Tole's Place

Five Simple Rules

2012-01-21T07:00:00.003-06:00

Been stuck for along while with nothing of note coming out of my brain. When all else fails, fall back on cheesy emails. Actually I may end up having the wifeling makea nice poster of these using her mad Microsoft Publisher skills. FOr now I am just going to let the wisdom of these soak in.

1. Money cannot buy happiness but its more comfortable to cry in a Mercedes than in a Yugo.
2. Forgive your enemy but remember the bastard's name.
3. Help someone when they are in trouble and they will most likely remember you when they're in trouble again.
4. Many people are alive only because its illegal to shoot them.
5. Alcohol does not solve any problems, but then again, neither does milk.

Tole

The Wisest Doctor Ever!

2011-06-26T11:27:00.002-05:00

After my wrestling match with Mr. Black a few years back I find myself on a restricted diet. Not too much fat or I'll be sick for a day or more. I have a pill that was prescribed by my gastroenterologist that I can take to mitigate the effects. It's called pancrelipase and it augments the low output of my pancreas that came from that whole episode. Ok, enouigh backstory.

My wife found herself referred to a GI doctor and of course we are extreme raving fans of the one that saw me back from the brink. She thought she'd be cute and rat me out to him for my occasional lapse in self control where fatty foods are concerned. His repsonse?

"Well there are a lot of temptations out there. Every now and then you have to look at that cheesecake and say 'I'm just gonna have to hurt." and plow right in."

I love my doctor.

Tole

Hi My Name Is Tole...

2011-03-10T20:38:00.004-06:00

and I'm an NCIS addict. I love all of the characters and actually respect most of the actors (that's hard to do nowadays.) Good show.

Then there's Pauly (Abby) Perrette. When I was a younger man, I went out of my way to associate with folks like her. The fringe appealed to me..still does truth be told. I like being considered a bit off. Makes me feel unique.

Oh well, enough prattle for now. Enjoy this little bit of happy I stumbled across tonight.

Oh and then there's this...

More to come...

Now That's Comedy...

2011-02-15T16:38:00.001-06:00

Chuck Lorre, the creator of Two and a Half Men, regularly adds messages to his end-of-show vanity cards. The one for Monday's episode that said this:

"I exercise regularly. I eat moderate amounts of healthy food. I make sure to get plenty of rest. I see my doctor once a year and my dentist twice a year. I floss every night. I've had chest x-rays, cardio stress tests, EKG's and colonoscopies. I see a psychologist and have a variety of hobbies to reduce stress. I don't drink. I don't smoke. I don't do drugs. I don't have crazy, reckless sex with strangers. If Charlie Sheen outlives me, I'm gonna be really pissed."

AMEN.

Tole

And Now For Something Completely Different

2011-01-29T08:04:00.002-06:00

I was inspired. Well, it was late, I was wide awake and Phlegmmy had a nice discussion on what attracts her to certain music. You can read about it here in the post titled "the dividend of years of improper vocal technique: train wreck".

It got me to thinking back to when I was in college and the types of things I liked. I was (am) first and foremast a metal-head with an unexplainable taste in "hair bands" which I still haven't quite figured out. HOWEVER, I spent some time in a music department full of experimental composers and performers. It was awesome. My time there really caused my appreciation for darn-near anything remotely musical to really bloom. My collection is...eclectic to say the least.

Back to the point. Phlegmmy's comment in her post that she has always enjoyed music that was "slightly askew" got me to thinking about one of my favorites, Tom Waits. I don't know what it is about his music, but I can, and do, sit and listen to it for hours. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy a good, no thought required, 3 chord brain blaster as much as I always have, but this is good stuff.

And I love that fact that his voice has been introduced to a whole new generation by way of this little spot.

Tole

They're No Bill Shatner...

2010-08-28T07:42:00.002-05:00

but then no one could ever be.

I was stumbling around youtube the other night watching some Dennis Leary and killing myself with laughter when I noticed these guys in the "related videos" section over on the right side of the screen. I have to say, I was impressed, and I spent about an hour watching everything they have up. So, with any more ado whatsoever...

Oh and here's the Shatner one, just in case you have been living in a cave or haven't been blessed with it before **cough** **cough**

Tole

Where Were You When I Was Unemployed?

2010-06-23T21:50:00.002-05:00

I was sitting at my desk the other night thinking that I really need to keep the old resume current. I have a good job now and have had since September..BUT...you know...uncertain economic times and all that rot.

I started to search my pc for the most current version and after about 15 minutes realize I don't know where it is. I am getting pretty frustrated when I remember that I uploaded it to that Monstrously Monstrous job site back when I was unemployed.

I go. I log in. I download. I notice that there is an alert that my profile is incomplete. Oh well, may as well fix that while I am here.

After going through the 543 questions and not changing a single answer, I start to to wonder what I am missing. Oh well....oh hey...my experience level is wrong. So, I change it from 7-10 yrs to 10-15 years. That's it. That's the only change.

One week out from that change and I've received 5 emails and a phone call offering interviews...wow. If only I'd have changed it sooner I might not have spent six months tearing my house apart and putting it back together.

***sigh***

Go figure.

'Ware the Frankenthumb!

2010-06-18T20:38:00.005-05:00

Well, I've been away a long time. Frankly I just haven't had anything to say. That was until Wednesday.

Over the last year my wife and I have completely gutted and remodeled our kitchen and both bathrooms. We have torn out all of our carpet and replaced it with laminate flooring. I have spent alot of time with my hands near to things that could literally made it so I could never count to ten again without using my toes.

I've cut drywall. I've cut hardibacker with a saw. I've cut tile. I've even done some modest carpentry. I've pulled and cut wire. All with no one to see my wonderfulness.

Well this week was one of the biggest projects yet. We had new electric service added to our house. We upgraded from the 60 amp serivce the house was built with back in the 70s to a shiny big ole honking 200 amp service.

I exercised a seldom used ability every husband has. I admitted that this was beyond my meager abilities and I called in a pro. I even talked him into letting me do some of the connections in the house so that he wouldn't have to charge me for them.

I was so proud of myself. I felt that my skills were being validated by a professional electrician. I was feeling very manly.

That's when this happened...***sssssliiiiice****

Imagine my chagrin when I had to schlep my goofy butt outside and ask the electrician to go finish making the connection I was working on when I did my dead-level best to filet my digit.

"Where is it?" he asks. "Oh wait nevermind I'll just follow the blood droplets."

Wisenheimer.

***Sigh***

But you know, after all that I've done to my house, if the only price I've paid is four stitches and a tetanus shot life ain't so bad.

Tole

One More Sign She's Mrs Right

2010-04-05T20:38:00.004-05:00

A few nights ago I was visited by Lawdog et al and we decided a movie was required to make the evening complete. Well, after much discussing and searching the internet, one of our guests logged into Netflix and brought up this...

The Gamers: Dorkness Rising

And before you ask, it was every bit as campy as the title and write up suggest. It was a full plate of Great smothered in Awesome Sauce.

Now, as for the title to this post...not only did my Mrs. watch the entire film...she laughed right along with us. She so gets me and I am so lucky!

Tole

The Trials of Office Life

2010-02-08T17:48:00.002-06:00

I knew it would come eventually. Friday my HR manager mentioned that I was getting a bit shaggy and might consider a haircut.

Personally, the status of my hair ranks about 847th on my list of things I concern myself with, so I was oblivious to the length it had acquired since last cut in August.

I supposed that it WAS time for my semi-annual haircut. So I fired up my clippers with the #5 guard and went to town removing about 6 inches of length from my glorious locks.

Now my ears and neck are cold.

***sigh***

Tole

Happy Thanksgiving

2009-11-26T08:35:00.002-06:00

I am so looking forward to this Thanksgiving. After spending the last one in hospital having to eat my...and I use this term VERY loosely...turkey dinner from the hospital cafeteria, there is nothing as tantalizing as my wife's turkey. Oh and spending it with my family in the ancestral manse will be nice too.

Pie...did I mention pie? I will probably eat myself to a near comatose state today. Oh well, diets are meant to be destroyed on Thanksgiving, and mine will most likely resemble the old car at the County Fair that you can hit with a sledge hammer five swings for a buck.

Honestly though, I am thankful. Scratch that. I am THANKFUL that I am here; I am healthy; and most of all surrounded by those I love.

So here's hoping that all of you who are celebrating today have a Wonderful Thanksgiving and let's remember all the things we have to be thankful for.

Last, but by no means least, I would like to give my thanks to those men and women who are getting their Thanksgiving dinner from a mess hall or a galley while they serve their country so that the rest of us can enjoy our day in freedom. So to all of you in uniform, I am THANKFUL for you, your service and your sacrifice.

Tole

I Come in Peace

2009-11-07T18:24:00.002-06:00

Ok, here's the thing. A lot of my friends enjoy watching campy movies. Especially campy sci-fi and action films. We have noticed that there is a running similarity in the form of the line. You know what I mean. The hero flexes, prepares to destroy the villan and says...the line.

So here begins the list. It goes like this:

Movie: I Come in Peace.

Villan - I come in peace.

Hero- and you're going in pieces asshole.

Feel free to join in.

(This post brought to you by the trailer for Edge of Darkness. Line - You need to decide if you're hanging on the cross or bangin' in the nails.)

Tole

Huh? It's Tomorrow Already?

2009-11-04T20:23:00.001-06:00

Where does my day go? I ask myself that question about 843 times a day. I was unemployed for over 6 months and it seemed like the days ran on forever. I had all the time I needed to get everything I wanted to get done...well....done. I was on the edge of despair looking for work. I am lucky and live in the Great State of Texas, so I knew that there were jobs to be had. Thing of it was, the town that I live in is not exactly brimming over with white-collar jobs in the best of times. When things get tight, those few and far between points of employment grow even more scarce.

The wife and I had even discussed relocating back to San Antonio or maybe DFW or Austin...**shudder** I like my small town. It suits me. My friends, family and life are here. BUT the kids gotta eat and it takes cashy money to make that happen, so we thought about it. Then we looked around us and noticed that about 30-40% of my town had a For Sale sign in the yard. Well, that was that. We'd tough it out.

Fortunately providence brought my family work, and I jumped on it with both feet. I've been there a little over a month and I have to admit I am more than a little pleased. The people are great and the work seems like it is going to challenge me. Me sooo lucky.

Ok I have walked way into left field from my original topic. Where does my day go?

I have joined into a weight loss consortium at the new job. I have started walking and am slowly working my way up to a jog. Currently I'm knocking out 1.5 miles in 30 minutes each morning. This has forced me to get my lazy buttocks out of the bed pre-6 am. **shudder** But I am determined to get under 200 pounds for the first time in damned close to 20 years. Even when I was make hot monkey spooning with the Grim Reaper a little over a year ago I didn't manage to get below 2 bills. I will dammit.

Breakfast and then to work by 8. Lunch at 12 and home by 5:30 or 6. Help the wife get the kiddos fed, bathed and in bed and it's time for me to go as well if I have any hope of being human when the alarm gets obnoxious the next morning.

I fully intend to do stuff...I really do. Like...post on my blog, apply to grad school (yeah, like I have time for school), and work on the house and yard. I have a truck that needs the engine overhauled and a roof that needs replaced. I just don't have enough hours in the day. Oh it'll all get done eventually, but man it sure is taking alot longer that it did when I had nothing to do.

Tole

Someone's a Press Whore

2009-09-16T09:34:00.003-05:00

I'm just sayin'...

Responding to an audience question at a town hall at his presidential center in Atlanta, Carter said Tuesday that (U.S. Rep. Joe)Wilson's outburst was also rooted in fears of a black president.

"I think it's based on racism," Carter said. "There is an inherent feeling among many in this country that an African-American should not be president."

Why can't someone criticize our POTUS without being called a racist? I just don't get it. Granted, Wilson was out of line, but I think Former POTUS Carter has taken "out of line" to a new level.

Carter, a Democrat, said Joe Wilson's outburst was a part of a disturbing trend directed at the president that has included demonstrators equating Obama to Nazi leaders.

No, the comparisons come from Pres Obama's past, his published and voiced system of beliefs and his efforts to nationalize the banking, auto and healthcare industries.

Let's put the race card away shall we? We have enough to complain about and disagree over without it.

Ignorance knows no race.

I'm just sayin'.

Tole

Yahoo Aricle

Is the Ground Cold?!?!?

2009-09-16T06:29:00.003-05:00

Do you smell brimstone? Are dogs and cats lying down together in peace and harmony?

I only ask because I find myself in agreement with our current POTUS on Kanye's little outburst...dammit, there I go having to think maybe he's a human being again...sonofa...OW!!! It hurtses us, it BURNS!!!

"I thought that was really inappropriate," Obama says. "What are you butting in (for)? ... The young lady seems like a perfectly nice person. She's getting her award. What's he doing up there?"

A questioner chimes in, "Why would he do it?"

"He's a jackass," Obama replies, which is met with laughter from several people.

Yahoo Article

Ok, we now return you to our usual blind disagreement with every word that comes from his mouth...for now.

Tole

No Idea Why

2009-07-30T17:36:00.002-05:00

but this makes me all warm and fuzzy inside.

Help Me Understand

2009-07-21T20:53:00.004-05:00

First let me say I haven't been posting much lately for a couple of reasons. The foremost reason being that I have felt that any post not pointing out how the current Administration and Congress are raping our Country, economy, and Constitution would be the equivalent of fiddling while Rome burns. (Unfortunately, this is nothing new or unique to this administration.)The other reason, only slightly less important than the first is that everytime I talk, write or think about the above situation it makes me too angry to think straight. The result of all of this is that I just can't write at all.

That being said, I can't sit quietly on this anymore.

Why is it that we can spend damned near a trillion dollars bailing out banks and automotive manufacturers who have so badly mismanaged themselves that there was "no other choice" but to bail them out because they are "too big to fail" because it would put too many people out of work...

***breathe***

I was about to fire up a rant...gotta stop...take a second.

Why would our government, who only wants us all to have jobs, pass a bill that will effectively put 100,000 people out of work AND severly weaken this country's ability to defend itself by cutting all production of the F-22. All in the name of saving 1.75 billion dollars. I know that sounds like a lot...but it was actually less than .2% (that's 2/10 of a percent) of the total cost of 680 billion dollars in the defense spending bill.

I just can't get my head around the logic behind this...

Here's the article from the AP that caused the blood to start shooting out of my eyes.

Yahoo Article

If you can reason through this, let me know. I need to go lie down.

Tole

Happy 4th of July

2009-07-04T08:06:00.001-05:00

Happy Birthday U.S.A.

Tole

Nod to Phlegmmy

2009-07-02T18:12:00.002-05:00

With a healthy *nod* to Phlegmmy's post on the modern primitive footwear here.

I give you the Utilikilt. One day I will have them all...and "only my neighbor will know for sure."

www.utilikilts.com

Veterans Everywhere

2009-05-25T08:46:00.002-05:00

I would like to take this chance to give a heartfelt "Thank You" and a bow of the head to all those who are fighting, have fought and especially those who paid the ultimate price so that my undeserving soul can be free.

On this day I spend some time thinking of my grandfathers who stood up to those who would do us harm. My late grandfather on my Dad's side came home from WWII paralyzed thanks to a mortar round hitting the bridge he was crossing. Even though I lost him when I was but five years old, his sacrifice and subsequent pain are all the reminder that I will ever need to hold those who serve in high regard.

My grandfather on my Mother's side served bravely in our Navy and was lucky enough to come out unharmed.

So I give a salute and to all of those who have and continue to serve.

Thank you.

Tole

Adventures in Firefighting

2009-05-20T08:30:00.005-05:00

Let me set the scene. I had worked most of the afternoon cutting down trees and cleaning out planting beds at a house that I am helping to renovate and clean. I was...tired. The drive home in my old truck was going to be my chance to recuperate and pull myself together.

Now my old truck has been acting up a bit lately. Miss firing and backfiring through the carb. My local wrench-jockey had told me that I had a burnt valve or maybe a lobe worn down on the cam shaft. Well, with over 100k miles on this engine (my truck's third) it was time for an overhaul or maybe just a replacement from the local autoparts megamart. I was even contemplating this very fact on the drive home.

