Last month, after years of off-putting, and with the imminent demise of my employment, I mustered up the courage to visit my doctor about the removal of a cyst that had taken up residence under my scalp oh so many years ago. At other visits he had assured me it was harmless but would continue to grow. It did continue to grow, it itched and worst of all it stymied Adorable Daughter who is also my trusted barber.
Facing the loss of perhaps the most opulent and all-inclusive Cadillac health insurance ever assembled, I knew it must no longer be postponed and made the call. Doc said OK, go see a surgeon. And he gave me the name of one he said was competent.
So I went to see the surgeon, He was pleasant enough but seemed anxious to move on out of the room. I was a bit offended, having taken pains to bathe and wash hair. The surgeon was also a man of very few words. Included in the words he failed to use were "...this is really minor" or "...I do these all the time" or "back to work the next day..." but he said none of those things. He did say he could do it there in the office, which I thought was a good thing. Then he said, "You will have quite a bit of discomfort from this--I'll probably leave you a scrip for some pain medicine." Then he left the room, with the "quite a bit of discomfort" ringing in my ears.
We set the appointment for two weeks hence and I set about to imagine how bad it might be.
Remarkably, I discovered other people have had the same procedure; I thought I was the odd duck. [I may yet be the odd duck, but not because I had a cyst to extract.] But in all of these other accounts I could not get a sense of how much recovery would be required and what the complications are from having folks saw on your head.
So the appointed hour arrived and I presented my head at the office as instructed, but that was the only instruction I had. They did not advise me what to wear, what to eat, what to expect or damned little else. The procedure actually only lasted less than 30 minutes which I assume is thousands in Central Surgeon Time, and was really quite pain free. I kept waiting for it to hurt as the day wore on, but it didn't happen. Good for me because the good surgeon chose against pain meds.
"Just take whatever you usually take for a headache," he said. And that was about all he said. Not even a good-bye or a go-to-hell; he just walked out and after you've had a fellow with his fingers right there on your skull for a half-hour you feel you should get a proper farewell.
By the way, the scalp bleeds profusely and the gore is incredible. The nurse advised me to go home, shower all the blood out of my hair and expect the wound to bleed for a while. It did.
She also told me not to freak when I looked at the water running into the drain in the shower. "It will run really pink," she warned. It did.
Maybe the low point of the whole thing was trying to lay still while he was cutting a hole in my head, and listening to the nurse who assisted say "Is that a cyst or a lymphoma?" He answered that it was probably a cyst but I had not entertained any thoughts of housing anything other than the cyst. Equally low was that very few asked afterwards "How did it go? How are you feeling?" What the hell good is it to have surgery if you don't get a little attention and sympathy from your friends and coworkers? You guys can see me, right?
But in the end, the surgeon of few words was right for not loading me up with percoset. Amazingly I really never was anything more than moderately sore. I have had much worse pain which didn't involve the medical community. A couple of days ago they took the stitches out, and I didn't feel that either. So it looks like Doc picked me a good surgeon, very skilled but seemingly contemptuous of us peasants.
And the best part--Adorable Daughter can cut my hair without complications. I don't want to do this often but you really need to take care of a good barber. Could be they're harder to get than good surgeons.
Next up: Colonoscopy!!
Friday, May 21, 2010
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
On the road again
I seem to be the only one I know that gets any of this.
Put yourself back in 1955. You are driving along a long straight piece of highway through a pastoral country setting. On your left are cultivated crops growing military-like in their neat rows, alternating with pasture or ground left fallow. On occasion a barn and farmhouse zoom by. On your right is open prairie with more agriculture in the distance, but pacing the highway is a railroad track. It is a main line and you know that because of the poles and wires following tightly along the right of way. They carry electrical impulses not only of communication but of signal indication as well.
Punctuating the track are those line side signals, silver-painted masts with a ladder for maintenance and the black-faced heads. In the center of the head is a hooded light which displays the condition of the track ahead--occupied or clear.
The signals and poles zip by. If only a train would pass to enliven the drive. In those old days you might have longed to see one of the road's passenger fleet. Immaculate stainless-steel sided cars stretching into the distance, let by a streamlined first-generation diesel locomotive. They would glide by almost noiselessly, faster than you could legally go on the highway, with passengers resting in air-conditioned comfort. Which incidentally, few of us had in automobiles. The named trains all carried a lighted sign at the end of the last car proudly proclaiming its identity.
Or maybe a distant haze on the horizon would convert into a pinhole-sized light which seemed to stand still. As you drove toward it the light would begin to be defined by a the blackness of a working steam locomotive, large and menacing, with almost a mile of freight cars in tow. The cars would be from everywhere carrying almost everything. Look-alike unit trains of coal or double-stack container freight were still in the future in the mid-50's.
Sometimes you might catch a meet: two trains passing each other in opposite directions, most often with one waiting on a siding while the other holds the mainline. Sometimes you could catch a glimpse of the signal changing colors as an unseen train approached. If the railroad had semaphore signals, you might get the rare opportunity to see one change positions as you and a train both passed by one.
