Esoteric Mumblings....Notes from the Barbershop

Run for Parkinson’s disease…

2012-02-07T10:02:00.000-08:00

So this is number two in what I hope will be on ongoing crusade to help us get back on track with knowing and appreciating our full potentials as the giving, honorable, loving human beings we all are in reality.
Something the media's would apparently love us to forget.

His name is Sam Fox. In the span of two months this past fall, he ran and hiked 2,400 miles on the Pacific Crest Trail, from Canada to Mexico. Through thick forests, over snowy mountains, and past sandy desserts, covering almost 43 miles every day, for 61 straight days. He did all of this in an effort to honor His Mother, Lucy Fox, who was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease a decade ago, and to raise funds for Parkinson’s disease research/awareness. To date, he has raised over $170,000 that will go toward a cure for this terrible disease.

Pacific Crest Trail Stats….

Stretches 2,650 miles from Manning Provincial Park in British Columbia all the way to Campo, CA, at the Mexican border.

Climbs 60 major mountain passes
Descends 19 major canyons
Passes more than 1,000 lakes
Traverses 3 National Monuments, 7 National Parks, 24 National Forests
Fewer people have successfully thru-hiked the PCT than have reached the summit of Mt. Everest.

Sam was born in Rhode Island, and he is 24 years old. He attended South Kingstown (RI) Public Schools and then the Wheeler School, in Providence. At Wheeler he earned 15 varsity letters in 4 sports. Sam captained eight teams, he was the Rhode Island High School State Champion in the high jump in 2005, and was presented with the Scholar Athlete award upon graduation in 2005.
Sam continued his athletic career at Yale University where he was a 4-year varsity letterman in Track and Field. He won a gold medal in the High Jump at the 2007 Penn Relays, and earned All Ivy and All East recognition in 2009, while also qualifying for the NCAA East Regional Championships (all in the high jump).
Sam is a 2007 graduate of the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS), in glacier mountaineering. As an experienced outdoorsman, Sam has run, hiked, biked, skied, and climbed in the Alps, the Rockies, the Canadian and American Cascades, the Sierras, the White Mountains, and the Himalayas.

He had been hiking, climbing, camping, skiing for as long as he could remember. In recent years, while out on various solo trips, he said he discovered a cardiovascular and pain endurance threshold he didn’t know he possessed. For this particular challenge; running the entire length of the Pacific Crest Trail, he’d certainly need a healthy tolerance for both. His training regimen was intense, mixing extreme mileage with extreme terrain, peppering in sleep deprivation, altitude training and injury tolerance. It took place on roads, trails across the country (Grand Canyon, Yosemite, Mt. Rainier, the Colorado Rockies) through deserts, mountains, and forests. Also taking place in weight rooms, in the back of his car, in the mud and in the snow. He said most importantly it took place in his own mind, which had to be conditioned right along with his body.

His mother was diagnosed with Parkinson’s more than 10 years ago now. While he had seen changes in his mother’s life, her hobbies, and often times her ability to do the things she used to love so much, he’d not seen changes in who she is.
He had said his mother was certainly an inspiration to him, but not because she is bravely fighting Parkinson’s, it is because there was never any doubt that she would face and defeat whatever challenge arose. He didn’t dedicate his training and efforts on the trail to her battle with a terrible disease, He simply dedicate them to her, for being his mom, for all that she’s done and all that she is.

He said simply……Thanks Mom.

So while it was his Dad who helped spark his love of adventure and the outdoors, it is his mother’s lessons about hard work and toughness that he’d call upon during the long days and nights on the trail. Those lessons would be what would carry him through the cold, rain, blisters and breaks, steeps, mud, and wracking exhaustion, for 2650 miles with (at the least) an ironic smile.

Obviously, this is a young man we all should not only be proud of but use as proof that the vast majority of American youth are intelligent, driven, caring people who will willingly and with great pride lead the country and world toward greatness.
So the next time you hear some doom and gloom idiot say something like: “The youth are going to hell in a hand basket. They don’t respect their elders anymore and are just plain lazy.” You can just smile knowingly and consider the ignorant source.

And from all who suffer from this devastating disease, I’m going to take it upon myself to give this young man a mental standing ovation and to shout out a great big THANK YOU SAM FOX, on their behalf.

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Amazing people doing amazing things....

2012-02-01T11:33:00.000-08:00

I've written about this before but I think in todays world of almost exclusively super negative news and commentary, all of us need to realize the truth is far from what we're daily fed.

Here's the deal, as I've said before, there are far far more creative, intelligent, forward looking, often times miraculously good things happening every moment than bad. My best guess would be for every bad thing happening, there are hundreds, if not thousands of great things happening not only in America but throughout the world. Every moment of every day.
Our entire information system is flat ass lazy. It's far easier for them to run out and take pictures of some poor soul murdered, they're hoping with his guts hanging out, than to search out all the good things happening.

So I've decided to make this my latest obsession. To search the Internet, Newspapers, or just listen to regular folk's stories and present just the good side of life for once. If for no other reason than to attempt a balancing act between the bad and the good, although I believe my side of the scales will always be setting on the table, while the bad side is waving franticly to be let down, scared of the heights.

So this is number one in what I hope will be on ongoing crusade to help us get back on track with knowing and appreciating our full potentials as the giving, honorable, loving human beings we all are in reality. Something the media's would apparently love us to forget.

One I've personally heard about for years would be Paul Newman's Business model.

What kind of a business would intentionally give away everything it makes and not keep one cent of profit? Well, that would be Paul Newman's kind of business. If you don't have Paul Newman's face on a product somewhere in your kitchen, then you know somebody who does. He gave us a lot of joy and fine performances in life. And while he's gone now, it's what he is still giving away that is still making news and making a difference.

How long can a corporation last when it gives everything away? Of course, it turned out to be a hugely successful experiment. Americans have been buying up everything with Paul Newman's picture on it for years, and Newman's Own, the company he founded, has now surpassed $300 million in charitable giving. That money has made a difference for thousands of charities, focusing on kids, education and nutrition for close to 30 years. It all started in Paul Newman's kitchen. He used to make his own salad dressing because he thought store bought had no taste and he used to give away a few bottles to friends at Christmas time. That idea exploded. So did the eventual list of products. Among his favorite charities is a landmark he founded, the Hole in the Wall Camps for kids with serious medical conditions.

What could be better than to hold your hand out to people who are less fortunate than you are? That's simply the way he chose to look at life.

The Hole in the Wall organization started with just 300 campers back in 1988 and has now helped over 200,000 children and families, just by giving them a safe place to be kids and get away from their illnesses for a while. Recently, Paul Newman's widow, Joanne Woodard, was joined by a number of celebrities and friends gathering to celebrate this $300 million milestone. Paul Newman was a husband and father and friend, a better than average looking race car driver, and he was a great actor who wanted to be remembered as a man who made a difference. That much is assured.
I'm guessing we would all agree three hundred million dollars toward charities makes him a man who truly made a difference.

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The world's inequalities....

2011-12-14T15:03:00.000-08:00

I've been holding back on this one for quite a while now because it's so loaded with extremist sensationalisms, it's hard for me to put in words.
As we all know, not just in America but world wide, there are protesters coming out of the woodwork, protesting everything from tyrannical rule to the growing divide between those that have and those that don't.

Speaking of those protesting in America right now, I truly wonder how many of these are hard working, honest, clean, intelligent people who have lost their jobs or on hard times from no fault of their own, other than trapped in the same currant recession as everyone else?
Is it possible and probable that the news media look for and find only the minority ones just for the sensationalism? The dirty, disheveled, shitting in the streets ones to show us and not the majority who are truly hurting?

I've worried for years with the worlds "The rich get richer and the poor get poorer" realities.
My best example of this would be Saudi Arabia, where there are maybe 14 families with more money than they or their future generations could burn for firewood and never run out, when the vast majority are wondering wither they'll be able to eat before they watch their children die of starvation before their very eyes.

The reality that we and all other countries seem to be heading down that same path scares the hell out of me. None of this will come to fruitarian in my lifetime but I worry about the future humans.

Truth is, that path is sick and not good for either the rich or poor. Those very rich have to live behind 20 foot cement walls, called "compounds" to keep the majority from killing them, which brings up the question....What kind of life is that, even for the rich? For the extreme poor around the world, it has to be a living hell.

What seems to have snuck up on us all in the last 30+ years is the exceptness of all the sports players, actors, CEO's of giant companies, high tech executives and investors making absolutely obscene amounts of money. We've come to except those folks having 4 mansions, dozens upon dozens of $100,000 cars, without batting an eye.

I know. I know....The extreme right wing folks would be screaming right now..."Those folks worked hard for what they have and deserve to be rewarded for their labors." The also yell "Who said anything was fair?" and I agree but like I said above, to follow this path to it's ultimate will only lead not only America but the whole worlds economies to the Saudi Arabia model, which is not healthy for anyone ultimately.

I have no desire to take from the rich and give to the poor but there has to be logical and fair ways to rebuild everyone's chances at being a hard working member of a middle class. Where anyone willing to work hard would deserve a living wage, with enough money for safe housing, healthy food, medical care for themselves and their families and yes, a secure retirement when they reach an age too old to continue working. Also a way for those super rich people to help those who aren't able to help themselves by sharing some of their wealth.

The truth is I have no idea how to make all this happen but I hear everyday great ideas that never see the light of day. Hearing all the sides of this issue for all these years, the only conclusion I feel is anywhere near true is the super rich, giant corporations and mega companies don't give a rats ass about any of us. They only care about their immediate profits and they'll do anything, including controlling and buying our politicians to satisfy their greed and selfishness.

By the way, I really think this might be the biggest issue to hit the world perhaps forever and in my humble opinion other than the problem of overpopulation, this one is just starting, probably in it's infancy and just might never go away until we get a real handle on it.

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Compromise. Remember that word?

2011-09-16T09:57:00.000-07:00

More and more people coming in to my shop are getting sick and tired of our two party system who only care about their own personal political agendas. Both sides have clearly forgotten who they're working for.
Worse yet it seems, both sides have been held hostage by their more extremist outer edges. People who reside so far out in the ozone, hiding in their super stocked (food and bullets) bomb shelters, waiting for the inevitable "end of the world' they forgot what it's like to be a normal, caring human beings. People who pretend to know what they're talking about when in actuality, they're just parroting what some radio or TV channel idiot tells them to think.

So now we've become a divided nation, pretty much right down the exact middle, it seems.

On the extremist right side, they seem to be screaming to cut all social programs to the bone, if not completely eliminate them and the hell with the poor.
On the other side, they're screaming to spend even more money on those very same programs, disregarding the fact that we're not only broke but owe an unimaginably large amount of money for all the borrowing we've done creating and maintaining those programs and the hell with the rich.

The left side clearly thinks we can borrow even more and or tax the rich and spend our way out of the present financial crises and the right side thinks we just need to drastically cut spending and lower the taxes and regulations on business and the rich as incentives for them to reinvest in everything.

Not being an extremist political or financial nut case as a very loud, obnoxious minority seem to be nowadays, I don't claim to know which theory (opinion) might be right but do have some thoughts on the subject.
How about both sides pulling their feet out of their cement encased bullshit agendas (asses) and finding common ground somewhere in the middle of both these approaches?

Even my little feeble mind can imagine both sides leaving their hard core doctrines back at their office and setting down together like the professional adults we chose as our Representatives and making their main goal for once or once again, to "Compromise" for the good of the common men and women in America.

Is that asking to much? That they get back on tract finding ways in the middle to solve our problems, as we elected and expect them to do?

Again, admittedly not knowing one iota about the sometimes seemingly insurmountable financial problems the entire world is experiencing right now, isn't it reasonable to assume taking a middle of the road, compromising path to be the only real answer?

So let me just free form some thoughts right now. Instead of taxing the rich out of business, is it possible to just make damn sure all giant cooperations and companies along with their owners, CEO's and upper management are paying their fair equitable share of taxes, leaving no excuse for any business or rich as hell person, large or small from paying no taxes. No excuses! Equitable being the magic word here. If your rich as hell, you should be paying a portion equal to your wealth, just as us peons do.

With our government clearly spending far, far more than it brings in, (what business could survive one day with that idiot approach?) how about adjusting all the entitlement programs down using a slow, carefully approach. After all, these things got out of hand over years and years of added abuse and would logically take years and years to bring back into reality, without negatively impacting the masses so drastically that people are starving in the streets. How about watching your own parents lose everything they have overnight? Not a pretty or acceptable scenario, is it?

Lets try adding another long lost word back into the English language. "Reasonable".

The one issue I do feel rather strongly about is the stupendous amount of Government regulations put in place through the years. I've been told over and over how crippling they have became for businesses, adding tremendous cost to almost everything we need or consume. When a business is forced by the government to pay far more to produce their product because of some added restriction, who do you think ultimately pays for that?

Could the powers that be just go back and take a hard, honest look at how many of those regulations are actually vital to add to the general safety of mankind versus just feel good bullshit, put in place by those idiots who feel we need protection from ourselves.

I for one being an adult, (well, most of the time) would like to take as much responsibility for myself as possible, thank you.

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Thanks a lot extremist. It's your fault!

2011-08-08T16:09:00.000-07:00

This is a direct quote from Standard and Poors rating change.

"Since then, we have changed our view of the difficulties in bridging the
gulf between the political parties over fiscal policy, which makes us
pessimistic about the capacity of Congress and the Administration to be
able to leverage their agreement this week into a broader fiscal
consolidation plan that stabilizes the government's debt dynamics any
time soon."

In plain words. Both parties are a bunch of idiots who forgot us peons in their zeal to be right no matter what.

I've been watching both sides of our political system become more and more extremist and divided for quite some time now and suspected they were slowly but surely becoming the main problem.

Well, they finally did it. Their kindergarten bickering about whatever political agenda they so treasure finally brought the house of cards to the floor. The Standard and poor's direct quote above says it all as clear as a bell. Instead of thinking and acting for the peoples behalf, both idiot sides only cared about their own version of "I'm right and your wrong".

Instead of applying tried and true values and systems with a healthy helping of compromise, both sides just used the "Blame Game" idiocy instead. Instead of moving toward a healthy middle ground, we have these new extremist nut case ignoramuses cropping up across America, blathering on and on with their end of the world crap.

Yea idiots, that'll surely help matters huh? My take on this is unless you have something intelligent and constructive to contribute toward solving our short and long term problems, then just SHUT THE HELL UP and quit contributing more idiot garbage to the mix.

JUST SHUT THE HELL UP!!!

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Helping entrepreneurs stay in business...

2011-08-05T09:30:00.000-07:00

Over and over again, day in and day out, I hear people complain about how hard it is to open and run a small business. With all the fees, crazy overblown regulations, stupid over the top rules and the Government trying to make everything perfectly safe for us dummies, it's almost impossible now to open and run a successful business.
One of the things I constantly hear is how California especially, is a anti-Business state. What the hell? California is an anti-business state? How insane is that?
Where do you think the majority of people have their employment? They work in the small business world, that's where.
The last thing in the world we should be doing right now is limiting intelligent entrepreneurs from pursuing their ideas for a business, which creates jobs for hard working Americans to have a chance at the good life.

A couple of examples now........

25 years ago a person with some great recipes from their Grandma, could find a good location downtown, grab up some tables, chairs, utensils, a stove, a sink, a fridge and whatever else they needed to make the food, then hire a cook, two waitresses, put sign on the front wall, flip the open sign around and boom, they were in business. Not only in business, but gave at least three other people the chance to make a decent living.

Now 25 years ago, that scenario worked perfectly, the business started making money, three people had good jobs and the patrons enjoyed Grandma's fantastic grub. Now lets stop right here to make something perfectly clear. No one got sick, no one died from food poisoning. Everyone working there were just normal people who knew to wash their hands etc etc.

OK, here's where it all started going to hell in a hand basket. So, some government bureaucrat prick took it upon themselves to try and help out all us idiot patrons. Instead of continuing to allow us to take responsibility for ourselves, to make our own choices of where and what to eat, this bureau-crap decided to treat all of us like children with no mind and make damn sure everything in the restaurant was perfectly clean and safe. A place where nothing untoward would ever happen to harm anyone.

So out goes the stove first thing. Oh no........you can't use a regular stove like we do in our homes. Hell no......Now the owners were required to purchase a $10,000 dollar super duper stove with super grease traps with a special hood to catch the toxic smoke coming off Grandma's food. Oh and completely redesigned and installed drain systems in the floor for.....some stupid idea or the other.

So guess what folks? These driven, intelligent, creative people with a great product and idea for a new business can't afford all that crap and have to shut their doors, kicking three other innocent people out onto the employment lines in the process, depriving everyone from enjoying Grandma's great food.
In this day and age when jobs are everything, how incredibly stupid and short sighted is that????

Right as I'm writing my latest tirade, a customer walked in telling me about him trying to move his construction business to a new location. To do this, because of all the excessive, stupid and unneeded regulations, the cost went from something he might handle to completely out of bounds. The new idiocy in that world now is the dreaded "Erosion Control". To do any construction nowadays, all the sudden when building anything, you can't let one little stone or piece of dirt leave the construction area, so...................
Now you'll need, of course ....Those straw Wattles, which are those round straw tubes you see around construction sites. What are they for, you ask? To make sure none of the disturbed dirt gets off the site.....

Huh? Since when is dirt a bad thing?

Wait, we're not done yet. Then you need to completely surround the entire construction site with a Silk Filtering Fence. What? What's that for? Just in case it rains, any dirt (here we go again with that devil stuff) that might wash away is filtered with this Silk Fence before poisoning the surrounding properties.

Not done yet.

Now you'll of course need a super engineered, filtered drainage system to again filter any of that dreaded dirt from getting into the water system.
Now, here's the cool part, None of this has anything to do with his business at all. All this expensive crap is just temporary installations just for the construction process. So, he told me when everything is done, all he can do with all that expensive crap is throw it away. You see, it's worth nothing now that it's used.

It's clear that right now the main problem in America is the lack of good jobs, so lets talk about how the Government could step in and help that process along.
The first thing that comes to mind would be to step back.....I don't know....how about to 25 years ago and take a hard look at how businesses worked then.
They did just fine without all those idiot regulations, thank you.
So.....my grand idea would be for the Government to get rid of all the new regulations put in place in the last 25 years. Just throw those pieces of shit in the garbage, where they belong. Go back to what worked all throughout time, which is nothing but common sense and logic.
I'm telling you right now. We were fine back then and we'll be fine now without overregulation.

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Attitude "Choices"...

2011-06-27T12:28:00.000-07:00

An old Chinese curse goes like this:
"May you live in interesting times"

It sure seems to me at this particular time in this great political, social and human experiment called America we've reached a very interesting and might we even say convoluted crossroads. Our political landscape seems to be cut right down the middle. The views from the one side seem to be saying the whole thing is off track, failing and doomed without drastic counter measures.
The views from the other side seem to be saying quite the opposite, that we're just going through another of many ups and downs, same as all throughout history and that everything just like before will eventually come out just fine, with or without the politicians interdiction.

I'm not sure of the exact percentages but the same seems to be true with our social/moral views. One side saying we're heading down the road of moral corruption and ruin and the other side believing we're on the cusp of finally starting to remove a lot of the barriers in the way of total social and intellectual freedom.

It seems to me the last time most Americans were on the same general page was in the first world wars. Those times we had a common and excepted enemy. An enemy that seemed to be trying to take our coveted and loved way of life away. We behaved as a family unit back then. Mess with my family to your peril was the cry and hue of the day.

Let me admit something here. Every day I hear some "fact" thrown out there that positively proves to me that their point of view is right and just. Then practically the very next day, I hear another "fact" telling me everything the other person or side said was a complete fabrication. A flat out lie to further their particular political agenda.
Now these "Facts" not only come flying out of the woodwork from all the media sources and politicians but also just normal hard working folks I come into contact with.

These normal nice, seemingly intelligent folks walk in with their "Facts" in hand either screaming bloody murder about some injustice being inflicted on the huddled masses or screaming about America going down the drain of communism, socialism or any number of other "ism's", far to numerous to count.

One minute we for sure have more oil available right here under American soil than all the other countries combined and the only thing stopping us from using it are those crazy and oft hated environmentalist. The next I hear is that's all a complete exaggerated lie by all the Oil companies in the world to keep ripping us off in price.

Some "Facts" I found on the Internet:

Where are the reserves?

Proved oil reserves are those quantities of oil that geological information indicates can be with reasonable certainty recovered in the future from known reservoirs. Of the trillion barrels currently estimated, 6% are in North America, 9% in Central and Latin America, 2% in Europe, 4% in Asia Pacific, 7% in Africa, 6% in the Former Soviet Union. Today, 66% of global oil reserves are in the hands of Middle Eastern regimes: Saudi Arabia (25%), Iraq (11%), Iran (8%), UAR (9%), Kuwait (9%), and Libya (2%).

So in the end folks, I think we're back to the basics of psychology here. We each have it within ourselves to form opinions and attitudes about all the subjects we care to pay attention to slipping in whichever emotional Tagalogs we choose to add. Is today going to be a nice day or a crappy one? Is the weather too hot or just right. Are we going to see life through rose colored or dark glasses? Is America on the cusp of ruin or will it be just fine eventually?

The trick is in what one emphasizes. We either make ourselves miserable, or we make ourselves happy. The amount of work is the same.

-- Carlos Castaneda

I admittedly and proudly count myself in the latter. I make a choice daily to see the positive in life. Most people I come across think life is pretty damn good right now and fully believe it will always only get better on into the future with the normal bumps in the road. I suppose it depends on where you live but I get proof everyday where I live and work. Everyone I come in contact with, including me are holding their chins high and their glasses proudly half full.

I have no plans whatsoever to start trading in my cash for gold, building a secret bomb shelter or Ark for that matter, to stock with food, guns and ammo for the "The end". I'll leave that up to the thousands throughout time, both from politics and religion who continue to make those silly and obviously failed proclamations.

Oh, one more thing. Every time I get on this rant, someone inevitably accuses me of being the ostrich with it's head in the sand hiding from reality. Sorry guys. I hold my chin and head high and enjoy the fresh air of my own attitude choices and I choose to think positive.

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Things I flat ass don't care about!

2011-06-17T08:36:00.000-07:00

This subject has hit me dozens of times over the last couple of years. As I watch the news, read newspapers, or any American media, more and more, all I see is stories about things I could care less about. Those things would be far too long to list in this short piece but I'm forced to give a few examples just to get my point across.

I could care less about all those weird ass countries in the far Eastern parts of the world. I live, work, and only care about America. I don't live over there and don't give a rats ass about the extremist's there with their continuing, unbelievably ignorant ways. I've been told the majority of them are decent folks. We'll have to wait and see how that war of ideas comes out in the end, now won't we? That crazy crap has been going on for thousands of years over there and probably won't end in my lifetime, if ever. I don't care about their religion, culture, habits, clothing, what they eat, how the extremist among them torture, kill and maim each other in the name of some idiot god. We have enough of that stupidity going on right here in America every day.

I don't have the slightest desire to be educated and understand anything at all about them. In my life, they don't even exist other than as some exotic tribesmen in some desert land. If there is a modicum of ignorance in my belief, tough $%#@.
Now the same thing is true for me about all the other places in the world. Mexico? I could care less, other than I wish they would stay home and handle their own problems and quit sucking our resources dry. Oh yeah. I could care less about learning to speak Mexican and they need to speak English to me or leave me the hell alone.

Again, I don't have the time, space or intellectual energy to name them all in this space but I think you get the idea. I am an American. There's no reason for me to apologize for that fact. I was lucky enough to be born here and everyone else in the world was unlucky enough to be born wherever they are in comparison. There's no reason for me to feel sorry for all those folks. It's just life. Their unfortunate circumstance in life is not my fault. Even here, I did not, nor would I own slaves. I did not bomb the Japanese. I did not kill the American Indians. None of that is my fault in the slightest and I'm sick of having uppity people try and lay blame on me for other people's problems I had nothing to do with.

Moving on, I could care less about other adults sexual or marriage habits. Not one tiny bit. Other adults have the right to do anything they want with their bodies and lives as long as they don't try and force any weirdness on others. I could care less about what women choose to do with their bodies. Those things are clearly none of my business. I'll take care of my own body any way I want thank you and it's none of anyone else's business.

Oh yeah. One more thing. I could care less about all the political extremist on both sides of the issues screaming their insanities and agendas. I could care less that they each think they have the right answer. Like most Americans, I think they need to shut the hell up, compromise or whatever else it might take and get something real done, once and for all.

In my perfect world which of course doesn't exist, we would all go back to the good old early America times, days where the only news that mattered was what was happening right in the town you lived. Towns hundreds of miles away didn't matter in the slightest to those folks, They had enough on their plates just etching out a living and staying alive. Those folks didn't give a flying $%#@ what was going on in New York city and barely even knew the rest of the world was real, much less cared.

I'm not even sure If I would say I'm especially proud to be an American, as much as it's just my incredible luck to have been born here. I really can't take any personal credit for that fact. I sometimes think all the "American Pride" stuff to be rather uppity and egotistical.

I'm guessing for a minority of folks these thoughts I'm conveying today somehow all of the sudden turns me into a non-caring %#*&@ but oh well, as the saying goes "You can't please them all".

Here's my truth as I and most people who know me personally see it though. I'm just a normal hardworking, honest to the core, caring about my friends, customers and family type of guy.

Nothing less, nothing more.

Like most Americans, I would jump out and help in any LOCAL emergency without regard for my safety or well being. I do care greatly about those around me.

Well? Whatchathink?
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The devil in the details is.....BIG BUSINESSES GREED

2011-06-14T12:58:00.000-07:00

I’ve come to the conclusion that when there are issues and problems in normal hard working folk’s financial lives, it’s inevitably the fault of big business in one way or the other and number one on my list would be banks. I know. I know. There's a small generally extremist screaming minority of folks down south and up in the junior high schools of deep Alaska who want to place all the blame for everything from toe rot to our present financial recession on the dreaded government but I beg to disagree. Just to remind those robots, the government is us folks. If you vote, you are the government. If you don't, go stand in the corner and shut the hell up. Is our government perfect? Hell no but it's probably the best in the world.

Now I'm not talking about the little corner market or friendly hardware store here. I’m talking about the giants of the world. Big business in most cases has only one agenda and that is profit. Profit above all other considerations. It’s all that matters. Now I’m not talking about a normal profit margin here to be able to keep a business healthy and successful but outlandish, rip-off and the hell with the public profit. The part that consistently angers my sensibilities is big businesses complete lack of consideration for a word that slowly slipped into the clouds of yesteryear and purposely forgotten at some point. That would be the whole concept of “Reasonable”. In the beginning, businesses were rightfully expected to make a “reasonable” profit. Somehow through the intervening years, that word just flat out disappeared, especially with concepts like “Whatever the market will bear” and “Supply and Demand”. These nonsense words were invented by big businesses as logical sounding excuses to rip a new hole in us, without guilt. A hole nothing goes in, just out.

In the beginning businesses also had far different concerns. They actually cared about their customers.... first and foremost above all else.
Lets see. What’s that old concept called? Oh yeah, customer service. Yea, that’s it.
Another old, out of date concept they practiced then was quality. They actually cared about the quality of whatever product they were selling, products that were meant to last for years if not generations. The owners had pride in the products. In fact as far as they were concerned the quality of their products reflected on them personally.

Seems like nowadays there is only one purpose for a business to be in business and that would be to make all the higher ups rich beyond their wildest dreams, including all the shareholders and owners. Not the employees mind you, screw those idiots! Just those at the very top of the ladder. The hell with those peons at the bottom.
Not just get rich but get rich as quick as possible, most time to the detriment of the common man. Not become more and more successful over a long period of time as in the past but RIGHT NOW!
I know, I know. I’ve heard all the talk about business being the grease that makes everything else happen. I even have a friend that proclaims that "GREED IS A GOOD THING!" That without hardcore greed, nothing would get done in life.

That same minority wanted from the very beginning to blame the people for being stupid agreeing to all those loans the banks were offering they couldn't afford. It was their fault for not reading all the fancy smancy legal fine print, only a lawyer could begin to understand. If any of them actually asked anything about this, the banks just said "Oh don't worry your little head about that. In just a few years, you'll make a fortune in profits on your home."

OK, I don't know about you but when my wife and I sat down in the Title offices when buying our homes and they spread out those 400 pieces of paper for us to sign, we didn't read one word, other than where to sign. You see, back then we personally knew and trusted our Realtor and trusted banks explicitly to not cheat us. We also had to prove beyond a shadow of doubt that we could afford the payment throughout the entire loan period.

Piss you off? Completely agree? Read below and DO IT!

Now click on the "Comments" link at the bottom of this blog and add your response or thoughts for others to see when they click on the "Comments" link (Try it now!). It makes it far more interesting if we make it a conversation, instead of just my bullshit. Thank you to those who take the time and effort to do so.....
COME ON..........DO IT!!!

Come on all you rich folks.....

2011-05-14T09:22:00.000-07:00

On all the American Media, we're always seeing these huge, wonderful sounding stories of the rich and famous in society donating to great and worthy causes, building homes for the poor, adopting children with incredibly unfortunate lives and histories, establishing institutions and schools for the poorest children imaginable. Everything they do is amazingly beneficial and often times the first and only time these unfortunate fellow humans have had to know someone out there knew or cared about them. The first chance they've had in their lives to know hope even existed.

All this wonderful, selfishness and giving altruistic attitudes and actions these incredibly rich and famous people do is great indeed. There's certainly no way we could ever take that away from these caring, loving folks, now is there?
Well, I personally have a huge issue with all this. Every time I see these stories, they are almost exclusively taking place in some other country.

What about America folks? Don't we have an overabundance of super poor, needy folks right here in America that badly need help, especially in these "interesting times" we find ourselves in right now? Aren't there children slowly starving to death right here, unseen and hidden on the streets of America right now also? With all the floods, fires, tornadoes, hurricanes and other horrible events on American soil recently, aren't there thousands upon thousands of deserving Americans, young and old who have lost everything they had and live with no hope for the future? What about them, Mr. and Mrs. rich and famous, what about them?

Seeing this I am often times forced to question their real motives and agendas. Especially the super rich and famous actresses and actors. Is part of their reasoning just a tad egotistical? Look at me, I am so cool. I adopted this super poor black baby from Africa. Without naming names, we all know of the most famous women on Earth right now creating somewhere in Africa a giant educational institute for young girls. A place to give them a chance to become educated and enjoy the benefits of a degree they never would have had. Well, Mrs richest women in the world, how about those same girls right here in America? What about them? Are there not thousands upon thousands of super poor deserving young girls here also? What about them?

I know this is probably far from politically correct (tough shit) but have you seen how much money all those famous actors and actresses make per year lately? Holy crap! You and I could live for a year on what they make "Per episode" on some of those silly weekly shows we drug ourselves out on.

I would ask them to forgo just one of their three mansions in Hollywood or get rid of just one super Jet and instead donate that money to....oh, I don't know....maybe a dozen super needy families right here in America? Maybe forgo that 3 months vacation for 30 of their best partying pals this summer in Haiti and instead keep a thousand children from starving to death this month right here in America?

Whatchathink?

Now click on the "Comments" link at the bottom of this blog and add your response or thoughts for others to see when they click on the "Comments" link (Try it now!). It makes it far more interesting if we make it a conversation, instead of just my bullshit. Thank you to those who take the time and effort to do so.....
COME ON..........DO IT!!!

Grown man crying..........

2011-05-05T10:05:00.000-07:00

I'm by anyone's standards a grown man. Like most men, I almost never cry. That I can remember at this point, I can count the times on one hand in my adult life. When my Dad died, then my Mom and when our Daughter was laying in the hospital on the edge of death (She survived fine in the end, thank you).