As the miles rolled by the truck was being even more cranky than usual. When I took the exit for my house the engine quit altogether. "Oh bother," sez I.

I grab the key and give it a turn to restart the cranky old heap when black smoke starts to roll out from under the hood.

"Bugger!!"

Luckily, I was being followed home by my dear friends Lawdog and Phlegmmy. Lawdog runs across the intersection to a gas station and returns with a fire extinguisher while I unload my truck into Phlegmmy's little ride just in case the fire gets out of control.

Luckily it didn't. The carb was just full of gas and needed to burn a little of it off. The local fire dept showed up and made damned sure it was out and then gave me a push the rest of the way home. (I was literally 3 blocks from my house when everything went pear-shaped.)

Now I have a decision to make. Do I clean up and revive my old friend of over 20 years or do I take my wife's advice and give him the rest he has earned a 100 times over?

I am, suffice it to say, torn.

Tole

Idle Hands and All That

2009-04-23T19:58:00.002-05:00

I know it's been a long time since I put some of the little things that course through my head on a daily basis out there for your review. To be honest, I've been buried trying to get back in the swing of going to work after 5 months of being out with that pancreatic mess.

So I get back to work...I'm there for just at two weeks and BAM I get laid off. Cue the new round of depression and feelings of inadequacy. How do I cope you ask? I destroy stuff.

Specifically, I gutted my kitchen...to the studs...nothing left. Now comes the tough part...putting it all back together. I'm getting there, but it is taking a long time. Fun part is that after being sick for so long my endurance is..well shall we say that an asthmatic hamster with a blood disorder can work longer than me.

Luckily, I have friends like Lawdog and a wife with the work ethic of a frontiersman to help me out.

Pictures to follow...I promise.

Tole

An Unpleasant Side-Effect

2009-01-26T21:13:00.003-06:00

I think I mentioned that I have lost about 70 pounds since September. I've begun to notice things I didn't realize were going on before I lost the weight. You know, all the typical almost cliche things. I have more energy. My blood pressure has normalized. I can breathe. Blah blah blah.

One thing I was happy to see is that I no longer have to buy "big guys" jeans at Wally World, which means my pants are $2 cheaper now. That makes the skin flint in me giggle a little.

BUT, I was not prepared for being COLD!!! When I tipped the scale at 266, I was never cold. I didn't wear a coat, even when it was close to or below freezing. I played in the snow with my daughter in a short sleeved shirt for Pete's sake!!

I haven't been warm in almost a week. I miss my insulating blubber. I am seriously tempted to hole up until May, burn my furniture and any other combustible material I can get my grubby little mitts on, and crawl under several blankets until I hear the geese fly by headed north again.

Oh well, at least I'll live to be cold.

Tole

4 Months in a Nutshell

2009-01-17T07:11:00.003-06:00

Ok, it’s time to talk about what the hell happened to me 4 months ago. Truth be told, the wind-up actually began in June of 2007. That was when I was first told I should get my gall bladder checked as a CT of that general area showed there MIGHT be some stones developing. Well, I didn’t want to pay the $500 deductible for the trip to the hospital, so I blew it off.

Fast forward 15 months, and one of those lovely little gall stones decides to leave the gall bladder for a change of scenery and gets good and bloody stuck on his way past the pancreas. This interruption of our little stone’s journey plays merry hell on the pancreas, which by the by will in turn play merry hell with the rest of the body, and will earn one a quick trip to the ER.

It took the nurse practitioner on call in the Bugscuffle Memorial Hospital, Hair Care and Tire Center, all of about 15 seconds to decide that whatever the hell was going on with me was WAY above his pay grade and promptly stuff me into an ambulance and forward me to someone with many more degrees on his office wall.

Oh, did I mention the pain? Second only to childbirth or so I am told.

Thirty minutes of hell on wheels later, I arrive at a somewhat bigger hospital and am greeted by my new best friend, my new GI Specialist. I am beyond grateful for the treatment I have received. He and his associates literally saved my life, but more on that later.

One of the side effects of acute pancreatitis is that your body thinks and behaves like it is dehydrated. The treatment for this is to pump mass quantities of fluid into the patient and hope he doesn’t drown. I almost did. See, my doctor decides, and rightly so, that the blockage must be removed to stop the pancreas from digesting itself. So a procedure is performed to remove our little hero, the gall stone, from the area where he got himself stuck.

This should have been a walk in the park…should have been. It wasn’t. See, while they were pumping me full of saline, I had decided to let about half of what they were giving me leak out through the walls of my blood vessels, and what wasn’t leaking out I decided to hang on to, so I shut my kidneys off. This had the effect of bloating me up like road kill in August. Bloating of the magnitude I achieved makes it VERY difficult for one to breathe, so I quit. This invokes the use of the term “Code Blue” and lots of people show up from all over the place and get very busy. In my mind it looks like that scene in the Fifth Element when Gary Oldman knocks the glass on the floor and all the little robots scurry in to clean it up.

I earned myself a 5 day vacation in ICU breathing on a ventilator and getting pumped full of diuretics. After leaving ICU, I got to spend 7 more days in the CCU before my doctors were happy that I was stable enough to go home.

By this point I had lost 40 pounds and a good portion of my pancreatic function. Joy.

Over the next two and a half months I would return to the hospital 4 more times for pancreatic and gall bladder attacks, and for pain from something called pancreatic pseudo-cysts. These little jewels are a common after-effect of pancreatitis.

Basically, the pancreas leaks fluid into the abdomen. This stuff accumulates in little bubbles and the body walls them in to protect itself. In most people these things will resolve themselves and re-absorb within three to six months. I am not most people. I had three of them. One was the size of a head of cabbage the two others were only slightly smaller. HA, take that normalcy!! Just to ice the cake, I developed a bit of an infection in the largest one in the middle of November. Shot my temp up to 103, my blood pressure down to 93/64 and my pulse up to 155. That got that ER nurse’s attention by God, no 6 hour wait while they triage me this time.

This little endeavor earned me another two week vacation at my (I think my name should be on the building somewhere) hospital. It also won me the privilege of taking part in a CT guided drain tube insertion. This is something I suggest everyone avoid at all costs as I think the technique was developed in a dark, dank dungeon sometime in the Middle Ages. It is also where I found out that the biggest lie you will ever hear is, “You’re going to feel a little pressure.”

You see, for a CT guided procedure like this you have to be awake…that’s right, I got to watch them poke a hole in me, insert a guide wire, insert a tube over that guide wire and then drain a liter of fluid out of my gut. (Sorry about the nasty factor, but it was necessary.) I went into that procedure with a temperature of 99, a pulse of 95 and good color to my skin for the first time in a week. I came out with a temp of 103, a pulse of 150 and a face that was as white as a sheet. It sucked.

Two weeks later, we had to do it all over again, because my drain got stopped up and I had to have a larger tube put in. Dammit.

By this time, I have now lost 66 pounds in two and a half months. I DO NOT recommend this as a method of weight loss. Call 1-800-JENNY20 or Nutrisystem or Weight Watchers or hell just go for a friggin’ walk. Avoid this illness at all costs. (Here endeth the PSA.)

This time the drain was working just as expected, so my doctor decides it’s time to send me to a surgeon who specializes in the pancreas. Two more weeks go by and I meet him and his staff. During the get to know you chit chat with his nurse we learn that there is a possibility that I may require a procedure known as a Whipple. She tells us that this is, bar none, the worst abdominal surgery known to man. It involves removing a portion of the pancreas and any other material in the abdomen that is causing difficulty.

There is good news though…apparently you only need 10% of your pancreas to remain non-diabetic. Will the happiness never end? Then she gets up and leaves my wife and I looking at each other like we had just been told, “The world might just end, see ya!”

Five interminable minutes later, the surgeon comes in and greets us with, “I’ve looked at your latest CT and I don’t think we’re going to need to do anything that drastic.”

“Ah,” I think, “the old good cop bad cop routine and now he’s my hero.” And he is…for the moment.

He also thinks that my drain is insufficient and needs to be upsized. There was a loud creak of vinyl as my sphincter sucked a considerable portion of the upholstery on the exam table up my bum. I remembered how bad the two prior procedures had hurt and voice my concern in a squeaky falsetto that would have made Lou Costello proud. (If you don’t know who that is:

1.) you poor, poor comedy deprived person, and
2.) go rent or buy Hold That Ghost.

I am informed that his hospital is a “kinder, gentler hospital,” and that I will be unconscious for the drain exchange. I almost kissed him dead on the mouth.
This drain would remain in for another month leaving a hole in my side the size of a #2 pencil, BUT the last CT that I had taken showed NO sign of any pancreatic pseudo-cysts.

Today I got a call from the surgeon who is going to be removing my gall bladder in 3 weeks. I am lucky that is all he is removing. Somehow, by the Grace of God, I avoided losing any of my pancreatic tissue. I’m lucky that way. I should fully recover, unless I decide to be troublesome again.

In all seriousness, if you thought about me or prayed for me during all this time, even if it was only once, thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Tole

Happy New Year

2009-01-01T07:29:00.002-06:00

I know it's been a long time since I showed my ugly face to the world, but I thought that I'd take a few minutes to wish anyone who hasn't given me up for dead a Happy New Year.

For any who didn't know I, I have been extremely sick for the last 3 months with acute pancreatitis and it's many after-effects. I'm slowly getting better and hopefully will be back up to factory specs in a couple more months. I will write about it as soon as I sort out all my feelings about shaking hands with the old Reaper. Dealing with my own mortality has not been fun.

In the meantime, love like you mean it and live like there's no tomorrow...there may not be.

Tole

Why I Vote

2008-09-12T12:21:00.000-05:00

While I was on the road the last few days and couldn't play on my pc, I spent my nights watching TV and saw this...thought I'd share it. It's worth the time and frankly...the man has a point, and I couldn't agree more.

Political Differences Aside

2008-08-20T18:41:00.002-05:00

I am giving a tip of the hat and a nod of the head to three actors who apparently haven't cashed in all of their souls.

Apparently it took three actors to replace Heath Ledger in the last film he was making. Johhny Depp, Colin Farrell, and Jude Law have all stepped in to replace the late Mr. Ledger in his role in Terry Gilliam's "The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus" which he was filming at the time of his death.

When they learned that he had not updated his will to include his two year old daughter, all three of these gentlemen donated all of the money they earned from that film to her.

I am truly touched. Well done Sirs.

Tole

"E" for Effort

2008-08-19T19:08:00.005-05:00

Little Johnny may be dumb as a box of rocks, but at least he tries really hard.

That's what schools in Dallas will be going to when deciding what grade a student should receive on assignments. Some of the key points from the new policy are listed below.

•Homework grades should be given only when the grades will "raise a student's average, not lower it."

•Teachers must accept overdue assignments, and their principal will decide whether students are to be penalized for missing deadlines.

•Students who flunk tests can retake the exam and keep the higher grade.

•Teachers cannot give a zero on an assignment unless they call parents and make "efforts to assist students in completing the work."

There is not enough Valium in the world to calm me down right now. I thought that in addition to providing an academic education, schools were supposed to help our children get ready for the world outside of school.

How the hell?!?!?!?!?!?

I can promise you one thing. If my boss were to take this philosophy, our company would be out of business in less than six months, because no one would do a damned thing. Why should we? There's no incentive. Ok, I'll grant you that there are those who live a life based on a work ethic. But sadly it has been my experience that we are a minority.

On teacher quoted in this article here said,

"It's like we're sending the message to kids that deadlines don't matter, studying is optional, and no matter how little you do, you're still [going to] pass all your classes anyway," said Ray Cox, who teaches world languages at Franklin Middle School.

I just don't understand how anyone could think that this practice will improve the education of our children. All we are creating is children who have been set up to fail once they have left the tender bosom of the public school system.

I have to go lie down...

Just Let Olympic Baseball Die

2008-07-27T21:31:00.004-05:00

I read this article today and all I can say is WTF Over?!?!? The IBAF is changing it's rules concerning extra innings in an attempt to keep baseball and softball in the Olympics. Unfortuantely the new rules will also apply to all tournaments that fall under the IBAF sanctioning body.

Under the new format, the 10th inning will be played normally. At the start of the 11th, teams will have the option of beginning at any point in the existing batting order and placing the previous two batters on base.

For example, a team that opts to lead off with its No. 3 hitter would begin with its No. 1 batter on second base and its No. 2 hitter on first with no outs.

...

The 12th inning and beyond would begin where the previous lineup left off, with the two hitters ahead of the batter scheduled to lead off that inning being placed on first and second bases.

Full Article Here

What's next? Giving everyone a chance to bat, quit keeping score and give everyone a trophy regardless of whether they win or not? Oh wait...nevermind.

More Eats

2008-07-16T19:01:00.003-05:00

When my wife and I were still newly married, that would be less than 5 years in, we used to share a steak and shrimp that we would cook on the hibachi every Friday. We didn't have loads of cash (still don't) so it was one sirloin and about 10 shrimp. It was quite arguably some of the best times we have had, pre-children.

We would marinate said hunk of bovis mortis in beer (I used Bud) overnight and grill it the next day with a little salt and pepper. The shrimp went on skewers with some lemon-pepper and sometimes bbq sauce. 'Scuse me while I wipe up the drool accumulating on my keyboard...

Better.

Well, after a few years we began to experiment with our food. We both love shrimp and we both love pasta, so the following recipe was destined to show up at some point. It took the place of our Friday night steaks for awhile. I hope you all enjoy it.

Tole's Shrimp Parmesan

4-6 shrimp per serving - they need to be big enough to handle, I like to use the 10-12 per pound size

1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese (don't use the stuff in the green can, get fresh and grate it yourself. You'll be glad you did.)

1 strip prosciutto ham for every two shrimp.
Slice these length-wise to make 1" wide and about 4" long strips

eggs for egg wash

Pasta of your choice.

Marinara sauce. (We usually make ours, but your favorite jarred sauce will work. I recommend Classico Sweet Basil.)

Peel and de-vein the shrimp. Wrap each shrimp in a strip of prosciutto and dip in egg wash. Dredge them in the Parmesan cheese and fry until golden brown. Serve on top of pasta and marinara. If you like a little kick to your food, add Louisiana Hot Sauce to your egg wash.

Tole

Judge William Young

2008-07-14T18:55:00.003-05:00

Below you will find the sentencing of Mr. Richard C. Reid. Mr. Reid for those who may have forgotten is the notorious "shoe bomber" from shortly after 9/11. I heard this read on the radio a few days ago and immediately had to have a copy of it for myself.

I am not an expert on The Honorable Judge Young's record. As a matter of fact this is the only ruling that I can say I have knowledge of. However, it gives me great pride as an American to know that this type of thinking exists in today's judiciary.

Here's hoping that those who now seek rememdy in our courts after leaving Club Gitmo will end up in this man's courtroom or the courtroom of one like him.

The attached transcipt was part of an article published on cnn.com and can still be found there I believe.

RICHARD REID: I start by praising Allah because life today is no good. I bear witness to this and he alone is right to be worshiped. And I bear witness that Muhammad Sa'laat Alayhi as-Salaam is his last prophet and messenger who is sent to all of mankind for guidance, with the sound guidance for everyone.
Concerning what the Court said? I admit, I admit my actions and I further, I further state that I done them.

JUDGE WILLIAM YOUNG: I didn't hear the last. I admit my actions and then what did you say?

REID: I further admit my allegiance to Osama bin Laden, to Islam, and to the religion of Allah. With regards to what you said about killing innocent people, I will say one thing. Your government has killed 2 million children in Iraq. If you want to think about something, against 2 million, I don't see no comparison.
Your government has sponsored the rape and torture of Muslims in the prisons of Egypt and Turkey and Syria and Jordan with their money and with their weapons. I don't know, see what I done as being equal to rape and to torture, or to the deaths of the two million children in Iraq.
So, for this reason, I think I ought not apologize for my actions. I am at war with your country. I'm at war with them not for personal reasons but because they have murdered more than, so many children and they have oppressed my religion and they have oppressed people for no reason except that they say we believe in Allah.
This is the only reason that America sponsors Egypt. It's the only reason they sponsor Turkey. It's the only reason they back Israel.
As far as the sentence is concerned, it's in your hand. Only really it is not even in your hand. It's in Allah's hand. I put my trust in Allah totally and I know that he will give victory to his religion. And he will give victory to those who believe and he will destroy those who wish to oppress the people because they believe in Allah.
So you can judge and I leave you to judge. And I don't mind. This is all I have to say. And I bear witness to Muhammad this is Allah's message.

