking it easy. I think I am more in danger of getting injured by the wife for hogging the computer than any ill effects from a sickness. Besides, the office chair that sits in front of the computer is MINE! How dare her want to sit there and read in writing.com all the time! After I get back from the doctor's office I plan on putting another chapter into my port. The one good thing to come out of this whole affair is that I have had ample time to write, man I have loved that. Let me ask you guys something here. Am I the only one who has become addicted to "Summary Stats" in here? I love being able to click on that from "Author's Tools" and see how many of my stories have been visited and how many people have read in my Port. There is just something about being able to see actual proof that people are really LOOKING at what I have written that is just so very satisfying. Oh, on a different note, I watched Faith Hill on the Today Show this morning. She sang a song from her new album, Mississippi Girl, the song was "Let me Let Go" and it was really beautiful. Faith is one of my favorite country singers. Her song: "Breathe" is my favorite. Ok, time for me to get busy. Gotta go get all ready for the trip to the doctor and then its back to MY CHAIR to work on the next chapter of Bygone Heart. If I have time I may even add another entry here before bedtime. Just a suggestion here, before I go, to all you who are reading here who have not yet put anything in your portfolio. Why not start a Blog? Not only is it easy, but it is downright addictive. I promise you that you will not be disappointed and I look forward to reading your thoughts. |
| Well I did it. Chapter four of Bygone Heart is now posted in my port. This chapter really flowed for me and I enjoyed writing it a lot. It's funny how, with a novel, some chapters can be such a joy to write, while others are just a pain and they come out slowly and only with a lot of effort. After I finished the chapter I treated myself to a real joy......I finished reading "Sara's Port" . If any of you out there have not read Sara's Port do yourself a big favor and read this story. I rate this work among the top five peices I have read in writing.com.I swear to God, there at the end of that story I actually teared up....don't you dare tell anyone! 4provinces has inspired me, I might try to get a second chapter in today on my own work though I can tell you right now my own talent pales beside the story of Ollie and Sara. On a different topic for a moment, for those of you not from the great state of Texas, let me now inform you......Texas government is going CRAZY! About a month ago they decided to get involved in High School Cheerleading and they want to make it against the law for cheerleaders to wear skimpy outfits or do any routine that might be deemed to be "suggestive". Good Lord, don't they have anything better to do than try to legislate morality at the High School level? I mean, really, these are high school kids. The girls could wear burlap bags that reached to the ground and just stand still and breath and it would be "suggestive" to high school boys! When is state and federal government going to relent and leave SOMETHNG up to the people to regulate themselves? They can't have their hands in EVERYTHING can they? "From the Cradle to the Grave" big government is one of my pet peeves. Just stay out of my life and let me figure out for myself what is right and what is wrong. If State or Federal Gov. wants to take care of morals then I suggest they begin with themselves....then work there way up to everyone else. Ok, time to be productive again.....who knows, I might try posting some pictures in my port today, if I can just figure out how to do it....GAWD. |
| Going to be a quick entry today. Last night I woke up sometime after midnight and I knew something was different. It took me a while to figure it out...I FELT BETTER! I had almost forgotten what it was like to not be dizzy, or have my blood pressure spiking. This ton of meds I am on now seem to be kicking in. I am almost afraid this good feeling won't last, its weird. Anyway, I am going to take advantage of this period of well being to write and I hope to get one or more chapters in today. I will try to make a later entry in my blog this evening and hopefully I will have some progress to report on Bygone Heart. |
| Ok, today I need some input, especally from the female readers. As most of you know I am deep into a new project, Bygone Heart. I have reached a point where I have just introduced the female character, Kim. Now as the story unfolds Kim and Brian are going to fall in love but will be torn apart by the war. Both are going to think that the other is dead. Now the other male character, Stan is also going to be in love with Kim and he is going to make sure she thinks Brian is dead. Now my question is this: Is it creditable to have Kim decide to marry Stan? She thinks the man she loves is lost to her. She knows that Stan loves her and he can protect her and give her a better life. She is not aware of what kind of man Stan is...he keeps that hidden. Can she forget her love for Brian and give herself to Stan? Will she always love Brian, even after marrying Stan? Is it creditable that she carry a love secretly in her heart for decades and still be married to another man? There is a surprise character who makes an appearance near the end of the book, but I can't tell you about that one yet. I want to make sure that this premise will work. Is what I suggest creditable? Please, please, please give me some input here. I feel a great urge to bang on this story and I need to know what you think. |