Trains could sure put life in a trip. Midwestern scenery is fine and watching license plates used to help break up a long trek. Burma-Shave signs were an exciting find. But there was little to compare with the ever-changing life along the rails. Work crews were always out with exotic-looking machines. Sometimes your gas stop was adjacent to a small town's wooden frame depot, complete with a high-wheeled baggage cart on the brick platform and a mail-bag post next to the tracks. And a water tower for the steam engines. Or perhaps as you crossed a major river you would see a magnificent railway bridge, black from soot, dwarfing the trains that used it.
Airplanes get you there faster but they just don't have character like trains did back then. Now, following a rail line is much more sanitized. Steam is gone forever. The communication and signal lines are disappearing leaving mainlines looking bare. Signals are strategically placed to maximize their effectiveness. Passenger trains are a rarity and freights are often land-bridges of impersonal coal and foreign-owned containers.
But you know what? I'd still rather follow the rails. Like I say, I'm the only one that gets it.
Put yourself back in 1955. You are driving along a long straight piece of highway through a pastoral country setting. On your left are cultivated crops growing military-like in their neat rows, alternating with pasture or ground left fallow. On occasion a barn and farmhouse zoom by. On your right is open prairie with more agriculture in the distance, but pacing the highway is a railroad track. It is a main line and you know that because of the poles and wires following tightly along the right of way. They carry electrical impulses not only of communication but of signal indication as well.
Punctuating the track are those line side signals, silver-painted masts with a ladder for maintenance and the black-faced heads. In the center of the head is a hooded light which displays the condition of the track ahead--occupied or clear.
The signals and poles zip by. If only a train would pass to enliven the drive. In those old days you might have longed to see one of the road's passenger fleet. Immaculate stainless-steel sided cars stretching into the distance, let by a streamlined first-generation diesel locomotive. They would glide by almost noiselessly, faster than you could legally go on the highway, with passengers resting in air-conditioned comfort. Which incidentally, few of us had in automobiles. The named trains all carried a lighted sign at the end of the last car proudly proclaiming its identity.
Or maybe a distant haze on the horizon would convert into a pinhole-sized light which seemed to stand still. As you drove toward it the light would begin to be defined by a the blackness of a working steam locomotive, large and menacing, with almost a mile of freight cars in tow. The cars would be from everywhere carrying almost everything. Look-alike unit trains of coal or double-stack container freight were still in the future in the mid-50's.
Sometimes you might catch a meet: two trains passing each other in opposite directions, most often with one waiting on a siding while the other holds the mainline. Sometimes you could catch a glimpse of the signal changing colors as an unseen train approached. If the railroad had semaphore signals, you might get the rare opportunity to see one change positions as you and a train both passed by one.
Trains could sure put life in a trip. Midwestern scenery is fine and watching license plates used to help break up a long trek. Burma-Shave signs were an exciting find. But there was little to compare with the ever-changing life along the rails. Work crews were always out with exotic-looking machines. Sometimes your gas stop was adjacent to a small town's wooden frame depot, complete with a high-wheeled baggage cart on the brick platform and a mail-bag post next to the tracks. And a water tower for the steam engines. Or perhaps as you crossed a major river you would see a magnificent railway bridge, black from soot, dwarfing the trains that used it.
Airplanes get you there faster but they just don't have character like trains did back then. Now, following a rail line is much more sanitized. Steam is gone forever. The communication and signal lines are disappearing leaving mainlines looking bare. Signals are strategically placed to maximize their effectiveness. Passenger trains are a rarity and freights are often land-bridges of impersonal coal and foreign-owned containers.
But you know what? I'd still rather follow the rails. Like I say, I'm the only one that gets it.
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Brave Travellers
Adorable Wife recently returned from a trip to a convention of educators, administrators and staff associated with parochial schools. All seemed to go well enough. Eight other souls ventured into the north woods with her on this four-day expedition. All nine Brave Travellers are accounted for, safely returned.
There were traditional gaffes:
Barely an hour en route in the rental van, Adorable Wife had a wardrobe failure similar to those of Janet Jackson, Katherine Heigl and other notables. While in the past I have assumed these episodes were accidental, she is beginning to establish patterned behavior. Not sure I should be concerned at this point but photos taken in early childhood have set her deportment in a straight line for a few weeks at a Tiger Woods-style clinic.
In the quiet hours preceding dawn, Adorable Wife rose to exercise. Not wanting to parade her statuesque self into the hotel's workout room and attract the attention of men many years younger, she tried to manipulate her bedroom television's in-house exercise video to keep her company. Claiming unfair working conditions due to the elaborate and confusing remote control, she not only failed to locate the desired video but activated an in-room presentation of -- she claims -- Avatar. Flustered she called the clerk and explained the situation, not wanting a large debit for in-room movies on her hotel bill. The charge was removed, and we all really want to believe it was Avatar.