YOUNG: Mr. Richard C. Reid, hearken now to the sentence the Court imposes upon you.
On counts 1, 5 and 6 the Court sentences you to life in prison in the custody of the United States Attorney General. On counts 2, 3, 4 and 7, the Court sentences you to 20 years in prison on each count, the sentence on each count to run consecutive one with the other. That's 80 years.
On Count 8 the Court sentences you to the mandatory 30 years consecutive to the 80 years just imposed. The Court imposes upon you on each of the eight counts a fine of $250,000 for the aggregate fine of $2 million.
The Court accepts the government's recommendation with respect to restitution and orders restitution in the amount of $298.17 to Andre Bousquet and $5,784 to American Airlines.
The Court imposes upon you the $800 special assessment.
The Court imposes upon you five years supervised release simply because the law requires it. But the life sentences are real life sentences so I need not go any further.
This is the sentence that is provided for by our statutes. It is a fair and a just sentence. It is a righteous sentence. Let me explain this to you.
We are not afraid of any of your terrorist co-conspirators, Mr. Reid. We are Americans. We have been through the fire before. There is all too much war talk here. And I say that to everyone with the utmost respect.
Here in this court where we deal with individuals as individuals, and care for individuals as individuals, as human beings we reach out for justice.
You are not an enemy combatant. You are a terrorist. You are not a soldier in any war. You are a terrorist. To give you that reference, to call you a soldier gives you far too much stature. Whether it is the officers of government who do it or your attorney who does it, or that happens to be your view, you are a terrorist.
And we do not negotiate with terrorists. We do not treat with terrorists. We do not sign documents with terrorists.
We hunt them down one by one and bring them to justice.
So war talk is way out of line in this court. You're a big fellow. But you're not that big. You're no warrior. I know warriors. You are a terrorist. A species of criminal guilty of multiple attempted murders.
In a very real sense Trooper Santiago had it right when first you were taken off that plane and into custody and you wondered where the press and where the TV crews were and you said you're no big deal. You're no big deal.
What your counsel, what your able counsel and what the equally able United States attorneys have grappled with and what I have as honestly as I know how tried to grapple with, is why you did something so horrific. What was it that led you here to this courtroom today? I have listened respectfully to what you have to say. And I ask you to search your heart and ask yourself what sort of unfathomable hate led you to do what you are guilty and admit you are guilty of doing.
And I have an answer for you. It may not satisfy you. But as I search this entire record it comes as close to understanding as I know.
It seems to me you hate the one thing that to us is most precious. You hate our freedom. Our individual freedom. Our individual freedom to live as we choose, to come and go as we choose, to believe or not believe as we individually choose.
Here, in this society, the very winds carry freedom. They carry it everywhere from sea to shining sea. It is because we prize individual freedom so much that you are here in this beautiful courtroom. So that everyone can see, truly see that justice is administered fairly, individually, and discretely.
It is for freedom's sake that your lawyers are striving so vigorously on your behalf and have filed appeals, will go on in their, their representation of you before other judges. We care about it. Because we all know that the way we treat you, Mr. Reid, is the measure of our own liberties.
Make no mistake though. It is yet true that we will bear any burden; pay any price, to preserve our freedoms.
Look around this courtroom. Mark it well. The world is not going to long remember what you or I say here. Day after tomorrow it will be forgotten. But this, however, will long endure. Here, in this courtroom, and courtrooms all across America, the American people will gather to see that justice, individual justice, justice, not war, individual justice is in fact being done.
The very President of the United States through his officers will have to come into courtrooms and lay out evidence on which specific matters can be judged, and juries of citizens will gather to sit and judge that evidence democratically, to mold and shape and refine our sense of justice.
See that flag, Mr. Reid? That's the flag of the United States of America. That flag will fly there long after this is all forgotten. That flag still stands for freedom. You know it always will. Mr. Custody Officer, stand him down.
REID: That flag will be brought down on the Day of Judgment and you will see in front of your Lord and my Lord and then we will know. (Whereupon the defendant was removed from the courtroom.)

God Bless the U.S.A.

Tole

Out of the Mouths of Babes

2008-07-07T18:38:00.003-05:00

My 8 year old daughter, and only daughter for as far as that goes, is a Food Network junkie. When she's not watching ***shudder*** Spongebob, she watches Food Network. She knows all the stars by sight and is beginning to grasp some of the basics of food combinations and varying cuisines. It's kind of cool to watch.

My wife and I are foodies as well, so we encourage her every chance we get. She gets to help shop and cook. By the by, it's true that kids are much more likely to eat something if they have a hand in preparing it. I've seen it happen.

I tell you that bit so I can tell you this bit.

The family and I were making our monthly trek around Sam's Club a while back doing our damnedest to spend about a month's pay (and doing a fine job)when my wife, who was recovering from surgery announces that she needs to sit down for a minute. We all make camp in the lawn furniture and I take the full cart to the front of the store to exchange it for an empty.

When I get back I am informed that my daughter has had an inspiration. It came in the form of "Mommy. You know what sounds good?" That comment was followed by this recipe, which the little darling came up with entirely on her own. We've had it three times now and it still blows my mind that she came up with it.

Enjoy.

Munchkin's Honey Lime Chicken

4 Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts
4 Limes
Zest from the limes (we used the zest from all 4 limes, but you could use less depending on your taste)
2 cloves of garlic
1 Tbls Honey
a dash of hot sauce (optional)
Salt and pepper to taste

Combine the lime juice, zest, garlic, honey, salt and pepper and hot sauce and marinate chicken for 30 minutes to an hour. Then grill until the chicken is done.

Tole

So Long and Thanks for the Laughter and the Insight

2008-06-23T17:33:00.004-05:00

For those of us who don’t take the world at face value today is a sad day indeed. George Carlin, the voice that woke me up to the bull that the world puts up in front of your eyes to hide the way things are, passed away Sunday from heart failure.

I remember the first time I saw him doing stand-up. I was maybe 13 or 14 years old. He made me laugh until my sides hurt. After it was done and I started to think about what he had been discussing, I realized that there was much more to his talk than simply humor. There were concepts and thoughts swimming below the surface of that humor that the people it was aimed at would probably never recognize.

Don’t get me wrong. Some of his material was just plain old blue humor. I am reminded of the list of 7 dirty words that over the years had grown to over 2000 words that people found vulgar or obscene. It took him almost 5 minutes to read it. His delivery while simply reading a list of words made me nearly hurt myself laughing. But thinking back the thing that makes it so very funny is that they are just words, but words that people find offensive. The list pointed out how stupid we, as humans can be to find words bothersome.

I’m still at kind of a loss here. I almost feel like I have lost a childhood friend. I am embedding a clip here. It is NOT WORK SAFE nor is it child safe, so please exercise some restraint. In a perfect world, the words in this clip shouldn’t even matter, but the world is as the world is.

He was due to receive a Mark Twain award in November. I think that the celebration should still be held and the award given posthumously. This man deserves it for the influence and the endurance of his career.

He will be missed.

If you're a fan you might check this out. I think it would be well worth the cash. If you've never really seen him before, it would be well worth your time to rent a few of his dvds.

George Carlin's All My Stuff

Tole

Dammit Dammit Dammit

2008-06-12T21:10:00.002-05:00

I'm so friggin mad I can't even put together enough cohernet thought to express my anger. SO I will let Justice Scalia say it for me.

Various excerpts (citations omitted) from Justice Scalia’s dissent (joined by the Chief Justice and Justices Thomas and Alito):

Today, for the first time in our Nation's history, the Court confers a constitutional right to habeas corpus on alien enemies detained abroad by our military forces in the course of an ongoing war…. The writ of habeas corpus does not, and never has, run in favor of aliens abroad; the Suspension Clause thus has no application, and the Court's intervention in this military matter is entirely ultra vires.
The game of bait-and-switch that today's opinion plays upon the Nation's Commander in Chief will make the war harder on us. It will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed. That consequence would be tolerable if necessary to preserve a time-honored legal principle vital to our constitutional Republic. But it is this Court's blatant abandonment of such a principle that produces the decision today. The President relied on our settled precedent in Johnson v. Eisentrager (1950), when he established the prison at Guantanamo Bay for enemy aliens.

[I]n response [to the Court’s 2006 ruling in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld], Congress, at the President's request, quickly enacted the Military Commissions Act, emphatically reasserting that it did not want these prisoners filing habeas petitions. It is therefore clear that Congress and the Executive—both political branches—have determined that limiting the role of civilian courts in adjudicating whether prisoners captured abroad are properly detained is important to success in the war that some 190,000 of our men and women are now fighting…. What competence does the Court have to second-guess the judgment of Congress and the President on such a point? None whatever. But the Court blunders in nonetheless. Henceforth, as today's opinion makes unnervingly clear, how to handle enemy prisoners in this war will ultimately lie with the branch that knows least about the national security concerns that the subject entails.

What drives today's decision is neither the meaning of the Suspension Clause, nor the principles of our precedents, but rather an inflated notion of judicial supremacy. The Court says that if the extraterritorial applicability of the Suspension Clause turned on formal notions of sovereignty, "it would be possible for the political branches to govern without legal constraint" in areas beyond the sovereign territory of the United States. That cannot be, the Court says, because it is the duty of this Court to say what the law is. It would be difficult to imagine a more question-begging analysis.… Our power "to say what the law is" is circumscribed by the limits of our statutorily and constitutionally conferred jurisdiction. And that is precisely the question in these cases: whether the Constitution confers habeas jurisdiction on federal courts to decide petitioners' claims. It is both irrational and arrogant to say that the answer must be yes, because otherwise we would not be supreme.

Putting aside the conclusive precedent of Eisentrager, it is clear that the original understanding of the Suspension Clause was that habeas corpus was not available to aliens abroad, as Judge Randolph's thorough opinion for the court below detailed.… It is entirely clear that, at English common law, the writ of habeas corpus did not extend beyond the sovereign territory of the Crown.

Today the Court warps our Constitution in a way that goes beyond the narrow issue of the reach of the Suspension Clause, invoking judicially brainstormed separation-of-powers principles to establish a manipulable "functional" test for the extraterritorial reach of habeas corpus (and, no doubt, for the extraterritorial reach of other constitutional protections as well). It blatantly misdescribes important precedents, most conspicuously Justice Jackson's opinion for the Court in Johnson v. Eisentrager. It breaks a chain of precedent as old as the common law that prohibits judicial inquiry into detentions of aliens abroad absent statutory authorization. And, most tragically, it sets our military commanders the impossible task of proving to a civilian court, under whatever standards this Court devises in the future, that evidence supports the confinement of each and every enemy prisoner. The Nation will live to regret what the Court has done today.

Tole

No Room for Discussion

2008-05-22T19:10:00.002-05:00

Since this is my own personal little soapbox from which I proclaim the things I think and believe, I thought I would post the best music video ever. Period. End of Discussion.

Tole

Joke Fodder

2008-05-21T18:02:00.002-05:00

I heard something on the radio today that will most likely make me lose sleep thinking up jokes about it for at least the next week. What could it be you ask?

How about a movie version of 21 Jump Street? Yep, that classic **snark** TV series from the 80's will be the next piece of dren to be cranked out by Hollywood.

My first thought was WHAT?!?!? Followed closely by OMFG NOOOOOOOOO!!!

I think that if we put all the movie people in one room with an infinite number of chimpanzees typing on an infinite number of typewriters, the odds of an original thought being developed into anything resembling a good film would only be slightly better than the odds of that same combination finding a cure for the common cold.

Oh well. If you're truly interested in the story here's a link.

Tole

Another Unintended Consequence

2008-05-20T19:12:00.005-05:00

I ran across a story on the intranet at my office that I thought I would share with you all. It's the kind of thing that everyone could benefit from, so please share it with as many folks as possible.

Meth critters are using the exchangeable propane tanks to hold the anhydrous ammonia that they use in the manufacture of their drug of choice. They rent them, empty them and return them when they are done. The ammonia is extremely corrosive and weakens the steel in the tanks. When the tanks get refilled and the propane mixes with the left-over ammonia in the weakened tank, bad things happen.

There will be a tell-tale greenish corrosion on the valves. If use these services, please check the tanks before you tank them for that greenish corrosion and if you see it ask for another tank.

I would just use my own tank and have it refilled at a propane station.

If you'd like the read the alert from the National Propane Gas Association you can find it at the link below.

http://www.npga.org/i4a/pages/index.cfm?pageid=529

Be safe.

Tole

Could it be a Sign?

2008-05-19T22:50:00.002-05:00

I had to go get a new chair for the old computer desk today. Why?? Because the hydraulic cylinder on my old one burst. I know I could have gotten another cylinder, but the foam was pretty well destroyed and the fabric smelled like old shoes....maybe I should get up out of my chair more.

That chair was a replacement for one that I broke while leaning back. I miss that chair..it was very comfortable, but it was one of those that the back bolted directly to the seat instead of being held on by the arms. I leaned back one night and broke the fittings that were embedded into the plywood base...and sheared the head off of one of the bolts.

As I look back on this, I think it is a sign that maybe...just maybe...I need to shed a few pounds....

NAH!! Must be inferior quality merchandise. Now if you'll excuse me there is a chocolate cream pie in my refrigerator that needs my attention.

Tole

I Got Tagged

2008-04-24T19:53:00.002-05:00

for a book meme, so here goes nothing.

1. Pick up the nearest book of 123 pages or more. No cheating!
2. Find page 123.
3. Find the first five sentences.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people.

Gonna skip step five, so join in if ya wanna.

Tonight's excursion wasn't something I could charge Murphy for--she'd have my ass in a sling if she knew I was running around asking questions, poking my nose in where it shouldn't be. So, if I wanted money from the Chicago P.D., I would have to spend time doing the research Murphy wanted--the black-magic research that could get me killed all by itself.
Or, I could work on Monica Sells's missing-husband case.

That's from the very first Dresden Files books by Jim Butcher. Best series, bar none, that I have read in the last 10 years.

Tole

When Hollywood Was Part of America

2008-04-19T19:07:00.003-05:00

I have mentioned before that my father was a huge influence on the person I am. (That's right Dad, we all blame you. lol)

When I was a little nard, my father owned a television sales and service shop in my home town. Mom worked in an office, so my brother and I spent our afternoons and summer days in Dad's store.

Imagine the sensory overload when there are rough 20 televisions, all with cable, all turned on at one time or another. It was alot.

We usually ended up watching TBS, WGN or ESPN, though at that time in history, ESPN really only played professional rodeo and ARF (Australian Rules Football, and what a game that is.)

As you can guess I grew up watching Abbot and Costello, Martin and Lewis, Hope and Crosby, The Marx Brothers and the Three Stooges. I could actually recite the entire Who's on First routine at the age of 10.

I also watched alot of westerns, both TV series and movies. I still enjoy the occasional episode of Bonanza or the Rifleman. For movies you really should check out Support Your Local Gunfighter or Support Your Local Sheriff starring James Garner. You also can't go wrong with ANYTHING starring The Duke...John Wayne...

That being said, I was not surprised to see an attachment to an email with a clip of John Wayne and Dean Martin. Imagine my surprise to see it was a clip with John Wayne talking about what he wanted for his new daughter and not from a film.

To put this in context, this would have been during Vietnam, but I can totally relate to everything he has to say. I would like alot of the same things for all of my kids.

Enjoy. I know I did.

Tole

A Glimpse Inside

2008-04-16T17:11:00.002-05:00

I think that it is important to, every now and again, share with people a small tidbit about who and what I am.

The fact that I find this bit hi-damned-larious most likely speaks volumes. Though I have to admit that almost everything Eddie Izzard does just slays me.

Enjoy.