Like a lot of folks, I'm a fan of National Public Radio. I listen to it religiously every morning on my way to work and every evening on the way home. No screaming music or bullshit talk radio for me. I enjoy what I consider to be a station for intelligent, thoughtful people like I consider myself to be.

By the way. This week is their pledge time. Get your butt over to their website
(http://www.capradio.org/default.aspx) and share some of your wealth to keep this great service we all depend so heavily on going.

As we all know, the airwaves right now including Public Radio are filled to the brim with the death of Osama Bin Laden. This morning during the Morning Addition segment, a piece they call a driveway moment came on for me. That's what they call a story that you find so compelling that you stay in your car until it's over. Before this piece was over, I could barely see, I was crying so much. I was bawling like a baby after receiving their first shot in the leg at the doctors office.

Giving full credit to National Public Radio's Morning Addition segment, I feel compelled to pass the story on to you. This is straight off their website (May 5, 2011), verbatim.
Now this was in Mrs. Beverly Eckert's own words and voice. As you can imagine, she was gently crying throughout the entire telling. It was her voice and deeply felt emotions that finaly tipped me over the edge.

Beverly Eckert lost her husband, Sean Rooney, in the south tower of the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. She remembers her husband's warm brown eyes, dark curly hair, and that he was "a good hugger."

The two met at a high school dance, when they were only 16 years old. When Rooney died, they were 50.

On Sept. 11, Rooney called his wife at 9:30 a.m. He told her he was on the 105th floor, and he'd been trying to get out.

"He told me that he, you know, hadn't had any success and now the stairwell was full of smoke," Eckert says. "I asked if it hurt for him to breathe and he paused for a moment, and says, 'No.' He loved me enough to lie."

After a while, they stopped talking about escape routes and instead focused on the happiness they'd shared together.

"I told him that I wanted to be there with him, but he said, no, no, he wanted me to live a full life," she says.

As the smoke got thicker, Rooney whispered, " 'I love you,' over and over," Eckert says. "I just wanted to crawl through the phone lines to him, to hold him, one last time."

Then she heard a sharp crack, followed by the sound of an avalanche. The building was beginning to collapse. Eckert called Rooney's name into the phone repeatedly, and then she just sat there, pressing the phone to her heart.

"I think about that last half-hour with Sean all the time. I remember how I didn't want that day to end, terrible as it was, I didn't want to go to sleep because as long as I was awake, it was still a day that I'd shared with Sean," she says.

Rooney had kissed Eckert goodbye that morning before going to work. She says, "I could still say that was just a little while ago, that was only this morning. And I just think of myself as living life for both of us now. And I like to think that Sean would be proud of me."

So go ahead and ask me what I think of Osama Bin Laden's death. Should he have been captured and tried in a court of law? Should they show the pictures of him as proof of his death? Who should get credit for his capture and death?
To every question you might ask, my answer is exactly the same. I don't give a shit!
Mrs. Beverly Eckert's personal story is the only reality that matters at this point.

The rest is pure unadulterated bullshit.

Now click on the "Comments" link at the bottom of this blog and add your response or thoughts for others to see when they click on the "Comments" link (Try it now!). It makes it far more interesting if we make it a conversation, instead of just my bullshit. Thank you to those who take the time and effort to do so.....
COME ON..........DO IT!!!

Personal Responsibility?

2011-04-14T17:41:00.000-07:00

I was born and raised on a small farm in mid California. Everyone raised in those conditions and times learned very early in life that there were things out there that could possibly hurt you. We were taught to be careful in life but told that bad things could still happen to you and it was your responsibility to take care of yourself. Example.....One time I was playing over at my friends farm. Now his father had dug a huge hole in the ground. No idea why. Maybe he was putting in a septic tank or something. Here's the deal though. With such a tempting thing as a deep hole in the ground, where do you think me and my friend were playing? Yup...right there on the edge of that hole of course. Probably throwing rocks in or something young boys do.

Well, the inevitable happened and I fell in. Smacking down in the bottom of that big old hole, I broke my arm. As I lay there yelling, crying and screaming in pain, my friend ran and told his Mom what happened and they called my parents to tell them what happened. My Mom came and everyone dragged my sorry ass out of there and she took me to the local doc to get it fixed. Guess who got in trouble here? Me and my friend of course. All the way to the doctors office my Mom was berating me for doing such a stupid mindless thing as falling in that hole. I knew my friend was getting his ass chewed out real good for the same reason.

Now I'm telling you right now that the idea that my friends parents should be sued or held responsible for having this huge, dangerous hole for me to fall into did not even cross anyone's mind, much less my parents. The only person they were mad at was the people responsible for doing such a stupid thing and that was me and my friend. Can you imagine how different this scenario would be nowadays? Nowadays, not only would people sue those negligent land owners for not properly protecting innocent kids from such a dangerous situation, the people who owned that land might even lose the whole farm over this.

How idiotic is that? Nowadays the injured party would not even feel bad about suing because it's not personal, you see. That's what insurance is for. With the advent of insurance, we have lost our sense of responsibility of our own actions.

Another example. When I was in high school, there were a couple of cool things all of us did. One would be to hang out at the bowling alley and the other would be to go roller skating. Now I remember plain as day, even at that age that as we walked into the roller skating rink, there was a huge sign up on the wall that said:
"Skate at your own risk". As far as everyone was concerned at that time it was a done deal with that sign. It made it perfectly clear that it was our choice and responsibility if anything were to happen while skating.

Another example we've all heard about is the lady who spilled her hot coffee she just bought at a McDonald's and won millions! Now clearly she was not responsible to make damn sure she was careful with that coffee. The restaurant was negligent for having the coffee too hot.

One of the insane things that drives me crazy nowadays are those jerks, mainly in politics both national and local who constantly try and make everything perfectly safe for us. Impossible, I say. What ever happened to the reality of "Shit happens"? Just to make a very clear, concise and direct point. In my perfect world, which doesn't exist of course, when some poor unfortunate kid fell down in the skating rink and became paralyzed from the neck down, everyone would of course feel terrible for him or her but that would be that. His or her parents or family would just have to deal with this unfortunate and sad situation themselves as humans have done all throughout history. The skating rink or society in general would have nothing to do with it.

Whatchathink?

Now click on the "Comments" link at the bottom of this blog and add your response or thoughts for others to see when they click on the "Comments" link (Try it now!). It makes it far more interesting if we make it a conversation, instead of just my bullshit. Thank you to those who take the time and effort to do so.....
COME ON..........DO IT!!!

Garbage in, garbage out.

2011-04-10T16:17:00.000-07:00

Has anyone else noticed the shadowy, slowly creeping, insidious "Dumbing down" intellectual place we seem to be entering nowadays? Let me take a wild guess here that the main cause is our entire drugged, hooked, obsessive fascination with "The Media". They very well might be our present day demon. The demon who is determined to erode our minds with trivial, shallow junk. Stuff about as stimulating as watching paint dry.

Lets take a good cold hard look at what's going on with the media. Starting with the News. You've all heard that only bad news sells? A stupid concept in my humble opinion but there it is folks. Doesn't matter in the slightest which news program you watch or listen to, the only things you're going to learn is how the world is about to end in one catastrophic way or another. Here's the truth though if you read between the lines. Pretty often the normal news programs will have a small story about this amazing man or women who does some absolutely stupendously wonderful thing for mankind out of the kindness of their ample hearts. Helps drug addicts or provides housing for the poor or started an organization to show our military people how thankful we are for their sacrifices.

I could go on with examples for pages here but you know what I'm talking about. These geniuses are most always just one person. In a lot of cases, if that one person went away, the whole fantastic organization would just melt away. Here's the thing though. Those unbelievable folks are out there right now doing stone cold miracles. There out there by the millions, all over the world much less. So, how come the "News" doesn't tell us all about their good deeds and accomplishments? Stories about these kinds of people would certainly be good food for our minds and souls huh? I'm going to take a wild guess that for every negative thing going on in the world right this second, there are thousands of purely wonderful and positive things happening also. Remember the golden rule though......Only bad news sells.

OK how about the general entertainment media now? If you have a bit of age on your bones, you'll remember that Movies and Television's early days had programs and shows that were intellectually stimulating. Alfred Hitchcock for instance put the fear in your imagination and intellect instead of throwing a bucket of blood and guts in your face. The shows had at least a modicum of substance and value. They set up situations that demanded your complete attention.

Nowadays? I personally think there are a few little diamonds in the ruff out there at this time as I'm sure you do. The vast majority though is pure unadulterated garbage. I would go so far here as calling it poison garbage. Ultimately insidious, dangerous garbage. Instead of challenging our minds, it's like having that 14th beer, third glass of wine or third joint. You've gone from fun to stupidity. The creators of the majority of programs or movies being made now could care less about the effects of the madness and stupidity their pumping in our vanes causes. They have the same exact agenda that all the other media outlets have. That's to take as much money out of our pockets they can and putting it in theirs.

The main point I'm trying to make here is we have let ourselves slowly but surely be pulled into the media's version of reality but it's all a damn lie. It's all not only false but mind numbing crap designed to rob us of our minds and turn us into something we clearly were not meant to be. Humans are the most amazing things on the planet. We were strong enough to pull ourselves out of the dirt and caves of long ago to be the creators of all the amazing, creative, artistic and useful things we have now.
The only thing I can think to do is try with all my might to remember it's all a bunch of bull pucky. It's not real. It's all just crap to draw you in and get your money. I think I would much rather spend my money on that first glass of wine.

My advise? Sorry, don't have any. Nor am I presumptuous enough to think I could tell anyone else what to do. Just more of my Esoteric Mumblings.

Now click on the "Comments" link at the bottom of this blog and add your response or thoughts for others to see when they click on the "Comments" link (Try it now!). It makes it far more interesting if we make it a conversation, instead of just my bullshit. Thank you to those who take the time and effort to do so.....
COME ON..........DO IT!!!

Random thoughts, or just magic?

2011-03-11T14:10:00.000-08:00

Being an amateur writer in the true sense of the word but enjoying the hell out of myself, there are some things I find amazingly interesting but just flat out don't understand about the whole writing process. I'm positive I'm not the first amateur writer to ask these questions.

Writing these rather small column type pieces is actually quite easy for me. All I need to start the faucet flowing is what I call just a seed of an idea. Almost always not from my feeble mind. Usually gleaned from some conversation at my place of business. It turns out that normal, everyday folks have great ideas, opinions and thoughts and can articulate them in interesting, intelligent and creative ways, if given half a chance. So that "seed" I speak of is actually one hell of a good head start for my blathering on and on about a subject.

The truth is once I get a seed, such as the seed of todays piece, which was simply "Where in the hell do writers get their ideas from?", I just set down as I'm doing right this minute and like magic, all these hopefully pertinent and applicable to the subject words just start flowing out of me like water onto the screen, using the keyboard strokes. I consider myself lucky because back in high school, while choosing which courses to take, my choices included "Typing". Now back then only girls took typing, so of course that appealed to me. Being the only guy with all these pretty girls sounded good to me. Also, typing seemed like it would be a pretty easy class, especially compared to things like Math(Yuk)or History(yuk and 1/2). So typing it was for three straight years. Didn't use that skill for years but now it paid off in spades for me.
See, there's an example of fill thoughts just to add to the story and take up space....heh.....heh....

OK, back to the subject at hand. I have to admit with just a touch of humble pride that quite a few times in the recent past, folks have said to me that my writing was pretty good and why don't I write a book? Well........On to another side tangent here for just a moment. I'm actually one of those crazy reading nut cases. Without exaggerating, I would take a wild guess, I've read thousands of books in my life but write a book? Holy Molly!

How do those great adventure writers do that? To make up an entire alternate reality or universe in the case of Science Fiction or Fantasy writers. Then fill it with original characters, places, scenes, timescapes, conversations, action sequences, danger, love scenes maybe including interesting and creative mysteries? Where do their original ideas come from? I've actually heard several writers say something like this. "I have no idea where those things come from. I just set down and things like that just come out of no where. Almost like I'm just the worker bee and someone or something else is feeding these ideas into my mind."

I once read a book by this psychiatrist by the name of Fritz Pearls. He developed the Gestalt Therapy model back in the 60's to help people hopefully dump all the built up crap out of their systems that might be holding them down. Wew...How's that for nonsense filler? The important thing I did take away from reading his junk though was he said everybody had a book in them if they would just set down and start writing without any editing at all. Just let it flow out like water.

So, am I going to write the next great novel of the universe? How should I know? I'm just the worker bee here, ya know....

So.....here's your assignment for today kids. Set down at your computer or get out a piece of paper and pen and just start writing. See what happens. I'm going to guess here that you'll be pleasantly surprised at what comes out in the end. Hell, who knows. Maybe you'll be one of those people who end up with a second successful career as a famous rich writer.

Now click on the "Comments" link at the bottom of this blog and add your response or thoughts for others to see when they click on the "Comments" link (Try it now!). It makes it far more interesting if we make it a conversation, instead of just my bullshit. Thank you to those who take the time and effort to do so.....
COME ON..........DO IT!!!

Community Involvement....

2011-02-04T12:22:00.000-08:00

I've had a business in a very small community for something like 34 years now. I've lived in another very small community for something like 23 years now. In both of those instances, a recurring theme and complaint I've heard over and over from the locals in one form or another is the fact that a lot of folks who live there don't seem to participate in the local clubs, organizations or events that come and go, sometimes yearly or more often. A lot of those complainers always wonder why more people who move there don't become involved in the local happenings.

Even I, in the beginning years of working and living in these small communities had the same disappointments, to say the least. Years ago, I got into the whole website building business. I came up with an idea everyone who heard about thought was a wonderful and grand idea. I noticed back in the early days of the Internet that large towns and communities had these great websites. Websites that gave all kinds of information about the towns or communities. People from all over the world could simply go to the town website to learn everything they needed to know about that town.

So, my grand idea for my own new successful business was to build both of those towns a great, creative, informative website. Now get this! My thought was to do this FREE! No charge whatsoever from the community. What I did do however was to offer to build all the small businesses in that town a website and maintain it for a relatively small fee. The few businesses who already had a website in those early years could pay me to have a link directly to their website, so potential customers could access information about their business straight from the community website.

I even had town meetings with all the interested parties and businesses present. I would then present my idea with power point presentations to educate everyone about this service I was offering. Well everyone thought it was a great idea. YEA! They would say. Lets do this!

The only thing I requested and expected from the local involved folks was for people from each of the clubs, organizations and event people to feed me any information they wanted others to see on the website. I would do all the technical work on the website FREE!

So, I went about the labor intensive work of building two small local towns websites, so the world could access information about them. Then I rounded up quite a few local businesses that were interested in having me build them websites or have links to their websites. I then created all those websites and added all the links of the others.

Then went in person to all the clubs, organizations and event people to try and get them to assign the job of a liaison between their clubs and me. People who would feed me via e-mail anything they wanted to have on the website for the world to see. Well, everything went pretty damn well for the first year or so, then slowly but surely those people assigned to talk to me got slower and slower. So I then went back out to reinvigorate them into action again. Again it worked for a while, then slowly went away. With very little new information on the websites, the businesses began to logically slowly drop out also. The truth about websites, whether they are about towns or are business websites is the towns or owners of the businesses have to constantly update them with new exciting information. Without this dynamic, you might as well shut them down. They just set there and die a slow and painful death.

Well.........there finally came a time when I decided that as long as I was the "Super salesman personified" everything went pretty well. You know what though. I was always only interested in being the technical administrator, not the "Used Car Salesman of the month" with this. So eventually I shut both of the websites down and both these small towns lost an unbelievable resource back in those early Internet days to show the world what they had to offer.

I came away from this very telling experience with a far better understanding of the dynamics of the whole small town "Community Involvement" realities. The cold hard truth about these folks is new people who move to these small communities are generally people trying to escape the whole big city overcrowding, noise and "neighbors in your face" experiences. They are clearly trying to avoid the huddled masses any way they can. They are mostly rather "recluse" and came there to be able to do that very thing.

So where does all these truths leave the civic minded folks who want to become involved in their communities and make them a better place to live? The ones who are constantly complaining about the lack of Community Involvement from most people? Well, as anyone knows who tries to get folks "involved", you learn right away that each club, organization and event actually only has a very few energetic, great volunteers who do ALL the work involved in making it happen. Any others that come to the events just come on show day and enjoy the benefits of these few people's efforts. I'm not judging anyone here. This is just the reality of it.

So everyone else should at least just appreciate the hell out of the 4 or 5 nice, great people in each of these clubs who are willing and able to make these fun, entertaining events happen. The next time you're standing there enjoying the wine, eating the delicious little sandwiches someone went to all the trouble to make. Profusely thank those 4-5 people for all they do.

Now click on the "Comments" link at the bottom of this blog and add your response or thoughts for others to see when they click on the "Comments" link (Try it now!). It makes it far more interesting if we make it a conversation, instead of just my bullshit. Thank you to those who take the time and effort to do so.....
COME ON..........DO IT!!!

Create your own games, then plan on winning!

2011-01-19T09:35:00.000-08:00

I think most folks by far just travel through life taking whatever is handed to them without much thought. With humans, there would be basically sheep types and then there would be the sheep herders. Most societies don't try and teach folks to aspire to sheepherder status at all. I guess under the guise of politeness, civility and just trying to get along with others, the sheep really don't want to stand out from the crowd.

Now this is all fine and good for a while but the truth is, the sheep almost never get anything they really want or need out of life. They tend to except blandness, sameness and safety over adventure, creativity or just taking chances. Being herded around by the man with the whistle and stick, they only get to eat the grass already stomped down by the masses, instead of the fresh tasty stuff just over the hill.

Seems to me the first thing one has to do to get what one wants and needs out of this very limited span of time on this magical blue ball we're standing on is to start taking stock of ourselves. The clear truth is each of us should be the dictator in control of our own personal domains. Creating our own game and then making sure we are the winner. We sure shouldn't depend on some Sheepherder to establish our path on this journey, now should we?

So the next time you walk into a store or any kind of business for that matter. Walk in with your own personal take charge attitude. Walk in with purpose. Hold your head high and look completely in control of yourself. Lets look at two ways to get things done in there. You could say what most people would say. Like "Please, do you think it would be possible for you to do this or that for me"? How about instead saying "Hi, here's what you're going to do for me today, and here's how you're going to do it"?

Here's where it gets interesting to me. A lot of times the business or person you're dealing with will say something like "I'm sorry sir but we don't do that. Our rules/protocols don't allow that". At that point, you have a couple of choices. The first of course is to start arguing your case with this person, trying to talk him/her into doing what you need. The second and better choice by far is to completely bypass this person all together as soon as possible. You could say "Ok Sir/Mame, the last think I want to do here is waste your valuable time and certainly not mine. I can see you don't have the authority to help me. Please go get your superior. He'll know how to handle this".

Again start out by not demanding anything. Just telling this "superior" what you expect him/her to do for you. Don't raise your voice. Just look straight into his/her eyes and tell them in a calm authoritarian voice how it's going to happen. Remember.....important point here. You're not "asking" them to do anything. You're "telling" them what needs to be done and how to do it. Remember. You are the dictator in control of your life and of this situation. Have absolutely no doubt of that at any time with your negotiations with this person or business. Doubt and insecurity leaks out of your pores like sweat, leaving a stain everyone can see.

Creating this kind of attitude in oneself leaves no room for others to cheat, rob, trick, cajole or in any way take advantage of you. All this is true in our personal lives also. People with lots of friends are the types that just barge right into others lives and just take over. Life doesn't come knocking on our doors. You have to go out and kick down doors and position yourself where you want to be, on your own terms.

The opposite of a winner is not a loser - it is a quitter. People who "win" at life, who accomplish their goals and do great things, are those who keep trying. Instead of letting a little setback knock them off course, they dust themselves off and take another go at it. I believe we were all born to win, but to be a winner, you must plan to win, prepare to win, and expect to win. That complete confidence is the grease and engine that will make it happen.

Here goes the old platitudes, in case you need them to meditate too.

Grabbing the bull by the horns. Dancing your own dance. Being in control. Setting your own rules of life. Being the dictator in control of your domain. Creating your own game and then making sure you're the winner. Think big - dare to dream. Put in the extra mile.
Above all else. Don't wait for anything to happen. Get out there and make it happen!

Now click on the "Comments" link at the bottom of this blog and add your response or thoughts for others to see when they click on the "Comments" link (Try it now!). It makes it far more interesting if we make it a conversation, instead of just my bullshit. Thank you to those who take the time and effort to do so.....
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A common man's perspective

2011-01-16T16:07:00.000-08:00

This is an e-mail response I got back from a very good friend. In this wild world of the Internet, we've never actually met in person at all. I became "net" friends with him on a Helicopter Pilot forum I discovered through my Daughters career with those weird ass machines. He visits the forum often to give new pilots the experience of his years of flying them safely and with great intelligence. I liked him immediately because of his great writing skills and attitude toward young people trying to break into the Helicopter Pilot industry.

He has always been nothing but positive about the industry and life in general. However, in just the last few months, I've seen him on his Face book page get caught up in all the negative political spin. I felt the need as a friend to write him a note telling him of my concerns. He wrote this back and as usual, it's so well written and I think perfectly reflects what a lot of, if not the majority of Americans are going through right now, that I thought it worthwhile to let all my blog readers hear what his response back to me was.

I'm keeping him anonymous for his own privacy.

Here is his letter back to me.....

First of all, you never have to worry about stepping "beyond your realm" with me. Friends are friends are friends, whether we've ever met face to face or not, and I consider you a very good friend indeed. I always welcome this kind of email from friends and family, because they make me take a look at myself. A reality check of sorts, if you will. That's never a bad thing in my estimation, and I'm not one to go getting defensive because I know the sentiments come from a genuine concern. I appreciate that more than words can say. I'm nowhere near perfect, so I can always use some words of wisdom from a friend!

I've caught myself on many occasions getting sucked into the negativity of the political realm and allowing myself to get swept up in the foolishness of it all. Being a passionate person, all too often I have a tendency to go overboard and let my emotions get the better of me. I have many hot button pet peeves that will set me off in a heartbeat and once I get going, I have a hard time stopping myself.

To name just a few:

Illegal immigration - I think it's just an absolute slap in the face to this nation, and to every immigrant who's ever gone through the process of coming here in accordance with our laws that our government is so incredibly willing to look the other way with regards to the rampant invasion we're experiencing;

Partisan politics - This country cannot survive as a nation divided along political lines. We don't have to agree on every issue, but we DO have to learn to work together and compromise for the greater good of the American people. It's absurd that our "leaders" act like spoiled children, and we allow them to get away with it. It's out of control and it needs to stop;

"Affirmative action" - There was a time when minorities might have needed an extra leg up, but that time is long gone. Nowadays, I just see quotas and affirmative action programs as a way to simply lower the standards for those who are either incapable or unwilling to meet the established standard. I've seen too many friends and family members who were far more qualified, lose out on jobs and scholarships for no other reason than their skin was simply the wrong color. These programs provide no motivation for self-improvement, and foster a society of people who have a sense of entitlement just because they're from a certain ethnic group. The ironic thing is they condone discrimination, even though that's exactly what they were designed to prevent. I think there should be one standard for everyone, and if you do not yet meet that standard, get off your ass and solve the problem. Don't sit around and wait for someone to lower the standard for you;

Anyone with a sense of entitlement - This country is great because people used to believe in doing an honest days' work for an honest days' pay. People knew that if they ever wanted to improve their lot in life, it would take hard work, motivation, and perseverance. Today, it seems too many people feel that they are "owed" something for nothing. More and more it seems people are just willing to sit around and stick their hands out and wait for someone to come along and give them something. I believe that if you want something, you go out and bust your ass to get it. I know you understand this as a self-employed business owner! ;-)

Hypocrites and Liars - Nothing chaps my rosy red ass quite as much as someone who falls into one or both of these categories. I find them more and more often anymore. Doesn't matter if they're slick salesmen, politicians, or whomever. I hate being lied to, I hate being ripped off, and I hate double standards (hence my FB photo album). In my chosen career, my life depends on honesty and integrity. I refuse to tolerate anyone who lacks either.

The above issues and topics will get me spun up fairly quickly and once I start seeing red, the horns come out and I start blowing smoke out of my nose and pawing at the ground. I absolutely have an incredibly fiery temper, though I do realize it and therefore do my very best to keep it in check. I guess it's the Italian in me ;-)

As a student of history, intellectually I realize that this time is just a downturn in our country's cyclical history and that things will get better, as they always do. There have been many before, and this likely will not be the last. On an emotional level though, I am not old enough to remember the last time our nation was in such a predicament. It's one thing to read about it in a textbook, it's completely different to be in the moment and experiencing it as it happens. I guess the doomsday stuff is a result of this. I just wonder how we can stop this snowball when it seems to be gaining speed and it's going down a very slippery slope. It scares me sometimes, to think about what the world and our country might be like when my Daughter has children of her own. I think this is part of the reason I get such a doom and gloom attitude at times. Just fear for what might become based on what I see in the world around me today. It's easier to see the bad than the good, and sometimes I get caught up in it all. I know in my heart of hearts that as you said, most people are good, rational, intelligent human beings. I guess I just need to try to focus on that a little more.

Like I said on my Face Book Page, I consider myself an independent, tho my tendencies are definitely more right-leaning than left. That said, there are plenty of things (gay marriage for one) that I agree with on the left side of the fence that would get me tarred and feathered with my righty friends. The problem is, I don't really care what anyone thinks of my political views, morals, or preferences. I'm always happy to explain myself and my beliefs to anyone who asks. I also love a good, civil debate on the topics when someone has a differing opinion as that is how I expand my horizons and learn. Basically what comes down to is that I just believe in what I think is right, no matter which political group endorses or condemns it.

On the Helicopter Pilot Forum, I do my very best to always be positive and helpful. Thats what that forum is for in my estimation, so that's what I try to present there. I do get caught up in petty arguements and Urinary Olympiads even in there, though I certainly try not to. I genuinely believe in paying it forward, and helping those who want to achieve what I've already achieved (or hopefully they want to do better than me!). On Facebook, it's more of whatever my day brings. Flying Pediatric and Neonatal transport teams for the last 8 months, I've seen some pretty depressing things so I know my FB statuses have reflected that. I'd say on an every day basis, I am far more like the persona you see in the Helicopter Forum, but this past year has been very rough on me and I'm sure that's come out in my FB postings. I do try to see the positive in things, but being an imperfect person, I know I do get negative sometimes. I will endeavor to keep that in mind in this coming year, and do my best to keep it from getting the better of me.

I'll tell you this much, I don't have many friends who would care enough to bring such concerns to my attention, so the fact that you wrote to me means a great deal. Thank you for watching my back, thank you for all the kind words, and thank you for being such an awesome friend. It is an honor to be able to call you my friend, and I hope someday I can give you as much as you've given me through the years. Your support, encouragement, kind words and wisdom have meant so much to me. Thank you.

Blue Skies and Tailwinds my friend.

Do you see why I consider him such an amazing, intelligent person? We need more people with his caring intelligence and integrety, that's for sure.

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Misinformation versus Truth.....

2011-01-14T09:33:00.000-08:00

Like a lot of folks, I listen to National Public Radio each day on my way to and from work on the car radio. I'll admit that I feel their news is by far the most complete, non-biased and lacking of any political agenda out there on all the mostly bullshit airwaves. I do know in the mostly extremist world, they would adamantly disagree with my analysis but tough shit!

Sooooooooooooo, this morning they had this report I personally found extremely interesting and informative. Like most news right now, the subject was how much responsibility do the various extremist idiots on both sides of our political system need to take for this present assassination attempt and all the others in the past.

I have to admit right here and now that my very last blog tried to deal with this issue also. As you can see if you read that one, I too got caught up in considering blaming the extremist news idiots for influencing these crazies to shoot politicians.

It's well known that in March 1981, John Hinckley attempted to assassinate Ronald Reagan. What is not well known is that several years later, the life of President Reagan and the life of his vice president, George H.W. Bush, were threatened again in fact, not just once. In the space of 18 months, four situations came to the attention of the Secret Service.

In two of these incidents, people with weapons and an intent to kill appeared at public events. In the two other incidents, the would-be assassins were intercepted before the events. Ultimately, all four cases were prosecuted. Two were convicted, and two were sent to psychiatric facilities, though the government didn't exactly advertise it.

These were not stories that hit the news, but they were situations that caused great concern for protectors. At that point in time the Secret Service decided they would like to know more about the behaviors of these people. So they undertook the most extensive study of assassins and would-be assassins ever done.

In the Secret Service Exception Case Study Project, they identified 83 people who had completed assassinations or made assassination attempts since 1949 — some cases known to the public, some not — and collected every document they could find. They also went to visit many of these people in jail.

They went with a very particular pitch: They would say, "We're here because we're in the business of trying to protect people and prevent these kinds of attacks. You are one of the few experts because you've engaged in this behavior. We would like to talk to you to understand your perspectives, your life". Most said they'd be very glad to talk.

The researchers asked prisoners how they chose targets, how they prepared. They inquired about their motives, every intimate detail of their process. After they asked these questions, they combined the answers with other sources and analyzed the information. In 1999, they published their results in The Journal of Forensic Sciences.

Nonpolitical Killers
The insights of this study are interesting to review in light of the Arizona shooting, though obviously we still don't know that much about Jared Loughner, the suspect in the attack, or his motives. Perhaps the most interesting finding is that according this study, assassinations of political figures were almost never for political reasons.

Ok, now here is where it gets super interesting I think. It was very, very rare for the primary motive to be political, though there were a number of attackers who appeared to clothe their motives with some political rhetoric. What emerges from the study is that rather than being politically motivated, many of the assassins and would-be assassins simply felt invisible and worthless. In the year before their attacks, most struggled with acute reversals and disappointment in their lives, which the paper argues, was the true motive. They didn't want to see themselves as nonentities. They experienced failure after failure after failure, and decided that rather than being a "nobody", they wanted to be a "somebody".

So these murderers or potential murderers chose their victims almost exclusively for the fame they thought they would get out of the deal, not for any particular political agenda at all. For example, there was one guy who was fixated on his governor until he heard that the vice president was coming to his area. He said he had read enough to know that there hadn't been anybody who had attempted to assassinate a sitting vice president. He reasoned that he would become far more famous killing a Vice President than his Governor.

Another assumption people make about assassins is that they're insane — people completely divorced from reality. But this study — to a degree — rejects that idea as too simplistic. The way these people sought to address what they saw as their main problems — anonymity and failure — wasn't inherently crazy at all. They had their share of mental problems for sure but don't we all?

So at a Safeway in Tuscon, U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords became the latest public servant caught in the cross hairs of an attacker's gun. This study suggests the attempt may have been driven by very powerful and personal motives.

Crazy huh? Just when everyone thinks they have it all figured out, along comes a very extensive and well thought out long term professional study to throw a heavy dose of water and reality on our completely misguided explanations.

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America needs to start talking, instead of blaming

2011-01-10T17:28:00.000-08:00

For all those who actually read most of my blogs, you know I've brought this subject up several times and ways, through the years. In fact the very last one was about this exact subject.

On a quick side note, would you believe I've just recently written my 100th blog. Where oh where does the time go and where oh where does all that bullshit come from? I knew I had a pretty big head because most stores don't carry my size hat but it does amaze me to reach that pinnacle of Esoteric Mumblings to be sure.

As I said, I've been writing about this subject a few times for years now and in my humble opinion (there's that odd, contradictory thought again), it's about time pretty much all the news media are FINALLY just starting to want to talk about it.