| Well, today is the first day of an unscheduled vacation for your's truely. As per my Witch Doctor's orders I am to stay off work for a week and go see a Cardiologist then a Neurologist...boy sounds like fun to me! NOT! Also, today, I was honored with a visit to my blog by a gray briefcase who Rated and Reviewed my poor little piece. I was quite happy that he gave me a good rating but I had to chuckle a bit when I read the review.... This blog is interesting as long as we get a peak into what gets the author thinking and where his thoughts take him. But if the author just doesn't have much to say and there is filler like wouldn't it be nice to watch a sunrise over the Rockies or excerpts from Uncle John's Absolutely Absorbing Bathroom Reader, surely readers of this blog are wasting their time. However, there is more substance than filler in this blog. You see, I had to laugh. He really wants a "peak" into what I am thinking? That is a scarry place, trust me, you don't want to go there. Ok, if you insist, I will acceed to his wishes and give you a little "peak" into what I think about things that go on every day and where some of my writing comes from...be prepared to duck the flying vitriol! Let's start out with the war in Iraq. Here is what I THINK about that conflict.... The other day I heard on the news that the soldier who was tried for murder for shooting three Iraq men who were feigning death, was found innocent...WELL DUH! The very idea that the soldier was tried for murder is ludicrous. People, when you are in a war zone, in a fire fight, you shoot anything that moves and you shoot it until it stops moving. I wonder how many men we have lost because they hesitated just a fraction of a second before they fired, afraid of what might happen if they are wrong. I have been in that position and I learned my lessons in a hard school, you either graduated or died. Yes, sometimes it's hard to do what must be done, I understand this. Shooting a kid strapped with explosives is hard to.....but we did it. How can you charge a soldier with murder unless the people who were shot were all in control, and searched and found unarmed and helpless. Now if he had shot them then, yes he would have crossed the line. You have to remember, War is legalized murder not a parlor game. So, if we are going to fight the war then turn the soldiers loose and let's fight it then get the hell out. Oh, and NO I don't believe we have a responsibility to rebuild the damn country. Just kill them until they surrender then tell them if they screw with us again we will come back and finish the job! Well, does that give you a "peak" at what I am thinking when I am writing my stories? Now that you have seen this, go read Journy into Darkness. That story is as close as I can come to autobiographical as I can get. On to another "peak" at my thoughts on a subject: Gay Marriage. Oh that's a no brainer for me. Marriage is the union between a MAN and a WOMAN, not a man and man, or a woman and a woman, or a man and a sheep! If two people of the same sex want to live together and screw their brains out, that is their business but don't you dare equate it with marriage. Can I be any clearer on that? Creationism vs Evolution taught in schools. I am a christian, I believe in God and I believe in the Bible. But on this you might call me liberal. I say teach both, with EQUAL emphasis on both. Let the children make up their own mind. Personally, though I have always believed in Creationism, after working around the public for years I can certainly see where one might be led to believe we are evolved from lower forms of life. Some of us are more evolved than others. Speaking of Religion, when did it become bad form to admit that you are a Christian? You can believe in Bhudda, you can believe in Mohammad and Allah and never catch flack for it from liberals. Hell you can worship at the shrine of the damn Spidermonkey and no one will say a word to you. But, if you dare to say "I'm a christian and proud of it you are instantly labeled a right wing religious fanatic. Personally, I believe any religion that tells its followers that if they martyr themselves for their god they will be serviced by a large number of virgins, has to be suspect. Do they equate Heaven with screwing women who have never been screwed? Ok, how ill is that? There, now you have all been subjected to how I think and you have taken a "peak" at what goes into some of my stories....See I told you that you would be sorry. Maybe tomorrow I will get back to something really important....like Uncle John's Absolutly Absorbing Bathroom Reader! |
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Congrats on 500 entries, and we are all looking forward to the sequel.