Tole

I Think I Broke Him

2008-04-13T08:19:00.002-05:00

Here's a very important lesson. When a friend, especially if your friend is me, says, "Hey what are you doing this afternoon?" your best and safest answer is anything other than "Nothing."

I goat-roped Lawdog into helping me remove some "volunteer" trees from my fence line that had grown up into the power lines. To be fair to myself, they were there when we bought the house, but I've ignored them. I tried to get the power company out to clean them up, but they are only responsible for stuff in the lines from pole to pole. Anything between the pole and the house is all on me.

So, LD and I attacked my tree at noon yesterday. Four hours and a broken chainsaw later, we've got about 2/3 of it down.

If you look closely at this picture you may notices that LD tends to SUNBURN really easily. It's a combination of genetics and meds, but after about 6 seconds in the direct sunlight without sunscreen he starts to sizzle. When he left my house yesterday (it was around midnight), he didn't need me to turn on the lights outside because he was glowing in the dark. It was kind of cool actually. Like watching a tracer round in slow motion at night.

He's not coming back today to help me finish up and I FULLY understand.

Oh and I am cutting the tree down in the alley as well. See we called the local power company shortly after we bought this place (almost 2 years ago) and it's still there. Maybe I didn't get my point across to the LOCAL power company when I talked to the call center in Calcutta or Delhi or wherever they are farming it out to. Someone DID show up 3 weeks after we called...to service our power outage...man, it would suck to have your power out for 3 weeks.

When I told him we called to have a a tree removed I was told that he'd submit a ticket for it. He must have had to call it in as well, because no one ever showed up.

Oh well, being the rugged individualist I am (yes that is sarcasm) I have decided to handle it myself (it just took me two years to pull on my boots and get to it.)

Tole

Out of the Mouths of Babes

2008-04-04T17:47:00.003-06:00

It always makes me feel good when one of my children uses the mind God gave them. BUT when they use it to overcome the indoctrination that schools seems to want to impose on them, it means a little more.

My oldest, who is 7, came home from school a couple of days ago and proclaimed that the world would be safer if we didn't have guns.

Now, in a Utopian world, where no one commits any violence against anyone else, I agree with her. However, human nature bring what it is, we all know that we'd just find another way to kill each other, but I digress.

My wife, God love her, told my daughter to stop and think about her comment for a minute.

***Tick***Tock***

Light dawns and my daughter says, "Wait a minute. That doesn't make any sense. For the world to be safer we ALL need to HAVE guns. That way we can defend ourselves from bad people."

Now I ask you. If a seven year old can figure that out on her own, why oh why, is it so difficult to convince more "edumercated" folks of that same fact.

I am not going to drag out the soap box and give the dissertation on how guns make people safer. I'll leave that to Lawdog and his counterparts. I just thought it was interesting that she drew this conclusion on her own.

Next target...Global Warming and those damned polar bears, lol.

Tole

White Guilt My Great Aunt Fanny

2008-04-02T21:57:00.003-06:00

On my daily commute I heard something on the radio that made blood run out of my ears. I actually think it might have triggered some sort of cranial episode.

I am realtively young, but I have learned that there are times to speak your mind and times to shut the hell up. One of the most important things I have learned is to think about what I am going to say before I actually let the words dribble out of my face.

This is a even more important skill if you are a public figure and are in front of people with record devices. Without further ado I give you superdelegate for Hillary Clinton, Congressman Emanuel Cleaver(D-MO)..

"If I had to make a prediction right now, I'd say Barack Obama is going to be the next president...," he said. "I will be stunned if he is not the next president of the United States. Now, when he is sworn in, 99.9 percent of Americans won't know who he is or what he stands for. But it doesn't matter at this point."

That's because, Cleaver says, many white Americans are supporting Obama because "they are looking at Barack Obama and saying this is our chance to demonstrate that we have been able to get this boogeyman called race behind us and so they are going to vote for him."

He says this is causing many African-Americans to "tremble" because they believe white Americans won't want to address issue of race then, saying it's been addressed by Obama's election.

I wouldn't vote for Barack Hussein Obama, Jr. if there were goon squads in black leather overcoats standing at the polling stations shooting anyone who didn't. I'd take my bullet and know that I died defending my country from a progressive descent into Socialism.

Now that I have read that again, I am going to have to go and lie down...my head hurts.

Tole

Star Wars Episode 2.5

2008-03-15T04:10:00.002-06:00

Lucas announced at Showest this week that the animated film about the Clone Wars was good enough quality that he has decided to release it to theaters as well as to tv. Look for it in August.

Article here:
http://www.starwars.com/theclonewars/news/announcement.html

Video sneak peek here:
http://www.starwars.com/video/view/478.html

and here:
http://www.starwars.com/video/view/000623.html

Tole

My Brain Was Busy Today

2008-03-14T18:45:00.002-06:00

and it's all the stupid election's fault. On my way to work today I heard a question on the radio that occupied my thoughts all day.

Should patriotism be a requirement for the President of the United States? The answer is, without question or pause, yes.

If you owned a company, from which you make your entire living, and were looking to hire a new CEO, would you hire someone who wants your company to succeed as it stands?

Would you want that CEO to have a deep seeded belief that your company is the best in its industry and wants to see it stay there?

**OR**

Would you want some one at the helm of your company, from which you make your living and provide for your family, who thinks that your company is intrinsically evil and must be brought down?

Would you want someone who believes that the only way to save your company is to completely stop all of its production, take all the money it has and give it to the employees and lock the doors?

This is what we must ask ourselves when we go to vote in November. While none of the three we have to choose from at the moment are 100% in alignment with my beliefs and philosophy, I do feel confident that at least one of them loves this country and wants it to continue to be the freedom loving, force for good in the world that we have been in the past. (hint: I speak not of a Dem. )

I fear for my country. I fear for my freedom and I fear for the future of my children. When we cannot question the beliefs of a man running for the President of the United States.

I fear for all these things when our words are chosen for us so that we avoid offending some one who might find them objectionable.

I fear for all these things when I look at the indoctrination of our children into these beliefs in our schools.

Finally, I fear for my ability to provide for my family when the government has to tax us at a rate like those in Europe, in the 50% range, just so that they can provide for us from the cradle to the grave.

I do not want my government that deep into my life. Where is my incentive to ever achieve anything for myself if I know that I can do nothing and get the same results.

Just remember…

The government that is big enough to give you everything you want, is powerful enough to take everything you have. – Thomas Jefferson

Tole

I'm SO Proud

2008-03-04T07:06:00.002-06:00

I was sent this video of my state legislature at work and it brought a tear to my eye and a bit of joy to my tired old heart. (smell that? that's sarcasm. **grin**) Just remember the election isn't over until the cemetary's been counted.

One hundred and seventy two years of practice and we're still just flailing around. My favorite was the bit where one of our legislators gets up to go vote for an absent member and someone near that monkey hits HIS vote button when he gets up.

Tole

Now THAT'S Funny

2008-02-23T06:28:00.002-06:00

Everyday on my way to work, or what passes for work, I listen to conservative talk radio while "drinking the blood of small people who are different from me." (Yes, I am an evil, hate-mongering conservative. Deal.) Glenn Beck being the show that is on at that time, it is how I start my day. Yesterday he was discussing the upcoming Academy Awards, and the discussion drifted to how Hollywood seems to be doing nothing lately but making message movies that aggrandize the liberal point of view and tear down America in general.

I was getting somewhat riled up and issuing my morning "damn straight"s and "hell yeah"s when he started talking about classic films and the way they would be marketed today. I almost wet my pants laughing, so I thought I'd share them with you all.

The two biggest issues in America today collide together for the first time on the big screen: Global warming and health care. You'll be gripping the edge of your seat as you take a journey with one Midwestern woman's wild escape from global warming as she flees into exile and meets up with three amazing friends with one common plight: They all need medical care and organs to survive. But a struggle to live without any universal health care coverage. Will a Democrat get elected in time to give them universal health care? Will the Government help and stop tornadoes caused by global warming, or will the evil Republicans give tax credits to the wealthiest 1% and let them all die? See the Wizard of Oz.

Power-seeking politicians have no mercy when it comes to starting war for oil, but what happens when technology expands beyond the atmosphere, when space travel is as easy as activating the hyper-drive? The endless potential for power and control of the universe becomes too much for evil politicians to resist. Entire planets are destroyed. Billions of lives are lost, and military industrial complex rules the universe. This summer see Star Wars.

When giant bank corporations have their backs up against the wall, they don't take it lying down. Follow one good local man's journey as he's forced by an evil corporation to jump off a snowy bridge and kill himself, only to have an angel save him and show him how horrible the world would be without him. If only everyone who was forced to commit suicide because of an evil giant corporation had an angel, which by the way don't exist -- save their life. See It's a Wonderful Life.

A common species with one uncommon characteristic, a tiny little difference in pigmentation has caused a world of hate. This winter don't miss the film that challenges conventional wisdom and shows black and white working together with all the gray areas in between. See Casablanca.

**giggle-snort**

Tole

A Basic Tejas Philosophy

2008-02-18T18:14:00.002-06:00

When I was but a young little nard, my grandfather, GOd rest him, told me the most important thing about fighting that I have ever heard. "The Hell with fighting fair, fight to win."

After reading Lawdog's last post on the Taser C2, I think that the folks manufacturing that particular device could stand with a lesson or two in that area.

My Dad has restated and reinforced that philosophy in me for as long as I can remember. I think it is with that in mind, that he forwarded this to me and that I share it with you.

To all you old law dogs now just lyin' in the shade, current pistoleros
and other fervent Second Amendment believers: I would rather be your friend,
but if you are not interested in that, I am prepared to be a capable and
efficient enemy.

This is the law: The purpose of fighting is to win. There is no possible
victory in defense. The sword is more important than the shield and skill
is more important than either. The final weapon is the brain. All else is
supplemental. As some wise man once said:

1. Don't pick a fight with an old man. If he is too old to fight, he'll just kill you.

2. If you find yourself in a fair fight, your tactics suck.

3. I carry a gun cause a cop is too heavy.

4. America is not at war. The U.S. Military is at war. America is at the Mall.

5. When seconds count, the cops are just minutes away. (but shoot first anyway, then call 911)

6. A reporter did a human-interest piece on the Texas Rangers. The reporter recognized the Colt Model 1911 the Ranger was carrying and asked him 'Why do you carry a 45?' The Ranger responded with, 'Because they don't make a .46.'

7. An armed man will kill an unarmed man with monotonous regularity.

8. The old sheriff was attending an awards dinner when a lady commented on his wearing his sidearm. 'Sheriff, I see you have your pistol. Are you expecting trouble?' 'No Ma'am. If I were expecting trouble, I would have brought my rifle.'

9. Beware the man who only has one gun. HE PROBABLY KNOWS HOW TO USE IT!!!

10. I was once asked by a lady visiting if I had a gun in the house. To which I said I did. She said 'well I certainly hope it isn't loaded!' To which I said, 'of course it is loaded.' She then asked, 'Are you that afraid of someone evil coming into your house?' My reply was, 'No not at all. I am not afraid of my house catching fire either, but I have fire extinguishers around, and THEY ARE ALL LOADED.'

Well, That'll Teach Me

2008-02-10T21:08:00.000-06:00

So I take the day off from work to take care of my family and how do they show their appreciation? They give me the crap they have. I guess I should know better by now.

Fever, stomach malfunctions, and lack of ability to remain upright for more than 10 seconds for 48 hours. I also got to have my first experience with IV fluids.

I need to give a nod of thanks to my boss for keeping me from getting seriously dehydrated. He asked that I get a doctor's note for my abscence from work. The request came from a phone call at 1:30 pm, and my regular doc closes up shop at noon on Fridays.

Running a fever, I called my Dad to drive me down to ye olde ER. Lucky guy that I am, my regular doc was on call and sittin there just waiting for me to show up. Vitals check, poke and prod on the old stomach and he retreats to the sink to scrub from his armpits down all the while remarking on how highly contagious this stuff is. Like I didn't know.

Then he checks the stats the nurse had jotted down...high pulse + low blood pressure + more than 24 hours since I last had the urge to pee. He rubs he chin, looks at the nurse and says, "stick him. One liter and push (something I can't pronounce, to make my stomach stop doing barrel rolls.)"

Took a little over an hour to get it all in there. But after it was all done, my headache was gone, my fever was down, and I felt much better. Still slept for 18 of the next 24 hours, but hey, what else can you do when you feel like death on a hot plate?

Tole

Please GOD Make it Stop!!!

2008-02-07T12:18:00.000-06:00

About a week and a half ago, my kids all got this stomach bug that has been going around along with a nice case of pink-eye. By some sheer act of mercy, my oldest and I missed out on it.

I screwed up and mentioned that fact. Never, and can't stress this enough, NEVER tempt fate. She's a deceitful old bitch.

The baby got it again. Followed a day later by my wife being laid low. I told my boss I was taking the day off to fill in for her and then last night...my oldest son comes down the hall doing a damned fine rendition of Linda Blair from the Exorcist. My God it was everywhere. I spent the better part of an hour cleaning it all up, and the rest of the night doing laundry just to try and get the smell of sick out of my house...I failed.

My oldest child, my daughter, gets up this morning and starts playing Old Faithful.

Sonofa...

As I write this I am the only breathing body in my house not down with this flu. (knocks on wood) Oh did I mention, the doctors tell us that the flu that is going around wasn't covered by the flu shots this year? Yeah...God hates me.

The wait to see a pediatrician is over 4 hours. People are getting really angry at their doctors when they spend a day waiting to see them only to be told, "It's a virus. Nothing we can do. Here's some stuff to help with the vomiting. Go home, drink fluids and pay the cashier on your way out. Oh, by the way, you could have just called and saved yourself half a day. Get well soon."

My wife, God love her calls. We avoid the toxic wastelands that are doctor's waiting rooms whenever we can.

The ERs here are cranking trough like 400 people a day because the clinics are all full to overflowing.

I really want to just dig myself a really deep hole. Crawl in it and pull the dirt in after me. Just gonna lie low until spring.

Tole

Keep You Mitts Outta My Wallet

2008-01-28T17:54:00.000-06:00

I often sit and wonder what I can share with my readers. Lawdog gives some great advice and instruction on how to protect yourself from critters who like to pounce on their victims in the proverbial dark parking lot or alley. While I have some similar training, I have a lot more experience in keeping virtual critters out of your financial business.

With that in mind I sat down and did a little research on ways to prevent identity theft.

Anyone who has ever gone through a big case of having their identity co-opted out from under them, knows what a HUGE pain in the butt it is. The sad thing is, there are some very simple steps you can take to help keep your name off the list of people waiting to hear from their local police department that there has been some break. The sad truth of that is, there are so many of those cases out there that you could end up at the bottom of a VERY long list of victims.

In an effort to save you that grief, I thought I’d throw out some steps and encourage you all to find out more. Think of it like building a fortress around your good name. The more important your name is to you, the thicker and higher the walls you will want to build. I am currently working to build a virtual version of Alcatraz around my credit. Nothing in or out unless I put my eyes on it and allow it to pass.

The first thing I would suggest is NEVER let your mail sit in your mail box. If you aren’t home when the postman brings your things around, get yourself a locking mail box for your home or if your post office won’t use one, a PO Box and use it. One of the most common methods that identity theft critters use is just to simply follow the mail truck and steal the mail out of the boxes right behind him. In this same line of thinking, if you still use paper checks, have your bank change the delivery option for your checks. I strongly recommend having them delivered to your local bank branch and go pick them up there when they come in. I know it may be inconvenient, but not nearly so much so as trying to recover from some critter writing hot checks in your name.

Shred every piece of paper with your name and address on it that you throw away. Plain and simple. Drive to your local Wally World or office supplies shop and buy yourself a $40 shredder and use it. I even shred my junk mail. No paper leaves my house in pieces larger than ¼” by 1”. If I had an incinerator, I’d burn it all. Trash is another very common place that people have their personal information taken.

Keep the antivirus and anti-spyware software on your computer current and if you don’t have any GET SOME. If you are on cable internet or DSL, your computer is an open window into your life. Protect it. You’ll be glad you did.