The "it" here is of course the clear responsibility all the news sources have to start taking for all the severe, extremist, partisan and clearly dangerous rhetoric they are all spewing more and more all the time. I'm sure for most of those Talk Radio and Television nut cases, it started out as simply an opinion wave they started and the money just started pouring in as more and more ignorant people who forgot to think for themselves jumped on their stupid ass bandwagons.

I have no idea if Jared Loughner who tried to assassinate Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and still might succeed, had any influences from the extremist asses but I can tell you this. It doesn't matter in the slightest which side of the stupid political fence these complete morons are on. ALL the talking heads need to turn down their hate and blame before we have another civil war between groups of extremist with middle America caught up in their insanity. Lets get something perfectly clear here. These groups of idiots with their extremist bullshit are a minority. The majority of real, intelligent Americans have not swallowed the bullshit put out by these nut cases and just wish all this stupidity would just go away.

Like I said, I'm super glad all the news organizations are starting to at least talk about their responsibilities in promoting all this hate and blame. Of course in the beginning of these very important conversations, I'm still hearing both extremist sides trying to blame the other side for everything. "Jared Loughner is a left wing extremist" says the right side. "Jared Loughner is a right wing extremist" says the left side. Can't both sides see how incredibly stupid and childish they all sound right now. They ALL sound like a bunch of kids on the Kindergarten playground yelling and screaming at each other. It's time to GROW THE HELL UP KIDS.......

In total, 19 people were shot in the rampage outside a supermarket where Giffords held her meeting. Giffords was shot in the head, and remains in intensive care.
Among the six people killed were a 9-year-old girl who was born on the day of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and was interested in public service, as well as one of Giffords' aides.

Giffords' brother-in-law, Scott, the commanding officer of the space shuttle, spoke over the radio. Flight controllers in Houston fell silent. "As I look out the window, I see a very beautiful planet that seems very inviting and peaceful," he said. "Unfortunately, it is not." "These days, we are constantly reminded of the unspeakable acts of violence and damage we can inflict upon one another, not just with our actions, but also with our irresponsible words," he said. "We're better than this," he said. "We must do better."

Yes, we are Scott. Other than a fringe of nut cases in American, the average intelligent American is indeed far, far better than that.

Robert E. Lee during the Civil War told his solders to not call or think about the other side as "Enemies". They were to call them "Opponents". Can you believe the incredable wisdom involved in that one thought and rule back then?

I am an ardent believer in the concept and stated law in America of freedom of speech but clearly we are going to have to somehow tell all the idiot, screaming, neck muscles sticking out, spit flying out of their mouths nut cases trying to blame the other half of the public for tearing the country apart to SHUT THE HELL UP and start being responsible for their actions. If they want to keep their flaming income and listeners in tact and actually do some good for society, they should slow down, quit the blaming and try and be a catalyst for real answers for our many problems here in America.

Maybe they could try and bring intelligence and pride back into the average Americans life instead of hate and fear. Wouldn't that be a breath of fresh air?

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Isn't it about time to try and heal the split, in America?

2011-01-03T12:27:00.000-08:00

Divisiveness galore. That would pretty much sum up the political climate in America and possibly the world right about now, wouldn't it? Somehow we in America went from a country joined in our quest for freedom from tyranny and religion to a country split right about the middle. With extremism at the outer edges moving toward the apparently very few in the middle.

This is an era where partisan politics seems to have split America right down the middle and political debate can grow so heated that most folks choose to avoid the topic altogether. Those who have joined either side of the extremist movements, whether that be the right wing or left are all convinced their political agendas are the one and only truth and the other side is literally trying to destroy the America we all revere and love so much.

If one were to travel from coast to coast in order to find out why political discourse regarding public affairs has become so disconnected, you would be shocked and amazed at how dysfunctional a lot of extremist have became. What does it mean for the future of our country when we can't even discuss our political differences in a civil manner anymore, and who has the authority to say what's truly "right" or "wrong" anyway when it comes to such hot button issues as abortion and gay marriage.

Permanently competitive and ideologically charged politics is a new reality for America. Governing the United States requires agreement among our basically two party system. America's present unstable power politics generates relentlessly bitter conflicts over a huge range of domestic and foreign policies and motivates activists in both parties to constantly compete fiercely all the time.

All us regular, intelligent middle of the road folks are now experiencing the results of this insane competition between the extreme right and the extreme left. "The squeaky wheel gets the grease", seems to be the rule nowadays. Both sides try to out shout each other for our attention. Both sides put out mostly misinformation and at times, flat out lies about the other side to further their obnoxious, outlandish, ignorant agendas, with no care at all about what's best for "the people".

Like the title of this piece says, isn't it about time we all try and heal the split, in America? This ideological split is slowly but surely poisoning our way of life. Each idiot, extremist side tries to blame the other side for all our ills. I say it's them and their insanity that is the cause of most of our problems. If they would simply shut the hell up about their own sick, stupid, ignorant agendas and start trying to contribute to real, honest solutions we can all agree with, "we the people" are capable of solving our many problems, one at a time.

The first step in my humble opinion (do I even have any of those?) is for everyone to admit that this partisan politics we find ourselves in right now is a major part of all our problems and needs to go away. All those nutcases need to crawl back in their bomb shelters, close and lock the door and stay away from the rest of us for a time. Lets give "The people" a chance to solve some of these things instead of those shouting, obnoxious, eyes bugged out nutcases on the radio and other obscure news organizations that have cropped up in the last couple of years.

Ok................whatsayyou?

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"The end is near" said the crazy guy on the corner.

2010-12-31T09:09:00.001-08:00

One of my super pet peeves is all the Doom and Gloomers who came crawling out of the woodwork in the last couple of years. All those idiots who claim to know the future and for them, the future is none too good, to say the least. Most of them belong to or subscribe to some extreme political cult or group. They only listen to talk/junk radio fat ass drug addict idiots and believe every word they hear.

For them, the main stream media are all lying to us on every front. They basically blame them for all our woes. They pine for the "good old days", when they thought life was basically "black and white". You know..........The guy with the white hat loved, protected the citizens and was always good, pure of mind and heart and never did anything wrong at all. Now.........The guy with the black hat was the devil incarnate. He was a crook, mean to small children and would rape and molest all the women in the neighborhood without a second thought to what was right or wrong.

These Doom and Gloomers really started big time during the so-called year 2000 computer disaster, which of course like everything else they freak out about never even happened at all. As far as I know, NOTHING whatsoever happened! Back then all these crazies dug huge holes in their backyard, lined the walls with 4" impenetrable metal and stocked up their hidy hole with enough food to last for the few years they thought the end of the world would take to catch up with them. Then they went out and bought up every bullet within 50 miles of their new home in the dirt to be able to protect themselves from the unshaven masses who were for sure coming to try and rape and pillage their loving families.

Now of course they all have rotting, stinking, putrid food they need to deal with. They also drove the price of ammunition through the sky with their idiocy. Now bullets cost more than gold, thank you very much...Maybe after they clean all the rotten food and ammunition out of their special holes in the ground, their children and grandchildren will at least have a fort they can play in huh?

All throughout history there have been nut cases standing on the corner with hand drawn signs that say "The end is near". I wouldn't doubt if they even had savage nut cases as far back as the cave man days screaming about the local volcanoes about to erupt because they thought the other tribes were not paying enough attention to whatever gods they believed in at that time.

So.........believe it or not, after all the Doom and Gloom predictions about the world as we know it ending because of our new president or any number of other stupid reasons put out by the extremist, we're still doing just fine, thank you. Matter of fact, there are clear signs that everything is creeping very slowly to be sure, back toward whatever will be our new normalcy in these interesting times we find our selves in at this time in history.

Sometimes the Doom and Gloomers even try and compare our present temporary recession to the Great Depression. Can you believe that? Have you seen pictures of those poor folks back in those times. Holy Shit. We're all rich beyond imagination compared to those times. Back then, there was no safety net of any kind for those poor souls. No welfare. No food stamps. No nothin! There was starvation, for heavens sake back then. Now days, with the wonderful outpouring of food, clothing and housing available for the poorest of the poor, we have it made in general compared to those terrible and unfortunate days.

There's nothing I can say to the Doom and Gloomers that will make them understand how out of touch and crazy they are, other than to tell them to shut the damn radio off, but for the rest of us.............

Just relax folks. Slowly but surely, the same as the other approximately dozen temporary recessions we have already lived through, the economy will get better. Americans are the most resourceful, creative people on the planet and will be just fine in the long run. The job market will start slowly growing with time. Even losing some of our manufacturing base is temporary. With all the new "green technologies" coming along and being invented daily, new job skills will be necessary, which will put people back to work eventually.

At this point in time, the only people I personaly feel sorry for are people who are subjected to the Doom and Gloomer's crazy rants. I'm guessing these poor folks make any excuse they can to get the hell away from these nutcases as soon as they can. As the title of this piece says:
"The end is near" said the crazy guy on the corner", as normal, sane people just shake their heads, laugh and move their families to the other side of the street for their own safety..........

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Christmas, oh so magical. Or is it?

2010-12-23T08:50:00.000-08:00

Christmas for everyone is assumed to be the most magical, amazing, wonderful time of the year. A time when all family's make a special effort to get back in close, personal contact with all their loving relatives and friends. Often times, this really only happens this one time each year, which should make it even more special.

Christmas starts out for all of us as this crazy, wild, huge event that slowly becomes more and more real and important starting from the day we are born. It's a time when as children, all of the sudden out of no where, relatives we might almost never see show up at our homes with smiles and love shinning in their eyes and souls. A time when we re-connect with people we have a blood connection with or those who married or coupled with our blood relatives.

All of the sudden our homes become this loud, happy, huggy and warm place where nothing bad could possibly happen. It re-affirms how life can be a wonderful and fulfilling experience for all. Our homes become this special place with the amazing smells of Aunt Gertrude's yearly dishes that taste oh so good. Everyone has their own special dishes that fill the home with aromas from heaven. We all eat far, far too much of everything and every meal includes the obligatory moans and groans of being too full at the end of each meal.

Okay. That's the dream Christmas and possible reality for a lot of folks lucky enough to have a large loving family who either lives close by or are willing to travel across the country to end up in one special home each year, sharing their love for each other openly and with great glee.

The sad truth for so many is as we grow older and most of the children move off to have their own families and realities, it becomes harder and harder to get together at all. Then there are those who had those times only when they were little kids. Then their brothers and sisters, if they had any at all, slowly became estranged from each other for tons of stupid but real reasons. In adulthood, they might even now be in a place where they are so dysfunctional that they don't even talk to each other at all now. As sad as that seems to happy families, there are a lot of people out in the world in that position.

For them the whole Christmas season becomes this sad, lonely time of the year. We've all heard about the incredible and unfortunate amount of intense depression, even suicides that happen during the Christmas season each year.

I'm not writing this piece to put a damper on the season for folks but to just point out that Christmas is not always this perfect, wonderful, magical thing for an awful lot of folks. These people could and should get love, comfort and understanding from everyone around them. If you know of anyone like this as I'm sure you do if you look carefully around you, lets all take even just a moment out of our hectic lives to do something special for these deserving people who don't have these great big loud, loving family's around to give them a huge group hug we all crave so much.

Just taking the time to spend a few moments with them. Giving them a call out of the blue to wish them a Merry Christmas. Giving them a small but thoughtful present. Just letting them know that you do care about them, even in just a small way most likely would make them feel wanted and cared about at this special time.

Since I do believe in some kind of Karma, I believe this goodwill will come back to you in spades if not now, someday soon.

Oh yeah. Merry Christmas to all of you and I hope we all have a wonderful, prosperous New Year.

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Most people really are quite amazing....

2010-12-16T18:32:00.000-08:00

When this whole recession thing first started and people started losing their jobs or as in the building industry, the jobs just started tapering off toward fewer and fewer, I started trying to think of ways I might be able to help. My business has never been impacted much by the various recessionary periods we have gone through in the past and thank the stars above, this one so far is no exception.

The reasons my business has not slowed to much are many, including just having so very many loyal, wonderful customers all these years. The other factors would be the price of my service. One doesn't have to get a loan to get a haircut. It's money most folks have right in their pockets. Another would be how much better a person feels after getting a haircut. Even I forget how great it feels to get cleaned up with a haircut until by wife gives me one. It's a relatively cheap feel good procedure that everyone can and does do on a regular basis.

I put a sign up right in front of everyone as their setting in my chair. The sign says:

If you have lost your job or been laid off in these trying times we find ourselves in right now, the price of a haircut is now $10.00, which is what I charge retired folks.
This price will stay at that level for you until you find a job and or the economy gets back on track for everyone.

At first almost no one took me up on that deal but as the economy started slipping more and more and people actually did start losing their jobs, more of them slowly and reluctantly started excepting my special deal. Even this far into these trying times, there are still people who refuse to utilize the deal out of their own person pride. Some folks are just barely making it and I still can't talk them into it.

Then a crazy, wonderful thing started happening to make me re-realize just how amazing and fantastic a lot of folks really are. One by one, several of my customers started handing me $20.00 for their haircuts. When I started to give them their change, they turned it down and told me to apply it to my deal to help others who need the help. Can you believe that? It shocked me at first but more and more folks have started doing this unbelievably generous, caring thing.

I am guessing I'm at the point where these wonderful people are pretty much paying for my deal with their sharing, beautiful attitudes. In most cases, these are people who have not lost their jobs and just want to pass on some amount of good will and sharing toward their fellow human beings in some small way.

I want to take this time to truly and proudly give thanks to these great people. They should feel proud of themselves and know that I appreciate their contributions with all my heart and soul. I now have quite a few folks who are taking advantange of the special pricing. I have to add that most everyone of them always mention that as soon as they are employed again, they plan on going back to paying the full price.

So............once again it proves beyond a shadow of doubt that most people by far are loving, caring people who in troubled times or good are ready and able to share with their fellow humans. I really think this whole thing should renew all our faith in the basic goodness of people.

I know it sure does for me.........

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Taking normalcy for granted............

2010-12-13T17:30:00.000-08:00

This is something none of us gives much thought to until something happens to bring it to the forefront. We go through life taking feeling normal completely for granted. We don't even give a seconds thought to how great just being a normal, healthy, alive and vibrant human being is. There are so many things to feel thankful for in life but most times these thoughts just don't occur to most of us on a daily or minute by minute basis, no matter how wonderful just feeling normal actually is. It takes something that forces us to compare normalcy to, to wake us up to the amazing, perfect being we really are feeling just plain normal.

What brought this to the forefront for us is the damn cold that rudely and obnoxiously crashed through my household the last several days. We went from just cruising through life without a care in the world to falling off a damn cliff of pain, aches, voice completely disappearing, noses running like Niagara falls, coughing like the end of the world and feeling like we just busted rocks for 5 years at a state prison for the hardcore misbehaving and misfit humans serving a life sentence . All of the sudden, normalcy is something completely out of reach. We would pay big money to just feel normal but there's no angel standing there with their blessed hand out promising to bring back normal for a fee.

Food? Nothing sounds good. Sense of taste gone down the road, visiting some other good person not standing on this train to nowhere, as we are. So, trapped in the house with the heater turned on high, sweating like an injun in a hot house of punishment for bad behavior. Living in sweat cloths that go from sopping wet with fever to cold as hell from being so wet from sweating. Stinking beyond most folks limits to behold. The only thing that would seem to help would be good old sleep, except that lovely state only lasts for a few minutes, then it's time to flop over on your other side trying to find that magical comfortable position, which is always and inevitably just out of reach no matter what you do.

Normalcy oh normalcy, where for art thou? Please come back. Don't forsake us during our great time of need. We've been good boys and girls. We've worked hard to achieve this wonderful station of life called older age and deserve nothing but the finest days and nights for all our careful, intelligent and industrious ministrations.

As awful as all this is, way down deep somewhere I guess I do know that this will have an ending and we will eventually feel back to whatever normalcy is for us. I can't even imagine what it must be like to come down with some sickness or disease, without a timetable to see. Some disease that has no wonderful normalcy at it's end. Some unfortunate disease with no cure.

For that all we can do is thank the goddesses above and the gnomes below for the health we do have and know that we are so incredibly lucky to be so fortunate to have the bodies and minds we were given on this Earth. To just wait out our turn with this Earthly hell called a cold and be thankful knowing it will come to an end eventually and we'll feel....

Normal again

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Children....Oh so innocent...Or are they?

2010-12-11T10:33:00.000-08:00

It seems most people always assume that our children come into the world as a completely clean, empty slate. Thinking this, our job as parents would then obviously be to fill that slate up with our abundant knowledge and teach them everything they need to become caring, intelligent, contributing members of the human race. We assume they bring nothing with them at all except the bodies they are born with. In the Western world, not believing in any form of reincarnation, our natural assumption of the "clean slate" theory is the only possible explanation for this.

I studied eastern philosophies and spiritualism for years in the wild and crazy sixties, which included Zen, Buddhism, Meditation and Reincarnation. The general idea with reincarnation of course is we are brought into this world over and over again until we finally learn all the reality lessons we need in order to advance into the higher planes of existence. Moving always toward the day we ultimately reach the realization of the oneness of everything or God, as the western religions call it. As each life ends, we choose our next life on the basis of what we need to constantly move toward that lofty goal.

The great eastern scholars don't see reincarnation as a absolute truth writen in stone like western religions tend to do. They just see it as the most logical explanation to the cyclic nature of the world.

Getting back to children, as I watched my child and other children grow through the years, I'm often left wondering how it could be that children come into the world as a blank slate, when they each show such individualism, no matter who their parents are or the environment they were raised in.

As we all know, there are kids who are raised in the most horrible circumstance imaginable. Dirt poor and living in filthy, even dangerous environments with uncaring parents and still somehow raise themselves above their appointed stations in life to become brilliant, amazing, accomplished human beings. Then there are other children who seem to have it all. Money, powerful loving parents who end up in prison, having done some incredibly stupid and horrible things, seemingly out of the blue and completely out of character in relation to their parents.

Nature versus Nurture. Which is it? The environment they're raised in or how they were raised?

Watching my own child through the years, I've often wondered why, if she had a choice, did she choose us to raise her. It took me years to finally admit that we must have done a lot of things right in her upbringing to help her be the super intelligent, driven maniac she ended up being. For the longest time, I couldn't imagine where she got a lot of the great attributes she ended up with, other than the obvious influences from my wonderful wife who had so much wisdom to give. I did finally take some personal credit for helping her along her path to who she ultimately became.

I've came to the conclusion that basically she is who she is. As most children probably are. She and most of them most likely would have turned out great no matter how they were raised or by whomever because that's just who they are down deep in their beings. This of course brings this whole conversation back to the idea that we are somehow born with at least a seed of who we are before we learn anything from our parents or the environment at all. What that seed is, I have no idea. Our soul? The ongoing culmination of all the previous lives we don't remember living? Again, I have no idea.

Do you?

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The grass is NOT always greener on the other side...

2010-11-27T12:59:00.000-08:00

You know, us normal peons often times look at all the super famous and successful musicians, actors and other creative people in the news, radio and airwaves and think they have the idealic, perfect, to be envied lives for sure. We see them traveling the world, playing their music in these huge venues, in front of thousands of adoring fans all the time. We see them making movies that bring in millions of dollars from the public, of which they get huge shares of wealth and think Wow! How cool is that?

Well, there are untold, unimaginably difficult concessions that come with those seemingly perfect life styles, to say the least. First of all, in the vast majority of cases, they've worked their whole lives super hard to achieve the skills necessary to make all that happen. Most of the super great musicians and movie stars started on their perspective career goals very early in life, if not when they were just children.

Just a few examples off the top of my feeble noggin. Let me get personal, just for a moment. I've been a musician basically my whole life and it's far from what it's all cracked up to be to most people. In my youth, I had a full time job during the day in Sacramento California and was in a "house band" 4 nights a week at a smoky bar in a town about thirty miles away in Davis California. My "Day gig" was a 9 to 5 affair and the night gig started at 9:00 P.M. at night and ended at 2:00 A.M.

So.........get off work around 5:00 P.M., go home to a quick dinner, say hi to everyone with phony smiles , change cloths and off I went into the night, not to be seen by my family until the next mornings few minutes before leaving for the day gig. Can you imagine how much quality time that left for normal life with family. To my family of that time in my life, I was just this guy who zoomed in and out of their lives, giving very little of myself indeed, to say the least.

I watched a special on Willie Nelson one time a few years ago where it told of him doing something like 157 different venues a year at that time of his career. OK............stop and give that some serious thought for a moment. That meant he and his entire entourage pulled up to a completely new town, got off the bus, unloaded the incredible amount of equipment necessary to do the concert. Then set it all up in a perfect, precise way to do the concert that night. Then they had to go on stage in front of thousands of fans and pretend that the fans were the most important things in their lives, not matter how bad they might feel. Headache? Arthritis? Hangovers? Screw those details. Doesn't matter. Put on the show, come hell or high water folks..

Being in the business so long, I have a very good friend that joined a group I was in when he was 16 years old. Had all of Jimmie Hendrix's material down pat. Note for note. From my day gig I used to get him false mustaches to make him appear old enough to play in the bars with us. A few years later he went off and became the lead guitar player in a very, very famous 60's rock band and played with them for years. Then he started his own band playing in the "Smooth Jazz" style. He's to this day very successful, traveling the world over, with a huge fan base.

Through these years, we talk once in a while about our lives and I've come to know just how hard his life style is often times. He also is one of the "traveling bands" that move from venue to venue pretty much year around. By the way, he has a home in Oregon with a wife and son. He told me once he sees them about once every three or so months. The truth is he gets to live in fancy hotels, eat in fancy restaurants but he's not home and not eating home made food, that's for sure. He just repeated to me the other day that he spends far, far too much time just handling the bookwork involved in such a large production. Uncle Sam drives him crazy with their demanding paperwork, just as he does all of us. He also told me once that I would be surprised at just how much money it costs to keep this enterprise on the road year around. So in reality, it's kind of amazing how relativity little is left over after paying Managers, Road Crews, other band members, hotel, food, travel expenses. That list is far to much for me to even imagine. I believe him when he says he doesn't get rich by any stretch of the imagination.

I remember a talk we had years ago where I was talking about how much I enjoyed working in my garden. He was very quiet for a while and then said "You know what? I should not complain with my life being so successful right now but I'm actually jealous of your talk of gardening. I have a beautiful house on a hill with landscaping galore but my gardening staff handles all that. I don't have any time at all to put my hands in the dirt and smell nature as you do". It was amazing. I almost found myself feeling a little sorry for him at that moment.

Well as your can clearly see, the "on the road again" phenomena is far from what we all thought it would be. Sure most of them make from very good to great money but in most cases have no regular life at all. In the Western music realm, the greats figured out years ago that they could just eliminate traveling all together. They created great halls and venues in Nashville Tennessee and just invite the public to come on down to their place. It worked beautifully and to this day, they all get to live at home, have great family lives and still enjoy their crafts.

So, as the title of this piece says "The grass is NOT always greener on the other side" at all. Looking out at the world of the rich and famous is not always what it's cut out to be. Probably the best example would be all the poor super famous, rich people who have committed suicide through the years with their flamboyant, crazy living or just done in using drugs to try a blunt their personal pains away.

Makes our plain, sometimes perceived boring lives pretty spectacular huh? So get out in your yard, stick your hands in the earth, smell the richness and be thankful for the wonderful lives you do have.

An update for ya.
In my zeal to talk about the down side of the artist world, I forgot that there are plenty of great artists who have wonderful lives and love every minute of their careers. So I have to add this little piece to complete the project.

Since putting up this Blog, my long time friend responded back with some reality checks that I feel are important.
First of all, he told me that all that "on the road" time was mainly when he was in the super successful 60's band, years ago. He's life was hectic 101 then. For years now though, he does enough concerts to keep it real and is home with his very loving family most of the time. One fact I do know is he is very proud father of his children, which are doing great. Of course that says something about him, now doesn't it.
Good job buddy. In my book, you made it!
I'm proud to say "I knew him when" and unashamedly use him as a bragging point in my life often........"^)

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Thoughtful, creative, loving, expressive presents....

2010-11-06T09:03:00.000-07:00

Oh boy. Hallelujah. Whoopee. Christmas is right around the corner again. Can you believe how quickly that happens? Now all of us have to run out and buy well thought out, considerate, fanciful, imaginative, originative presents for our loved ones. Presents that perfectly match their every desire and secret wishes. Presents that show we, out of everyone on the planet know them to the bottom of their souls and hearts because we love them so deeply.

Add to all that the clear assumption at least by the department stories and most people whether they know it or not is that the amount of money spent is in direct correlation with how much we love and care about this person. If the stores had their way, when you asked their advise for a present, the first and most important question they would ask is "Well, lets see here. Tell me this. How much do you love and care for this person"? Same thing is true for choosing a casket for your loved ones who pass away but that's a whole other story to tell...

So...............I see myself as a pretty typical male and I'm telling you right now that us typical males are the worst present pickers in the entire universe and beyond. We have no clue whatsoever how to choose something special, creative and special, especially for our waaaaaaaaay better half's, much less the rest of our "loved ones". We never go to the type of stores that carry anything close to things our loved ones would actually love to have from us in the first place. If it's not at the auto parts store or hardware store, how in the hell are we supposed to find anything?

What's happened also through the years is all the old standbys that men used to be able to give (lucky bastards of yesterday) are all completely unacceptable in this new world we find ourselves in nowadays. Men used to be just fine with kitchen items for instance. Well....no more huh? That is now just a hint that they should just be barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen cooking your meals while you set in the front room watching sports on the TV and having your nightly relaxing drink that we so clearly deserve after a hard day at the salt mines.

Now in my personal case and lots of others I'm sure, what used to be normal choices become less and less acceptable. My waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better half does not like jewelry at all! Can you imagine what that does to my gift giving potential? That's right. You heard me correctly. Not even earrings, bracelet's, watches, rings or necklaces. Nothing at all! Lets try collectibles. NOPE! She doesn't collect anything at all. We basically have no shelves at our home whatsoever to put nicknack's or collectibles of any kind on. Now, I have to say I'm the same on that front so that's cool with me but it sure takes a whole world of present material out of the picture, now doesn't it?

Here's another weird, odd thing about this whole subject also. In general, this whole "problem" of gift giving is only a problem for the giver. The receiver in this scenario usually is quite calm and not stingy at all. The receiver would be quite happy with just a small thoughtful present, even just a hand made card that shows the giver cares and thought about the receiver. The saying "It's the thought that counts" is so true it's amazing. Especially as we get older, there really is not much we actually need someone to get us. All we really want and expect is some show that they care/love us.

I don't think I'm giving out any kind of family secret here when I tell you that for years, I would call our daughter and ask "OK honey. It's time again. Tell me what to get Mom for her birthday/Christmas or anniversary". She most times had great ideas just off the top of her head and I got to take credit for being super cool on the gift giving front. I shamelessly used her very ample creativity relentlessly for years. I'm pretty sure my waaaaaaaaaaaay better half knew this secret all along or she does now for sure........."^)

My waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better half and I have finally and thankfully reached that point in life where we just choose something we both want for the house or life in general. The next and I think final stage of life would be the way some friends of ours in their late seventy's handle it. They don't even give any of those holidays a second thought at all. No gifts, no cards. Nothing. As far as they are concerned, they don't need to bother with that crap anymore at all. Not sure what I think about that but it is what it is.

OK, that's all the bullshit I can think of right now to add to this subject. Now, here's your assignment folks. Read the instructions below and put in the "comments" page your suggestions for presents for me and other men reading this to give our waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa better half's. Come on now. There has to be several people out of all the hundreds who regularly read this who have cool ideas and suggestions for creative, loving, expressive, thoughtful presents. Tell us about them........Pretty please. Save our asses......

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Hiding in plain sight.......

2010-11-02T09:33:00.000-07:00

A guy I used to work with first introduced this interesting phenomena to me years ago. He called it an old Indian trick. Hiding things you don't want people to find right in plain sight. It's amazing how well this works for most anyone.

An example all men can relate to right off the bat would be...."Honey, where's the ketchup?". "It's in the fridge, where it belongs" Your much better half would respond. Now the man has been standing there with the fridge wide open for like 5 straight minutes now and can't find it. The trick of course is the damn bottle is right in the middle, on the top shelf right in the front of his eyes. He of course is looking around it completely missing it. He might even have moved it to one side to get a better view behind it.

One of the things that brought this up at this time for me is I finally got one of those antique Barber Poles for the shop. You know, the kind inside of a glass tube with a spinning red, white and blue thing inside. Now this is a very brightly lit up contraption, spinning around and around all the time. One would think this would stick out like a fart in an aqualung for all to immediately notice when they come through the door. Well, as you can imagine, not one customer so far has commented on it at all. I've had this shop for something like 14 years now with no plain as day, brightly lit Barber Pole hanging in plain sight.........ever........

Because I'm excited about this new purchase I'm wanted my entire career, I ask them if they notice anything in the shop brand new. Everyone of them look all around and around and say "Nope, nothing new here I see". When I point it out, they often times think it was there all along and are amazed when I tell them it's brand new on the wall. They swear it's been right there for years.

Upon some reflection it kind of makes sense that a Barber Pole inside a Barber Shop is so normal and expected that they don't see it at all. It just blends in with all the other Barber related crap on my walls.

I think it's pretty clear that we all go through life taking most things for granted and don't see the trees for the forest. Why would we care about one tree in an entire forest, even it that particular tree was somehow amazingly different and wonderful. So that tells me most of us are truly missing out on a ton of small but wonderful nuances of life without even knowing it.

So, we all probably should pay attention to one of those other great, wise and useful sayings.

Stop and smell the roses.

The key thought here would be the "stop" part. If we never stop or at least slow the hell down once in a while, we won't even know the damn roses are right in front of our faces, much less that they offer one hell of a nice sampling of pleasure for our olfactory senses.

So the next time you want to play a trick on someone or simply hide something well, just stick it right out there in plain sight. No one will ever find it....

Old Indian Trick.

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Oh yeah? Well, your Mom wears combat boots.....

2010-10-27T09:27:00.000-07:00

Well, It's FINELY becoming apparent to all of us that our collective acceptance of negative ads on the political front is readily and rightfully coming to a screeching halt. I just saw on the news a perfect example of this fact. Seems during a get together somewhere in California, between our present Governor and the two idiots trying for the job an interesting and very telling thing happened.

Tom Brocaw, with NBC who was moderating the event asked a very, very good question of both of the idiots. He simply asked them if they might declare a cessation of all negative political ads until the end of this mid term election. Now the part that completely blew my mind was the immediate and loud applause just the question got from the visiting audience in attendance.

I've been disgusted for years with this whole lame brained method of trying to get our votes. Everyone I've talked to for the last couple of years have always agreed that it was idiotic and questioned our intelligence to say the least. We don't need to hear the opposition bring up every little negative thing about their competitor to make up our minds who might be the best idiot to run things into the ground, as they all seem to eventually do.

I'm sure everyone in California and probably most everyone everywhere see that the candidates all use negative and smear campaigns until right at the last minute. Then they all put out some smiley, syrupy, sappy, look at how nice and capable I really am ads. They believe of course that with our very short memories, we'll forget they acted like little kids on the kindergarten playground calling each other dirty names all along with these last minute niceties.

One of the worst negative ad offenders was the bitch Meg Whitman. Then just this last week, she put out what I thought was what I would have loved to hear from day one. An ad talking about only herself and what she might be able to bring to the political table to help California survive into the future.