I have been hearing a lot about a company named LifeLock. Most of what they offer you can do for yourself, but just to satisfy my curiosity I went to their website. Understand, I am NOT endorsing their service. They had a great analogy for what they do though. Think of it like changing your own oil. It’s not hard and you can save some money, but unless you are diligent, your car won’t get the same level of service that a professional could provide. So, what I AM saying is that if you are like me and tend to let small things slip, a service like this might be a good option.

As to what they do for you that you can do for yourself.

1. Place a fraud alert on your credit report. With this in place any business who receives an application for credit under your name/social security number will have to contact you to verify that you are indeed the one applying for that credit. Fraud alerts must be renewed every 90 days. Some states will allow you to even permanently lock your credit report effectively making it impossible to use it. With a lock in place, you will have to contact the credit bureau to lift the lock. There are costs involved in doing that, but again it is cheaper than recovering from having fraud committed against you. My state will only allow locks after you are a victim. I am helping that to change by contacting my state senator and U.S. Representative. Until then, I will be placing and renewing fraud alerts on my and my family’s credit reports.

2. Opt out of pre-approved credit card offers. You can do this at http://optoutprescreen.com. If you do it on the web it must be renewed every five years. You can opt out permanently by mail. The instructions are on that site.

3. Take advantage of the free annual credit report available to you by each bureau. You can do that at this site https://annualcreditreport.com. Review them and dispute anything that doesn’t belong. Be careful of the services that advertise on television that claim to get it for you for free. Most times they want you to subscribe to a credit monitoring service. If you’ve done step 1 above, then you don’t really need to subscribe. The website above is free. Most credit bureaus will want a small fee to provide you with the actual credit score.

4. Safeguard your personal items like wallets and ATM cards. Don’t leave them laying about and NEVER give your PIN to ANYONE for ANY REASON. I can’t tell you how many times we have had members/customers who have been ripped off by a family member they thought they could trust. If you just have to give your PIN to someone for an emergency, get that card re-pinned as soon as possible. Your bank or credit union will most likely do this for you for free.

5. The biggest thing they provide is insurance if they fail you. You are your own best insurance.

I think the most important thing to remember is just to be diligent. Educate yourself. Don’t fall into the trap of “it won’t happen to me” because it can and will. The only way we will ever put a stop to this crime is to protect ourselves. Law enforcement just doesn’t have the resources to be proactive. They can only help you after you’re a victim, and the help they can give is minimal. Be your own best defense.

Tole

Just Something to Discuss

2008-01-25T19:58:00.000-06:00

Here's something I heard on the radio today that has spawned a great deal of discussion with some my friends and co-workers.

I was listening to El Rushbo today and he interviewed Sly Stallone on the topic of the new Rambo movie.

Over the course of the discussion, Sly says the following, "War is natural, peace is an accident. I mean, we can start a war in 6 minutes but take hundreds of years to achieve peace."

I have often told my friends that Stallone is alot smarter than people give him credit for, but that comment is an amazing insight into human nature.

Tole

What Moves Me

2008-01-18T18:31:00.000-06:00

I am a HUGE fan of music. I try not to limmit myself to a particular genre, but I do tend to focus on one for a while and then move to another. But I can listen to just about anything if it is done well.

The last few days my radio has been on a local country station. I have found quite a few songs lately that have hit a chord in me. I thoughtI'd take the time to share one while it was on my mind.

A lot of people who know me, don't understand me. I guess I am more complex than I like to believe, but a song I heard today seems to sum me up pretty well. Here's a link to the video.

And here are the lyrics...

Sometimes I think that war is necessary.
Every night I pray for peace on Earth.
I hand out my dollars to the homeless.
But believe that every able soul should work.

My father gave me my shotgun that I'll hand down to my son, try to teach him everything it means.

I stand by my right to speak freely. But I worry 'bout what kids learn from TV. And before all of debatin' turns to angry
words and hate, sometimes we should just agree to disagree. And I believe that Jesus looks down here and sees us, and if you
ask him he would say

(chorus)
I'm a man of my convictions. Call me wrong, call me right. But I bring my better angels to every fight. You may not like
where I'm going, but you sure know where I stand. Hate me if you want to, love me if you can.

Hope you enjoy it.

Tole

Debit Card Quirks

2008-01-16T19:10:00.000-06:00

OK, I've been toying with this topic for a while now. Not because it is controversial, or anything like that. Just simply because I didn't know if you'd give a damn. After much deliberation and introspection I've decided, what the hell. If one reader finds it interesting, then that's good enough for me.

I learned of most of this as a result of working at a credit union, but some of my support of my point of view is an left-over of my teenage "put it to the man" attitude.

OK, that's enough set up. Let's get down to brass tacks. When you swipe your debit card you are often given a choice of Credit or Debit. Without fail I always choose Credit and here's why.

The first difference is, who pays for the transaction? Since a debit or PIN transaction works just like an ATM withdrawal the cost of the transaction is passed on to the financial institution. Now granted, if you bank at one of the huge banks, this doesn't really mean spit. BUT if you bank at a credit union, this savings in costs are almost always passed on to its members as higher interest on savings or lower interest on loans. Some financial institutions are even starting to charge for this type of transaction, just like you took the cash out of a foreign ATM.

If you do a credit, or swipe and sign, the merchant pays that fee. I get a little satisfaction knowing that Wally World has to pony up 1-2% of my purchase for the privilege of taking my money. Plus, a portion of that fee goes to your bank/credit union. Once again, since credit union are not-for-profit organizations, they pass the income on to their members in the ways I mentioned before.

Here's the BIGGEST reason though, and this is the one nobody talks too much about. When you do a DEBIT or PIN based transaction, especially at the gas pump, the merchant places any amount they see fit on hold at the beginning of the transaction. That hold can stay in place for 48-72 hours. While that hold in in place those funds are not available to do things like, pay for checks or drafts that come in during that period. Legally, a merchant could freeze your entire account for up to 3 days, even though they got their $$ the instant you finish the transaction.

By the way, if you do shop at Wally World or any other place and when you swipe your debit card it automatically asks for your PIN. You have the option to press Cancel and select Credit for the transaction. Wally World even hides the cancel key to make it hard for you to opt out. When you think about the dollar volume that they do every day you can understand why. 1-2% of a million bucks is 10,000-20,000 dollars in income they have to give up.

Tole

One Big Hell Yeah!!

2008-01-09T18:15:00.000-06:00

I am here today to give respect and a big old Hell Yeah to Jane Hambleton of Des Moines Iowa. It's always nice to see a parent who practices the ancient art of, well, parenting.

The ad reads: "OLDS 1999 Intrigue. Totally uncool parents who obviously don't love teenage son, selling his car. Only driven for three weeks before snoopy mom who needs to get a life found booze under front seat. $3,700/offer. Call meanest mom on the planet."

You can find the entire article here.

Hats off to you Mrs. Hambleton.

Tole

The Rumors of My Death

2008-01-04T19:49:00.000-06:00

have been greatly exaggerated.

I am in point of fact still sucking air, but I am also extremely guilty of neglecting my blog. Long story short, my department at work has been woefully understaffed, and I have been too tired when I get home to put together more than 2 coherent thoughts at a time. Unfortunately, I've needed those to do things like remember to put on pants before I venture outdoors or turn on the water when I am in the shower. Small things such as that.

With year end behind me finally, I can see the light at the end of the tunnel and this time I feel reasonably sure that it is not an on-coming train.

If there are any of my readers left, I have set myself a goal of posting at least 3 times a week. (This one doesn't count.)

Oh...about the tree in the toilet. We had to bust out floor, cut out about 3 feet of cast-iron pipe (the plumber went through 32 saws-all blades to get it) and now we are preparing to gut that bathroom completely and start over. Doesn't that sound like fun?

In truth, I am very excited about it because I enjoy that kind of stuff. Especially the demolition...maybe I missed my true calling. If you'd like to see a photo-journal of the whole process just say so and I'll make it a regular feature on the old blog.

Sorry I was away so long. It won't happen again.

Tole

A Ray of Hope

2007-11-20T19:31:00.000-06:00

Every morning as I get dressed I listed to either Sirius 23, Hair Nation (Long live the Hair Band!!!) or Sirius 19, Buzz saw (harder 70s and 80s rock) on my TV courtesy of my friends at Dish. It sets my mood for the day, get me centered and gets this Old Fart's blood a pumping.

My daughter, 7, my oldest child has been an Ozzy fan since she had the hand coordination to make the rock and roll sign with her fingers. God love her.

My oldest son, 4, has rocked out since he gained enough strength in his neck to head bang of his own volition. Life is good.

But this little ray of joy came to me courtesy of my youngest, 15 mos old. I have noticed that lately he has begun to stand in my bedroom and bounce to the music coming from the TV. I thought, nice, he's gonna have rhythm like his old man. Then, this morning, I realized I have reared one more devotee to the power chord.

I forgot to turn on the TV. It was quiet in my room. Quiet that is until the little sprog found the power button for the TV and turned it on himself and commenced a-bouncin' and laughing.

Ah. Life is good.

Tole

ummmm...dayum

2007-10-31T17:22:00.000-06:00

Is it bad when your plumber looks into your sewer says "DAMN! That ain't right!" and then runs from the house.

I come home to my wife telling me that there is a tree growing out of the floor in my guest bath.

"Yeah right, " sez I.

I venture in to el bano and holy mother of pearl! There's a tree growing out of the floor.

This is NOT going to be cheap.

BAH!!

Tole

And I Bought a House Why?

2007-10-30T17:05:00.000-06:00

***sigh***

For the last couple of months I have been noticing a slowly developing problem with my sewers. We have 2 bathrooms in the house and they were taking turns stopping up. It all came to a head today when they both backed-up at the same time.

I ran a sewer snake down the clean out in the backyard. I ran a toilet auger down both toilets. I reamed out the vents pipes coming through the roof. All to no avail.

Dammit.

Call a plumber.

He does everything I did, just with better tools and pulls some roots out from under the house. I'm going to repeat that; because, it bears repeating. He pulled TREE ROOTS OUT FROM UNDER MY FRELLING HOUSE!!!

crap.

Then we move into the house and he comments that the sinking floor, cracked ceiling and leaking shower in the master bath are all most likely the result of how we got roots into the sewer pipes under the house. The cast-iron sewer main is cracked and leaking water under the house.

I turn to see the ($) ($) look in his eyes, but I am pleasantly surprised that he looks as forlorn about it as I am. Either this guy should be selling stuff for a living, giving his acceptance speech to the Academy, or he really feels my pain.

I'm going to go with the latter. My brother recommended this guy, and my brother brooks no bull from those he uses. If the guy was even the least bit crooked, my brother would have smelled it out and stomped on him hard at some point. I begin to feel better.

Then he comes out with the small ray of sunshine in this whole drama. He's seen this before and home owner's insurance should cover most of the repairs.

**dance a jig of joy***

So tomorrow, I'll give a call to the old insurance shiester...ummm...agent and see where I stand.

Tell me again why I thought giving up renting was a good idea?

Tole

It's Called Satire

2007-10-23T06:35:00.000-05:00

and that's all the explaination I'm goin' to give.

Exsqueeze Me? Baking Powder?

2007-10-22T18:23:00.000-05:00

Late last week J.K. Rowling, who I had held out hope for staying as normal as possible, fell right off the face of the planet. Were sales lagging? Did she freak out about the possibility of losing all the press coverage with the end of the Potter series? She seemed so normal...

WHY?!?!? WHY?!?! WHY!!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

Dumbledore is gay?!?!? WTF?!?!? I bet he liked little boys too and hence his affection for Potter….wait did he touch him in an inappropriate manner?

YE GODS!!!!

Please retract it. Why can’t you just be happy with being the richest psycho on the planet and keep this crap to yourself? Why not just let the series fade into the annals of literary history?

Oh well. I would like to at this point state that I do not actually have a problem with the fact that she wants one of her pivotal characters to be gay. BUT if that was the intention all along, why not deal with it in the books? Why now after the end of it all drag this crap out into the open?

I will most likely continue to read the series (I’m only up to book three), but all copies purchased hence forth will be used so as to not put another nickel in the pocket of a press-whore who just couldn’t let sleeping dogs lie.

Now if you'll excuse me I have to go investigate a rumor that Frodo was Bilbo and Gollum's love child.

**groan

Tole

You Just might be from Podunk.

2007-10-03T18:56:00.000-05:00

Last Christmas one of my co-workers gave me one of those joke-a-day calendars as a gift. This particular one happens to be just chocked full of "You might be a redneck if..." bits of comics genius. (Canst thou smellest te sarcasm?)

Some of them are really funny, others make my head spin in circles and feel like I should be spewing split-pea soup...sorry, sidetracked.

The particular thing that drove home to me exactly where I live went something like this...If you've ever bummed a dip of snuff from your mom, you just might be a redneck.

Now there are several people where I earn my daily bread who most definitely fit the redneck category, and even they found this one to be just plain gross. I share these daily gems with one lady in particular who responded with a story about a woman she works with in a gorcery store who always has a dip in her mouth and a spit cup close at hand. She asked, "Can you even imagine dating someone who did that?"

I thought about this for a minute and responded, "Do you have any idea where I grew up?" I not only dated girls with "snuff rings" on their hip pockets, since I worked in a grocery store in high school, I also supplied their habit with my employee discount.

I of course bought them gum as well.

Tole

and the Wheel of Time Turns

2007-09-17T18:27:00.001-05:00

"The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again. In one Age, called the Third Age by some, an Age yet to come, an Age long past, a wind rose. The wind was not the beginning. There are neither beginnings nor endings to the turning of the Wheel of Time. But it was a beginning."

I am more than a little bummed out. The world of fantasy literature lost one of its best the last Sunday. Robert Jordan lost his battle with cardiac amyloidosis, a build up of protien in the heart muscle that causes the heart to harden and lose the ability to pump blood. While his books frustrated me to no end, it was the kind of frustration that came from the fact that there never seemed to be enough time to read them with the kind of attention I felt they deserved.

It is odd to me that the death of someone I've never met should move me so much. Perhaps it is that I felt some familiarity to him through his writing, and a bit of grief over the story that will never be finished. He was also quite a remarkable individual. So it is with a saddness in my heart and a small lump in my throat that I say good bye.

Tole

Robert Jordan
Oct 17,1947 - Sept 16,2007

Human Weapon

2007-09-04T17:52:00.000-05:00

Over the last few weeks my close little group of cronies and I have begun to gather on Friday nights to watch The History Channel. Yep, you read that right...The History Channel.

Some programming genius found an idea for a show that touches some primal part of my hind brain and I can't stop watching it. It's called Human Weapon and runs at 8 and 9 pm Central on Friday nights.

Basically you have a former UFC fighter and a former pro football player/wrestler who are travelling the world learning a little bit about the hand-to-hand fighting styles native to whatever region they are in. They spend some time training with various teachers and then face a local champion (usually getting their butts handed to them in the process.)

Last week's show featured Krav Maga. Krav Maga isn't as much a self-defense as it is a way to put someone down as fast and as painfully as possible. (Did I just hear Tim Allen grunting? No? hmm...) What made the evening complete was when someone asked Lawdog how some technique to disarm a knife wielding baddie could possibly work. Lawdog, being the helpful and eager to educate others individual that he is offered a quick live demonstration.

Quick...yeah...it happened so fast that our unsuspecting inquisitive mind never saw it coming. He also had a tough time holding his drink in that hand for quite awhile afterwards.

Anyway, if you have an hour to kill on Friday, this one is worth buring a small bit of your life for.

Tole

The Man Code

2007-08-31T06:25:00.000-05:00

A friend of mine forwarded this to me the other day. While it is meant as a joke, I found it kinda of amazing how many of these my friends and I put into pracice without ever having written them down.

Tole

1. Thou shall not rent the movie Chocolate.

2. If you’ve known a guy for more than 24 hours, his sister is off limits forever! Unless you actually marry her.

3. When questioned by a buddy’s wife, girlfriend, mother, father, priest, shrink, dentist, accountant, or dog walker, you need not and should not provide any useful information as to his whereabouts. You are even permitted to deny his very existence.