We can't leave out our old as the hills, forever politician Jerry (moonbeam) Brown, though can we? With his very negative but concise ads comparing the bitch with our present failed Governor. I really don't know as I try to not watch any of that crap, but I'll bet even he has now put out a couple of last minute positive ads also.

By the way, their answer to Tommy was something like this. Moonbeam mumbled something like if the bitch stopped, he would. The bitch went into this whole explanation about not using personal attack ads but stating moonbeams political failings was different. By the way, the attending audience booed all attempts to their justification for continuing the negative ads.

I've asked myself this question for years now. Do you think we will ever again have a candidate we are actually excited about? One we believe cares about the common man/women and would do things on our behalf, instead of their own bullshit political agendas or just to further their personal careers?

Read the instructions below and let us know what you think.........

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SUPERCALIFRAGILISTICEXPIALIDOCIOUS!

2010-10-12T10:41:00.001-07:00

Words are mighty interesting sometimes, aren't they? I've been told several times the English language has the most infuriating, nonsensical, cockeyed, ludicrous, obtuse, opaque, meaningless words known to man/women/critter and of course Aliens from various other Galaxy's. Our language is about as convoluted, tangled, tortuous, labyrinthine and impenetrable as can be.

Who in the hell decided that we needed hundreds of different ways to say things that should be quite simplistic to convey, transmit, communicate or even proclaim?
The man/women who made these stupid decisions should have had their assess kicked for muddling, confusing, dumbfounding and bewildering us with their idiosyncrasies and insanities.

They should be bound and dragged to the town square, put in the stocks and have all the children in the town throw rotten garbage and other unmentionables, nightclothes, nightwear, underclothes, underclothing, underthings, underwear, and undies at them until they beg the forgiveness of the masses for screwing up the language.

To tell the truth, (novel idea huh?) I was just getting a tad bored and most times, that's all it takes to drive me to write. The next thing required is just a kernel, seed, crux, grain, morsel, nubbin and or grain of an idea.

Often just one word or phrase, byword, catch phrase, catchword, diction, expression, idiom, locution, maxim, motto, parlance, phraseology, phrasing, remark, saying, shibboleth, slogan, styling, tag, terminology, utterance, verbalism, verbiage, watchword, wordage, wording and off my little mind travels down the yellow brick road.

The word that came to mind this time was "SUPERCALIFRAGILISTICEXPIALIDOCIOUS!"
God, what a cool word huh? Of course the first thing it brings to mind for those of us in the "long of tooth" era is the Mary Poppins movie, Sound of Music.
Often times song writers have super, creative, originative, fanciful, notional, fictive, imaginative, inventive and yeasty ways with words, don't they?

If you really want to see words stand up straight and come alive. If you have some valuable time to completely waste, goto:

http://paul3333.blogspot.com/2007/11/this-is-test.html

This was actually the first piece I ever wrote, written far far before I even knew I might have it in me to write. I probably should have known right then and there that telling worthless tales might just be my best attribute. One I should milk for all it's worth and go down in history someday as "A rumor in his own time".

Soooooooooooooooooooooo. After completely wasting some of your valuable time on this piece thinking this Paul Dude might have something wise or at least intelligent to say about something, finding out instead he was just bored and just set out to fill this space with nonsense to feel important and alive, what say you?

Do you have it in you to write a letter to Editor of this Newspaper and ball Paul out or whatever you need to do to feel self important also? I'm telling you right now that a damn kindergartener could do this. Most people are just too lazy or insecure to try and figure it out. Are you one of those or do you have what it takes?

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I’m schizophrenic and so am I…………

2010-10-09T13:29:00.000-07:00

Most people in the world seem to take life far, far too serious. Now there are plenty of times when seriousness is completely called for, that's for sure. The problems seems to be how much that attribute has taken over obsessively to the exclusion of all else. What about fun, enjoyment, laughter, merriment, lightness, craziness and just plain treating life as the dance it could and should be?

Seriousness:
Important: important or grave enough to require thought and attention. Thoughtful or thought-provoking way. Earnestness, serious-minded, sincerity, sedateness, staidness, solemnity, solemness, graveness, gravity, sobriety, soberness, somberness, connectedness, commitment.....

Looking at all those definitions of the word seriousness gives one pause, now doesn't it? They all sound stiff as hell and damn boring. Not a plan or philosophy one would choose to live all the time by huh? Now there are plenty of times in ones life where being serious is the only way to go. Driving a car, any kind of flying, school in all it's applications, at work when one is trying to accomplish an important task etc.

To my admittedly (and with great pride) twisted mind, the devil in the details here is the entire concept of "political correctness". This stupid, insane, asinine present day invention was invented by muddle headed do gooder idiots who think they can tell everyone else what's "proper thinking". Well, they can all take a flying leap off a tall building as far as I'm concerned.

Ask anyone who works in a small to large company and they'll tell you as this insidious garbage philosophy entered the work place, all the fun went out the window and their jobs slowly became a drag instead of a place they wanted to be at. Instead of having a vested interest in doing the best they could for the company because they flat out enjoyed being there and being a positive contributor to the success of the company, now they just "put in their time, doing just what's necessary to get by and not be fired and get the hell out of there as soon as the clock lets them go each day.

Women became something you better not even look at for fear of "offending" them is some way, instead of Men's friends and equals. People of any color other than white became someone you deferred to and stepped lightly around for fear of "offending" them in some crazy way. So everyone you used to consider friends and co-workers now became potential enemies, who could cause you to lose your job. Now everyone there was now required to go to "political Correctness" education classes. Now doesn't that sound like some god damn communist countries attempt at mind control or something?

Well.....................I'm super proud to say that at my business, people have the right to say anything they damn well please about any subject whatsoever. It's a place for sexist, racist, dumb, crude, bad, stupid, nonsensical jokes of any kind. The only rule there is "if it's funny, it's funny". Even it it's not, it only deserves a loud, rude groan at the most. I pride myself on sending people out the door with not just a great haircut, but in a completely different mood if they were kind of grumpy when they entered.

Examples of my line of bullshit would be as I'm letting them out of the chair, I might say "Well, that'll have to do until the good Barber gets back", Or "I promise, the bleeding will stop soon". Or "I re-carved the dirty word in the back". I especially enjoy messing with stiff, uptight people in expensive suits. One time, I asked this judge dude why he kept coming back for my abuse and he surprised me with "You know what? You're one of the only people in my life who treats me as a normal everyday person, instead of with phony respect as most everyone else does at my job. You give me a healthy dose of reality and I like it".

So come on folks, life doesn't have to be so damn serious all the time. It should and can have a healthy dose of fun, creativity, laughter, spontaneity (a huge, loud, obnoxious, snot flying belly laugh is good for you) and a little bit of craziness can go a long way to enriching and improving your lives and those around you.

Whatchathink?

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Use it or lose it...

2010-10-07T11:30:00.000-07:00

The older I get the more this fact becomes apparent, vital and real.

USE IT OR LOSE IT!

That just might be the definitive reason and clear objective of life as we know it. What brought this fact to the forefront for me at this time is the latest little hobby I've taken up. Learning to fly Remote Control Helicopters. I've taken up some rather difficult things in my life but this one takes the cake for sure. Everyone in the Remote Control world made it extremely clear every time I brought it up that this was a complete waste of time and money. They all told horror stories about people wasting hundreds, if not thousands of dollars trying to perfect this and failing miserably in the end.

Even my Daughter who is a Helicopter Pilot told me she knows several Helicopter Pilots with thousands of hours of experience who bought into the hobby with extreme gusto and gave up in disgust in a surprisingly small amount of time and now have them sitting on a shelf in a closet somewhere in their homes collecting cobwebs, with nothing but cuss-words and shame for memories. Other than learning to actually fly them is the extreme learning curve on the transmitters. That's the control mechanism you hold in your hand to send the signals to the "Servos" which move the control surfaces on the Helicopter itself. That damn thing nowadays is a very sophisticated computer, would you believe. You can now program it to do just about anything except maybe butter your bread or give you a massage.

So along with trying to learn to fly this damn thing for more than three minutes without crashing and adding another $100 for repairs to my wonderful new hobby (say thank you, Terry at HobbyTown USA in Rocklin), I now have to learn another entire new computer language. Now as complainy as I sound, I actually am having a ball learning and adding all these new skill sets to my life.

That brings me to the gist of this new revelation. It's wonderful, challenging and exciting to have new hard as hell I should add, things to do to my life. It's so easy for everyone to just fall into normal routines of life. Hell, it's hard enough to just get by nowadays without purposely adding more complications to everything as it is, now isn't it? But ya know what? That's what keeps life new, interesting and anti-boring.

This "Use it or lose it" philosophy is true in every aspect of our lives. Ask any health professional and they'll tell you to use that body. Push it to it's limits at all times. Get off your lazy ass, get off the couch, turn off the boob tube and get moving. You see all the time quite old people at various stages of activity or lack of. The ones on the move are staying in pretty good shape and seem happy, vibrant and alive. Now discounting the very unfortunate facts of disease in it's every form, the plain lazy, weak ones are unfortunately sliding down the slippery slope of declining health right before our eyes. A generation or so ago, the thing to do was to retire as soon as you could, buy a great recliner for the front room and finally get to relax after working all ones life. Well, that lasted maybe a few months or years and then they achieved the ultimate relaxation staring up at the grass at the cemetery.

This whole thing also applies to all the parts of life also. Sex......Use it or lose it. Happy attitudes......Use it or lose it. Friendships......Use it or lose it. Skills, like cooking, playing an instrument, reading, writing, playing golf or any game. They all require one to keep on going full blast at all times. Just like exercise or using the hot tub (silly example but true). Each time I think of it, the first thing that comes to mind is "Dammit, that's just too much trouble, I'm kind of tired right now and don't feel like putting the effort out to do it". Then I force myself and ALWAYS, it's great and I'm super glad I did it.

Sooooooooooooooooooooo, get off your ass, start a new hobby, get outside and go for a walk, take up Kayaking, get in the car and go shopping in a new place you've never been before, learn something new. Something completely beyond your normal skill sets and desires.

By the way, come hell or high water, I WILL get this down. I WILL amaze and impress my daughter, her Helicopter Pilot husband and my friends one day soon. Well......... maybe next year but by God, I WILL DO THIS!

Whatchathink?

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Interesting, creative, dysfunctional people in my life

2010-09-10T19:55:00.000-07:00

All my life including now the most interesting, creative, intelligent people I've known have always been the oddest also. I've came to the conclusion that the few people I would call close friends are noticeably weird, different and just this side of crazy. These are people most others would shy away from, if for no other reason than these types don't seem to fit the "normal" package that most people try to fit into. The saying about trying to fit a square peg into a round whole comes to mind with most people who have became close to me.

Starting in high school, I went off into the wacky world of being a musician, which put me right in the middle of some of the strangest people on earth. Musicians in general are a pretty odd group to say the least. For musicians, nothing exists except creating music. Most serious musicians are the types who set in their bedroom practicing all hours of the day and night not paying much attention to what other people would consider normal life. The only real relationships they have is with other musicians.

Another attribute of these people would be their unusual and flaming dis functionalities. They are usually great at one or two things, like art or music and completely out of it with normal functions like bills, obligations, jobs, responsibilities etc. They're the people you see walking around with mismatched cloths, holes in their pants, white socks or wild, crazy colors on. The reasons they do that has nothing to do with having a "style". It's more they could care less about what they consider to be unimportant and irrelevant aspects of life. Again, the only thing that matters to them is their music or whatever Art form they are involved in.

Moodiness, maybe even various levels of depression comes with these folk's weirdness also. I honestly think people like this have a completely different wiring system in their brains than "normal" people. I'm sure at times they regret and lament having these problems but I also think it's part and parcel of being one of the "chosen ones" with incredible creativity, genius and special intelligence it takes to put out great works of art, music, poetry, movies, plays or dance pieces.

When I was playing guitar in a rock band back in the cave man days, the first thing I was taught was to never get anywhere near the amplifier because it would start "feeding back", which meant it would start making this loud screeching noise. Well Jimmie Hendrix practically set on top of his to force as much screeching as possible. I think that pretty much sums up how those kinds of people think. They not only think outside the box but purposely tear the walls down and do whatever they want to.

Another unfortunate but true fact about these people is the fact that throughout history, they usually peak quite early with their genius talents and end up dying from drug overdoses, diseases or freak accidents in their wild ride through life. Clear examples of this would of course include Elvis Presley, Jimmie Hendrix, Marilyn Monroe and a host of others I can't think of right at this moment. I often wonder what these people would be doing at this time if they were still alive and still creating in their art forms.

Now, I'm not saying there is anything at all wrong with "normal" people. Without them nothing regular or normal would ever get done and life would probably be some kind of anarchist system by now. I do think that our incredible and persistent emphasis on "normalcy" goes too far though. If we loosened up on that goal, we probably would have quite a bit more creative, inventive people doing their magic for all to enjoy.

These interesting times......

2010-08-26T11:27:00.000-07:00

In these "interesting times" we now find ourselves in, quite a few folks are pretty nervous about what's going to happen in the future. How we're going to survive the present economic conditions, with all it's uncertainties and unknowns. Will we follow the normal events that have came out of all the other recessions and even the "great depression" in our history?

It sure is hard to imagine positive results when we are all caught in this particular recession. With all the poor folks out of jobs and losing their homes. People struggling just to pay their bills and put food on the table, it's pretty easy to get caught up in the old "down mood" prevalent in a certain ill informed minority of Americans at this time.

OK, enough with the negative spin on things. Lets talk about some realities throughout history now. First of all, with an average unemployment rate of around 10% across America right now, the thing never mentioned in the news or from the Doom and Gloomer's clubs is that means on average, 90% of folks are still employed and doing relatively fine. Now even those folks still employed are a little nervous and playing it safe with their money, as well they should. Which according to reliable economist is the main cause of our ongoing recession right now. 75% of our economy is driven by Americans spending money. With people not spending money on normal items, it means the production of those items with the employment involved is at an extreme slowdown right now.

Another truth that's not said in the media is some of the best times in American history took place AFTER THE DEPRESSION. By the 40's and on through the 70's, the depression was pretty much gone and prosperity was at an all time high for the average American.

The truth that comes to mind for me in times like these is even though we have made some huge mistakes like sending all the manufacturing of American products to other countries, instead of having our own people have those good paying jobs and sustaining our own economy we let them go elsewhere. All in the name of being able to buy the things we think we need as cheaply as possible.

So, obvious mistakes aside, the reality is all throughout history, Americans have always been some of the most inventive, creative, intelligent folks on this Earth. So.... we gave most of our large manufacturing away, we'll come up with something else new and exciting as hell to manufacture soon.

Mark my words. There's some engineer, inventor, or genius out there right this minute working in his dark barn or garage about to have his own "AHA" moment, when he discovers some miraculously wonderful new product or way of doing something. Some amazing breakthrough that changes everything for us. Something of tremendous value that puts thousands, if not millions of people to work.

Some examples of this truth would of course be the light bulb. Did you know that when Edison invented that little devise, most everyone of those times thought it was a waste of time. A stupid idea when everyone was quite happy with their lanterns and candles. It took him years to convince small towns to install the systems needed to make it work for them. Then and only then did the populations of those times see the good of this new fangled idea as something they might actually use on a regular basis.

Another example is of course the Automobile. When whoever first built one had it up and running, everyone basically laughed right out loud at that noisy, clunky worthless piece of crap. Why would anyone want one of those contraptions when they had dependable horses to get where they wanted to go? How would you even be able to drive it anywhere on rut and pocked marked horse and wagon dirt trails all over the country? Again, it took years to create the infrastructure to make it a usable device for the masses to use .

In the present times are things like Solar Power. This relatively new invention came out of the brains of people who one day just looked up and wondered about that bright, hot thing in the sky that burns every day without fail, other than on cloudy days. They probably noticed that water left out in the sun became hot. That led them to wonder how that tremendous resource could be put to good use and Viola! A whole new exciting industry was started. It's now growing in leaps and bounds and putting tons of folks to work making pretty good money. It's especially good for those who lost their jobs in the building industry. Those people are now being re-trained in the manufacturing and installation of Solar Units by the millions across America.

Being a perpetual, life long "Glass half full" guy and proud of it, I'm telling you right now the future is going to be just fine. It very well might take more time than we all would like to see but get better it will. The old "Bubble" analogy will probably happen again just like this time and every time after a large downturn makes everything seem hopeless. That's just the nature of life folks. Life is one big old pendulum. Swinging on way, much too far eventually, then it starts back in the other direction, way too far in the end. The reality and part that's important to always remember is that damn pendulum has always worked that way and will continue forever to swing into the future.

So as I've said over and over in these "interesting" times...........don't let the doom and gloom idiots get to you. They're full of shit and their bullshit is just that... Hold your head up high, grab a smile and see your life as it clearly is.........hopefully with loving friends and family, a dog and two cats who love you unconditionally and a mate who thinks you're the cats meow....(well, most of the time)

Don't make contacts. Make friends....

2010-08-13T12:40:00.000-07:00

Go out and make contacts young man/women. Most of us have heard this great advise along the way. As you meet people in your career, get their names and keep in touch through the years. That way, when you need help climbing the social or business ladders of life, you will have someone you know personally and who knows you to possibly help along the way. People you can use as references in your search of better, more lucrative jobs, positions or business situations.

We've all heard this. How one gets ahead in the business world or even personally with other people is to accrue a list of people who at least know of you and have a good memory of who you are. People who just might give glowing and helpful statements about your character, morals and strengths to a potential employer or business opportunity you might come across in your future.

Now this is not only great, wise and intelligent advise at any time in history but in the tough economy we presently find ourselves in, it's probably of the up most importance. Nowadays the competition for jobs, positions and business opportunities are amazingly fierce. The whole trick at this time is to somehow stand out from the crowd. Make your self larger and more visible than all the other people with the same exact talents, skill sets and financial needs that you have.

Now is when I get to the meat of this little dissertation. I have to stop right now and give credit where credit is due. Through my Daughter's occupation and ongoing career as a Helicopter Pilot, I've met or at least know through the world wide web dozens if not more Helicopter Pilots all over the world.

There is one particular Helicopter pilot who shall remain unnamed for the sake of his personal privacy that taught me this and uses the saying as the subtitle of his life, morals, occupation and personal philosophy. This man has to be the nicest, most sincere and generous person I've ever known of in my life. His philosophy is to always pass on everything he has received that's good or helpful to those just starting out in life. He always gives unlimited professional advise to young, just starting out newbie students or just beginning Helicopter pilots. His advise to them is always right on and comes from years of problem free experience and expertise as a Helicopter Pilot. With a perfect safety record, I might add. His writing is impeccable, with perfect grammar and spelling at all times, which of course gives them an incredibly good example of how to professionally handle their own affairs now and in their futures in the industry.

So here it is folks. Here's his bi-line. Instead of the standard great advise of "Make Contacts"

His take on the whole thing is:

"Don't make contacts. Make friends"

When I first saw that, I was completely floored. Is that the coolest, most wise one sentence saying you've ever heard? When you meet new people, don't think of them as potential contacts to further your career, profession or even your personal life. Just be your normal friendly self and make them your friend. How cool is that? Just with that one little side wise slant on things. That one little difference in approach and boom....You've just changed the dynamic of the whole situation with this new person in your life. This new person will remember you fondly for years to come and will gladly help you in any way he/she can.

So the next time you meet a stranger to you. A new person. Treat him/her with kindness, respect and put on your best face because he/she just might turn out to be your new best friend and be willing to help you in some special way. More important than helping you, he/she might just become a very important part of your future life. As we all know, great friends are a rarity in these times, so do everything you can to make yourself available and receptive to the wonderful side of being human.

My name is Cuddles........

2010-08-12T09:57:00.000-07:00

My given name is Cuddles. The humans I allow to take care of me named me that when I entered their world and fell asleep on their lap, which of course is what we mainly do. The interesting thing about humans is they think they are the dominant species when most of us in the real world know they are just above the ants walking in lines like living robots to find food and comfort. They scurry around most of the time aimlessly, perceiving their activities as somehow important and required in order to survive in the world.

Luckily, I found pretty good humans to obey my every whim and desire. I have a pretty good house to live in. A house with all the requirements we demand from life, like warm sunny areas to get my beauty sleep in. Unlike humans who deprive themselves of the proper amount of sleep and slumber, we need a minimum of 16 hours of deep sleep out of every 24 hour day.

I have no idea what my humans names are as it doesn't matter to me as long as they do exactly as I demand. I really don't demand much. Just constant food, including the kind that comes in the little cans. I prefer foods at body temperature--the temperature of freshly killed prey. I demand my water bowl be changed daily with room temperature water only. Not too warm or too cold. That wouldn't do at all.

A few facts for you humans who are considering living under the same roof as we do.

Sense of smell:
Humans have 5 million odor-sensitive cells in their noses--cats have 200 million. Of course this means they can smell when you don't clean the litter box every day and will "inappropriately urinate" because of this.

Hearing:
Human beings can hear sounds up to 20,000 Hertz (cycles per second), dogs can hear up to 40,000 Hertz, and cats can hear up to 100,000 Hertz. Cats can even hear electrical currents in cords. Pretty amazing, huh?

Psychic:
In China, cats have been used successfully as earthquake predictors for years.

Cats are color blind,
but only need 1/6th of the light that humans require to see.

The cat has 26 facial expressions
The same parts of the human and feline brain correspond to emotion. So pay attention and learn to recognize what we need and we'll get along a lot better.

So as you can clearly see, we are far, far superior to humans in most every way. We have learned through generations to keep life simple. Humans make everything so damnable complicated. They even complicate the simple pleasures of life. Attaching all kinds of unnecessary rules and regulations to most everything they do sure explains their general befuddlements and confusions.

I was going to go into my entire life with the humans I choose to live with but you know what? I'm getting kind of tired and sleepy right now and don't feel like indulging any of my sacred secrets with you anyway. We must keep this stuff to ourselves. We can't let on that we are actually very smart and only pretend to put up with you doofis humans and your weird ways. You just keep on thinking your superior and we'll get along just fine as long as you do as your told.........

Right now I'm just going to lay down and............zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz........

By the way. One super important thing we all require. You need to take us right away to our special doctor or better yet to a Spay and Neuter Clinic to be fixed and get all our shots. Our species tends to over populate like crazy and I personally don't like the competition.

Are you under the false impression that you're superior to your cats? Carefully read the instructions below and tell us about your misconceptions. We could all use a good laugh...

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Good News......

2010-08-11T10:36:00.000-07:00

We've all been indoctrinated into the non-truth that only bad news sells. That bad news is the only thing interesting to the masses. Well, I've always thought that was a royal cop-out. The ultimate lazy news organization's rationalization for not doing the work of finding all the good news out in the world that happens every moment of every day.

I consider myself to be just an average, normal American with average intelligence (well, maybe a little more than normal...."^) and I and everyone I know are getting sick and tired of only hearing bad news. Especially on the bullpucky political front. All the Doom and Gloom nut cases, who think they are the majority, when they're thankfully and actually a very small minority indeed. I know they think otherwise but their only kidding themselves. Normal people are sick and tired of all that nonsense and want to get back to understanding and re-realizing that there is far, far more good things happening in the world than bad.

So I went searching and easily found sources for good news. Things happening around the world that are both interesting, informative and worth repeating. Stories that are uplifting instead of degrading, negative and meant to scare, intimidate and make us hide in our homes in fear. We all know down deep these good things are happening all around us because if we just open our eyes to our neighbors and friends, they are all good people trying to do good things every day.

So...............here's just a few things I found easily in just a few moments on line to share with you.........

40 Billionaires Pledge to Give Away Half of Wealth!

A little over a year after Bill Gates and Warren Buffett began hatching a plan over dinner to persuade America's wealthiest people to give most of their fortunes to charity, more than three-dozen individuals and families have agreed to take part, campaign organizers announced Wednesday.

In addition to Buffett and Gates — America's two wealthiest individuals, with a combined net worth of $90 billion, according to Forbes — 38 other billionaires have signed The Giving Pledge. They include New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, entertainment executive Barry Diller, Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, energy tycoon T. Boone Pickens, media mogul Ted Turner, David Rockefeller, film director George Lucas and investor Ronald Perelman. "We're off to a terrific start,"

Buffett, co-founder and chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, said in a conference call also attended by Bloomberg and San Francisco hedge-fund manager Tom Steyer and his wife Kat Taylor, founder of OneCalifornia Bank. Buffett said he and Gates, the Microsoft co-founder, and Gates' wife Melinda made calls to fellow billionaires on the Forbes 400 list of wealthiest Americans — in many cases, people they had never met — to try to persuade them to join the giving pledge."We contacted between 70 and 80 people to get the 40. A few were unavailable. We don’t give up on them. Every saint has a past, every sinner has a future.

Cab Driver Returns $21,000 to Tourist

A New York City cab driver is being praised for returning more than $21,000 lost by a visitor from Italy.
Felicia Lettieri, who's 72, left her purse in a Manhattan taxi on Christmas Eve. It contained traveling money for her and six relatives.
Police told them not to get their hopes up about finding it.
The cabbie drove about 50 miles, to a Long Island address he'd found in the purse. No one was home, so he left his phone number and later returned with the money.
Lettieri's daughter, Maria Rosaria Falonga, told Newsday from Pompei, Italy, that the cabbie also left a note.
He told her: "Don't worry, Felicia. ... I'll keep it safe."
"When I was 5 years old, my mother told me, 'Be honest, work hard and you will raise your station,' " said the driver, Mukul Asaduzzaman, to the New York Post newspaper. He refused a reward.

Mother, Baby Revived, After Both Dying

DENVER - Mike Hermanstorfer was clutching his pregnant wife’s hand when her life slipped away in a Colorado hospital on Christmas Eve, and then he cradled his newborn son’s limp body seconds after a medical team delivered the baby by Cesarean section.

Minutes later he saw his son come to life in his arms under the feverish attention of doctors, and soon he learned his wife had inexplicably come back to life.

Hermanstorfer’s wife, Tracy, went into cardiac arrest and stopped breathing during labor on Thursday, said Dr. Stephanie Martin, a maternal fetal medicine specialist at Memorial Hospital in Colorado Springs, where the Hermanstorfers had gone for the birth of their son.

“She had no signs of life. No heartbeat, no blood pressure, she wasn’t breathing,” said Martin, who had rushed to Hermanstorfer’s room to help. “The baby was, it was basically limp, with a very slow heart rate.”

The Soldier Who Smuggled Himself Into Auschwitz

When millions would have done anything to get out, one remarkable British soldier smuggled himself into Auschwitz to witness the horror so he could tell others the truth.

Denis Avey is a remarkable man by any measure. A courageous and determined soldier in World War II, he was captured by the Germans and imprisoned in a camp connected to the Germans' largest concentration camp, Auschwitz.

But his actions while in the camp - which he has never spoken about until now - are truly extraordinary. When millions would have done anything to get out, Mr Avey repeatedly smuggled himself into the camp.

Now 91 and living in Derbyshire, he says he wanted to witness what was going on inside and find out the truth about the gas chambers, so he could tell others. He knows he took "a hell of a chance".

"When you think about it in today's environment it is ludicrous, absolutely ludicrous," he says.

"You wouldn't think anyone would think or do that, but that is how I was. I had red hair and a temperament to match. Nothing would stop me."

Veteran, 84, Attacks Gun-Weilding Thief

John Dietsch wasn't scared – then or now. While working in the engine room of World War II Allied warships in the North Atlantic, he faced the threat of Nazi mines, warships and U-boats.

"You would hear the guns go off above us. You could feel it all around you," said the 84-year-old.

"There really wasn't time to be scared."

It was the same on Thursday afternoon, when a gunman stormed into a Royal Canadian Legion in Scarborough, demanding thousands in poppy donations. Dietsch and three others had just finished counting through $10,000 at Oakridge Legion, Branch 73, near Danforth and Warden Aves.

"At first, I didn't see the gun. I said, `What are you doing here?' He said he wanted all the bills," said Dietsch. "But nobody was going to get that money we had worked so hard to collect. It's for the veterans and the widows and the community."

When the gunman lunged for the cash, Dietsch grabbed his arm, pushing away the gun. They struggled and Dietsch fell to the floor. The startled attacker, who looked to be in his 20s, ran to the door empty-handed.

Woman Celebrates 100th Birthday

Astrid Thoenig got dressed, went to work and sat at her desk smiling Thursday as she slid her finger gently under the envelope flap of yet another identical birthday card. They don't make that many that say "Happy 100th."

Thoenig was interrupted by a steady stream of deliverymen bringing bouquets, chocolate-dipped strawberries and stacks of cards to the Thornton Insurance Co. in Parsippany where she's been answering phones, keeping financial records, handling payroll and typing up documents for more than 30 years.

"It's another day — it's hard to explain," Thoenig said of turning 100. "I don't feel old, and I don't think old."

So there ya go folks. In just a few moments of my valuable time, I easily found these few examples of wonderful, intelligent, interesting stories to digest and enjoy.

So, the next time someone gets that angry negative look on their faces, starts spitting, with their neck muscles bulging out and starts ranting about all the horrible, awful things they heard some talking head say on the garbage box or radio, just smile and walk away before they infect you with their self important crap. I guarantee you will be better off not allowing yourself to be infected by their disease..

A little side note.

In our home, we are in the middle of a little life experiment right now. We decided to turn off the TV completely. We have not watched TV now in over a month. We now listen to music, read, work outside in the garden, talk to each other.....Can you imagine? This is not something written in cement, it's just something we are messing with right now. Who knows how long we'll keep this up but for now we are loving the quietude and calmness it gives us. Personally, I think the best thing about doing this is NO NEWS! I'm guessing if the world is going to end, some customer will let me know. Until then, I don't miss hearing all the crap regurgitated over and over nightly at all.

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THE STORE.....

2010-07-13T15:10:00.000-07:00

Just today a customer brought up a subject I have thought about for years and years now. I'm thinking this whole subject hit me around 40 years ago when I was working down in Sacramento out in the North area around Fulton and Marconi Avenues.

The business world came out with this new fangled idea of a super sized store called "White Front". Remember them back then? I think the first one was on El Camino Ave. I remember back then being in wonder at just the sheer size of the thing and the amazing amount of products they carried. Seems to be what drove people into this new type of store back then was the prices. As we all now know, the whole business idea was they can buy everything in huge lots and get things much cheaper than the corner family market can. They then can sell things much cheaper.

Well history tells us those days were just the beginning of this new phenomena. Since then, probably dozens of those kinds of "big box" stores have sprung up across the country. Now we have Cosco, Best Buy, Office Depot, Office Max, Target, Staples. Then all the Hardware giants who cropped up in the last few years, like Home Depot, Lowe's etc, etc. Then there is of course the king and ruling master of huge, Wall-mart.

Now placing myself back to those years about 40 years ago, I can clearly remember having a slight but real little uneasy feeling in my gut about the whole new concept of these huge stores. What came into my feeble mind back then was the stories I had heard growing up about what life was like back in the early timber industry towns. I was told these little towns were developed and operated by the giant timber companies. These little towns were located way out in the boonies, way out in the forested areas where the trees were.

So the Timber companies would build these little houses for the workers to live in, plus the company put in these little stores for the workers. It was far too far to go to the nearest town to buy what they needed, so their only choice was the company store. I'm told they didn't even pay the slaves/workers in actual money. They paid them in company script. With this script, the slaves could pay to rent their little company houses and buy whatever food and sundry items they needed from the company store.

So having these thoughts running around my noggin, I saw this future potential for humans where when we said we needed to go to the "store", we meant "The Store". Just one store where everything one needed would be there. You would go to "The Store" for your food, banking, haircuts, pharmaceuticals, theaters, tires, butcher shop, clothing, shoes, glasses, hearing aids................well, I think you get the picture now huh? Looking around nowadays, how far off are we from that very scenario?

What also seems to be the inevitable outcome of all this is these giant stores pretty much wipe out all the Mom and Pop stores of every kind. How can these regular people trying to run a small business compete with these giants without their extreme buying power? When the giants buy shoes by the millions at a time, how can the little family shoe store compete when they only buy a dozen at a time.

The other negative issues would be just the sheer congestion involved in everyone climbing into their cars to go to this one store. Especially when they seem to locate the damn things right in the middle of neighborhoods where we live. The other bothersome reality is this whole new phenomena just keeps on creeping slowly but surely into our lives. So slowly that we collectively don't seem to be very upset about where this might eventually lead us.

I'm telling you right now that our local governments are only too happy to have these monsters among us for the income in sales taxes they generate for the bureaucrats in office who are supposed to be looking out for our futures. The very people we vote for ultimately could care less about our future needs in this regard. They only care about the mighty buck and getting re-elected to their cushy, do nothing lifetime jobs, with lifetime benefits. By the way, the ONLY money the local area gets is that sales tax. The millions and millions in profits go who-in-the-hell-knows where?......China maybe? The employees? Minimum wage with no benefits at all that I know of.

Now I'm sure there are many, many other reasons why we quite possibly should look into the future of all this with a certain amount of apprehension and fear even but I think we all get the drift of what I'm trying to say.......

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Changing definition of "Old"...

2010-07-01T11:39:00.000-07:00

I started out the last blog with this idea in mind and got completely off the subject, which turned it into a different blog all together. So lets try to stay on task with this one, you silly space case old hippy dude.

The thing that comes to my feeble, wandering mind this time is how many folks I'm coming in contact with nowadays who are incredibly healthy, vibrant and still contributing members of society on into their much later years. Aren't you seeing this new phenomena also in your lives with people you know or see everyday?

Seems like only yesterday 50, 60 and 70 year old people were just this side of dead, if not already. If not gone, they were confined to wheelchairs or walkers by that age. I'm sure all of us have heard that the farther back in time you study human history, old age was at a time in life much younger than it is now. I've heard of folks from the "cowboy days" for instance only living into their 40's. People in their 40's back then were just this side of looking up at roots instead of down at the grass.

Some examples I can think of just off the top of my twisted, feeble mind and personal experience would be:

I just talked to the best example yesterday. This is a man I know who just turned 90 years old. He spent his life as the owner operator of a well drilling company. On top of working super hard his whole life, he has also been a musician playing in a western music band with friends and relatives. Well, he finally sold the company and retired just a few years back but still to this day plays gigs late into the night at various venues. He still works out in his yard, plants and attends his garden. He still drives his car anywhere he wants to go and is in my view quite vibrant, healthy and happy in his "older" years. He tells me he knows he probably only has a little time left but lives each day with glee and gusto.

Another man I know is 75 years old and still works in the building industry full time. He walks in with a full tool belt hanging on his belt, a pocket full of pencils for planning out his jobs and a work truck completely full of a hard working man's power tools. Everything he does he does with vigor, energy and apparently a strong back. He's the kind of man who talks, walks and works fast and with purpose. I truly doubt most young people could stay up with him throughout a long hard day at work.

I could go on and on with examples of people I personally know or have met through these past years who defy everything we thought we knew about what one can or should be doing in our "older" years. All I know is this whole thing has been completely redefined for those of us in those age brackets in this new time of human history.

This new "older" generation also have changed the whole idea of retiring also. In our fathers time, his generation could not wait to retire, take out the lawn and put in gravel. Set about getting everything in their lives as maintenance free as possible so they could spend their days in the rocking chair relaxing. Maybe a little traveling. As we know, after about 6 months in the rocking chair, they were found with their heads on their chests gone for the count, finally obtaining the ultimate nap. Obviously, this whole life thing involves a great deal of "use it or lose it" now doesn't it?

We all have to ask the obvious questions now don't we? Why are we now living so much longer in great health and with pretty good energy levels compared to our forefathers and mothers? Not the energy of youth. That's for sure but plenty of energy to do whatever you want with breaks in between the bursts. How is this possible?

The changes that have enabled us to live so much longer and better that come to mind right off the bat would be the whole present emphasis on health. Healthy living, exercising, healthy eating and probably most important healthy attitudes about and with life in general. Of course we have to hand our doctors and their associates a healthy dose of thanks, gratitude and appreciation for the modern medicinal approaches to the subject of health. We now can take blood pressure pills, cholesterol pills, adult daily aspirin, Hallelujah and whoopee for Viagra huh? and anything else one requires for their good long standing health.

So the bottom line here is we all need to look around at all the "older" folks still contributing to the good of society with the experience and expertise they apply to their jobs, the companies they own or work for and for just still being with us. Add to this we all owe them a note of gratitude for the wisdom they have acquired over a lifetime of knowledge and just plain know how they teach everyone who are lucky enough to be around them.

Maybe society owes them a great big THANK YOU! I'm sure that would just embarrass them but would also give them a warm fuzzy feeling deep down inside.......and we all certainly could use one of those from time to time in this crazy world we find ourselfs in huh?

By the way...........being only 39, none of this applies in the slightest to me.......I just thought I would write a piece about all you "older" folks......

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Don't trust anyone over 30.....

2010-06-30T13:09:00.000-07:00

I remember well that saying when I was in my late teens/twenties. It was a very popular sentiment back in the wild, crazy sixties and seventies. In those times, it seemed to us hippy dippys that only people our age knew anything about anything. Everyone over 30 was "over the hill" and then some. Besides, everything we thought was cool they hated with a passion. Drugs, sex and rock and roll represented everything bad to those over 30 back then. Those things were the only things that mattered to those under 30. It clearly was like the sixties generation and the fifties generation were from different worlds.

I know that to this day, the youth doesn't understand how very much they owe all their taken for granted social freedoms to the whole hippie dippy movement. The sheer amount of change that happened during this generational changeover was probably the largest between any period that ever happened before. It really was a sexual, financial, social and political revolution "happening" then and those realities still permeate life as we know it today. Now admittedly as with all new generations and their new ideas, a lot of the changes were great new ideas and some were idiot changes just for change sake.

Lets see now...........In the fifties, boys had to tuck their shirts into their pants at all times. Girls were not allowed to wear pants of any kind. The great side of this rule was us boys could see their bare legs and might look up their dresses, heaven forbid. Girls wore enough hair spray to hold a battleship together in the high seas. Boys wore enough grease in their hair to take care of all the lubrication needs of the battleship. Above all else sex was a completely forbiden subject in all settings. Sex education was simple. Don't do it! It's BAD!!!

Then one day these wild and crazy guys from England invaded our consciousness and as with a lot of things of those times, completely changed the entire musical landscape for the youth. We all saw them on the Ed Sullivan Hour. Holy shit, how I miss that show. The fifties youth got their first look at Elvis Presley on that show. Along with the Beatles great new musical stylings, they had this super long hair compared to what we were wearing at the time. Looking back at pictures of them now, we realize it wasn't really very long at all but compared to the styles from the fifties, it was outrageous in the extreme to everyone "over thirty".

Those "over thirties" pretty much thought the end of the world was upon us now that boys wanted to look like girls. I knew of families completely torn apart over just the issue of boys wanting to wear their hair long. I used to ask the parents who were completely torn apart by this issue how their children were doing in school. When they said they were doing fine, I would tell them to not worry about the hair thing then as it will pass like most new fads. Of course they didn't, so it lasted just this side of forever. Hell, some of the old hippies (knowing grin, insert here) still to this day have rather longish hair.

Of course the rather innocent beginnings of the drug experimentation started long about then, so the changes became more and more severe. People of that generation honestly can not believe that something that started so innocent and mellow could ever turn out so violent and insane as it has for those with dependent personalities through the years. The vast majority from the sixties smoked a little pot, played with LSD a few times and eventually outgrew the whole thing when they reached adulthood and started families.

At this point I feel compelled and find it tremendously interesting to note something about all this though. I've seen and personaly know about a few of those people who have decided after all these years of "doing the right thing" in quitting to have a change of heart about it. They say after retiring from successful lifelong careers, responsibly raising their children to adulthood with great care and love, it's time for them to have some fun again. So they decided to partake of pot once in a while once again and are now doing that with complete success and enjoyment. I would be willing to bet that it would shock most people to learn just how many folks have made this decision right about now.

Whatchathink?

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Our Forefathers. Heroes or Monsters?

2010-06-25T09:46:00.000-07:00

Every time I read a true story about our long ago forefathers and I mean long ago, I get a very disappointing and sometimes drastic view of what they were really like way back then. I've suspected for years that the histories we have been taught have been cleaned up to show them as brave, honest, hardworking, driven souls we should emulate in the present time. When one gets a clear view as far back as the Roman days for instance, the leaders were generally cold blooded killers, torturers, rapist and treated the common man and women as slaves, sometimes worse than dogs in the street.

A great example we can all relate to would be our own "cowboy days". We were all raised on "cowboy's and injuns" Television shows. These showed the good guy in the white hat taking on all the bad guys in the black hats. White and Black. Good versus Bad. Reading real accounts of those days tells us about a lot of gray areas. The "good" guys often times just shot people on sight without any proof whatsoever that they were guilty. Let's don't even consider how the "nice" folks of those times treated the local American native Indians. Just that subject alone would make us sick to our stomachs.

I found this piece about the "supposed" discoverer of America, Christopher Columbus. If even a tiny bit of this is true, HOLY SHIT! The histories we have been fed all our lives about our past heroes are pretty much flat out lies.

This piece is mostly quoted from another source I found, not written by me but I thought it was tremendously interesting, shocking and telling about the lies and missinformation we have been fed all throughout our history about our past "heroes".

To mark Columbus Day In 2004, the Medieval and Renaissance Center in UCLA published the final volume of a compendium of Columbus-era documents. Its general editor, Geoffrey Symcox, leaves little room for ambivalence when he says, "This is not your grandfather's Columbus.... While giving the brilliant mariner his due, the collection portrays Columbus as an unrelenting social climber and self-promoter who stopped at nothing - not even exploitation, slavery, or twisting biblical scripture -to advance his ambitions.... Many of the unflattering documents have been known for the last century or more, but nobody paid much attention to them until recently. The fact that Columbus brought slavery, enormous exploitation or devastating diseases to the Americas used to be seen as a minor detail - if it was recognized at all - in light of his role as the great bringer of white man's civilization to the benighted idolatrous American continent. But to historians today this information is very important. It changes our whole view of the enterprise."

"They ... brought us parrots and balls of cotton and spears and many other things, which they exchanged for the glass beads and hawks' bells," Christopher Columbus wrote in his logbook in 1495. "They willingly traded everything they owned.... They were well-built, with good bodies and handsome features.... They do not bear arms, and do not know them, for I showed them a sword, they took it by the edge and cut themselves out of ignorance. They have no iron. Their spears are made of cane.... They would make fine servants.... With fifty men we could subjugate them all and make them do whatever we want. Let us in the name of the Holy Trinity go on sending all the slaves that can be sold."

Catholic priest Bartolome de las Casas, in the multi-volume "History of the Indies" published in 1875, wrote, "... Slaves were the primary source of income for the Admiral (Columbus) with that income he intended to repay the money the Kings were spending in support of Spaniards on the Island. They provide profit and income to the Kings. (The Spaniards were driven by) insatiable greed ... killing, terrorizing, afflicting, and torturing the native peoples ... with the strangest and most varied new methods of cruelty."

This systematic violence was aimed at preventing "Indians from daring to think of themselves as human beings. (The Spaniards) thought nothing of knifing Indians by tens and twenties and of cutting slices off them to test the sharpness of their blades.... My eyes have seen these acts so foreign to human nature, and now I tremble as I write."

In 1892, the National Council of Churches, the largest ecumenical body in the United States, is known to have exhorted Christians to refrain from celebrating the Columbus quincentennial, saying, "What represented newness of freedom, hope, and opportunity for some was the occasion for oppression, degradation and genocide for others."

Yet America continues to celebrate "Columbus Day".

The one word key to that is: Myths. The explanation is that the myths the United States is built upon have paved the way for the perpetuation of all manner of violations.

Among the first of these is that of Christopher Columbus. In school we were taught of his bravery, courage and perseverance. In a speech in 1989, George H.W. Bush proclaimed: "Christopher Columbus not only opened the door to a New World, but also set an example for us all by showing what monumental feats can be accomplished through perseverance and faith."

Never mind that the monumental feats mainly comprised part butchery, part exploitation and the largest part betrayal of host populations of the "New World."
On their second arrival in Hispaniola, Haiti, Columbus's crew took captive roughly two thousand local villagers who had arrived to greet them. Miguel Cuneo, a literate crew member, wrote, "When our caravels ... were to leave for Spain, we gathered ... one thousand six hundred male and female persons of those Indians, and these we embarked in our caravels on February 17, 1495.... For those who remained, we let it be known (to the Spaniards who manned the island's fort) in the vicinity that anyone who wanted to take some of them could do so, to the amount desired, which was done."
In 1500, Columbus wrote to a friend, "A hundred castellanoes (a Spanish coin) are as easily obtained for a woman as for a farm, and it is very general and there are plenty of dealers who go about looking for girls; those from nine to ten (years old) are now in demand."

Such original "monumental feats" as were accomplished by our nation's heroes and role models were somewhat primitive. Local inhabitants who resisted Columbus and his crew had their ears or nose cut off, were attacked by dogs, skewered with pikes and shot. Reprisals were so severe that many of the natives committed mass suicide and women began practicing abortions in order not to leave children enslaved. The population of Haiti at the time of Columbus's arrival was between 1.5 million and 3 million. Sixty years later, every single native had been murdered.

In "A People's History of the United States," celebrated historian Howard Zinn describes how Arawak men and women emerged from their villages to greet their guests with food, water and gifts when Columbus landed at the Bahamas. But Columbus wanted something else. "Gold is most excellent; gold constitutes treasure; and he who has it does all he wants in the world, and can even lift souls up to Paradise," he wrote to the king and queen of Spain in 1503.

Rather than gold, however, Columbus only found slaves when he arrived on his second visit with seventeen ships and over 1,200 men. Ravaging various Caribbean islands, Columbus took natives as captives as he sailed. Of these he picked 500 of the best specimens and shipped them back to Spain. Two hundred of these died en route, while the survivors were put up for sale by the archdeacon of the town where they landed.

Columbus needed more than mere slaves to sell, and Zinn's account informs us, "... desperate to pay back dividends to those who had invested, (he) had to make good his promise to fill the ships with gold. In the province of Cicao on Haiti, where he and his men imagined huge gold fields to exist, they ordered all persons fourteen years or older to collect a certain quantity of gold every three months. When they brought it, they were given copper tokens to hang around their necks. Indians found without a copper token had their hands cut off and bled to death.

"The Indians had been given an impossible task. The only gold around was bits of dust garnered from the streams. So they fled, were hunted down with dogs, and were killed." As a younger priest, the aforementioned De las Casas had participated in the conquest of Cuba and owned a plantation where natives worked as slaves before he found his conscience and gave it up. His first-person accounts reveal that the Spaniards "thought nothing of knifing Indians by tens and twenties and of cutting slices off them to test the sharpness of their blades. They forced their way into native settlements, slaughtering everyone they found there, including small children, old men, pregnant women, and even women who had just given birth. They hacked them to pieces, slicing open their bellies with their swords as though they were sheep herded into a pen. They even laid wagers on whether they could manage to slice a man in two at a stroke, or cut an individual's head from his body, or disembowel him with a single blow of their axes. They grabbed suckling infants by the feet and, ripping them from their mothers' breasts, dashed them headlong against the rocks. Others, laughing and joking all the while, threw them over their shoulders into a river, shouting: 'Wriggle, you litle perisher.' They slaughtered anyone on their path ..."

Like I said above "If even a tiny bit of this is true, HOLY SHIT! The histories we have been fed all our lives about our past heroes are pretty much flat out lies."

This piece is about just ONE of our cherished heroes of the past. How many more lies were told to us about the people of the past we were told wore white hats and were the "good guys" in the world of times long past?

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Observations about political extremist.

2010-06-24T09:34:00.000-07:00

In my business I get to hear people's personal opinions on lots of subjects in depth. Of course in the last few years, politics is the driving force (sometimes the reason for living) for the extremist type of folks. Personally, I see this as a waste of time and a shame for those folks and anyone who has to spend time with them.

It doesn't matter which side they're on with their extremism. To me they're both just people with no real lives. Instead of having normal productive, loving, caring lives, nothing else matters to them. The only things that seem to matter to them is whatever is being fed to them by whichever radio, television program or philosophy they roboticly believe in. Everything has a political spin or slant to them. If you were to ask them about the weather, they would talk about it being the "Liberals" or "Conservatives" fault somehow. Some kind of conspiracy to destroy America by secretly controlling the weather.

Here's the weird dichotomy in this whole thing I've noticed though. Each of these folks are basically pretty normal down deep. I used to think that they were just plain stupid or ignorant for having all these wild, unusual, out there thoughts and ideas. What I've found though is everyone of these folks on both sides of the crazy political fence we have right now are actually as intelligent as the average American, hiding under all the crazy crap they obsess over. They're also decent, caring people when you can get them to shut the hell up about their political obsessions. They're the type of folks who would help you out if they knew you needed help.

So that brings up some mighty strange and wonderful conclusions about us humans. A lot of things we hold dear and claim as our own deeply held truths have nothing whatsoever to do with intelligence. Nothing to do with how kind, caring or worthwhile we are as human beings either. I've seen this over and over in life. I know people right now that are complete nut cases if you get them rolling down that slippery slope we call politics. They come unglued and start yelling, screaming and demanding heads in the process from whoever they disagree with. Anyone who doesn't automatically believe in their ideas are just plain idiots. Me and all their friends I'm sure, do everything they can to not get them started.

Now before that nut case faucit got turned on and after they calm down and start talking about normal concerns in life, they are just fine. They go back to talking normally, in a normal tone of voice, without spitting and drolling and actually smile often and well. Without politics they actually have great senses of humor even.

How can this be? How can people you think of as normal turn completely inside out when the subject of Politics rears it's ugly head? I flat out don't understand this at all. A person I know and deal with all the time is someone I would consider a person with extreme views when it comes to the political arena. Starting years ago, every time we would see each other after some time went by, he would start going off about all that. One day I set him down and told him I wanted to remain good friends but didn't care one iota about all that nonsense he continually wanted to talk about. Now him being a great, noble friend immediately said "OK, subject done". To this day we talk about those kinds of things only infrequently if at all and are still great friends with tons of interests in common.

I just plain don't get it......

Do you know? Is this your experience also? Do you know people who are fine until politics rears it's ugly head and they turn into the proverbial dragon slaying nut case, ready to search and destroy on a moments notice?

Jeez, us humans are just plain wierd creatures, now aren't we?

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Life is what happens between cigarettes

2010-06-18T09:13:00.000-07:00

I was a life time smoker. Like most smokers, I quit dozens of times until the nicotine devil laughed at me as it grabbed me by the throat once more. Years ago, I quit for 5 solid years until one night setting with a smoking friend listening to music and relaxing. I asked him if I might have just one puff for old times sake and BOOM. Went straight to the store first thing in the morning and bought a pack of those delicious, scrumptious, satisfying to the soul darlings and down the yellow (teeth?) brick road we went again.

Well, after all these years and dozens of tries it finally happened. I'll talk about how later but I finally was able to quit for good. After just a few days or weeks, I was amazed at how much time I had without having to stop and smoke about once an hour. That's when this wild thought came into my feeble brain.

LIFE IS WHAT HAPPENS BETWEEN CIGARETTES!!!

Let me prove that fact for all of you reading this right now. OK, I want to go shopping down at the mall or Trader Joe's or wherever on a Sunday. Wake up in the morning and it's time to have a smoke, take a shower and get dressed and it's time to have a smoke. Have breakfast and it's time to have a smoke. The drive to go shopping is going to take about a half hour at least so right before I leave, it's time to have a smoke. Then when I arrive at the store, I'll be shopping for a while so now I'm out in the damn hot parking lot standing under this little bitty tree panting like a banshee having a smoke. In the store to shop for a while and now back to the parking lot under that little puny tree having another smoke, sweating like a pig. Guess I'll have lunch on the way home, so drive there and guess what folks? Before I go in, again standing out in the parking lot like a damn idiot having a smoke I am. After eating is one of the best cigs of all, so it's time for another smoke. Of course as soon as I get home, it's time to have another smoke now isn't it?

So, lets go back over what I did that day just up to the point of getting back home from a simple shopping trip BETWEEN CIGARETTES. I got up, took a shower, ate breakfast, drove down to the store, went shopping, drove to the lunch place, and drove back home. Lets count the cigarettes. How about 10 just up to that point and it's only about 1:00 or 2:00 in the afternoon.

LIFE IS WHAT HAPPENS BETWEEN CIGARETTES!!!

Now each cigarette takes about 10 minutes out of ones time, so that's about 120 minutes out of the total shopping trip up to the point of arriving back home. Man that's a pretty good chunk of wasted time out of my life, now isn't it? After quiting, I could not believe how much more time I had in each day. The time factor is kind of misleading though because even other than actually smoking, your mind is always close to working out the details of the next cigarette.

What finally happened to make me quit was a potential health issue that came up in a medical exam in our family. That scared me beyond belief. All of the sudden the idea of actually dying over the stupid things became a real reality instead of just a far away thought. So that did it. I finally totally decided to quit. That's probably the most important and useful thing to happen to someone wanting to quit. To finally make the decision and mean it.

Now a few negative realities about quiting. Did I gain weight? Yup, no doubt. Probably something in the neighborhood of at least 20 pounds, which I am still struggling with after around 5 years have gone by. The fact is one's sense of taste comes back big time after quiting which makes food taste sooooooooo much better. This is a great thing and a crappy thing at the same time huh?

Do I feel better? Not really.....I guess I can breath a little better now and also don't have that little smokers cough I used to make excuses for. By the way, that little noisy, gurgling thing in my lungs that caused me to clear my throat every night several times when I first laid down in bed before sleep went completely away after only about a week. I was making excuses for that also. Oh.......I'm just clearing my throat...

Lets talk about the money.........HOLY CRAP!!! Do you realize that the damn things cost about $6.00 a pack now or around $60.00 a carton. When a couple both smoke around a carton or so a week EACH, that is about $5700.00 A YEAR!!!! What could most of us do with that kind of extra money just setting around?

OK, now my learned advice............DO NOT USE GUM or anything like lozenges, where you just pop one in your mouth every time you feel the need. I know a guy who has been hooked on gum now for FIFTEEN YEARS!!!!! The only thing I would recommend that worked for me and lots of other folks is the patch. One each morning, starting with the "Step #1 patch" for a few months, then stepping down to "Step #2 patch" which has less nicotine, then finally "Step 3 patch", which has very little nicotine.

OK, I'm done with my tirade about smoking now. One final note though. I thought for sure that I would die with a cigarette in my hand. There was no doubt in my mind. The only thing that saved me was that one important medical scare and my making up my mind to choose life over that fat obnoxious idiot, the nicotine devil himself.

I'm sure you've heard this lots of times but here goes again.

IF I COULD DO IT..........ANYONE CAN!!!!!

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The Student becomes the Master

2010-06-17T10:32:00.000-07:00

Life sure is funny most times now isn't it? We start out alone, eventually if we're lucky, we find our mates. Then we have that magic moment of becoming parents. That's when the hard work, effort and sacrifice becomes a reality. Our whole life changes with that little demanding bundle of joy, noise and smelliness. We just thought life could be kind of tough, unfair and difficult up to that point. Oh boy!.....nothing compares to the abrupt changes one goes through when children enter the picture.

Everything changes. We go from carefree, happy lovers of life with backpacking, camping, long leisurely hikes, candlelight and wine dinners with our mates. Loving moments that seem to last forever into the night to...........WHOA!..........what happened dear? Sleep....What's that? Quietude.....What's that?....Loving moments?....What's that?

So........for the next dozen or so years, our whole lives are caught up in teaching the little punks how to not kill themselves with every innocent thing in the house and yard. Everything is a danger just waiting to take them out and it's up to us to teach them all the facts of life. The funny part is we just barely grew up ourselves and all this teaching comes without any handbook, manual or "parenting for Dummies" book to tell us how to do that. So we just stumble along doing the best we can.

If we're lucky our own parents can at least advise us on what not to do. You see, the only things they learned in the process of raising us is what didn't work so well, using how we turned out as examples. They tell us that the whippings they got as children didn't seem to hurt them too much but why don't you try something else since the law tends looks down of that method of instruction nowadays? So we go with the "quiet time" routine for better or worse.

Then the lessons start. Dance, music, sports, gun safety....oh wait!.... Not nowadays, unfortunately. We deliver and pick them up several times a week for years on end. We spend a fortune on costumes and uniforms. For what purpose? To teach them responsibility, sticking to the task at hand, working with others... All of this because we love them and want them to do the best they can in life.

Then without warning the dreaded teenage hood rears it's weird convoluted head. All of the sudden us parents don't know anything. We are no longer their special friends, we are their secret enemies. The ones who refuse to let them do everything they think they need to do. "All the kids are doing this" they say about some of the most idiotic things they think they have to do. "All the cool people have tattoos and rings through their noses" they assure us, when explaining the monster standing at the door waiting to take her out on the first date.

HOLY CRAP!!!! Now it's time to learn to drive a car. Look out world, now we have our little darling barreling down the road in a machine that weighs thousands of pounds heading straight for our neighbors and family out on the roads. "I can not and refuse to drive that ugly Honda civic. I need at least a corvette to be cool". In high school years, to be cool is EVERYTHING, you see.

After all the schooling is done, now it's time for them to find a mate. Maybe get married, or more likely just live together in sin for 13 or so years. "I don't know what went wrong Grandma, we thought we taught him/her better than that". Their mate has a good job and seems to wear clean underware so we just except their lack of morals and let it go at that.

OK, now is when that bum father time puts his interfering nose into our reality and of all the dumb things turns our hair white. What could possibly be the logical reason for that turn of events? Then comes all the aches and pains that appear out of nowhere. Add to that we have all these weird, rude noises our bodies make when we first get out of bed or simply stand up from a chair. HOLY CRAP!!! What happened to our youth, energy and stamina? When and how did that faucet get turned off? We find ourselves saying time and again. "Is this fair"?

The great thing about this time of life though is it's our turn! Now we get paid back for unpinning and removing that dirty diaper, cleaning unmentionable places on their bodies and replacing their clean diapers. Cleaning blood off of cuts and applying bandages so they won't get infections and have limbs fall off. Wash up and clean the vomit off of them and everywhere around them they so pleasantly leave laying around special for us to attend to when they're sick.

If we haven't completely blown our relationship with our children up to this point, they do appreciate all the hard work, effort and sacrifices we made through the years for them and help us in our later years. If we're lucky enough to have them close by in their adulthood, they help us physically. If they live far away, those hour long phone calls with emotional and physic help are unimaginably important and vital for us.

So after a lifetime of doing our best to teach them how to live a good productive life, it all comes back full circle.......right?

The Student becomes the Master......

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Soul food..........

2010-06-08T12:40:00.000-07:00

Ah........Gardening. When I was a small boy growing up on a small working farm, my Mother always had a garden. Out of that garden, she canned everything we needed for an entire year. In those wonderful days, buying a can or jar of anything was a novel and weird thing to do. Everyone canned their own supplies from their gardens. We also had cows for milk. My Mom would squirt fresh, warm milk straight from the cows teet into a metal cup for me to drink. From the cows came the ingredients for my Mom to make cheese. Ah....I remember the cheese balls hanging from the rafters of our dark, cool, damp cellar when I was sent down for another jar of canned vegetables or fruit.

So, vegetables from the ground and fruit and nuts from the trees. All in their own season and all put away with loving care with skills passed down through the generations of my family and the families of most people of those times. The only food type items that one bought from the store were salt, sugar, flower and maybe spices. She even made most of our clothes with material she bought. One pair of Levy's and one pair of shoes each year right about the time of the county fair and beginning of school. The rest my family was basically self sufficient with using things we grew or raised. Chickens were for meat and eggs. BY the way, real fresh laid eggs are supposed to have a dark orange yolk, not the pail yellow crap you get at McDennys or at most stores. Pigs, chickens and butcher cows were our meat supply.

To this day, what's for dinner usually revolves around what's in season, ripe and ready to go out in the garden and what we bought and store in the freezer from the local butcher shop. Lets get something perfectly clear here. There is no comparison between ANYTHING one buys at the store to what you grow yourself and pick fresh straight from the ground. Also none of the butcher departments of the major grocery stores has anything to compare with finding a local butcher store, with the whole carcase hanging right there in plain sight for you to see. Real butchers know exactly where the cow was raised, slaughtered and how and what it was raised on.

Our daughter when young asked one day in the middle of winter why I bought those "so called" tomatoes. She said they were nothing more than pale yellow cardboard things and we should not buy them from a store ever. Also one time at a Denny's (probably one of the last times we have ever eaten there, thank the goddesses above!) we were just served out breakfast and was starting to dig in when we noticed her just setting there staring at her plate. We asked her what was the matter. She said "What are those"? Pointing at the eggs. "Eggs", we said. "no they're not, eggs are orange, these are pale yellow". You see, she was raised her whole life with fresh eggs straight from the chickens butt and had hardly ever even seen a store or restaurant egg until then.

OK, back to gardening......

It's actually quite simple really. Just add something organic back to the soil every year in the winter to make up for what your plants that year took out to grow and your good to go. As everyone knows by now, the only way to go is with raised beds. That way whatever you put in your beds stays there. Also, the weeds tend to be less and easier to deal with.

Don't ever let anyone tell you that it's just easier and cheaper to buy everything at the store. Money has nothing to do with the subject of great, freshly picked and eaten food. What you grow yourself comes with unbelievable taste and soul and you're not going to come close to that with store bought anything.

One more cool thing. Even if your children are not required to work in the garden, they will see how important it is to you and see you doing it. They will also learn how great the food that their parents grew tasted. That will stay with them for the rest of their lives and they too will have gardens when they're adults. Then their children will get to experience it also. So pass it on for the next generations of your family...

To this day, our daughter has these tubs she bought at the hardware store, along with pay dirt and plants and has a little garden in the backyard of her condo.

YEA!!! IT WORKED!

As we all know, there are lots of city kids who think eggs, vegetables and meat come from the cabinets at the supermarket. They have no idea they too can do this in the backyard or patio of their apartments.

and to me, that's a pretty sad thing indeed..........

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The big rip off in America

2010-06-07T17:52:00.000-07:00

The news just made this amazing pronouncement that should be nothing but a miracle for millions of people all over the world.

Two novel anti-cancer therapies -- one that targets a type of lung cancer, the other a drug that trains the body's immune system to fight off melanoma -- created a stir at a major cancer meeting this weekend. Both therapies are still in their experimental phases; however, physicians at the American Society of Clinical Oncology 's annual conference in Chicago were hopeful that the different approaches could change the way doctors treat cancer.

For one thing, he said, the study demonstrates the speed with which discoveries can be translated to clinical testing. The protein that the therapy targets was first reported in 2007, and that finding is now starting to show results in clinical trials.

"In just three short years we've gone from a description of [a cancer gene] to a therapy," he said.

He also said that patients with the mutation that leads to the protein "can expect a dramatic benefit."

Indeed, in the study of 82 patients with advanced disease, Bang and colleagues found that the patients had a 72 percent probability of halting the progress of cancer at six months after starting the therapy. The majority of these patients saw their tumors shrink by more than 30 percent, he said, and some saw their cancers disappear.