4. Unless he murdered someone in your immediate family, you must bail a friend out of jail within 24 hours.

5. You may exaggerate any anecdote told in a bar by 50% without recrimination; beyond that, anyone within earshot is allowed to yell out “BULLSHIT!” (Exception: When trying to pick up a girl, the allowable exaggeration is 400%)

6. Under no circumstances may two men share an umbrella.

7. The minimum amount of time you have to wait for another guy is 5 minutes. The maximum is 6 minutes. For a girl, you are required to wait 10 minutes for every point of hotness she scores on the classic 1-10 babe scale.

8. Complaining about the brand of free beverages in a buddy’s refrigerator is forbidden. But you may gripe if the temperature is unsuitable.

9. A friend must be permitted to borrow anything you own - grill, car, firstborn child - within 12 hr notice. Women or anything considered “lucky” are not applicable in this case.

10. Agreeing to distract the skanky friend of a hot babe that your buddy is trying to hook up with is your legal duty. Should you get carried away with your good deed and end up having sex with the beast, your pal is forbidden to ever speak of it.

11. On a road trip, the strongest bladder determines pit stops, not the weakest.

12. Before dating a buddy’s ex you are required to ask his permission and he in return is required to grant it. He is however allowed to say, “man, you’re gonna love the way she licks your balls”.

13. Women who claim they “love to watch sports” must be treated as spies until they demonstrate knowledge of the game and the ability to pick a Buffalo wing clean.

14. If a man’s zipper is down, that’s his problem - You didn’t see nothin’.

15. No man is ever required to buy a birthday present for another man. In fact, even remembering a best friend’s birthday is strictly optional, and slightly gay.

16. You must offer heartfelt condolences over the death of a girlfriend’s cat, even if it was you who secretly set it on fire, and threw it into a ceiling fan.

17. While your girlfriend must bond with your buddy’s girlfriends within 30 minutes of meeting them, you are not required to make nice with her gal pal’s boyfriends - Low level sports bonding is all the law requires.

18. Unless you have a lucrative endorsement contract, never appear in public wearing more than one Nike swoosh.

19. When stumbling upon other guys watching a sporting event, you may always ask the score of the game in progress, but you may never ask who is playing.

20. When your girlfriend/wife expresses a desire to fix her ugly, whiny friend up with your pal, you must grant permission, but only if you have ample time to warn your friend to prepare his excuse about joining the priesthood.

21. Only in a situation of mortal danger or ass peril are you permitted to kick another member of the male species in the testicles.

22. Unless you’re in prison, never fight naked.

23. If your buddy is outnumbered outmanned, or too drunk to defend himself, you must jump into the fight. Exception: If within the past 24 hours his actions have caused you to think “What this guy needs is a good ass whuppin’, then you may sit back and enjoy.

24. A man in the company of a hot, suggestively dressed woman must remain sober enough to fight.

25. When picking players for sports teams it is permissible to skip over your buddy in favour of better athletes - as long as you don’t let him be the last sorry son of a bitch standing on the sideline.

26. If you compliment a guy on his six-pack, you better be referring to his beer.

27. Never join your girlfriend/wife in ragging on a buddy of yours, unless she is withholding sex, pending your response.

28. Phrases that may NOT be uttered to another man while weight lifting:
“Yeah, baby, push it!”
“C’mon, give me one more! Harder!”
“Another set and we can hit the showers”
“Nice ass, are you a Sagittarius?”

29. Never hesitate to reach for the last beer or the last slice of pizza, but not both. That’s just mean.

30. Never talk to another man in the bathroom unless you’re on equal footing: either both urinating or both waiting in line. In all other situations, a nod will do just fine.

31. Never allow a telephone conversation with a woman to go on longer than you are able to have sex with her.

32. You can not rat out a friend who show’s up to work or class with a massive hangover, however you may: hide the aspirin, smear his chair with limburger cheese, turn the brightness on his computer way up so he thinks its broken, or have him paged every seven minutes.

33. If your buddy is trying to hook up with a girl, you may sabotage him only in a manner that gives you no chances of getting any either.

34. Before allowing a drunken friend to cheat on his girl, you must attempt one intervention. If he can get up on his feet, look you in the eye, and deliver a “Fuck off!” then you are absolved from all responsibility. Later on it is ok that you have no idea what his girlfriend is talking about.

35. The morning after you and a babe, who was formerly “just a friend”, go at it, the fact that you’re feeling weird and guilty is no reason not to jump on her again before there is a discussion about what a big mistake it was.

36. When using a urinal in a public restroom, a buffer zone of at least one urinal will exist at all times. If the only empty urinal is directly next to an occupied on, then you are still required to wait.

37. When coming to a room which you know is occupied by your friend and possibly another girl, you must knock and wait for an adequate response. If no response occurs, and the door is locked, a 10 minute period is required before knocking again.

38. If you accidentally touch or brush against any part of another man below the waist, it is an understood accident, and NO apologies or any reference to the occurrence is necessary.

39. Any dispute lasting any longer than 3 minutes must be settled by rock, paper, scissors. There is no argument too important for this determining method.

40. Only acceptable time when a man is allowed to cry:
When a heroic dog dies to save his master.
After being struck in the testicles with anything moving faster than 7 mph.
When your date is using her teeth.
The day Anna Kornikova chooses a husband.

41. If a hot girl shall happen to pass by while you are in an arms reach of your buddy, you must, tap him on the shoulder to make him aware of the babe.

42. A man’s shoes may not intentionally match any other article of clothing on his body.

43. No man shall ever allow anyone to speak ill of The Simpsons or any Rocky movie. (Exception: Rocky V)

44. Any object thrown with reasonable speed and accuracy, MUST be caught.

45. No man shall ever keep track of, or count, the amount of beers he has drunk in a night.

46. It is permissible to consume a fruity chick drink only when you’re sunning on a tropical beach, and it’s delivered by a topless supermodel, and it’s free.

47. Under no circumstances may two non-related men share a bed or anything which could be perceived as a mattress.

48. If you jiggle more than twice, you’re playing with it.

49. A man shall never help another man apply sun tan oil.

50. It is the God given duty of every man to assist any other man that may be in need of assistance in obtaining a threesome with two girls.

He Likes It, He Really Likes It!!

2007-08-30T19:51:00.000-05:00

My middle child (ye gods I hate that term!)...my oldest son (better) started preschool this year. We weren't sure how he was gonna deal, but he seems to be doing great. Turns out, school sponsored pre-k is a lot like kindergarden was for old relics like me.

All of our fears were laid to rest today when the little nard got right cheesed off because he doesn't get to go on Saturday and Sunday. All is right with the world.

Tole

Since When is the WWE Sci-Fi?

2007-08-27T18:42:00.000-05:00

I'm done. I let them set me up again and just like Charlie Brown and that football, I am lying here on my back, looking at the clouds drift by and wondering where it all went wrong. Oh yeah, I screwed up and trusted them.

See, there used to be this little show on on the SciFi Channel called Farscape. I loved it. Then they got Stargate from Showtime and cut it after 4 years ending the series on a frelling season finale cliff-hanger. I cussed and screamed and stomped about my living room longing for a gnome to punt. They suckered me back in and bought a little forgiveness with a mini-series to sort of wrap things up.

So I gave them a second chance, but it took a couple of years.

I am a huge Jim Butcher fan. Well, I should say a Harry Dresden fan because I haven't read Butcher's second series yet. I highly recommend them. Any of the books stand alone, but they are best read in order.

The Dresden Files

Imagine my shock when I hear rumblings that they are going to translate them into a TV series. I was, to put it mildly, giddy. I think I might have even shuddered once or twice.

As with all book-tv or book-movie adaptations some changes had to be made, but the integrity of the series stuck around. It had good writing, good special effects, and even bore more than a passing resemblance to the stories I loved...for one season.

I see Lucy taunting me with that football and even though I know I'm gonna end up flat on my ass, I charge in anyway. I watch the whole first season...which I think was only 11 episodes or so.

At the end of season one, there ensues the controversy about whether it will be back. Two months of hemming and hawing and now the answer.

When I see that they can't afford it in a cost vs. ratings analysis and then I see that they've added WWE to the line up, I find my self once again looking for a puntable gnome.

So, with the exception of the occasional crappy horror/ "B" scifi flick, I am done with the SciFi Network. Not that they'll ever notice or even care, but at least I get to speak my peace.

Thanks for listening.

Tole

Rate My Life

2007-08-16T21:16:00.000-05:00

Thanks Lawdog...I feel better about myself now.

This Is My Life, Rated
Life:	7.2
Mind:	7.5
Body:	5.7
Spirit:	6
Friends/Family:	7.1
Love:	9.1
Finance:	6.1
Take the Rate My Life Quiz

I Ain't Skeered

2007-08-13T21:09:00.000-05:00

A few weeks ago a recently punctured friend of mine brought by a couple of fishing poles for my 2 oldest kidlings.

Their Papaw had been wanting to take them fishing all summer, so this last weekend we took them down to the local fishing barge and let them wet their hooks.

We spent 4 great hours getting hooks caught in the brush, having sneaky little fishys swiping our bait, and we even reeled a few in. I think the final count put me and my dad's total equal to each of my kids alone. Apparently fish do have a soft spot for the young 'uns.

My son, who is 4 by the by, decided that he was going to handle his own fish. He took hold of the little slimy things and handled the throw back of any that were too small to keep. Promptly wiping his slimy hand on his shorts.

My little delicate flower of a daughter was not so eager. Fish detail was relegated to dad and me. I don't think either of us minded a bit.

By the end of the day the boy was even skilled at reaching into the minnow bucket and grabbing his own bait. However, he decided it was best for me or Dad to put them on the hooks, and after seeing the picture of his Unca' Lawdog I don't think he'll be playing in the tacklebox any time soon.

Dude...that was one coordinated maneuver.

My mommy sez I can't go fishin' with you at 4 am though. She wants you awake enough not to hook me in the honker.

Tole

Isn't This Obstruction of Justice?

2007-08-09T21:44:00.000-05:00

I may be a simple country boy. I might not be a law scholar, but it would seem to me that if I call ahead of our local LEOs to warn someone that they are coming, I get to go sit in the old vertical bar hotel right along with 'em.

I heard this mentioned on the radio today and had to go read it myself to believe it. I would suggest a liberal wrapping of duct tape around your head before you read it too. That way when your head explodes you can find all the pieces.

Here's the lead in.

SANTA ANA – Responding to a refusal by city leaders to declare the city a sanctuary for illegal immigrants, more than a dozen people gathered outside City Hall on Monday night to denounce recent immigration raids, accusing federal officials of "terrorizing" immigrant communities and breaking up families.

A coalition of local immigrant rights groups, including the Orange County Alliance for Immigrants Rights and the Front Against the Raids, announced a planned program to create a hot line that will notify people where and when immigration raids will take place. The program would also coordinate a support system for the families of deportee targets.

"We want to have a more organized effort to counter these attacks," said Jaime Conteras, a 20-year-old Filipino immigrant who now lives in Santa Ana. "We cannot let people trample on our rights."

Read the whole story here.

I have to go lie down.

Tole

My Heart Swells

2007-08-01T18:36:00.000-05:00

I knew early on that the volatile mixture of my wife's DNA with mine was going to give us an interesting life together...I could never have guessed it would be like this.

I can remember an instance when my daughter was 2, that made me laugh until I damned near peed myself. I was in the backyard putting a mean case of char on a hapless chicken when my wife sticks her head out the back door and summons our little angel for a fresh coating of anti-skeeter spritz.

The little darling stops mid-stride. Hoists a matched set of rock-n-roll hands into the air and announces, "Here I come and hell's coming with me!!"

That hurts. She's been a fan of Ozzy since she had the dexterity to make a rock-n-roll hand sign and bang her head in her car seat. Isn't that special?

My oldest son, well, you can see what kind of a challenge he is going to be. His personal mantra seems to be, "If I can't knock it down with a head-butt I will respect it. If I can knock it down, i will eat it." OY! But when he isn't knocking stuff over, he can jump around with the music with the best of them.

My most recent moment of pride though was this morning and it came from my baby boy. Kid #3. I had the old Sirius radio fired up and was belting out a slightly off key rendition of Stroke by Billy Squire. I turn around to see the baby throwing his hands in the air and bouncing in time to the music.

For someone who gave up a music career to live in the real world, (how the hell did I become an accountant?) it give me a small measure of comfort to see my kids enjoying music too.

Tole

Inspiration

2007-07-31T18:04:00.001-05:00

I just can’t take it anymore. I want so much to write about things that are important to me, but I find more and more that people who specialize in those areas are covering the things I want to discuss better. I, therefore, will defer discussions on politics and government to those with the expertise. I defer to Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity and the like.

Ok, now you know that I am relatively conservative.

I support the war in Iraq. I am in favor of smaller government and I throw up a little every time I think about the possibility of Hillary Clinton in the White House. I don’t own a gun, but I will stand by your side and fight for your right to do so. I should say that the primary reason I don’t own a gun is because I can’t afford one, not because I don’t want to. I DO however own several rather nasty pieces of cutlery not intended for kitchen use.

Now that I have that all off of my chest, I hope that this terminal case of block will clear up and I will be able to put something really worth reading on this place for you all to enjoy.

I think that for the near future I am going to look to my children for inspiration. They just about make me laugh myself to death every day. I should share some of that. They also scare the hell out of me, and I have a feeling I am not the only parent in the world to feel this particular sensation.

My oldest son, for instance, has shown his father’s ability to act without thinking his actions through as well as he could have. I should preface this little tale by saying that the boy is growing faster than his coordination can adapt to. He tends to fall quite a lot. My wife calls it being gawky. That works for me.

This particular day he had fallen over and collided with things for most of the day giving himself a couple of really impressive goose-eggs on his boney little head. Me being older and more fragile would have taken that as a sign that perhaps I should park my considerable butt on the couch so as not to risk serious or permanent injury. I am not however 4 years old and immortal. He is.

Lawdog was over for a visit and I enlisted his help in unloading some stuff from the trunk of the car. We head outside and I hear this earth shaking WHUMP from behind LD and me issues forth with an, “Oh dayum.” That’s when the crying fires up from just inside the front door.

My boy had tried to time his exit from the house to be able to push the GLASS storm door open with his head…he missed…at a dead run. Once we got him calmed down, I took a few minutes to explain that trying to open a glass door with one’s head is a recipe for unpleasantness.

I like to think that he took that wisdom and applied it, but let’s be honest. He’s four. I do take some comfort in the knowledge that he already knows he can’t fly, but that, my friends is another story.

Tole

Thought you should know

2007-07-13T09:58:00.000-05:00

I heard this story on Glenn Beck and thought it was worth sharing. Somehow this story didn't make any of the national new sources. If the roles were reversed I guaran-damn-ty you it would run on every national show for at least a month and we would get in-depth analysis from every psycho-babbling monkey that can grab 5 minutes of airtime.

Mainstream news media makes me wanna yark.

A story on Yahoo can be found here.

Let's keep this young man who was willing to put his life on the line defending our country, but was shot by a nutjob with an agenda at home, in our thoughts and if you do so prayers.

Tole

W.S.S.R. Revisited

2007-06-28T18:31:00.001-05:00

It has come to my attention that the plight of our civic minded gas station owner that was discussed here, has once again made the news.

MADISON, Wis. — A Wisconsin gas station owner who claims state regulators forced him to stop giving discounts on fuel to senior citizens filed a lawsuit Tuesday, saying a law requiring retailers to sell gas above cost is unconstitutional.

Raj Bhandari argues in the lawsuit that Wisconsin's minimum markup law violates the equal protection clause of the state constitution because retailers who sell gasoline — and few other products — are barred from selling any item below cost.

Bhandari, who owns Center City BP in Merrill, Wis., about 150 miles north of Madison, made headlines earlier this year after he stopped offering discounts of 2 cents per gallon to senior citizens and 3 cents per gallon for donors to a youth hockey league.

He did so after being warned by state regulators that such programs may violate the minimum markup law, formally known as the Unfair Sales Act.

The full text of the article is here.