Now all this is clearly the most important and wonderful news perhaps in my lifetime for those poor souls suffering from these cancers plaguing humans all this time.

At the end of the announcement, they threw the proverbial rock into the glass wall. The same rock that always ruins everything to do with our pharmaceutical system here in America. That would be the cost. I just heard them say on the news that these wonderful new miracle drugs could and probably will save countless lives very soon BUT the damn thing at this point will cost "hundreds of thousands of dollars PER PILL".

WHAT THE HELL!!!!! What are they made out of, pure gold and diamond dust?

How in the hell could that be? I'll tell you what I and others think. The same thing that drives almost everything humans can't live without. GREED! Our financial system has these cool words for this. "Whatever the market will bear". "Supply and Demand". So lets get this straight. These idiots will set their prices not by how much each little pill cost them to make but the highest possible price the most amount of money people can scrounge up. Also if they keep the supply very low and the demand is huge, which of course they will, they can charge whatever the hell they feel like.

Okay okay, I know they tell us it costs a lot of money to do the "Research and Development" stuff. I'm sure it does but that's what they're in business to do, isn't it? How about instead of trying to make all their research money back in just a year or two, they make the damn things affordable to the masses and get their return in however long it takes under those logical and humane conditions?

Another aspect we should look carefully at is how much money does the owners and management of these zillion dollar companies personally make on the backs of the masses? Millions and millions? Do they drive Rolls Royce's and live in mansions? Do they have personal jets to travel? If the answer to these questions puts them anywhere near super rich, then they can just live closer to the normal people they are claiming to care about. Isn't that the ultimate, real reason for these pharmaceutical companies to exist? Or are they in business to become super rich and the hell with everyone else?

I also see on the box ads for drugs to help us with the cancer drugs. They say "Our new drug makes cancer a much more comfortable problem". I ALWAYS say "Yea, if your rich! Otherwise suffer and die fool".

One more thing. We've all heard that the cost of meds in Canada and Mexico is pennies on the dollar. I know people who go to these countries once or twice a year and get all their prescriptions for incredibly low and reasonable prices. For prices that normal working stiffs can handle without going without food.

What should this tell us about the pharmaceutical companies operating in America?

Indeed what?

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The History of the Art of Barbering

2010-05-27T09:00:00.000-07:00

The word "barber" comes from the Latin word "barba," meaning beard. It may surprise you to know that the earliest records of barbers show that they were the foremost men of their tribe (Damn, I was right all along!). They were the medicine men and the priests. Wherever there were legends and superstitions about the hair, the barbers flourished. To this day in India, the veneration of the hair continues and those who cut and dress the hair are important characters. In Egypt, many centuries before Christ, barbers were prosperous and highly respected.

In Greece, barbers came into prominence as early as the fifth century, BC. These wise men of Athens rivaled each other in the excellence of their beards. Beard trimming became an art and barbers became leading citizens. Statesmen, poets and philosophers, who came to have their hair cut or their beards trimmed or curled and scented with costly essences, frequented their shops. And, incidentally, they came to discuss the news of the day, because the barber shops of ancient Greece were the headquarters for social, political, and sporting news.

The earliest known organization of barbers was formed in 1096 in France when William, archbishop of Rouen, prohibited the wearing of a beard. The barber-surgeon, or chirurgeons, began to thrive all over Europe. They were the doctors of the times and the royalty as well as the common people came to the barbers to have their ills treated as well as for shaving and haircutting. The barbers embraced dentistry as well as surgery and this brought down on them the enmity of the dentists of the times.

Up to the year 1416, the barbers were not interfered with in the practice of surgery and dentistry. But it was soon evident that they were attempting too much. It was impossible to expect ordinary human beings to competently practice surgery, dentistry and the various tonsorial operations. People began to complain that the barber-surgeons were making them sick instead of well. Many barber-surgeons resorted to quackery in order to cover up their ignorance of medicine and anatomy. Some of the McHaircut places pretending to be Barbers, when they are actually beauticians trained in beauty collages still do to this day........."^)

ORIGIN OF BARBER POLE

The modern barber pole originated in the days when bloodletting was one of the principal duties of the barber. The two spiral ribbons painted around the pole represent the two long bandages, one twisted around the arm before bleeding and the other used to bind is afterward. Originally, when not in use, the pole with a bandage wound around it, so that both might be together when needed, was hung at the door as a sign. But later, for convenience, instead of hanging out the original pole, another one was painted in imitation of it and given a permanent place on the outside of the shop. This was the beginning of the modern barber pole. The blue stripe was added in recent times as a political gesture.

In these modern times the Barber Shop still is the place where men and some women come to relax, hang their worries on the hat rack for a bit, kick back and enjoy some humor and have some intelligent conversation with like minded souls. Also a place to get a great naturaly cut, long lasting haircut without a gallon of overpriced product capable of holding the hair in place in a full blown hurricane. I also think it's one of the last bastions of a completely free speech arena. A place where you can talk about anything and say anything you want without the bullshit of political correctness unfortunately so prevalent in these times.

So wherever you get your haircut, if it's at a regular Barber Shop by a real Barber trained at a Barber Collage, thank the guy or gal cutting your hair. They probably are a dying breed of professionals. They started out on the forefront of the art of cutting hair and are now slipping into the past with a lot of other wonderful things we all will come to miss. Like the rest of the world the McHaircut places located in McWallmart will probably eventually win the contest.

Until then frequent your local Barber Shop, keep them in business for as long as possible and give them a huge THANK YOU!, along with a giant tip........."^)

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Upcoming bullshit...er, I mean elections

2010-05-26T12:27:00.000-07:00

Every election I go through this ridiculous, frustrating and worthless endeavor to try and understand the issues I'm asked to vote on. On top of that, I give it my best shot to try to get a grip on all the candidate's stands on things I care about. Which ones would best represent my views on what the government should or should not do with all the incredibly complex but worthy causes we encounter in life.

That is after all the reason most democratic countries have these things called elections. Supposedly we pion's get the chance to vote for people we think are way smarter than us to represent our wishes. Although at this time in our history a whole bunch of pion's seem to think they know what's best for the country and are making a bunch of noise to try and talk the majority into forcing our representatives into agreeing with their agendas. But that's a whole other blog for later.......heh.....heh.....

My main frustration for years now is how in the hell am I supposed to get unbiased information and knowledge about these things to help me make intelligent, responsible decisions at the voting booth? Don't EVEN suggest I find those answers on the internet. If you believe ANYTHING you see in there, I've got some swamp land for you to buy. I don't know about where you live but I can only talk right now about California. Being the 5th largest economy in the world, makes our problems huge indeed. I've even been told our problems effect the entire United States, if not the world. So, if you live elsewhere, you can't just write us off as "those crazy, hippy dippy left wing radicals". It's just not true in the first place and if our problems do effect the whole country, everyone everywhere better pay attention.

To get to my point (Holy crap, what a blabbermouth), I watch the political ads on the box and what do I get? We have three people running for the Governor of California right now. On the Republican side is a lady with a Gazillion dollars in her front pocket she made running some high tech company, then a career politician who is also at least a several times over millionaire. On the Democratic side we have this old as the hills, skinny, malnourished forever politician who was the damn Governor of California back in the cave man days, for craps sake.

Now what does the gazillionaire lady tell us with her ads? Every four minutes, for months on end (remember, she is a gazillionaire) she just pours on every negative spin she can find, make up or create about the career guy who is running against her, including accusing him of being one of those dreaded liberals in disguise. Does she tell us anything at all about how she would handle the many problems we have. Nope. Just how crappy the other guy is. I was at first infatuated with a successful businesswomen running the state but now just see her as a bitch.

Now what does the career politician tell us with his ads? Well, lets see here. That the gazillionaire is actually one of those dreaded liberals in disguise. On top of that his latest discovery is she has never voted in an election in her life. Holy crap Mr. career politician, I'll bet you screamed right out loud and wet your pants when you found that one out huh? Does he tell us anything at all about how he would handle the many problems we have. Nope. Just how crappy the lady is. I see him as this invisible nothing with a suit on, with nothing whatsoever to offer anyone, much less the state of California.

What does the one old fart Democrat tell us in his three or four ads thus far (He is only a millionaire after all). That his running mates (has a nice ring doesn't it?) are a bunch of nut cases, completely out of touch with reality. Does he tell us anything at all about how he would handle the many problems we have. Nope. Just how crappy the other two are. What I think about him is about as insignificant as can be imagined.

So after watching all the ads, reading all the political pamphlets and listening to everyone tell me who and what to vote for, do I have the slightest idea on how to do this very important and vital thing called voting with any intelligence or wisdom?

Nope!

Do you?

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Is speeding worth it?

2010-05-04T09:17:00.000-07:00

I've lived in a little mountain town called Foresthill for around 23 years now. It's about 17 miles up a relatively windy mountain road from the main local freeway. Several years ago, the state did a major revamping and straightening out project on our road. The funding was provided on the basis of safety because so many terrible accidents were happening on our humble road through the years.

I remember at our little 4th of July celebration at the local park right before authorization of the project, people had a booth there asking us to sign petitions asking the state to do something about our horribly dangerous road. Even then I remember thinking what the hell does the road have to do with anything dangerous? It's just a road isn't it? In fact a beautiful mountain road with gorgeous views to enjoy on the way down the hill. Isn't that like blaming guns instead of the human finger? In my mind there are actually very few truly dangerous roads that I know of. Now there are plenty of complete idiots that drive too damn fast though isn't there? They are the ones causing all the danger to say the least.

I came to the conclusion years ago while driving about 30 miles on the freeway from Placer County to Sacramento for a job that driving like a mindless maniac or driving completely relaxed and safely made very little difference in time saved. Would you believe maybe 5 or so minutes in a 30 mile stretch? On Foresthill road almost every day I drive around 60 miles an hour on the straightaways in a 55 mile zone (just kidding Mr. Highway Patrolman Sir). Every day cars wiz past me going at least 65 approaching 75 miles an hour on these little passing lanes we have there. The truth as we all should know is the time saved driving fast on the 15 or so miles of foresthill road is probably in the few minutes range, at the most.

So the obvious question we all need to ask is this. Is this few minutes saved worth the look on the faces of our friends and loved ones standing there looking down at our coffin during the funeral? How about living with the fact that our stupidity killed a whole family of neighbors/friends living on the hill?

I know this will get me in trouble but here goes anyway......No science involved here but in my own personal experience 90% of those cars have one young to middle aged well dressed women apparently on her way to work. The other 10% are young male idiots looking to get their thrills killing someone with their sports cars/motorcycles or construction workers in their gigantic 4 wheel drive stupendous monsters they think they need for some reason.

So if you are one of those women or guys who think you need to speed and hurry everywhere you go, how important really is a couple of minutes in the grand scheme of things. Are the lives of your children, your friends, your neighbors worth so little to you that you would hold a loaded gun to their heads while drunk out of your mind? Of course not!

So for all our sakes, the next time you get in your car to start the drive down the hill to go to work, take a moment to reflect on your mood right at that moment. Grab your coffee, set back for just a moment and do some deep breathing exercises to get you in the right mood to not be stupid today.

In the case of speeding cars, stupid=DEATH!

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House Concerts

2010-04-11T15:57:00.000-07:00

My wife and I became converts and complete fans of a relatively new phenomena started just a few years ago called "House Concerts". I wanted to take the time to introduce all of you to this new very cool musical venue. This is a new venue idea that the musicians and the audience both love because of the intimacy and realness of seeing great acts on such an up close and personal level. Instead of watching your favorite acts with binoculars from hundreds of feet away, you're now just 10-20 feet away.

What is a House Concert?

It’s an invitation-only concert in someone’s home, presented by a host who does not profit from the event.

Also, house concerts are usually…

Held indoors and on weekends.
Attended by 20-100 people.
Paid for by a $10-20 donation per guests, the entire amount goes to the performer (s).
Known to include light snacks, beverages or in some cases, a pot-luck dinner.
Attended by the host’s friends, neighbors, co-workers, and maybe a few fans of the artist.
Attended by a 25-60 age group.
Performed by solo, duos and small groups.
Performed with little to no amplification.
Very intimate - the audiences sit close and are attentive.
Performed in 2, 40-minute sets with a 15-20 minute break.
Almost always has the artist Cd's for sale. Plus the wonderful chance to personally talk to them.
Then there's the chance to socially network with others of like interests.
The host often are known to house and feed the artist for the night.
They usually are scheduled about once a month, sometimes more often.

We are always completely blown away with the quality, perfectionism, intimacy and great story telling abilities of these traveling minstrels. My wife and I are complete Jazz nut cases and I never thought we would enjoy these Singer/Songwriter types. What I found is all artists of this caliber and talent are far and away in the same creativity realm, no matter the type of music they play. In fact, I personally made a choice that we would go back until we were disappointed with a concert, then just stop going.

Well, it's never happened and we've been attending one in our area for over a year now. We've seen some of the best guitar players, best incredibly unique singers, best creatively written songs imaginable in that year. We leave every concert with a smile on our face that lasts for days and our souls more than amply fed.

With the house concert series we attend, we were invited to be put on the concert e-mail list. Then the incredibly talented and giving host (Thank you Kevin from the bottom of our hearts for inviting us) e-mails you a notice with who's coming and when and you simple RSVP them back that your coming. They are almost always sold out performances, so you need to respond back immediately. We enjoy ourselves so much that we asked to be put on the list of always coming, so we don't miss out on any of the sold out performances.

I read a piece in the newspaper the other day that these House Concerts are the rage now across the United States and beyond. I'll bet if you do a net search for your area, you will very likely find one or several to pick from. In our area, there are at least two that I know of and maybe more. I've heard that there are several up in Grass Valley. Most of them are Folk type singer/songwriter types but heard that one of them in Grass Valley is a Classical venue. Also in San Francisco, I know of one which presents Jazz.

Personaly, I would love to have a Jazz House Concert to attend also. Hell, maybe I'll just take that on myself in the future........who knows........

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Time to think outside the box.....

2010-04-01T15:08:00.000-07:00

I actually thought about this years ago, when I heard young people moan and groan about it being so hard to get a job. When I asked them what they were doing to find one, they would say things like "Well, I ran around all day long one day filling out applications". "And then?" I would say. "Well, that was two weeks ago and no one called me to come in for an interview yet".

Then I would give them my humble (suuuuuuure) advise that their method was not going to get them anywhere. They would need to first off show up dressed to the hilt. Clean cloths, shined shoes, hair combed. Act with some class and complete confidence. Try to find and ask to please speak to the manager or owner and introduce yourself to him personally while handing him the application.

Then go back a couple of days later and ask to talk to him/her again. Reintroduce yourself as the one he met just a couple of days ago and ask if he might have any openings yet. Then repeat that process at least every week until he/she hires you or tells you to get the hell out and quit bugging them. You want them to remember you as the person who is doing everything they can to get a job. Not just some name on a piece of paper stuck inside the big stack of papers on their desk. You want to stand out in their minds. That way when an opportunity does come up in their business, they might very well think of you.

Ok now there is my normal advice to young folks in normal economic times. As we know though, these are NOT normal times and each applicant to any job nowadays are competing with a hell of a lot more people. People probably far more qualified than average. So now the trick would be to stand out as much as possible from the masses. Stand out like the blazing sun for Christ's sake.

So now the trick is to start thinking outside the proverbial box as they say. WAY OUTSIDE the damn thing. Ok, how about this idea?

Work out some way to involve the media. The local newspaper of your town, a News radio station, the local Television News station or all the above any way you can think of. Lets see here.......how about having a friend stand by with his cell phone and call them all, yelling and screaming that there is a person doing something dangerous and they need to get this on film or tape quick before their competitors get there first. In fact tell them you heard the other station, newspaper or whatever were on their way over right now to cover this wild fast breaking local story. You could even arrange to have a group of friends pretend to be just passerbys who happen to see this happening and start a crowd of lookyloos, pointing up at you in wonderment and amazement.

You find something very high to climb up on. Like a power pole, a high building, a bridge. Anywhere where it's going to take the authorities quite a bit of hassle to get you down. Dressed to the hilt as stated above . As soon as the media show up, start yelling down that you ARE NOT COMING DOWN until someone offers you a chance at a job. All you want is a chance! YOU NEED A JOB! I'M NOT COMING DOWN UNTIL I AT LEAST GET A CHANCE TO GET A JOB! Then absolutely refuse all pleas from the law or fire department to come down. All this of course is becoming quite the scene with the media and the crowd that's starting to gather to watch this crazy person.

Ok ok, the truth as we all know is you ARE going to get in some trouble with the law for causing this uproar but I guarantee even they are going to admire your creativity and initiative. In the end, you come down peacefully with the help of the rescue people and thank them profusely for their kind and professional help.

In the meantime this news will be watched by business owners or people who know business owners. This crazy story on the news about this guy who so wanted a job that he did this wild, potentially dangerous stunt to draw attention to his jobless plight. Now within the next week or so, you WILL be getting offers for jobs. In this instant news world we find outselves in, this is just a fact.

Now.....if I, just one guy can set here at my compuker and think up this one out of the normal box idea to get everyone's attention and get a job, how many more super cool "out of the box" ideas are out there just waiting to be discovered?

How about I ask all my blog readers out there to use the "comments" link at the bottom of this piece (Thanks for the comment about the i and e being out of place) to give their "out of the box", creative ideas on this?

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It's about time to legalize it folks

2010-03-25T09:08:00.000-07:00

I just read in todays paper that there was easily enough signatures gathered to put on the California ballet this November to finally legalize Marijuana. Holy crap folks! It's about time...My generation coming from the fabulous sixties thought this would easily and logically happen way back then and are flat out shocked beyond belief that it still has not happened after all these years.

Marijuana is the most recreational used illegal drug in the United States. It has been estimated that literally millions and millions of otherwise law abiding Americans use the drug to get "high". Same as that glass of wine most regular people relax with nightly. Still there are millions of others that use the drug to ease their suffering from ailments like: Insomnia, Cancer, Aids, or chronic aches and pains. While it is true some states, including California have legalized Marijuana for medicinal purposes, on the federal level Marijuana remains illegal to: possess, cultivate, import, sell or consume. So, lets get this straight. The majority of Californians view Marijuana as a harmless, even beneficial medicine and our "government" considers us to be stupid and wrong headed?

So that means doctors who could prescribe it to their patients as a positive and proven treatment are scared to do so even though they reside in a state that has medicinally legalized it. It is truly nuts that Marijuana should be illegal in a nation where Tobacco kills thousands of people each year from lung cancer and Alcohol causes a majority of fatal car accidents, divorces, murders and and every other kind of crazy crap known to man throughout the ages. When have you EVER heard of a "crazed person on Marijuana, killing people on the streets"?

A study deliberately covered up by the U.S. gov't until recently, The National Toxicology Program found no evidence that Marijuana causes cancer. In fact the study proved the exact opposite. Animals that were exposed to THC (the active chemical in Marijuana) showed less of a risk of getting cancer then those that weren't. Study after study has shown that Marijuana actually decreases a persons risk of getting cancer and that smoking Marijuana does not increase a persons risk of getting any of the cancers associated with smoking. Would you believe that a long term study in Europe has established that those who used it in the sixties were way, way less likely if at all to have anything to do with Alzheimer's disease? Wait, what was I saying? Crap, what's my name? Who are you? Oh that's right. I'm writing this here blog thingy right now...

With marijuana users no longer being jailed for possession lots of room would be opened up in our already overcrowded prison system for more hardened offenders such as: murderers, rapists, child molesters and other violent criminals. The Judicial system would no longer be burdened by having to trial cases involving marijuana. The police will be able to allocate more resources to solving more violent crimes. Since marijuana could be purchased at any drug store after being legalized, violent crimes such as: robbery, drug warfare, contamination of drugs by other substances such as: LSD, PCP and Cocaine could quickly become a thing of the past.

Have you heard the potential tax benefits involved? If it were legalized in the US, $40 billion to $100 billion in new revenue, would be raised off the taxes alone. Can you believe how much that would help our economy? Government would simply be transferring revenue from organized crime to the public purse.

Now clearly the only folks apposed to the legalization of Marijuana are the booze, tobacco and legal drug industries. They know without a doubt that when people wake up to the enjoyment, safety and benefits of weed, they stand to lose their monopoly on our money into their multi-million (multi-jillion?) dollar coffers. The other insane quote I hear is that without a doubt it is a "gateway" drug. In other words if you start using Marijuana, you will inevitably move on to harder and harder drugs. Oh bullshit! Can you imagine how many sixties folks would now be running around hooked on Heroin if that were even remotely possible?

So come on folks. Grow a pair and vote to legalize Marijuana this November and all the other times it will come up here and across America as time goes on. It WILL be legal eventually across the land because we humans eventually do grow up and face reality. It just takes us a hell of a long time sometimes to see the light. Tell those fat, lazy, good for nothing rich politicians to put down their martini's, straight shots of whiskey and legal drugs and quit taking bribes from the tobacco, legal drug and booze industry and do the right thing.

Lets get something perfectly clear here now though. This is NOT FOR YOUNG MINDS. It has no place in the learning process whatsoever. It's not an age thing, it's a mind thing. Another important issue with the youth is they quickly see how relatively innocent weed is and wonder if adults are lying about the dangers of all the other drugs.

Obviously there are certain occupations, like Surgeons ("Cool, would ya look at that"), Pilots ("Wow, lets try that upside down")(insert a little knowing grin here), Barbers (Oh hell, it'll grow back and stop bleeding before you know it), Blasters (Here light my joint, NO NOT THE WICK IDIOT!) and others that just can't partake with safety but the majority can, using common sense and logic.

One last thing here. I really think we should slip some in all the politicians big fat cigars out there who are yelling, screaming, spitting with their neck muscles sticking out right now in our political arena. They certainly could use some mellowing out right about now huh?
OPPS! Did I just say that outloud? Oh well, that's another blog for sure.....

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New digital world is a double edged sword

2010-03-10T16:40:00.000-08:00

This subject comes up often in the shop in the digital world we find ourselves in nowadays. All us old timers (well, not me of course) were told by our elders something like: "Don't get any of that fancy smancy stuff. It's just more things to go wrong". For instance when we were young, cars and trucks were pretty basic things. As far as turn signals, you just stuck your arm out the window straight if you were turning left, up for right and down for stopping. The windows were rolled up and down with a handle you turned. Originally, I was told even windshield wipers were a little handle you moved back and forth.

I swallowed all that for as long as I could but alas, one day............KABOOM! I now LOVE all the bells and whistles on newer cars. I love pushing the little doohickey the keys are attached to as I'm approaching my car and hearing the doors unlock. I LOVE the little cool buttons that make the windows go up and down. I LOVE the ones that will adjust the rear view mirrors side to side and up and down. I LOVE just telling the car what temperature I want in there and have it do whatever is necessary with the heater or air conditioner to make that happen. How cool is that stuff?

The recent news of all the problems Toyota is having points to the shortcomings of the digital revolution for sure. As cool as all that stuff is, there are clear potential problems and hazards if we completely trust all this digital technology.

The biggest digital change in everyones lives in the last years have of course been the whole computer world. Holy shit. Has that changed life or what? Typewriters became absolute overnight. Now we use Keyboards. With all the software Mr. Gates so gleefully provided us, writing letters, documents, graphs and books have become something almost anyone can do with a little education.

Then came the INTERNET......Holy shit times 10 over on this one......
Slowly but surely as it became more powerful and faster, basically the entire world became our playground and workroom. It brought with it instant communication around the world, instant file sharing and storage capabilities we can't even imagine yet. Entire libraries can be accessed instantly. What the Internet opened for humankind would take up not only this blog but enough books to fill a stadium so lets just agree it's a hell of a thing.

Now here's where this starts becoming a double edged sword though. As cool as the Internet is, it does come with some problems. I am a reader. A reader of books, newspapers and sometimes anything I can get my hands on. As we all know, the Internet has slowly eaten away newspapers place in society and that just might only get worse as time goes on. I've also heard of a "reader" system that's already here that will store hundreds, if not thousands of books. You can just call up whatever book you want to read and viola!, there it is to peruse.

Now I don't know about you but there's something calming, comforting and relaxing about having a real book or newspaper in my hands. In fact it's a huge, important part of my life. I'm really not sure if I ever want to make the jump to digital readers with these things.

The other issues I've recently heard about is what this "instant access" issue has been and is doing to our world financial systems. One of the main problems with our economy right now was caused by the attitudes of big business. The clear philosophy that exist today is greed. Immediate profits are all that matters. The long term viability of the companies slowly turned into a non-issue for the huge companies of America and even the world. Whatever it takes to make a buck RIGHT NOW became the normal business model.

Now the speed and dexterity of the Internet makes all that completely plausible. Those greedy bastards can do their backroom betting in the middle of the night when no one is watching the hen house. They could care less if it involves taking down a company or how many honest, hardworking folks they steal from. Being generally against government control or interferance in the business world, I have no idea how to regulate this kind of reckless behavior but it sure seems like a good path to examine.

So like most new things in life, this whole digital world comes with a bunch of positive things and a shit load of negative stuff too. Who knows where all this will play out in the future but I'm fairly sure it's here to stay....

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Everything is "The Media's" fault?

2010-03-08T14:10:00.000-08:00

As a comment on one of my recent blogs (The Doom and Gloomer's and their hate, anger and bullshit), a person signing themselves Anonymous gave some great points on life being pretty damn good for most folks if they would just take the time to see it without the fog of "The Media".

I want and need to thank that person for taking the time and energy of leaving a comment on that piece. The more comments that are left for people to read, the more varied and interesting the viewpoints presented become. That way also, It's not just exclusively my bullshit. So get with it readers. Play your part in this nonsense!

I've noticed that everyone on both sides of our bullshit political landscape always want to put all the blame on "the media". I'm as guilty of that sideways thinking as the next person. It's always easier and more pleasant to blame anyone but ourselves for our shortcomings, stupidities and sins.

What we each choose to take in from others on TV or the Radio are just potential tools for our use. It's what we do with that stuff that matters. I know as a fact that there are a minority of people especially in the last few years that do nothing but watch certain news programs and listen to certain talking heads on the radio. Then they just parrot only what they hear their semi-godlike talkers say as if it's the truth and only truth. Luckily, they are an extremist minority, even though they think everyone agrees with their crap.

So clearly and ultimately, we have to take complete responsibility for our thoughts and actions. We can't in the long run blame "the media". The main stream media and the extremist right wing media are both in reality nothing more than income producers for the owners of those media's. All the talking heads laugh all the way to the bank at our gullibility. I am guessing all the owners, CEO's and managers of those outlets think they are some kind of royal truth seekers but alas, it's the money folks, it's the money...

To put all the blame on them implies we have no self control or self determination. We would just be robots to the media if they had complete control of our minds. I might be just a tad idealist but I'm convinced most intelligent folks are not robots. Easily misled maybe (all knowing grin inserted here), but how we ultimately think and act is still up to us.

By the way as a last thought on this weighty subject, if watching "the media" upsets you too much and all the time, the answer is pretty damn easy and plain for all to see. You see.....they make this little button on the remote control special for us robots. All you have to do is firmly push the little sucker down, turn "the media" off and go do something else with your valuable time. Like read a good book maybe? Plant a garden? Take a walk?

Smoke a joint? Oh wait......Did I just say that outloud?.......that's another blog.........

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A note of reality to the "No" party.......

2010-03-08T11:48:00.000-08:00

Today, I'd like to speak to the "NO" party who as usual are against the government financially helping the poor and especially right now all the millions of people who have or are about to lose their homes to foreclosure.

So when the government gives billions and billions to a few bankers who knew...or ought to know, they were "the best talent" in the world, remember?...that they were sailing too close to the wind, that's capitalism and you think it's great, or at least you don't object, right? Right.

But when the government spends billions shoring up the consumers in any way (in this case, mortgage holders), that is socialism, communism, marxism and all the other stupid ism's you can spin up and you object vigorously, right? Right.

I know you live in your own self made (Rush butt induced) dream world. But in the public interest, let me give you a few facts about capitalism:

1) The capitalist system is based on production and consumption.

2) When consumption drops off, production must drop off.

3) When production drops off, factories and service providers close and jobs are lost.

4) When jobs are lost, consumption goes further down, exacerbating the cycle.

5) People who work for a living making things and providing services are the most important link in the chain of capitalism because they spend almost all they make, driving consumption and therefore production.

6) When the situation is set up so that the needs of workers are put first in a capitalist society, the consumers, the producers, and the investors (i.e., the capitalists) all prosper.

7) But when things are optimized to reward investors by minimizing employment and therefore inflation, making investments more profitable in constant and immediate dollars, and optimized to reward consumers through low prices brought on by unrestrained foreign production and imports, the workers suffer, and eventually, so does the capitalist class (see 3, 4, and 5 above).

You don't seem to understand that by putting the bailout money in the hands of the mortgage holders, people would be able to stay in their houses and make the payments and pay their ongoing bills; therefore not only would social costs (relief expenditures and crime) be reduced, but the money would make its way back up the chain to the mortgage holders, i.e., the banks, anyway.

But when the money goes directly to the banks, they will appropriate it as they see fit, usually in the form of obnoxious profits, bonuses to executives and paying off bondholders. It's a fact that lending did not and has not resumed following the banks receiving their TARP funds directly. What happened to all that money? Weren't they supposed to start loaning again by now? Wasn't that the whole idea of bailing them out?

You may not know these things but I suspect that at at least on some level you do.

I think if you were completely honest, your real objection is to the concept of helping poor and working people. No doubt you think such people are just lazy, no good for nothing pieces of shit. Even evil, because after all, if they were any good, they'd be rich, right? Right.

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The Doom and Gloomer's and their hate, anger and bullshit

2010-03-04T09:05:00.000-08:00

In my reality with everyone I know in my personal life and at my business, most people by far are doing pretty damn well right now. Because of the present TEMPORARY economic situation we find ourselves in right now, they are like most people in the world being very cautious with their spending, that's for sure.

Again in my business, most people are basically happy with life, have great friends, neighbors and relatives. They come in smiling, content in general and we usually have plenty to laugh about. Also, there are plenty of positive, intelligent things to talk about and most people choose to look on the good side of things. They are not the proverbial "ignore the negative" types. They are hard working, smart, caring folks who understand what the world is going through right now. They just choose to look at things as a glass half full instead of a glass half empty.

Now I have to unfortunately admit that a very, very small percentage of folks who come in to my shop have a very small minded view of life for sure.
Their total focus is politics. Nothing but politics. They live, breath and only have that one subject in their lives. Politics! By far, these are types who do nothing but listen to the talking heads on the radio and television with their same "The world is ending" philosophies. They hate anything to do with the government. They see the government as the enemy. They live everyday with hate, anger and outrage toward the government.

The truth as most normal, intelligent folks know is the government is just an organization created by the people we set up to take care of the larger issues of life. Things that average people don't have the time or inclination to do. We set this system up in such a way that we get to vote for who we want to represent us. If our elected Representatives don't follow our wishes, we get to vote them out and vote someone else in. So ultimately, we are in control and have to take responsibility in the long run for the way things are. These politicians are not the
enemy. They are just people we voted in to do this job for us. If we don't think their doing the work the way we want, vote them out. Pretty simple concept that has worked for over 200 years now.

Back to the reality of the present TEMPORARY economic situation we find our selves in at the moment. I'm sure during the great depression, folks thought the world was coming to an end for sure. Those times were a hundred times worse than we are in right now. People were starving to death, for god's sake back then. Recently, some old black and white pictures of those times flew through the internet. Holy crap folks, those were some intense, crappy times for those poor folks then. Hell, we're living in heaven right now compared to those days.

It took years and years to get over that and get most folks back to work but that did happen. Everything went back to normal despite the Doom and Gloomer's saying the world was ending. It not only got back to normal but by the 1950's everyone's lives was doing pretty damn good. Some of the best times in America's history were AFTER the great depression.

The truth and reality is economics is and has always been a rollercoaster kind of thing. It goes up, probably too far, then it crashes back down, probably too far for comfort. Now being a good example of that.

So to all the Doom and Gloomers out there, which are "thank the heavens above", a very small minority of Americans, I say "Try and relax, it WILL eventually get better. Try to remember that regular, normal life could care less about your bullshit negative philosophies. The flowers are still there to enjoy, creative people are still creating, the sunny days are still wonderful and your friends and family still love you or at least care about you.

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Religion's new/old role in todays society?

2010-03-03T11:39:00.000-08:00

With the present economic situation we find ourselves in, an idea crossed my feeble mind. It's becoming more and more obvious that we the people, our government and business in general slowly but surely started spending more money than we had coming in. This spend, spend problem is not just centered in America but throughout the whole world. This infection came out of nowhere and slowly poisoned everything and everyone.

With most normal people, the problems started with the invention of credit. When I was young, you only purchased what you could pay cash for. If you couldn't afford something, you saved until you could go buy it. Before credit reared it's ugly head, there was something called "Lay-A-Way". This way, you could set an item aside at the store, make payments on it until it was paid for and then take it home. Then the devil in disguise called "credit" became the standard and that's when people started spending more money than they had coming in.

Of course the business world soon followed suit, which of course made those things called "banks" very happy indeed. It didn't take the banks long to realize they could charge outrageous ripoff "interest" for loans to businesses and become the rich, happy, suit wearing greed mongers shitheads they presently are. Now in order to pay back these business loans, the businesses had to charge rip off prices for their goods. All this nonsense sent the whole concept of "Reasonable profits" straight to the garbage bins where they reside to this day.

Getting to the problem of Government now. In the beginning, when people first settled the lands of America in small enclaves then small towns, things were pretty basic and simple, to say the least. People helped people, neighbors helped neighbors. If one of your neighbors fell on hard times with health or just bad luck which was pretty common in those hard days, everyone would jump in and help in any way they could.

There basically was no "Government" in those first days. If there was, it was something to do with setting up the constitution, bill of rights and those kinds of lofty but important things that the common man didn't have the time or inclination to deal with. The common men and women of those times had their hands full just staying healthy and alive. Just dealing with the rigors of everyday life.

When the small towns firmed up, usually a preacher would establish a "church" to fulfill the spiritual needs of the people. Often times, these preachers were just kind, caring semi-educated men who wanted to help their fellow man in any way they could. It was probably most times they who organized parties of caring, like minded folks in the town to help their fellow citizens in times of need. They would form up parties of people to rebuild barns that burned down, replant crops that failed due to drought or other unforeseen and unfortunate causes.

Somehow it went from those logical, caring, creative days of people helping people to where we are at today with government. One day some "elected official" saw some perceived need and thought he could just jump in with government money (our money, shall we not forget") and fix the problem for the people. It all started out as a nice gesture, to be fair and honest but then that or some other government official decided the government could jump in and solve every conceivable problem mankind could ever Have.

Well as we all know, this led to the inevitable place we find ourselves in today. The government started spending more than it was taking in with taxes. Now each of those expenditures were for thoughtful, caring problems seen in society. Things taken individually, were good sounding ideas. The real problem was not asking if the Government (we) could even afford to do these wonderful things. They started borrowing from the future until it inevitably imploded as has now happened.

Okay, to the point with my long winded nonsense. I'm thinking that since religion somehow started out making money through donations or guilt money, whichever you want to call it while paying no taxes, don't they have a tremendous responsibility in all this? What about Government dropping most entitlement programs like welfare, food stamps, free housing, free anything for illegal immigrants and anything else people think government owes them.

How about going back to how it all started where the religious leaders organize the people, volunteers, neighbors, friends and congregations to take on these responsibilities and leave our tax money for the uses it was original designed for. Roads, public safety and the military? Doesn't this make sense? Let organized religion do what they say they're there for. To help the needs of humankind. They can do this if they want to. Quit putting millions and millions into their solid gold trimmed and oak paneled offices and churches and use the money for the good of the people.

I've often thought that if Christ stepped into one of those giant, super fancy, expensive as hell religious palaces, he would be shocked and dismayed at the complete waste of money and effort just for the sake of showing off. I'm sure he would think the religious leaders have completely misunderstood and misconstrued his clear and concise teaching to go forth and help the lowest of the low in society.
Now obviously, not all churches are these monoliths with millions of dollars in the bank. Most small town churches are just that but even they could and should take over as much as they can of they're original purpose of helping humankind, especially at the lowest levels. Therefore leaving our precious tax dollars to be used for their original purposes.

I guess the real question we all are forced to ask ourselves now is can Government (WE) keep on paying for all these things indefinitely with forever rising prices? Should they even try? Are these things the Government's job and function or are they our personal jobs as caring intelligent people with the express help of the tax free religions of the world taking a leading role?

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VOTE FOR ANYONE BUT REPUBLICANS OR DEMOCRATS!!!

2010-01-18T15:12:00.000-08:00

Again as usual, these thoughts came straight from my shop. Every time I bring this simple idea up in the barber shop, EVERYONE loudly and completely agrees.

The truth is both political parties have had a couple of decades trying to make America the best political system in the world. Compared to most of the rest of the world it has worked pretty good. There's a huge BUT in all this though as we all know.

Somehow it went from a few very caring and intelligent people basically volunteering for the sake of the people to take a part time job in the various offices. Making laws and guiding us in our quest to greatness to a complete career , hell we might even call it kingdom building. I'm told they used to come in for a couple of years, add whatever contribution they had to offer the people and then moved on. Back to their normal jobs, which back then was running a farm or business wherever they came from.

It was not a lifetime career at all. They did not get anything other than expenses while there. No Health insurance, lifelong retirement, fancy cars, jets, bodyguards and all the other expensive as hell crap we throw at them now. How in the hell did it get to the point it's at now from there?

Obviously now the only reason they are there are to further their own personal bullshit agendas, make a butt load of money and live like kings and queens for the rest of their lives. They lie, cheat, steal, take bribes, commit acts of perversion with each other and small children, all with no consequences. If they're not corrupt when we send them there, they become so shortly there after, in order to survive.

Isn't it about time that we changed all that? Make the bastards live with the same health care plans, retirement, personal integrity standards, etc. as the rest of us Americans. How did they somehow become like gods in their perverted eyes? Sorry fat ass, lazy rich suits, you are nothing compared to regular hard working Americans out in the country making an honest living for their families. Normal people who treat their neighbors, family and friends with the respect they deserve.

Okay, to the point with my rant......

I honestly don't think we can go any farther with our present very limited and short sighted two party system. Like I stated above, I think it's apparent that after a couple of decades in the saddle, both parties have changed everything to a completely unrecognizable mess and it's time to vote all those assholes out of office. It's time to drop our crap conservative/liberal agendas and try something completely out of the box. The same damn thing the Englanders did when they told England to eat shit and moved to America when they got sick of being ran by religious nut cases, for a fresh new start. A fresh start with new ideas and philosophies. Our two party system is done for and can just disappear into the sunset and history books as a good idea we had until we thought up new, better ways of governing ourselves.

So............to put all this in one sentence...............

DO NOT VOTE FOR ANY REPUBLICAN OR DEMOCRAT the next you vote.

Vote for ANYONE BUT THEM! It doesn't really matter at all who you vote for. ANYONE IS BETTER THAN THEM. Also, always in the future only give each of them one longer term in office or two shorter terms, then they can move along and go back to work like the rest of us normal working stiffs.

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Leave Tiger Woods the hell alone Media!

2009-12-17T09:37:00.000-08:00

Ok, like most regular intelligent common people, I assumed this whole Tiger Woods thing would just flair up and go away in a few days. Having all the fame and money in the world, he really doesn't need another additional 15 minutes of fame, now does he?

Oh no.......the stupid ass news media decided to make this their darling cause of the universe and make believe that all us regular folks really give a shit what some super rich, sports guy does in his private life. Lets see now...on my personal scale of importance, this ranks right up there beside how many enemy terrorists got killed today. I could care less (well, that does give me a little cruel smile).

In my business, no one even brings this subject up as a point of conversation other than commenting on how incredibly stupid those that would care about this kind of crap are. Most people realize it's not even people who are to blame for this news fiasco but the News media itself has to take sole blame for this one. I think it's becoming more clear each day that our news media complex are becoming completely out of hand. Instead of just presenting the regular news that we care to know, they are trying to become like one of those insane junk magazines that puts out innuendoes and lies about the rich and famous. They are trying to lower the standard of our group intelligence to some kind of low denominator. We are more intelligent than they want us to believe and become folks.

Let me make something real clear here folks. I don't mean just the main stream media here. I mean all of them. They're all to blame in the misinformation, innuendoes, flat out lies department, all intended to try and make us believe whatever crap agendas they believe to be true.

With all the super, vitally important issues and wonderful things going on in the world right now, we all still appreciate and enjoy the media letting us all know what's going on but please leave off all the personal spin and rumor garbage. Especially the extremist crap from both sides of the political bullshit aisle. There is far more to life than politics or personal rumors.

What Tiger Woods or any other person on earth does in their private lives is none of anyone else's business at all. Get this straight Mr/Mrs News Media idiots. It's none of your damn business what other adults do in their private lives. We don't need nor want you to drag anyone's privates out in the light of day for us to see. We flat ass don't care.

I wonder if there might be some way to let our true wishes be known to those numskulls. Maybe if we all directly e-mailed/called/wrote whichever television/radio station you generally watch or listen to for your news and reamed their asses out for this kind of crap reporting, maybe they might take notice and back off. Tell them to stop this crap or you're going to shut them off for good. I have a sneaking feeling that money talks with these idiots.

Mmmmmmm, I wonder?

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We're miracles

2009-11-28T09:52:00.000-08:00

We are miracles ya know? We're walking, talking living miracles. For a lot of folks, they're living miracles constantly on a mission of searching for a miracle. That would be called religion or spirituality. The miracle of this thing we call life is most people have no idea at all that the miracle is themselves. In fact this whole thing we call life is plainly one big miracle now isn't it?

So here we are existing on this big old ball in the ether that we've named Earth. It's exactly at a distance from the Sun in our solar system to make the temperatures perfect for our very delicate bodies to not only exist but thrive for millions of years. With just the right combination of gases and oxygen to allow us to breath and live. With the perfect amount of gravity to keep us firmly rooted to the ground, without just floating off into the sky. The Earth is also conveniently a little off center with it's axis to cause and create our seasons, which allows all the crops and food producing plants to go thru their cycles and allow us to live off it's bounty.

Everything on this earth has an exact and perfect reason to exist. Starting with the large animals and plants, down to the smallest life forms. Some so small, we can't even see with our naked eyes. Even these things are all vitally crucial to our existence here on Earth. When one pictures this whole thing from a distance, like our astronauts luckily get to do, it would seem like one big living, breathing, alive, vibrant organism, which of course it is. The heart would be the burning, molten, churning, liquid metals deep within the core. The skin would be the outer layer where we and everything alive call home. The oceans and upper atmosphere would of course be the producer of air and Earths lungs. The Sun out in space would be the heater and giver of life as we know it.

This whole thing I'm calling a miracle is indeed a complex, wondrous mess, that's for sure. It sure would be nice to put a purely positive, loving slant on the whole thing now wouldn't it? But people, animals and all else alive go through terrible pains, diseases, traumas and all eventually die, rot and go back to mother earth, where the worms get to fulfill their destinies. Everything on Earth also has great joys, wondrous life experiences, pure pleasures and get to experience things like love, happiness, brother and sisterhood and greatness also.

The reality is this whole "Life on Earth" thing doesn't have anything to do with our concept's of positivity or negativity at all. It just is.....All of our concepts, philosophies, ideas, opinions and general bullshit mean absolutely nothing to reality. The Earth could so easily just shrug us off in a moment with a cataclysmic event like a earthquake or all encompassing flood. Luckily for us so far, it's decided to let us stay here. Who knows how much longer but here we are.

As far as how we got here? Whether from a divine source, planted by aliens as a test tube project or just grew from the Earth's bowels? Personally, I don't think that matters in the slightest. Just more opinions to add to the crazy mix we call intellect.

So in my humble opinion, all this bullshit adds up to how us humans want to view all this. As a glass half empty, knowing we all are just going to die someday for sure, or......as a glass half full, living each moment as the very cool miracle that it is....

So, dance like no one is watching and make the most of it huh?

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The News

2009-11-24T14:09:00.000-08:00

When you tune in the news on the TV or listen to the news on the radio, what are you expecting to see or hear about?

I consider myself to be just a regular common, middle class American with normal (well, maybe higher than many) intelligence. I also know that I'm part of the vast majority of folks. The way I see it, here's what's happening to a minority of Americans right now. What they call news is actually just the "political" news. Nothing else matters to them. They live, breath, discuss, harangue, bitch, moan, scream, have fits, lose friends, gain enemies, fight, slobber, spit, lose sleep and join causes all in the name of "the news", they consider the gospel truth. Now where this minority of people get their news depends on their political leanings. If they lean to the right wing, they get their news exclusively from places like talk radio and FOX NEWS. If they lean to the left, they rely on MSNBC, CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS. For the more middle of the road folks, Public Radio probably fits the bill.

Well folks, us regular folks who could care less about extreme viewpoints with real lives, head for the fridge or the shitter when that right or left leaning crap comes on the tube or radio. What we're interested in is the regular, what's going on with people in the world news. How's the economy right now? Up or down? Not the extremist spin on why. What's being done by other intelligent, creative folks around the country. What's the latest high tech stuff, cars, environmental concerns? What's going on in the educational world? What's the weather going to be, What's happening in the sports world. We are only interested in the facts of these things, not the "spin" crap that the political junkies put on everything. The last thing in the world we're interested in is the left or right extremist and what they think about the other side's ideas and philosophies..I personally can't think of a more boring subject than politics in general and that would certainly include all the extreme political junkies....

It seems to me that this minority of Americans have lost the ability, or desire, to use rational, critical or logical thinking. They forgot how to choose their battles wisely. To keep everything in perspective. Politics in the everyday, common person's lives takes up at most a few moments of reflection a day. We have a whole lot more important and real, I might add, things to spend our time and energy on. At my business, the subject of politics rarely even comes up. Of course me not bringing it up or not contributing to it probably has something to do with that fact. As all that know me can attest to, I'm probably the epitome of the proverbial blabbermouth but there are tons of creative, interesting, intelligent topics of conversation to be had without digging in the shithole of politics.

So........How much of your life is taken up in with serious, ongoing, engaging, all inclusive talking about the subject of politics, especially in a loud pervasive voice? If a lot, have you noticed normal, regular people making excuses that they have to be somewhere else quickly? If so, maybe you have a social problem you might want to give some serious thought about huh? I do know that all the regular folks I ask are clearly getting sick and tired of constantly being bombarded with all this political nonsense and they do try and avoid all the political nut cases running around nowadays.

Whatchthink???

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The answer is Middle America

2009-11-16T19:14:00.000-08:00

The sooner we as a nation reject the extreme right- and left- wing views and bullshit agendas that are so prevalent today and find common ground in the center, the sooner we can get the country back on its feet and maintain - at least for a few more decades - our global lead over the Asian tigers. Hell we might even solve some of the 1,677 or so very, very serious problems here in America. We need to get both extremist sides out of politics and in the gutter where they belong. They all need to shut the hell up and go away!

Try to understand that the world is not black and white, but rather various shades of grey. Personally I have liberal views in some regards ( environment, personal rights, morality, freedom of speech).) but conservative views in other areas (law enforcement, balanced budget, taxation).

Then we need to find people with intelligence (NOT POLITICIANS!!!) who can see all the gray areas of real life and start thinking completely out of the normal box to make some real, intelligent changes to our tax, prison, drugs, social benefits, health care, environment, big business rip offs, immigration systems just to name a few, which in most cases are complete failures. I think the biggest reason we are in our financial mess right now is because of the complete waste of money our approach to these problems causes.

My immediate suggestion is to vote all Republicans and all Democrats out of office as soon as possible. Who to vote for? ANYONE other than them. Look where both sides have gotten us so far.

Have you been satisfied?

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Reality = Change

2009-11-11T10:43:00.000-08:00

Listening to all my old as hell friends, customers and especially extremist right wing political people constantly rant on and on about how much better things were in our past got me to thinking (ooooooh, there's that dreaded problem I have again). Thinking back to my own youth, I do have to admit that from the present perspective, everyday life sure did seem to be a lot simpler, more clear cut and easier to understand . There were far less consumables, things to do and see, far less information or choices that seemed important. One basically only had to deal with your immediate surroundings, not the whole country, much less the whole world. All of that stuff "out there", didn't even exist for me in my youth on the farm.

Having admitted all that, I have to face reality here though. The ONLY thing that is truly and forever true and constant is CHANGE. We go thru life, living in each moment not really noticing that everything constantly changes. So slowly that we don't always see it as an ongoing reality but it plainly is. In fact again, it is the ONLY REAL THING.

Okay, lets talk details to put all this in perspective. The price of things.....As time goes on, the price of everything slowly and unfailingly goes up. Picture an old man standing in line at the grocery store saying "Holy shit, a candy bar is now a #$% *#$* whole dollar???, Why when I was a kid, they were only 25 cents, for gods sake!? Now picture a ten year old boy standing in line right behind him. He out of a modicum of respect is not saying this out loud but what he is really thinking is "Jesus, you old grump, that's what candy bars cost. Pay the damn price, quit bitching and get out of my way, I've got more important things to do today than stand here listening to you complain". You see, to that kid, the price is just the price. It's normal to him.

How about some more serious examples of change that us old farts have such problems with. Back when all the emigrants were pouring over to America from Europe and beyond by the thousands, I would bet that the Americans living here then were outraged that these "foreigners" were coming here and taking over "our" country lock, stock and barrel (How's that for a cool old as the hills saying?) Well turns out that those "foreigners" are now "us". Those people pouring over here are our forefathers and foremothers. If they didn't have the courage, need and stamina to come to America, we all would be right now living in who knows where, with far less freedoms or choices. Now plainly the only reality that was going on then for them was the reality of change. Things were changing at a hell of a pace back then but guess what? We all made it! They were wrong thinking that "those" people would ruin America.

In the present time with all the Mexicans, and all the other "foreigners" trying to make a life in America, we again are freaking out that they are "trying to take over our country" lock, stock and barrel. Do I have a problem with all this? Hell yes!. It scares me along with all the other old shits in the country but you know what? It's just change folks. Okay, I know....the original emigrants came here legally, where now we have a lot of illegals. I personally don't like that fact but in 20 years, do you really think that will matter at all? Or just more "change" that we don't at this time understand.

Will there eventually be more people of color than white folks here? Probably...
Will the country then turn into a third world shithole....Most probably not..

Other great examples are the social ones. As time goes on humans naturally and logically become more intelligent, open minded and caring of others and their basic human rights. A perfect example right now would be the whole sexual preferences issue. Ask any young person what they think of gay rights, gay partnerships, gay marriage or gay adoptions and I'm telling you right now that the majority of them will have no problem with it at all. They will tell you that it's none of their personal business what other folks do with their private lives. You see, they live and accept natural change and are not stuck in the same grumpy time zones most of us older people are in.

Whether we like it or not, it's going to happen. It's called CHANGE. All of us old farts will eventually die and then to those left all this will be just normal life. America will keep right on changing with the times and Americans, no matter who they are will all survive just fine because of our creativity, intelligence, bullheadedness and perseverance. We always have and always will.

Now, the reasons or motivations for change are ultimately irrelevant. Even the outcome of change only depends on your personal philosophies. That all depends on whether you see life as a glass half full or half empty. I choose half full, thank you.... The whole point of my bullshit in this blog is that change is the only real thing in life. All the details are just that. They are all subject to change with the times also.

So please don't fall into the trap a lot of people are in right now with believing all the idiot doom and gloom on the news. Don't forget that "only bad news sells". Normal, average people's lives are cruising along just fine. Are there problems in the world? Yup........ but guess what? It WILL change.

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Sleeping Pilots

2009-10-29T13:23:00.000-07:00

The news about the Northwest Airline overshooting their destination by something like 90 minutes hit the front page news all over the world. As usual, it got me thinking (Crap, that bad habit again) about the whole issue of doing well your whole life and then screwing up once. I'm not at all sure that our society handles this with complete logic, compassion, individualism or common sense at all.

Now I completely understand all the standard arguments about their screw up possibly putting hundreds of people's lives on the line because of their line of work. What if their apparent lack of situational awareness (cool words I learned from my pilot daughter) buried the plane in the dirt destroying those poor unsuspecting people's lives and even potentially more on the ground? The other argument running around in the aviation world is that these guys were probably screw-ups before and only just now got caught with their preverbal pants down on this one flight. I'm certainly not sure how we would know that though, now would we?

Ya know? It struck me that these two pilots, whom I know nothing at all about, have ( I heard) thousands of hours of perfect service. Hours and years apparently doing everything by the book and safely doing their jobs. It would seem to me these facts would have to be taken into consideration when trying to judge this one infraction, no matter how grave it is. After thousands of hours of professional, safe flying should their licenses, career and livelihood be taken from them over this one thing?

I think this situation unfortunately happens a lot of times in normal life also. Where good, hardworking, honest folks just plain screw up once in a blue moon after a lifetime of being "perfect". Where people who would normally not do anything wrong or crazy at all go off the deep end for some crazy once in a lifetime reason that cannot be understood. I wonder how many crimes of passion or rage are completely out of character for the people involved. Things they would never think of doing when their lives are on track and normal.

I know this can't be compared with the airline pilots dilemma but I do know I've had weird moments when I thought I was being treated unfairly taking into account my normal reputation. When for instance the power company sends me a "shut off" notice because I forgot or mislaid my bill and it was late. When that happens, I always get super angry with them for not checking my record to see I've paid perfectly on time for years on end with no problems whatsoever. It lets me know I'm just a damn number to them after all these years and they could care less of my record of perfection.

Okay, I'm certainly not the FAA or any other aviation department who has to make these decisions about these two pilot's licenses, lives and career but I sure would hope their entire flying record would be at least as important as this one incident. Personally, I would think when both facts are put on a balance scale, their total service would far outweigh this one screw-up.

What say you?

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Bottom up leadership?

2009-10-28T09:12:00.000-07:00

Listening to the common workers around my little world through the years always had me thinking (bad habit of mine). I listen to them complaining about idiotic policies, rules, proclamations, changes and procedures constantly coming down the pike from who in the hell knows where at their jobs. Somewhere toward or at the top of the totem pole of whatever big company or government agency they work for. Usually they come from some guy/gal in a fancy suit who got some kind of degree from a collage proclaiming they are way smarter than those little guys out in the field actually doing the work on the ground, or in the air for you pilots. Everything they learned came out of some usually very expensive books having almost nothing to do with the reality of doing things logically or right.

Interestingly, most if not all small businesses don't have these kinds of problems because the decision making processes are still being handled by the owner and he has to run a tight, efficient ship or he doesn't make any money to keep going. He has no desire or the money to hand out vital, important decisions for his company to some collage graduate to analyze.

No, most of these crazy things happen in the big business or even bigger government arenas. These become so large that they completely loose track of the real purpose and mission they started out to do. They lose sight of the fact that the actual worker, laborer and employee doing the work day in and day out is really the only ones who see what's really happening. They are the only ones who know if the work is being done in a logical, reliable, efficient, product producing way. They are the ones who see the waste, inefficiency and just plain stupidity being handed down from up above.

What brought all this to a head was a customer just the other day who works for PG&E. He works in their building and maintenance department. He was complaining up a storm about how these stupid directives come down the pike and eventually get to him. These papers are telling him to do things which he plainly knows are just plain stupid and wasteful in the extreme. He told me of a case where PG&E was setting up a job to put parking and directional stripping on the pavement around one of the buildings he is responsible for. So of course they put out bids to all the giant paving/stripping contractors in the whole state of California. Then bids for 5 or 6 other contractors for various other issues involved with this project. He said this relatively simple little job is going to cost the company some astronomically high amount of money. He told his boss to give him the budget set up for this one job and if he couldn't do it for less than one quarter of the money, they could fire him. He was so disgusted with their insanity that he meant it but alas, they just mumbled some crap and walked off.

Now in PG&E's case, guess where their headquarters is? Guess where the suits sit making these kinds of insane, wasteful decisions? In downtown San Francisco. Yup, these idiot suits have never even seen the job site. They have no need to actually visit the work site in person to know what the best, most cost effective, logical way to get the job done.

What kind of world have we inherited where this kind of foolishness can happen. Shouldn't the first and foremost people big business and government look to for answers be those very peons at the very bottom of the hill. The ones with the shovel, hammer, tape measure, tool kit or sales laptop in hand. The ones who are sweating, trying their damnedest to do the best job they can with the tools, instructions, skill and information they have available. They are the ones to ask, Mr/Mrs stupid CEO, Manager, Stock Holder for the answers you need.

One more thing and I'll try and climb down from my self inflicted soap box for today. These lowly workers, if asked their valuable opinion, should be paid a hell of a bonus (yea, cold hard cash), if and when their ideas are put in place.

So......wherever you work. Do you see waste, ineffective, idiotic policies happening and if asked could probably do it way better with better results, profits and a much better end product?

Then read the next bit and add your bitch to this blog....

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Humans are amazing creatures...

2009-08-14T11:15:00.000-07:00

Ok, with all the negative doom and gloom naysayers screaming their insanity's (are you as sick of it as I am?), especially on the political bullshit front, I thought it was about time to point out some amazing positive facts about us humans.

It has always amazed me that in the worst times and situations we find ourselves in, people of every color, ethnicity, age, economic statis and sex always put their best foot forward and do incredibly heroic and brave things for the good of their fellow man.

One of the examples that comes to my mind would be the Earthquake we had in Northern California a few years back. You know...the one where entire freeway bridges collapsed, trapping poor souls in their cars between the layers? If I remember this correctly, a lot of those scenes took place in downtown Oakland. In some of the worst places in that city. Places where crime ran in the streets like greasy liquid. Gangs, drugs, prostitution and killings were an everyday happening. Bars on most every window and where the average person generally lived in fear for their lives.

I watched the news that day in complete fascination and awe with what was taking place. People including those same druggies, robbers and rapist ran out of their homes, risked their lives climbing up into the crumbling cement structures and went to work trying to save anyone they could. They worked for hours with no care of their own safety right beside the emergency personnel who eventually came to help. I saw overweight, out of shape, never exercised in years type folks sweating blood that day putting their lives on the line to try and save complete strangers.

You see on the news all the time where car accidents happen and strangers get out of the safety of their own cars, run up to a burning inferno, break out windows and drag the victims to safety. They suffer severe burns to their arms and more but do it anyway. The other thing that comes to mind is when a heavy weight falls on a person and someone comes along and lifts far, far more than they should be able to in order to save the victim. I'm sure all of us have seen stories like these.

Seems the truth is us humans always shine the brightest in the darkest times imaginable. The more horrible the situation, the more we rise to the occasion and do the right and honorable thing. I would bet these kinds of incredibly heroic acts of bravery have been happening since humans came to this earth. To me one of the most interesting facts about all this is how no matter how noble and brave or not people are in their normal lives, in the right situations all that goes out the window and most everyone becomes like some kind of superman or women and does whatever it takes to help others out.

So, being the incredibly complex creatures we in fact are just makes us more, not less enduring and interesting to be sure. Yes obviously we can be complete monsters, pricks and idiots at times but at the most important times, even those types of people can be angels in drag also. So when the news portrays us with their dark lenses, we should all not forget that we are really like many faceted diamonds, even to the extent that diamonds can be beautiful and at the same time cut the crap out of you.

So, come on folks. Hold your chin up and face this crazy world with a huge helping of hope with a healthy dollop of positiveness. Take a moment to view it as a glass half full and smile once in a while. At least you and I are looking down at the grass. Think of how many people over at the cemeteries are looking up at the roots possibly wishing they had our measly problems.

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Kick them ALL out?

2009-08-08T20:15:00.001-07:00

I think it's time for a little reality check here. Not only all the extremist on both sides of the aisle but most regular Democrats and Republicans who are presently screaming and yelling need to shut the hell up and crawl back in their bomb shelters and freakout chambers and take a self imposed time out.

I've heard of a movement that I'm going to join from now on that asks each of us to never again vote for ANY incumbent from either side ever again. The common fear is that we would lose the experience if we did that. Well, look where that experience has gotten us at this point.

Both sides have their own personal agenda that has nothing whatsoever to do with what's best for the common working, contributing people of America. The only things that matter to the extremist is that their particular bullshit ideas are right and the other side is wrong. What in the hell does that have to do with anything real? How does that divisiveness help solve any of the super pressing problems we are now having. We all need to shut off the super partisan political radio and TV shows blabbing on both sides of the isle and start thinking about what's best for americans in the long run.

Then we need to elect people as far away from normal as possible and see if they can come up with completely new, inventive and creative approaches to almost everything we do here in America. Obviously, our time worn ways are completely worn out and no longer work in this new age we find ourselves in and we need huge, real, out of the normal box thinking to move on ahead.

I'll admit that I thought our new president was presenting just those things but alas, he seems so far to be just more of the same. Of course he has only had a few months, so we need to give his policies a fair amount of time before making rash judgements. We are just now starting to show real and positive economic changes, so lets all hope for the best.

The majority of Americans obviously thought the same thing and desired huge changes also. So unless he can make these changes within his time in the spotlight, out he goes and we'll try someone else. Just not anyone in there right now. Their ALL idiots who could care less about us. Their all just fat, spoiled rotten good old boys who love money, power and sex, probably in that order. We obviously are to blame for this. They make far too much money. Have far too many perks and just sit there year after year in their thousand dollar suits and we just keep right on electing them. How stupid have we become?

The serious questions we have to start asking ourselves is this: Is our present system working for the good of the common people of America in this new high tech age we find ourselves in? Should we just keep on keeping on, the way it has been all these years and somehow expect things to change for the better? Is it time for some kind of completely new "out of the box" kinds of thinking and changes?

So, is it time to consider the idea to NOT vote for ANYONE from either party with "incumbent" next to their names from now on?

As usual, I can only ask questions as I have no answers. Come to me with a hair problem and I just might have some real, concrete ideas on how to solve them. As far as real answers to all the world problems, you would be better served to ask a rock.

As I've said over and over......I'm just a Barber.....the best damn Barber in the entire universe but alas, just a Barber. Oh wait....I almost forgot....I also do Brain Surgery, Leach Application and Blood Letting.

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Is life Intelligence, luck or just Timing?

2009-07-15T16:41:00.000-07:00

My business, my wife's job and our financial lives in general are doing just fine in these interesting times we find ourselves in right now. Having said that I wonder, is this because we are somehow just plain smarter than those who have lost their jobs, homes and possessions lately or is something else involved? If it were pure intelligence, how could it be possible that people with high scholastic degrees are having some of these same problems that average people are having? How could that be? Doesn't high intelligence with Masters and Doctorate degrees exclude those people from making drastic mistakes with their money and means of employment?

Now my wife and I only have our High School diplomas plus some collage courses through the years. I of course went to Barber Collage, which involved about a year and a half full time with a state test at the end. Another test after a couple of years for my journeymen license (which they don't even required anymore) and like magic, I've been working in the hair hacking world for over 40 years now, making decent money to support my wayward and sometimes questionable ways.