The law firm representing him is doing it pro bono, (holy cow and bully for them). I sincerely hope he wins. From what I have read and heard in various interviews, this law was passed in the 1930s in an attempt to keep Standard Oil on top of the heap. I think it has outlived its usefulness.

I have found a new quote from Thomas Jefferson that I throw out as much as possible and I think I will include it here.

A government that is large enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take away everything you have.

Tole

Something I Love to Share

2007-06-19T20:46:00.000-05:00

Mostly because it always gets me in trouble. You see, I'm a nerd. Have been all my life. Even when I played sports (and I wasn't half bad either) I was still a nerd because I was one of those kids who could be athletic and still carry A's. Problem with that is, the rest of the athletes were threatened by that so didn't like me. The rest of the brainiacs were threatened by the playing of sports and didn't really care for me either.

Luckily there came an epiphany. A light shone down on me (actually it was from the concussion I got in practice) and I realized it was better to be able bodied and smart than brain damaged and beat up all the time.

OK, I've rambled about that long enough. It was meant to give you all some insight as to why I find the attached funny. Math jokes crack me up.

I do have to give credit for this to the forums of my guild in Everquest. It shows up alot in there.

Tole

Good News From the Doctor

2007-06-18T17:50:00.000-05:00

Well, I have spent too much time and money ( I even got to hold my breath for one of those new fangled CAT Scan machines) to find out that the root of all my problems is that I am a fat tub of goo.

DUH!

I could have told him that with just one cursory glance in a mirror. **grin**

Truth be told I am suffering from 2 completely unrelated problems that added together make me feel cruddy some days.

The first is that I have a fatty liver. No big deal yet, but left unattended it could cause cirrhosis later in life.

Cure? Lose weight you tub of goo.

The second is called Gilbert's Disease, which I find ironic in that my grandmother's maiden name was Gilbert. This condition is benign and the worst that can really happen is I turn orange from time to time. What it does is cause my liver (see a pattern here?) to not process bilirubin like it should. Again, no big deal.

Cure? None. It's genetic and you just have to live with it.

So, now that I know I am not going to be making my journey towards room temperature any time soon I am going to do my dead level best to get more time in on this little bit of blather. Sorry I bowed out for so long.

Tole

MSRs Don't Get Paid Enough...

2007-06-04T17:54:00.001-05:00

Ok, this is a blatant rip-off from LawDog, but if you can't rip-off your friends, what good are they?

I have been trying for some time to figure out if anything I come across at work bears any value at all in sharing it with those of you who put up with my blather. Suddenly it dawns on me that there are plenty of folks who just don't get how it all really works, so the answer to my musings was a resounding YES!

Now, as it turns out, financial institutions have our own version of LawDog's poor downtrodden dispatchers. We call them MSRs, or Member Service Representatives. They get to deal with John Q. Public on a daily basis and some of the things they encounter will make blood run out of your eyes. I'll take it easy on you with the first story, because I fear that I could vapor lock your mind. I won't be responsible for causing that kind of damage...I won't. So I will ease you all in slowly...if that is possible.

John Q. Member says, "You all took my money and I want it back!"

(You'd be amazed how many of our encounters start just this way.)

"I'm sorry. We did what now?"

"You all took my money and I want it back. If you don't give it back, I'm gonna call the cops."

"Ok. First let's talk about what happened and see if we can figure out how to best handle your problem."

"I'll tell you what happened. You all took $1,500.00 out of my account at an ATM and you're gonna put it back."

"Ok, Sir. Someone took $1,500 out of your account at an ATM? Do you have your ATM card?"

"Damned straight! Never let it out of my sight, so you all must have stolen it and I want it back."

"Ok, I see on your account that you have 2 ATM cards. Is that right?"

"Yeah, my son has one."

"And I see by your account history that it was withdrawn in $500 chunks over 3 days at an ATM in Germany. Do you know anyone in Germany?"

At this point, our friends facial expression changes from one of indignant disbelief to one of "Oh really?"

"Why yes, my son is stationed in...Thank you very much for your time."

You'd probably also be amazed how many people don't realize that an ATM with drawl requires the use of an ATM card AND a PIN. Barring forgery, almost all of these situations end in the member realizing that they got taken by a family member, boy/girl friend or roommate.

I swear I keep a roll of grey duct tape in my desk to wrap around my head to keep it from exploding during one of these little conversations. Especially when I hear this...

"Well yeah I told 'em my PIN, but they were only supposed to use it that one time."

"Another little bit of info for your personal growth sir. If you give them your PIN, you have by default given them authorization to take as much as they want, unless you re-PIN after that time."

Short of the long, it is your money. It is your responsibility to safeguard it. We do all we can to keep criminals out of your stuff, but you have to help us.

Tole

Absence

2007-06-01T06:34:00.000-05:00

Let me start this with an apology. I realize that my posting has dropped to almost nil in the last month. I am going through some helath issues that make me hurt quite a bit and it takes the desire to write right out of me. My doctor and I are working on nailing down exactly what is going on. It all seems to revolve around my liver. Add all of that to the fact that I tend to get depressed easily and BANG..I withdraw. I will do my best to get more out here. But please bear with me if I take awhile to put thoughts to digital paper.

Tole

So Much to Read...

2007-05-15T17:30:00.000-05:00

so little time.

I have begun to build a list of daily reads. It started simple, just Lawdog, but I find that there is more and more for me to see. Here's the list:

http://ambulancedriverfiles.blogspot.com/

http://booksbikesboomsticks.blogspot.com/

http://boobsinjuriesanddrpepper.blogspot.com/

http://hollys-hystrionics.blogspot.com/

I'm enjoying them all and hope to add a few more to the list. My only problem is that I tend to read kind of slowly, so I may run out of time in my day...or I might have to give up sleep. I can always sleep when I'm dead.

Tole

W.S.S.R.

2007-05-14T19:00:00.000-05:00

MERRILL, Wis. (AP)- A service station that offered discounted gas to senior
citizens and people supporting youth sports has been ordered by the state to
raise its prices.

Center City BP owner Raj Bhandari has been offering
senior citizens a 2 cent per gallon price break and discount cards that let
sports boosters pay 3 cents less per gallon.

But the state Department of
Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection says those deals violate Wisconsin's
Unfair Sales Act, which requires stations to sell gas for about 9.2 percent more
than the wholesale price.

Bhandari said he received a letter from the
state auditor last month saying the state would sue him if he did not raise his
prices. The state could penalize him for each discounted gallon he sold, with
the fine determined by a judge.

Bhandari, who bought the station a year
ago, said he worries customers will think he stopped the discounts because he
wants to make more money. About 10 percent of his customers had used the
discount cards.

Dale Van Camp said he bought a $50 card to support the
local youth hockey program. It would have saved him about $100 per year on gas,
he said.

http://www.wboc.com/Global/story.asp?S=6490175&nav=MXE0

I first saw this story on the net a few days ago and it has been bouncing around in my head for close to a week. I thin today the blood started to trickle out of my ears from the hemorrhage that the sheer “DO WHAT?!?!” has caused me to suffer. The last time I checked this was still a free market economy and retailers (unregulated ones of course) we free to charge whatever the hell their conscience will allow.

I am quoting here from the National Federation of Independent Business’s website:

According to Wisconsin's Unfair Sales Act (also known as the minimum mark-up
law) it is illegal (with certain exceptions) to sell products at retail at less
than cost with the intent or effect of diverting trade from a competitor. Cost
(other than motor vehicle fuel) is determined as the lesser of the invoice cost
or replacement cost of the merchandise. Minimum mark-up requirements do not
apply to merchandise sold in clearance sales, damaged goods and merchandise at
risk of spoiling. The minimum mark-up requirements also do not apply if the
merchandise is priced in good faith to meet the existing price of a competitor.

Correct me if I am wrong, but isn’t the whole idea of running a business to divert business away from a competitor? And if I, as a business owner am willing to take a hickey on an item to get you in the door, who the hell is the government to tell me I can’t? This sounds an awful lot like the way an economy of a certain former Soviet Republic was running right before it collapsed in on itself.

The website goes on to say that the law was designed to keep small town America from losing local businesses to the “mega” retailers. But here’s the thing on that topic, those “mega stores” were once a local businesses that made their business model work. Why should they be punished for their success? If your town is truly upset about losing local businesses to the “mega stores” the answer is simple…don’t give them you patronage. That’s how a free economy works. Take your business to the local retailer. I do, whenever I can, but it is hard to pay 10-20% more at the local place over Wally World. I do not think that it is the state or federal government’s place or responsibility to make sure my business succeeds. That is my job.

Anything else is socialism at best and communism at worst.

Tole

And Now for Something...

2007-05-06T08:26:00.000-05:00

Completely Different.

I am an avid watcher of Food Network, and my physique has unfortunately suffered the consequences. I would like to point out that I am in shape...round is a shape. I am also very adventurous when it comes to food.

A few weeks ago I saw an episode of one of my favorite shows, Good Eats, that dealt with cornmeal. Growing up in Texas I have seen this stuff put to good use, and I have, unfortunately also seen many culinary tragedies come from it. Undaunted though, I keep on trying. Last night was one such foray into the unkown. I am happy to report that this one was a win.

Pineapple Upside-Down Cornmeal Cake
Recipe courtesy Alton Brown, 2004

3/4 cup whole milk
1 cup coarse ground cornmeal
4 ounces unsalted butter
8 ounces dark brown sugar, approximately 1 cup
6 slices canned pineapple in heavy syrup
6 maraschino cherries
1/3 cup chopped pecans, toasted
3 tablespoons juice from canned pineapple
3 whole eggs
4 3/4 ounces all-purpose flour, approximately 1 cup
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
5 3/4 ounces sugar, approximately 3/4 cup
1/2 cup canola oil

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a microwave-proof dish, bring the milk to a boil. Remove the milk from the microwave and add the cornmeal. Stir and let soak at room temperature for 30 minutes. Set aside.

Melt the butter in a 10-inch cast iron skillet over medium heat. Once the butter has melted, add the brown sugar and stir until the sugar dissolves, about 5 minutes. Remove the skillet from the heat and carefully place 1 slice of pineapple in the center of the pan. Place the other 5 slices around the center slice in a circle. Place the cherries in the centers of the pineapple slices and sprinkle the nuts evenly over the fruit. Drizzle pineapple juice over top.

Sift the flour, baking powder, and salt into a medium mixing bowl and whisk to combine. In a separate mixing bowl, whisk the eggs. Add the sugar to the eggs and whisk to combine. Add the canola oil and whisk. Add the cornmeal and milk mixture to the egg mixture and whisk to combine. Add this to the flour and stir just until combined.

Pour the batter over the fruit in the skillet and bake for 40 to 45 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool for 30 minutes in the skillet. Set a platter on top of the skillet and carefully invert the cake. Serve.

Recipe SummaryDifficulty:
Easy Prep Time: 30 minutes
Inactive Prep Time: 30 minutes
Cook Time: 50 minutes
Yield: 1 (10-inch) cake
Episode#: EA1H08

The ER...Late Night Edition

2007-04-30T00:24:00.000-05:00

So it was a usual night. Kiddos drifted off to la la land in my room watching my TV while Lawdog, yours truly and one more were sitting in the main hall shooting the breeze. The wife comes in and asks me to put the little tricycle motors in their own beds and I jump right up to oblige her.

Here's where things go south...quick.

Put the boy in his bed without a hitch.

Pick up my daughter and she starts to cry telling me that her ear hurts...did I mention that it's nigh on 10pm? No? It was. I carry her on to her bed and send in Dr. Mom to assess the situation and get sent to Wally World for children's Tylen-something.

By the time I get back, my daughter is in tears and not showing any signs of letting up, so I do what any self-respecting man would. I grab my 15" Mag-Lite and look in her ear...ye gods. There was something the size of a pea in her ear.

Breathe Tole...It's not moving, Tole...Everything is gonna be ok, Tole.

See I have this overwhelming need to protect my kiddos, especially my little girl. I want to put mass quantities of hurt on anything that comes within miles of causing her any grief, but I'm at a loss here. So, I once again do what any red-blooded American man would do in this situation...

I call my mommy.

She calms me down and tells me she will go with us to the ER...by the by we're closing in on 11pm now. On the way to the hospital, I damned near killed myself when my little girl, with all the calmness of someone 8 times her age says to me, "Daddy, I can feel whatever is in my ear moving and going pop pop pop."

Oh bloody hell, she's got a bug in her ear. Eww Eww Eww!!!

Just to finish this, because I am still juiced on adrenaline. After being examined by first an EMT, then an RN and finally an NP, we determine that the temporary tube that the Ear, Nose and Throat doc put in almost a year ago is making its exit. No big deal.

My daughter's reaction? "COOL? Will I get to see it when it comes out?"

Youth.

Tole

Scary Stuff

2007-04-25T18:06:00.001-05:00

I am going out to the local University to get the ball rolling on an MBA. It is a daunting thought. I am about to put myself through three years of hard work and hope it pays off in the end. I’ll be 40 by then…yuck. Wish I had started sooner, but hey if wishes were horses, we’d all be eating steak.

I guess the biggest thing I will have to relearn is how to be a student again. It’s been over a decade since I received my BBA, and to be honest I wasn’t all that great of a student then. Of course I was young, dumb and full of…well you know how that old saying goes. I really wasn’t driven and had no reason to be. Now I do. I have 3 of them and they all depend their mother and me to give them what they need. IMHO, they need her at home with them and the only way that happens is if I am able to provide the income we need to see to it.

The next biggest obstacle will be from the kiddos themselves. They love to play and so do I. Not only that but they make enough noise for 12 kids their size. Studying will be an interesting prospect. I guess I will have to build that addition on the house so I can have a Fortress of Solitude.

So it is once more into the breach friends to do or die in the attempt. I begin classes in September and tremble a little at the thought.

No More

2007-04-22T09:32:00.000-05:00

After the terible ocurrence at Virginia Tech, I have been bombarded by the media with all the regular hoopla and fanfare. I'm sick of it.

Let the healing begin. Let the families of the victims and, yes, even the shooter start to move on. It's time to let this kid's name fade into the past without so much as a footnote in history.

The thing that scares me the most is that with our competative nature in America, there are already those thinking, "I can top 33 easy."

We need to quit glorifying and raising these evil acts up and to steal a phrase, "banish the name of the evildoers from our society." If we quit making the villians into heroes, some, mind you not all, of their incentive to gain notariety goes away.

Tole

Wally Wallington and Stonehenge "Reloaded"

2007-04-22T09:29:00.000-05:00

I was sitting at my little pc checking my email when I get this link emailed to me from my Da'. When I read the accompanying blog link, my initial reaction was yeah right, but I watched the YouTube video anyway.

Bugger me, but I think this old boy might be on to something. Judge for yourselves and let me know what ya think. Personally, I think I may be building my own very soon.

Tole

Big Trouble

2007-04-12T19:18:00.000-05:00

Lawdog came by the other night and it didn't take long for us to decide it was movie time. I would like to point to item #3 in this post here that speaks to the quality of movie I enjoy. That being said I continue...

A couple of weeks ago I scored a major win at the $5.50 bin at Wally World. Big Trouble in Little China is up there on my list of all time favorites. Hell, all of the Kurt Russel/John Carpenter movies are great...The Thing, Escape from New York (and or LA), so on and so forth. Luckily Lawdog shares a similar affection for these films so we pulled out BTiLC and popped it in.

Here's where things got sideways.

We've both seen this flick 147,748 times so we thought, "Let's check out the Special Features first." Lo and behold the only choices were Language and Commentary On/Off. Having never watched a movie with the commentary on we decided to give it a shot, and we were well rewarded.

What we got for our intrepidity was a running dialogue between John Carpenter and Kurt Russel as they drank and reminisced about the film and their lives in general. At one point the discussion got so far off track that they even commented, "Oh, hey I guess we should talk about the movie since that is why you all turned this feature on."

I think that the "Escape" films are next in queue. Should be interesting.

Tole

Patton By God

2007-04-07T19:40:00.000-05:00

Got this in an email from my dad today. Now while I would never endorse the blanket bombing of the middle east **looks around and whistles innocently** I do find this as funny as hell. Kinda makes ya wonder how the War on Terror would be conducted by some of the old school military greats from our history. Lightbulbs and liquor bottles, heh heh.

To Joss

2007-04-06T17:44:00.000-05:00

I miss Firefly.

That's it.

Upgrade Schmupgrade

2007-03-23T17:46:00.000-06:00

One of the duties that I have carefully wormed my way into, as I have said before is as a backup to our sole IT person at the credit union (poor bastard.) We have recently gone through a couple of conversions and some training on how to more effectively make the REALLY expensive processing software we use work.

However, as with any change there is resistance. The "I've always done it this way. Why should I change?" mentality is really difficult to overcome. Even in the face of how much easier the job will become, once someone becomes entrenched in a way of doing something, the new way is scary and frustrating.

That having been said, there is a certain joyous satisfaction in that moment that light dawns on marble head and you see the realization on their face that we are not trying to ruin their lives.

Then you see something like this and it makes all the frustration of convincing them seem somehow funny. It helps to keep the IT folks from coming to work with some sort of incendiary device or W.M.D.

Enjoy..

This is NOT Why I Had Kids

2007-03-21T06:06:00.000-06:00

I remember the day I saw my first child on a sonogram. I remember the joy in seeing that the baby was a little girl, the first in 2 generations on my father's side of the family. I remember holding that little bundle in the delivery room. The same can be said for both of my son's. The light they have shined on me cannot have a value placed on it nor could it ever be replaced.

That being said, I can't wait for the little buggers to get past childhood illnesses!

It seems, no not seems, it comes to pass that everytime any of them have a sniffle or the trots, it finds its way into my system as well. I hate being sick. It makes me feel like a weak old fart. That being said, I am sitting here debating whether I should drag my less than healthy butt into the office or spend another day on the couch. Yuck. I find that neither option really sounds like any fun.

On the one hand, I could go to work and sequester myself in my office and sit at my desk and stare at the walls until it's time to come home not really doing anything.

On the other, I could stay home and drive my wife crazy, risk the threat of physical violence and wait for the inevitable, "Why didn't you go to work" from her.

*sigh

It's a no win scenario...my own personal Kobiashi Maru. (for my Trekkie friends) Oh well, life is full of hard choices.

I Can Fix Social Security

2007-03-08T18:37:00.000-06:00

Here it is and the solution is fun for everyone...get busy with the one you love and make some damned babies. When social security was founded there was something like 20 people paying in for every 1 taking out. Now it's 8 to 1 and by the time I retire that number will have inverted.

Why is this happening? Simple, the birth rate in the good old U.S. of A. is currently 1.6 children per couple. If we aren't even replacing ourselves we are faced with a declining population and the direct result of that will be less people paying into government programs and therefore fewer programs can be funded. In many countries in Europe it is closer to 1.1 per couple. We are literally breeding ourselves out of existence.

One other interesting stat I'd like to throw in there for your consideration is that the birth rate in the "terrorist prone" countries is in the neighborhood of 7-9 children per couple. President Tom in Iran and Colonel (I think his rank is still Col.) Qaddafi (Sp?) have both said that the Al Queda approach to bringing the world to Islam is outmoded. They simply have to keep having children and soon they will be welcomed to countries to take the place of the children that the populations there aren't having. Then they can re annex all of the land that they lost to the Christians back in the past not to mention even more area just by over-running them with their children.

Scary huh? While I have been saying that babies are the cure for SS for a long time. I think I started when I heard Australia's govt slogan for the tax incentives they were giving families for having 3 kids 'One for you, one for your spouse and one for your country' due to their declining population and low birthrate. The info on the Middle East came to me from a video on www.foxnews.com. If you'd like to see it just search for "save America" and click the link for videos, or you can check the book by his guest, Mark Steyn called America Alone.

Most who know me will say that this stand for more kids kinda flies in the face of one of my other philosophies, specifically that a lot of people shouldn't be allowed to have kids, just to stop the genes from spreading. I suppose in a way it does, but we can deal with screwed up kids after we are stable and funded. Besides, it'll give LD job security.

Tole

Comments are Life

2007-03-06T17:50:00.000-06:00

OK, I don't want to sound like Needy Ned, but feedback drives my creativity. That being said, if something I say interests you, tickles you or just plain pisses you off, let me know. I feed on discussion. It's like sweet, sweet nectar.

Ok, done begging.

Tole

MFA, What Is It And What Does It Mean To Me?

2007-03-06T17:38:00.000-06:00

MFA or Multi-Factor Authentication is a new layer of security being added to online banking by financial institutions. The federal government has determined that simple user id and password verification is too easily spoofed by a cyber-critter and has there fore required F.I. to add another layer.

There is a pretty good article on Wikipedia on this topic that you can read here.

As I type this I can hear protests about how inconvenient it will be to have to go through another step to get to your information. My feeling is this, it’s a lot more inconvenient to have to go through a fraud and lose all my money to some cyber-critter with too much time on his hands and who, in all likelihood, will never get caught. It is the same approach I have about the increased airport security. If my being troubled just a bit keeps my plane from being the one they talk about on the news, more power to ‘em.

MFA relies on a few things and the levels that your own FI will go to is largely up to them. Our credit union chose to go with a two-factor verification, and it goes a little something like this. You log into your account as usual. But one time and one time only, you have to choose a picture from a group of pictures that the FI has provided. Second you have to set up one or several (again, wholly up to your FI) challenge questions to which only you know the answer.

The idea behind this procedure is that when you log in using your id and password, it gives you access to the next layer of security. Then you will see the picture that you have chosen. Since only 2 people in the world know what you have chosen, you can be reasonably sure that you are on your FI’s servers. You must also answer your challenge questions. This lets the FI know that you are you; because, you are, theoretically the only one who knows those answers.

That’s it. You’re in and everything should act as normal from there.

Like I said earlier, this is how my credit union has chosen to do this. There are a lot of other possibilities out there. Some FI will allow you to download a certificate to your pc that will let you into your account taking the place of the challenge questions. This is great, as long as the certificate doesn’t get compromised, and it makes your pc the ONLY one you can do online banking from.

With the advent of the biometrics for pcs, like using your fingerprint to log into Windows or to unlock the pc from screensaver, you may one day see the ability to scan your fingerprint from your pc to access your account.

Ok, that’s two pretty dry write-ups in a row. Story from growing up with LD next time, I promise.

Tole

Gone Phishing

2007-03-05T18:29:00.000-06:00

There are very few times when stories from what I do for a living are worth telling. Accountants have, by nature, very boring jobs. Put an accountant into a financial institution and stand back and let the naps ensue. However, I have wormed my way onto the e-Commerce committee at my FI and get to help fight the cyber-critters and the Nigerian scammers on a regular basis.

We do everything we can to educate our members (ok, now you know I work at a credit union) and I thought, why not share some of what I know with anyone willing to take the time to put their eyes on my humble little blather.

I recevied an email in my home email the other day that kicked off this little diatribe and it serves as a really good example of a phishing scam. It also gives some really good examples of things to look for in these type of things. I'm going to copy the text directly into my post here and then I'll tell you what tipped me off. I guess I'm lucky that part of my job is to bust up this stuff, because except for a few small things this isn't a bad attempt.

Your Online Banking is Blocked
Because of unusual number of invalid login attempts on you account, we had to believe that, their might be some security problem on you account. So we have decided to put an extra verification process to ensure your identity and your account security. Please click on sign in to online Banking to continue to the verification process and ensure your account security. It is all about your security. Thank you.and visit the customer service section.
Bank of America, N.A. Member FDIC. Equal Housing Lender © 2007 Bank of America Corporation. All rights reserved

There were lots and lots of official looking logos and all kinds of BofA propganda attached as well. The first thing that caught my eye was the fact that I do not have an account with B of A. Pretty much a dead give-away. But let's suspend that trivial factor and move on to the body of this piece of linguistic mastery. Two major grammatical errors in the first sentence and the fact that the "click here" link (removed for safety reasons) leads to the web address below:

http://www.phatmass.com/gallery/albums/login_verify2&.src=ym/bankofamerica/bankofamerica/bankofamerica/onlineid.signin

Now what this link will lead you to is a site that in all probability looks JUST like the B of A sign in screen. So you sign in and bang right into online banking. What you didn't see happen was the hand off from the phisher's site to B of A where he, nice guy that he is, signed you in, leaving you none the wiser. BUT he now has a record of your user ID and password and as soon as you sign out, he signs in and sends himself a nice little gift. You go back to balance your check book and WTF?!?! you have no money. Neat huh?

This is just one way that they get you. And they have hundreds more. The best advice I can, and do give is:

1. always be suspicious, take every thing you get in an email as fiction unless YOU initiated the contact,
2. if you are concerned go to the website yourself, NEVER use the link provided in the email,
3. when in doubt call or go by your bank or credit union. They'd rather help you prevent this than have to help you recover from it.
4. use your brain. Most of these critters are banking on us being lemmings, and all to often they are, unfortuantely, right.

Hope this was worth the read and if it helps anyone avoid getting taken, then it was worth the write.

Tole

The best brownies EVER

2007-03-01T22:53:00.000-06:00

OK, there's no recipe for this. It's just a technique and wow is it good. It goes something like this:

1. Get a brownie mix or make your grandma's brownie recipe or whatever turns your crank.

2. Get your self a box of Andes mints. You know, the ones they give you at Olive Garden. You can get boxes of them at Wally World and other fine retailers.

3. Put half of the brownie mix in the pan you are going to bake them in.

4. Put a layer of the mints on top, and

5. Finish it off by putting the rest of the brownie mix on top of that.

6. Bake it per the recipe, let 'em cool a bit, grab a glass of cold milk and bliss out.

(You can substitute any melty candy you like that goes with chocolate for the mints. Peanut butter chips also work REALLY well.)

Enjoy.

Tole

Musical Memories

2007-02-23T19:20:00.000-06:00

I have spent a good amount of my time converting my CD collection into mp3s. I don’t share them. I don’t upload them and I don’t download them from any of the various sites out there. I just got tired of swapping cds out whilst surfing, gaming, or whatever. As I type this I have gone through about 1/3 of my collection and have taken up about 10 gig of my hard drive and stored about 3300 tracks. Wow that’s a lot of music. Some of it is really good, some of it is crap, but all of it is from my life and it all has meaning to me.

As I listen I remember things that I was doing when I heard them for the first time, or when I was doing something that I really enjoyed (wink wink nudge nudge) while they played. Music is great that way.

I generally just put the old player on shuffle and drift off in thought. But what I love the most is when you stumble across some obscure artist from years gone by that had slipped to the back of your mind and comes rushing forward when one of their songs comes up in queue. Had that happen to me just the other day and it caused me to stop the player and narrow my play list to just his albums. This musician’s name is Joshua Kadison. He’s a piano player and storyteller. Not really too mainstream and really relaxing music. I sat there for almost 6 hours just soaking it up. I almost could see the time fall away and carry me back to my youth.

I should say at this point that I am a non-practicing musician. I spent a long time plying my art, but it never came to much and I find that life has taken away the time needed to be any good.

/Sigh.

Oh well, I guess it was this time in the company of artists that I developed an appreciation of musicians who play for music’s sake and not to make a buck. They are few and far between and even those who start out with this altruistic bent eventually cave to the greed (you hearing me Lars?)

He had one or two moderate hits off of his first album and none off of his second. His record label ditched him. Now he has his own label and records his own music and (Are you ready for this?) gives it away. You heard me right. He still puts out cds, but he also has all of his music since his label dropped him available for free on his website.

I respect that and recommend his stuff. If you have a penchant for the genre that is.

Not so GLAAD

2007-02-09T20:16:00.000-06:00

Ok, there comes a point in my life...and it comes more and more frequently as I grow older, that I just want to take someone by the giggly bits and scream in their ear to grow the hell up already. The most recent moment occurred as I read a story about a Snickers ad from the Superbowl.

For any that missed the ad, it involves 2 mechanics involved in an accidental kiss. They then feel that they must do something manly to counteract the smooch, so they elect to rip out a handful of chest hair.

The ad made several Top 10 lists, including one published by another gay organization. GLAAD, however didn't find it funny and raised their collective voice at the company who manufactures Snickers accusing them of defamation of the gay lifestyle and promoting homophobia.

Give me a frelling break. It was a commercial, and a funny one at that.

I would like to give a nod and a thumbs up to Masterfoods, Inc. the maker of Snickers. They pulled the ad from their website and the airwaves, but that was it. No apology.

[Masterfoods spokeswoman Alice Nathanson issued a statement in which she said the company would stop running the ad on television and the Web site.

"Feedback from our target consumers has been positive. In addition, many media and Web site commentators of this year's Super Bowl commercial line-up ranked the commercial among this year's top ten best. USA Today ranked it 9 of its top ten picks," she said.]

When they were asked to apologize for putting the ad out in the first place, they responded with, "we have done all that we can do."

Frankly, if I were in charge I would have checked our demographics and told the pompous, self-absorbed gits that GLAAD's membership were not our target consumer and to take the proverbial long walk off of a short pier.

This morning, I was watching TV with my kids and an ad for strawberry frosted mini-wheats came on. In this ad, a regular f.m.w. accidentally hits on a male strawberry one because he is pink. The regular one gets really nervous and can't look the strawberry in the face and the strawberry one begins to question his pinkness. How long will it be before this falls in the cross-hairs for teaching homophobia to the kids.

For the love of all that is holy. If people could just back up and calm down and maybe, oh I don't know, lighten the hell up, our society would be a much happier place in which to live. Learn to laugh and you'll live longer. Oh wait, stay grumpy so I don't have to put up with your narcissistic ass.

Ok, time to go drink something potent and calm down all over again.

Thump Thump...Thump Thump

2007-01-22T18:30:00.000-06:00

Well, once again the passage of time has come along and kicked me right in the mommy/daddy maker. About a week ago I was feeling a little under the weather and after arguing with my wife about whether I should go to the doctor (guess which side I was on) , I gave in and popped in to see my local shaman.

He treated what ailed me and I was about to roll on out the door when I got hit with the "come hither" by his nurse. "Have you ever been diagnosed with high blood pressure?" she asks.

I told her no because I am after all young and immortal.

Well, apparently 140/100 is too high for my local witch doctor to be comfortable with so he asks that I monitor it for a week.

One week goes by and it hovers right around the 135/95 area plus or minus 5 on both numbers. I once again trek down to the hut in the center of town where lives my shaman and give him the news. He in turn gives me a 2 week supply of bp med and says that if they show no side effects that it will be my daily drug for the future.

Now, I've had to take pills before, but this will be my first long-term regimen. In my mind that is one of the mile markers that shows you've crossed over into "Old Fogey-ville". I weep for my lost youth.

Not all is as bleak as it might appear at first blush. If I can lose the weight I have gained in the 18 years since I graduated high school, I can most likely shuck this particular monkey from off my back. And here comes kick in the dangly bits #2. That totals out to about 100 lbs. Yes you read that right...I need to lose a 10 year old. Damn. Looks like I'm on these things for the foreseeable future.

bleh

5 Things I Hate about Me

2007-01-21T19:12:00.000-06:00

Thanks Lawdog...I am going to exact my vengeance someday...but then I still owe you for the "I'm so drunk" beating damned near 20 years ago. FYI folks, LD covers his butt very well.

"share five off the wall, strange, unusual or just little-known facts about yourself. Then you "tag" five other bloggers who are supposed to do the same thing."

So here we go...

1.) I am ADD and OCD which makes my life really interesting. I get fixated on something to the point of obsession for about 5 minutes at a whack.

2.) I sing...not well, but I do. It's a bad habit I developed at an early age and have yet to realize I shouldn't share with others.

3.) I love crappy science fiction movies...I don't mean the ones that everyone says are crappy. I mean the ones most folks won't even admit to having seen.. "Roger Corman Presents" anyone? (Oh, and by the way LD, I loved Hell Comes to Frogtown.)

4.) I still play D&D whenever I get the chance...which isn't often enough. (You hear that LD?)

5.) I don't have 5 people I can tag, so this branch of the chain ends here.

Now, let me take a minute and say I'll do better and post more often. I've just been finding it hard to find stuff worth writing down. Maybe I am too critical of my own stuff.