Ok, this pretty much establishes that high scholastic degrees and extreme intelligence plainly don't have much to do with how one comes out in the financially competent, fit world, doesn't it? So that leave us with another possibility. Is it some kind of divine luck that only some people seem to have? Does all the super well off people just have luck on their side to get where they are? Are some people just born with luck? I really doubt that idea because we all know or have heard of folks who seem to be lucky their whole lives and then all of a sudden have super bad luck and lose it all or even lose their lives. All the recent celebrities with their dysfunctional lives comes to mind in that department, don't they?

So......that leaves us with Timing. Could it just be a simple matter of timing most of all that makes some peoples lives stand out as successful, rewarding and enjoyable? Could it be something as simple as when one was born into this crazy world? I was born in 1945. Into a much simpler and less complex world. A world where we were taught the value of being careful and cautious with our money. Our parents were products of the great depression and passed those experiences and lessons on to us. We were taught to only buy things we could afford. Credit was a rare thing indeed in those days. If you could not have something by paying cash then you could not have it. Simple as that. If you desired something you couldn't afford, you had to slowly save your money until you could buy it. Stores even had this thing called "Lay-a-way". Where you could keep putting a little money in an account until you could then pay for the item and finally take it home.

So, Timing.....We bought our house over 20 years ago. Back then there were only regular loans. Banks would only give home loans with payments you could afford long term. You had to prove beyond a shadow of doubt that you could afford the amount of payment. Plus over 20 years ago, homes were relatively cheap, especially compared to the recent past when prices were extremely over-inflated. So, for the last 20+ years our payment has been somewhere along the lines of what one might rent a one room shack or dog house for now.

Timing........I have been a Barber now for over 40 years. I started Barbering in 1964. Developing my hair butchering and bullshitting skills over such a long period of time has served me well. I worked at a shop in Sacramento for years, then came up into the foothills, oh so long ago. I actually have dozens of customers who just followed me up and have been loyal all these years. Plus during all these years in my present shop, I've developed an incredible amount of customers. Loyalty seems to be one of the driving forces in any successful business. I have customers who tell me if anything ever happens to me, they'll just have to start shaving their heads as they have no intention of finding and training a new Barber. So my business is so successful because of the large volume of super loyal customers i've acquired, bullshitted and cajoled through all these years, even in these and other questionable times in the past.

So obviously there are several complex reasons and explanations why some people seem to be in a better place in life than others, even in bad economic times. In my experience timing sure seems to be at the top of that list though. It sure seems that folks just recently born, just bought homes in the short term past and were taught to live on credit are having or will have a hell of a lot more negative financial issues than those of us lucky enough to be born long ago.

Whatchathink?

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Dysfunctional Artists/Geniuses

2009-06-25T16:27:00.000-07:00

Isn't it amazing that everyone you know or have heard of who are geniuses with great creative talents are mostly running around with only one oar in the water? The very recent deaths of Michael Jackson and David Carradine of Kung Foo fame brought all this to the forefront for me. Michael Jackson was probably one of the most creative and successful geniuses in the music industry and his realities and baggage turned out to be so overwhelming and insurmountable that it obviously destroyed him in the end. Other crazy music artist names include: Mozart, Schubert, Rossini, Tchaikovsky, and Beethoven. Modern musical geniuses like James Taylor have been relatively public about battling mental illness and drug addiction.

In my hippy days, all my friends and I would show up at whoever had the largest screen television to watch our hero Kung Foo beat the crap out of the bad guys and loudly and with great gusto cheer him on in the process. We would listen to every word his master told him about reality and try to emulate the philosophies we learned into our daily lives. He was just this side of a god for all of us at that time.

He died HOW???

Holy crap, why doesn't reality just pull the rug out from under our feet?

I can go on and on with examples of great people all throughout history who we all looked up to and revered who turned out to be complete nut-cases in reality. Elvis Presley easily comes to mind for most everyone in that category huh? He might as well have been from a different planet toward the end of his career. Who was the great painter who cut his damn ear off for some reason only he understood? Wasn't his name Vincent Van Gogh?

The truth of my life, having been in the music world most of the time in one way or another, is most everyone I know and care about is half crazy. The most interesting, creative, intelligent people I knew and presently know in life and consider friends are all in that category compared with whatever normal means. I would bet the same is true of most of you. That out of all the people you've known, the crazy ones were the most fun to be around.

Even in my shop at the present time, I LOVE and try my hardest to bring out the nuttiness of my sometimes rather staid customers. My biggest thrill is taking some suited self important man and get him laughing right out loud at some stupid, politically incorrect statement I make. I take great pride in knowing I'm probably the only person in his life who gets away with treating him irreverently and outside his normal box. Now here's the wild part. They keep coming back for more, which tells me they like it. If I ask why, they tell me most everyone else treats them with phony respect and that gets tiresome in the long run. Being treated like normal idiots is refreshing as hell for them. So when they come in and I tell them to "Shut the hell up, sit down and wait they're turn". I know they are finally there when they say back "Oh stick it where the sun doesn't shine Paul".

I really don't think I'm stating a new idea here. I'll bet these facts have been studied and well documented by the mental health field for years now. Isn't this the most interesting thing though? All our lives we are taught to "be normal". "Don't stand out". "Watch how you behave and act". "You don't want society to think you're crazy or something is wrong with you".

And yet........and yet........everyone we love to see, hear, revere and appreciate are clearly a bubble off center aren't they? I suppose this gets back to the idea that if we were all exactly alike, what a boring ass world this would be. Then the world would be a world of robots and no one would want that would they?

Ok, my mission specalist is trying to contact me via my Viscal Assimulater.

Opps, did I say that outloud?
Never mind..........

So......who do you remember with a small smile? Your boring friends or your wild ones? You tell me........

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Don't get old!

2009-06-20T09:56:00.000-07:00

I was having lunch the other day at a Produce Deli in our little town and watched a very old couple walk through the door. They were probably in their eighties, maybe late eighties. They were both fairly emancipated, very small people who walked with super small steps to keep their balance, I guess.

I watched them shuffle over and order their lunch, then slowly make their way over to the table area where I was setting. As the little old lady slowly came right close by me, she stopped for a moment, looked me right in the eyes and simply said "Son, don't get old!", then walked on without another word to the table her husband was sitting at. For some reason, those serious, direct words coming from her affected me immensely at that moment and I'll never forget that little kind old ladies words of wisdom.

I'm like a lot of people around my young age......"^) I talk to at the shop. Most times I don't feel old at all. When I'm up and about my day, running around or at work, I feel.....oh, I don't know....maybe in my forties or younger most days. I still can do the hard yard work on the weekends. Cutting trees and limbs with the chain-saw, digging ditches or holes for placing posts in the ground, planting trees, spading up the garden. Any number of hard labor things I've always been able to do. Now of course I have to take a lot more frequent breaks for heavy breathing, complaining and plenty of water. Ok maybe now I have to do those things real early in the morning before it gets too hot. Where I used to be able to do those things all day long, now maybe a few hours and then I'm done for the day but by god, I can still do them.

One thing needs to be said here though. I have a longtime loving wife who has always and without fail jumped right in beside me on all those hard outside plans and chores. I'm certainly not sure how many of them I would have accomplished without her strong back and soul at my side all these years. In fact as one of my earlier blogs admitted, she most times was the one who started the whole thing and deserves all the credit for our beautiful house and yards.

The only times I truly might feel old is certainly when I first get up in the morning, what with all the grunting, groaning, popping noises coming from parts of my body and quiet bitching I do. Then when I first look into that bad ass lying mirror and see that white haired, wrinkly old fart looking back at me pretending to be me. I usually just cuss the old shit out and turn out the lights at least until I can brush my teeth and by then be a little more awake and partially sane.

There are a lot of great parts to getting older too for sure. My body feels the aches and pains but my mind....oh, my mind. I love what has happened to my mind as I get older and I hope wiser. I used to easily become intimidated by most anyone when I was young. I used to easily become embarrassed by the slightest little things and what people said to me in life.

Now, I could care less what people think about my thoughts or opinions about anything. I love being able to be blunt and honest and say what I mean and mean what I say without the slightest pause. I used to hem and haw and try and make up excuses when confronted by a salesman at stores or in my shop when they walked in. NOW.....oh yeah......NOW.....It's like, hell no, I don't want any of that plastic crap your selling and matter of fact, get the hell out of my face and my shop NOW! I LOVE THAT FACT! I even feel like and sometimes do a little jig dance afterward. By the way, I've had times where the customers waiting all broke out into applause after the rude and crude salesmen sulked outside.

So, I certainly don't have any idea how many more wonderful years I have left at this stage of my existence but I'm telling you right now, I'm going to live them out full blast, with all my heart and soul, laughing out loud as much as possible and to hell with what others may think of me.

The Golden Years

The Golden Years have come at last
I cannot see
I cannot pee
I cannot chew
I cannot screw (well, we'll leave that in for the sake of the rhyme)
My memory shrinks
My Body's drooping
Got trouble pooping
The Golden Years have come at last
The Golden Years can kiss my ass

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One man, one vote?

2009-06-08T10:39:00.001-07:00

You know what? It hit me one day as I was again setting there with my absentee ballet at the kitchen table, trying to figure out the best way to vote about the issues of the moment. Do I really know anything at all about these issues? The answer unfortunately is hell no!

The really sad part is I never know anything about them. I always feel fairly guilty and plain stupid about just guessing what might be the best thing to vote for. I almost always base my vote on weird things like how much will this cost? When I look down at the cost, if it's in the millions, much less billions then my vote is always NO. Another method I'm using lately is to vote out all incumbents, no matter which side their on or who they are. I figure everyone there at any given time are idiots who never seem to do the right or logical thing about anything.

Watching the news or listening to the radio for real, true knowledge about the issues is like winking in the dark. They all have their own agenda having nothing whatsoever to do with what's right and proper for the masses in America. As I've said in some of my other blogs, their ALL full of bullshit. They act like they care about us and know some kind of truth but their all just stating their own opinions, which are just that and nothing more.

So the conclusion I'm slowly starting to formulate is our system is out of whack to say the least. The whole "one man, one vote" thing is ridiculous to the extreme. Who in the hell thought this up? Did they really imagine that all of the regular, normal folks out there had the intelligence, insight and knowledge to decide what the best course of action is for the many, complicated issues facing us all the time?

Did they envision some way to properly educate the public enough for them to make these decisions intelligently? If so, does that not smack of indoctrination or
lead to just plain lying to us to achieve their particular agendas?
How do any of us know if the information we are getting is anything close to a real and honest truth about anything? So my guess here is no matter how smart and informed you think you are, it's mostly your own self delusions and egos, not any kind of reality.

Ok, here's my own personal truth. I don't know shit about any of the super important issues facing our nation and the world. The only things I do have a fair handle on would be my business, customer/friends, my loving family, gardening and a little music ability. Other than that all I can offer would be fancy, smancy sounding philosophies that in the end don't mean shit.

So is there some other way we could go about choosing leaders and making decisions? Well, as I just made clear. How in the hell should I know. I'm just a Barber, for christ sake.

Do you have any idea to help out mankind with this? The next paragraph will give you a chance to lay them out for others to see. Just follow the instructions.......

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Overpopulation

2009-06-07T14:25:00.000-07:00

It has constantly amazed me that no one, the news media included NEVER even bring up probably the biggest problem facing mankind. That being just plain too damn many people on the planet. Overpopulation is beyond a doubt the largest problem the world has at this point in time and no one even mentions it at all. This is unbelievable to say the least. Are all the great thinkers just plain stupid? Are they avoiding this plain as day issue for some reason? Is it just too touchy of a subject for them to discuss? Are they just plain chickenshit because of the delicate nature of trying to tell people about responsible birth control? Is religion somehow holding the subject at bay because of their weird and completely irresponsible precepts about birth control?

I fully understand that its a hell of a complicated issue because we're talking about somehow telling people or even somehow forcing the issue on how many children they can have but does that mean we just keep on pumping out humans until we destroy the earth, without even discussing it?

Overpopulation begins growing very slowly, but over generations the growth rate increases more and more rapidly, similar to a snowball affect. It took the human population thousands of years to reach 1 billion in 1804. However, it took only 123 years for us to double to 2 billion in 1927. The population hit 4 billion in 1974 (only 47 years), and if we continue at our current rate, the human population will reach 8 billion in 2028. Doubling from our present count of 6.8 billion to 13.6 billion will have a much greater impact than our last couple doublings combined.

One thing which must be taken into consideration is the amount of time, money, and effort we have spent toward saving and extending lives. Billions of dollars have been spent in this field, and successfully. However, something that we also must look at is the effect this has had on our own number. How much have we contributed to birth control, family planning, and preservation of the environment? Nature is a balance of existence. In order to coincide with nature, we must balance the saving and extending of lives with controlling the number of lives which we produce. We mustn't use resources any faster than they can be reproduced. We need to respect ourselves by learning to respect the environment which we depend on for our own existence. If not, we will cease to exist.

The super politically incorrect part of this whole subject is all the intelligent, normal, working responsible people of the world try to hold their own birthrate down to something they can be responsible for. They choose to wait until they can afford everything involved with having children. They understand that it is a hell of a lot of work and gladly do that work out of love, respect and just plain trying to bring a contributing member of society into the world who is equipped with the resources and plans to be self reliant.

That leaves the vast majority of ignorant, cave men/women all over the world putting out babies without a second thought. People who barely, if at all even know where babies come from, much less care. People who have no idea how their going to feed, cloth and shelter their children. People who have no education and have no intention of trying to provide their ongoing brood with any real knowledge of the world. The end result is we are obviously headed for a world populated by ignorant idiots.

With our present complete silence on this growing subject, I can see no answers coming up the pike, only more and more ignorant and increasingly dangerous humans inhabiting the earth. The truth is, this whole thing will not implode during my lifetime or even our children's lifetime but implode it will without some kind of real, thoughtfull and intelligent action on our parts.

I'm thinking, even hoping that nature might just handle it for us with famine, disease and natural disasters. I've often pondered that our planet seems to have a kind of destiny and even perhaps an intellegence we can't even imagine. I can only hope those lofty thoughts could be true for the sake our our future.

Luckily so far, it seems nature does those kinds of actions in the backward, third world locations, so I might be right that nature is a lot smarter than us supposedly intelligent humans.

Lets hope so...........

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Opinions and Change

2009-05-29T12:17:00.000-07:00

Opinions. We all have them by the truckload on every subject imaginable. Just ask anyone you know what they think about something and they're more than happy to let you know in spades. Everyone from regular folks to famous people, politicians and even criminals have them.

The problem with opinions I'm starting to have is all of us have somehow lost the true meaning of what an opinion really is.

OPINION:
–noun
1. a belief or judgment that rests on grounds insufficient to produce complete certainty.
2. a personal view, attitude, or appraisal.

So www.dictionary.com tells us the truth, I think. It does not say an opinion is some kind of superior truth written in stone on some magical tablet found in a sacred cave in the holy land. It clearly says an opinion is a belief or judgment a person has. A personal view or attitude.

I'm going to add one more definition to this. In my humble "opinion", opinions are nothing more than our attempt at bullshit, my own opinion notwithstanding included....None of us know what we're talking about in most instances at all. Our opinions are just an excuse to sound like we do. They also are the grease that keeps conversations from falling off a cliff. Our opinions and a dollar might get one a cup of coffee.

Especially now in these trying economic times everyone on both sides of our great divide in this country rattle off their bullshit opinions about causes and cures without the slightest inkling of the realities or complexities involved therein. All the Television newscasts and radio personalities get in on this insane game of course. They are just people with opinions but they somehow want us to believe they possess some kind of supreme truth. They especially are guilty of prostitution because they get paid the big bucks to put their bullshit out.

We, the gullible public walk around saying "Well, Rush said, Hanna said, Katy said, Brokaw said and spew the same crap as if it means anything at all. As if there is one iota of truth involved. Now the next logical step in my little opinion bullshit piece would have to be......What is truth? Are there such things as absolute truths? Truths that are always the same forever? I would have to suppose that the only people who lay claim to that would be all the various religions of the world and maybe some of the scientist who believe they know the absolute truth about some subjects.

So that leads me to the second thing in the subject line. That would be change. I propose that the only true, real and forever thing in life is change. If our president actually gets anything right during his term in office, it just might be his emphasis on change. I'm saying that everything we think of as truth is actually a forever changing landscape of opinions. What our forefathers thought was the truth is vastly different than what we think nowadays, to say the least.

Even in the religious realm our decedents from the very distant past believed they would appease the gods by throwing virgins into the mouth of a volcano. In fact it was a great honer to be such a chosen one. They knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that the gods would shine their loving light on them for their sacrifices.

In the not so distant past, women and children were possessions of men and they could do onto them whatever they wished. Blacks and American Indians were savages to be killed on sight or turned into slaves for the white mans bidding. All of these truths were only just recently re-examed and found to be wrong.

Change happened, didn't it? We constantly change our minds about what's real and true. What was true and real in 1950 is vastly different than what's true and real today. I know we often times pine for the "good old days" but guess what? They are forever gone. Change comes whether you like it or not.

Just off the top of my feeble brain I can guarantee you that homosexual relationships, gay marriage, marijuana and all drugs for that matter will be legal sometime before you know it. Our prisons will be much smaller when we treat the whole drug thing as medical issues as they should be.

The youth of today look at us hassling those "issues" and just shake their collective heads and roll their eyes in wonder. They wonder why in the hell we are even talking about such trivial things in the first place in the light of such huge social, economic and political problems that we are facing. These changes and many, many more you can't even imagine right now will take place for sure as soon as all of us old codgers with our stuck in the past ideas are dead and gone.

Ok, I've freely given you a hearty helping of my bullshit (oops, I mean my opinions). Now if you add in a smidgen of your bullshit, we can make a fabulous bullshit stew. The next paragraph will tell you how.....

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Being in the Moment

2009-05-21T10:17:00.000-07:00

Normally, we do not so much look at things as overlook them. — Alan Watts.

How often have you eaten a meal and not really tasted it, or completed a chore or drove to work without really thinking about it? Maybe even spent a whole day doing things and at the end of it can't even remember most of what you did. I used to watch some late night TV, until one morning I found I couldn't even remember what the show was about. I then made the decision that if I couldn't even remember it, the damn thing was meaningless in my life and a waste of my time.
Our days often pass us by while our minds are elsewhere.

Practicing being in the moment is one of the foundations of Zen Buddhism, of course, (actually all Buddhism, I believe), but it’s not necessarily meditation, per se — it’s more being aware of your actions and thoughts, and what your senses bring in, in your every day routine. No one actually lives in the moment all the time — I don’t think it’s possible. Some, with practice, can learn to live in the moment for longer than most of us, but there will always be times when you’re worried about the future or thinking about the past, and forget to be in the moment. Which brings up a truth that most people don't give much thought about. There really is no reality other than right this exact moment. Right now. The past is a done deal and is gone forever. The future is nothing more than a supposition. Something we assume will come along but there really is no guarantee it will even happen. You could get hit by a car in the next few moments and where would the "future" be then?

Living in the moment is actually quite hard to do. People who try meditation find out in a hurry just how hard it is. You sit down and try to calm your mind and immediately find out our minds have a mind of it's own. Try it sometime and you'll see that our minds are like raving maniacs. Running around in circles. Blabbing incessantly about every little detail in our lives, non-stop. Mostly about things in our past or thinking about what will happen in the future.

Close your eyes and concentrate on your breathing — the sensation of the air as it enters your nose or mouth and fills your lungs, and as it goes out again. If other thoughts come up, be aware of them, acknowledge them, let them go (but don’t try to force them away) and then return your focus to your breathing. It’s hard, isn’t it? Being in the moment isn’t as easy as it sounds.

Another method is the use of a word tool, like a mantra. A lot of folks use the OM sound, saying it each time they breath in and again when they breath out. There is no special significance of the word one uses, it's just something to hang onto like an anchor. So each time you catch that wild ass mind running around in a million directions, you can simply start concentrating on saying the word again.

Other examples of when we at least partially achieve that level of concentration would be in any activity where you are completely involved to the exclusion of all else. Sex comes to mind. Also almost anything you really enjoy like sports, playing music, singing, dancing, hobbies ect.

One last thought about all this "living in the moment" and "now" being the only real thing. For most everyone "right now" is actually perfect. Unless you're in some unfortunate circumstance, everything is pretty damn good right this moment. It's probably a very nice day, your stomach is full, you have a roof over your head and you have people who love and appreciate you. Now if we could only shut that monster in our head up, even for a little while.

Pretty damn nice moment huh?.......

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It's all her fault

2009-05-01T15:35:00.000-07:00

A subject that has come up numerous times for years in the shop has been about who has the redecorating ideas in our households. Is it the men or the women that come up with all the great home improvement or landscaping ideas? Do the husbands or wives have all the creativity in those departments?

I can tell you right now that all the men reading this blog right now are slowly but surely developing that knowing and embarrassed little smile that comes with excepting the truth is about to be revealed. They all know the answer to those questions plain as day. Just today, I had a full house of customers and that subject came up. Down to the last man in there, the answer was their wives.

All the men in the shop including me had to admit that if it were just ourselves living in our homes, the house and yards would look exactly the same right now as they did when we moved in, no matter how many years ago that happened. Same paint on the walls, same furniture, same appliances, same patch of weeds outside.

When the front door started getting loose and falling off it's hinges, we would just tell everyone who came by to "just lean it back on, it'll be all right". When a window broke, we would just put clear plastic over it with duct tape and call it good. When the roof started leaking.......well, that's what tarps were made for right? When the dishes got too dirty to clean, that's what Goodwill is for right? Just buy some clean ones and off you go for more years.

So, here is how it goes according to all the men I talk to. It all starts with the women in our lives looking at something long and hard, with their hand on their chins saying something like: "mmmmmmmmmmm, you know what? We should fix, change, repair, remodel, move, redo, get a new one" or any number of words to that effect and come up with the beginnings of some outlandishly wild idea for a giant project in our lives. Soon as those words start pouring out of their mouths, our heads hang down, our chins hit our chests and inside of our minds we're saying "Oh shit!, here we go again, a whole shitpot full of money, time and labor".

We mostly then try for a few moments at least to change the subject, put it off to a later date, try to scale back the grand ideas she has or anything but agree that she might just possibly be right about it. After completely failing to change her mind about anything, which is the standard result of trying to change anything about a women's mind, we finally and reluctantly give in and start trying to plan on step one to make it happen.

Then the fun begins. It almost always starts with complete destruction of the existing thing being changed, with all the mess, dirt, grime and junk hidden for years under or around said object. In other words hard, sweating labor for weeks on end before we can even start with the real project she has envisioned. The whole thing always takes three times as long and costs three times as much as you thought it would.

Ok, we finally get the whole thing done and here's the part that's so very hard for the average man, including myself to admit. First of all, ALL of the original idea she had was just this side of genius. It probably needed to be done years ago and it looks gorgeous. It most likely added thousands of dollars to the value of our property. So here's the truth boys. EVERYTHING that's nice and functioning perfectly in our lives and homes, we owe exclusively to our wives or our better halves, more accurately.

So ever since the caveman days, us men went out pounding our chest, killing everything that moved, dragged the bloody meat back to the cave thinking we were the bosses and higher beings, when the truth is and was then that it was our women who actually made life great for everyone. So grunt and yell all you want. The only person your impressing is yourselves.

God, all of this is so hard for us men to admit, soooooooooooooo hard.

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Is personal service coming back?

2009-04-26T12:45:00.000-07:00

A lot of folks I chat with in my shop are talking about something they are noticing more and more nowadays with the new economic realities we are facing. It seems in the past, businesses and we all created this incredible consumer society. It started seeming like we could have it all. If you didn't have the money right then, just whip out the old credit card and have it anyway. You could always just pay later in small increments. No problems. Life was good.

Of course credit was the devil in the details for this insane, wasteful, stupid path we all got caught up on. The truth is the devil eventually wants and demands his due, which is of course what finally brought this house of cards down to it's knees and damn near destroyed the entire world economy in the process.

The scary part and really the good news about all this is most if not all the stores that came along to sell us all the stupid plastic phony crap we really didn't need in the first place are going to go bankrupt and quit or just close their doors. That would include some big ticket items also. Gas guzzling cars, Giant Trucks, 5,000 square foot McMansions up on the hill, Jet boats and on and on. Buying crap we not only didn't really need but could not afford in the first place.

What we will be left with is regular stores selling things we actually need. Now these stores will all have generally the same items and prices, so how are we to choose which one to make our purchases from? Competition will always exist, so what will make them stand out from each other to get our attention?

What people are noticing coming along now is the fact that an almost lost attribute is slowly but surely sneaking back into the business world. That would be simple humility and gratitude. Those rare attitudes are bringing back a wonderful thing from the past called "Service". You know, where the owners and employees of the stores make it plain that they appreciate you coming in and are ready to help you in any way to make your shopping experience a fruitful and enjoyable one. Where they approach you with a smile and a good attitude, making it clear they are glad you're there.

I was at our new Home Depot store in Auburn Ca. the other day and one of the employees told me about a new policy they just instituted there. I thought whoever thought this up deserves a medal. He said they worked out the most volume of customers is between 10 am and 2 pm. During those hours all the employees are now supposed to ONLY help customers. No stocking, cleaning or anything else. Just find customers who could use some help and stick with them. All I can say is WOW!

I have to admit something here to avoid anyone thinking I might be above all this nonsense. I'm not. Having been barbering for something over 40 years now, I have caught myself becoming a tad crotchety about certain types of customers also. My main problem was the type of person who comes in like once a year and clearly doesn't give a crap about his hair or appearance. In fact, I was thinking in the last couple of years of just telling them to go find someone else to cut their hair. My attitude was becoming "I care exactly as much as you do about your hair. If you don't give a shit, then neither do it".

Well even though my business is actually doing better than ever right now, which I am forever grateful for, this whole economic crash we are experiencing kind of put the fear in my bones too. Now when Mr. "Don't give a shit" walks in, I only have one thing to say to him. "Hello sir, sit right now, How would you like your haircut?".

Humility, thoughtfulness, gratitude and service. I think and hope those wonderful things are coming back into our collective lives.

What do you think?

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Don't you dare retire....

2009-04-13T19:51:00.000-07:00

Don't you dare retire! Don't even think about it. You'll have to wait until I die, then you can retire......

People say this to me all the time now and I feel the same way about a whole host of other people in various businesses I deal with on an ongoing basis.

When you spend years dealing with your favorite businesses and service people, something starts to happen. Before you know it, you take them all pretty much for granted. You don't think just how important and vital they have become to your normal everyday life. I'm talking about your Mechanic, Bookkeeper, Butcher, Barber, Baker, Doctor, Dentist, Therapist, Grocer, Boss, co-workers, best friends and on and on....

We reach a point where we really have no desire to find a new copy of any of these irreplaceable people and services in our lives. Can you imagine if any of them were just not there one day. What would you do?

What they say to me is "Don't you dare retire, I have no intention of finding some other haircutter to take care of my hair. If you go, I'll just have to shave my head, because I am NOT going to trust anyone else and I sure don't want to try and find one and then retrain them to my likes and dislikes. It's too damn much trouble."

I feel the same exact way. We've been using the same bookkeeper for instance for something like 25 years now. We can just walk in there and she knows every tiny piece of our financial lives. We basically just sit there, talking about the weather and each other's lives while she completely takes care of our tax needs and we trust her explicitly with our affairs.

Beverly, forget retiring, you're stuck with us for life.

Our Doctor has become a personal friend through the approximately 30 years of our relationship. In fact just the other day, he put his finger where no other man may ever dare and it was a good thing. Because he found with that and other tests that I would live on in health a lot longer. Would I want to find some stranger to perform these wonderfull procedures for me. Nope!

John, forget retiring, you're stuck with us to the end.

Our Dentist has become an irreplaceable part of our life. He is the only one we trust to put his fingers in such an undignified dark place and keep everything in there healthy. Besides, how in the hell would we hear all about his love life if he were to go away.

Walter, forget retirement, your stuck with us for life.

I'll bet everyone reading this rant has lots of folks in their lives who they don't ever want to replace. People who have been doing special things and services for you for years and years and the idea of replacing these fine folks is pretty much out of the question.

Damn, it kind of makes one wonder who is going to start going to all the new, just starting out practitioners of these vital services? Oh that's right, I guess there is a whole new generation coming along after we're gone. I sometimes forget we're really not the center of the universe. Of course they'll have to establish their own "irreplaceable service people" themselves, won't they.

I'm starting to think we all should somehow give these people in our lives who are so important a huge hug and a "Thank you" for all they do for us. That they do matter greatly to our sanity and health.

Well, I took care of my Bookkeeper, Doctor and Dentist with this Blog. Maybe just maybe, I'll get around to thanking all the other fine people on my list someday before too long also.

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With ripening comes wisdom.....finally......

2009-04-08T10:17:00.000-07:00

When I asked a very old timer customer (approximately 85-90) how he was doing recently, he had a great answer for me. He said: "Son, when you get my age, there are only two things that matter." "and what would those be sir", I asked? He said: "A good fitting pair of shoes and a good shit". Being called "Son" put a little smile on my face that lasted for hours, by the way. I've heard plenty of these gems through the years in my shop from old timers, some of which had a kernel of genius, with a large dollop of humor and truth involved.

Speaking of old timers, I've had this thought running through my head for years that we should at some agreed upon age allow old timers a pass on ALL social conventions. You know, like kindness, thoughtfulness, manners. All the things we have agreed on that make a person an excepted part of the normal human race. So, when they reach this special time of life (how about 70?), they can do, say or act any way they want at that moment. The rest of society would just learn to take this wild behavior in stride and just say: "Oh well, he/she deserves the pass because they lived this long with all those wonderful attributes intact and now they deserve to just let it all go". So the next time some low life tried to give them a bad time they could just say: "Hey, you low life @$%&^*#, I don't like you. Get out of my face now or I'll kick your ass". Anyone within hearing distance of the exchange would just applaud and smile. Or lean way over in public, let one rip and laugh right out loud with gusto. Again, the only reaction would be a smile, because in the end, we would all be waiting with glee for our turn to drop all the social conventions and have some fun again before it's all over.

Ok, one last thought on my little "getting older" jag. As we all know, there are tons of little things that are not in the least fun about getting older. Making all those disgusting grunting sounds when we get up from bed in the morning or even from a chair after setting too long. All the little pains and sore spots that somehow just started appearing one day without any warning or foreknowledge, thank the stars above. Crossing ones legs while sneezing because we don't want to depend on depends yet. Carefully passing gas incase it's not.

There is however one hugely wonderful thing about our ripening (cool take on aging huh?) in this life. That would be our mind, intelligence and intellect. You know, everything from the neck up. When younger, we are easily and immensely embarrassed by the slightest things. We turn red at the drop of a dime. We stumble and stammer when trying to gather our thoughts about most any subject we have to deal with. When confronted by a salesman for instance trying to talk us into buying his plastic crap we have no need whatsoever for, we lose all ability to form intelligent reasons why we're just not interested. In fact, most of us have bought some piece of crap at some point in our lives just because we didn't have the cayones to say NO THANK YOU!

Well, with age comes this wonderful new ability to say and do whatever you want. We tend to have gotten over our reluctance to hurt idiot's feelings or to suffer fools lightly and are now free to tell it like it is for each of us. Most of us have learned how we really feel about most subjects and can just blurt out our truths unhindered by conventional bullshit. I don't know about you but I'm telling you right now I LOVE THAT FACT! No more beating around the bush, just straight to the point and let the cards fall where they may.

Damn I love that part of life I'm in right now.....

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