A sudden stop on a highway, caused by conditions best not discussed in this forum, sent several items flying in the rental van which conveyed Brave Travellers on their journey. One flying item was a cell phone which deposited itself with remarkable accuracy in a cup of water. Someone suggested that a soaked Blackberry could be returned to usefulness by packing it in rice overnight. The call went to Adorable Wife for some rice, but alas she had packed none. The Brave Travellers were forced to obtain rice at market prices, which Wife handled on their behalf as usual.
She also bought a can of carpet cleaner to launder away a substance (which she would not identify) that was spilled on the cargo floor's carpet as a result of the same sudden stop.
And rice as a cure for a drowning phone is apparently dead-on. Field reports claim full recovery.
Wife is now on a two-glass limit for wine consumed in a six-hour period. Explanations need not be aired here but let the record show that age is not the only cause of failing memory. Her coworkers are supposed to be watching her a little closer since last year's birthday discomposure, but she undoubtedly escaped their scrutiny. The Timber Lodge Incident, as I will call it in years to come, is to be one of those definitive moments in life; a hinge upon which the door of existance swings.
Minnesotans could probably step up their signage for visitors to the next level. Adorable Wife and others walked in the rain for a mile looking for a place to eat lunch during a midday break. They found one but on returning to the convention hall discovered that catering was available right there in the same building, dry as a bone and warm as toast.
Adorable Wife is all about shopping. Trips were arranged to the out sized Mall of America, built on the site of the old Twins' stadium in Bloomington. Historical anecdotes regarding said Twins went unappreciated. Brave Travellers ate, drank and shopped with lust as though that were the true motivation for the adventure(?), with the convention an afterthought. I can prove this with the pile of debit card receipts that she toted home.
Incredibly, Wife kept track of jackets, shoes, reading glasses, room keys and cell phone with remarkable accuracy. On a normal junket Brave Travellers have to set aside a time budget for her to return to her room for many of these lost necessities. If Brave Travellers fail to cooperate, no quarter is brooked and loud public pronouncements will be made. (Regrattably I cannot say with reasonable authority the Timber Lodge Incident is somehow negated as a result of this years' improved tracking of jackets.)
There were other amusing occurances of a less public and blogworthy nature. We are just glad to have Adorable Wife back in the fold, but as soon as she returned Adorable Daughter and family left for an exciting weekend in Omaha. That put us in charge of Fearless Dog. Dog is a great guest and loyal companion but has no tolerance for other creatures--squirrels, dogs, cats, deer, etc., and has sensitive digestion when Adorable Daughter is gone away. The best thing is, though, that he cares nothing for shopping.
There were traditional gaffes:
Barely an hour en route in the rental van, Adorable Wife had a wardrobe failure similar to those of Janet Jackson, Katherine Heigl and other notables. While in the past I have assumed these episodes were accidental, she is beginning to establish patterned behavior. Not sure I should be concerned at this point but photos taken in early childhood have set her deportment in a straight line for a few weeks at a Tiger Woods-style clinic.
In the quiet hours preceding dawn, Adorable Wife rose to exercise. Not wanting to parade her statuesque self into the hotel's workout room and attract the attention of men many years younger, she tried to manipulate her bedroom television's in-house exercise video to keep her company. Claiming unfair working conditions due to the elaborate and confusing remote control, she not only failed to locate the desired video but activated an in-room presentation of -- she claims -- Avatar. Flustered she called the clerk and explained the situation, not wanting a large debit for in-room movies on her hotel bill. The charge was removed, and we all really want to believe it was Avatar.
A sudden stop on a highway, caused by conditions best not discussed in this forum, sent several items flying in the rental van which conveyed Brave Travellers on their journey. One flying item was a cell phone which deposited itself with remarkable accuracy in a cup of water. Someone suggested that a soaked Blackberry could be returned to usefulness by packing it in rice overnight. The call went to Adorable Wife for some rice, but alas she had packed none. The Brave Travellers were forced to obtain rice at market prices, which Wife handled on their behalf as usual.
She also bought a can of carpet cleaner to launder away a substance (which she would not identify) that was spilled on the cargo floor's carpet as a result of the same sudden stop.
And rice as a cure for a drowning phone is apparently dead-on. Field reports claim full recovery.
Wife is now on a two-glass limit for wine consumed in a six-hour period. Explanations need not be aired here but let the record show that age is not the only cause of failing memory. Her coworkers are supposed to be watching her a little closer since last year's birthday discomposure, but she undoubtedly escaped their scrutiny. The Timber Lodge Incident, as I will call it in years to come, is to be one of those definitive moments in life; a hinge upon which the door of existance swings.
Minnesotans could probably step up their signage for visitors to the next level. Adorable Wife and others walked in the rain for a mile looking for a place to eat lunch during a midday break. They found one but on returning to the convention hall discovered that catering was available right there in the same building, dry as a bone and warm as toast.
Adorable Wife is all about shopping. Trips were arranged to the out sized Mall of America, built on the site of the old Twins' stadium in Bloomington. Historical anecdotes regarding said Twins went unappreciated. Brave Travellers ate, drank and shopped with lust as though that were the true motivation for the adventure(?), with the convention an afterthought. I can prove this with the pile of debit card receipts that she toted home.
Incredibly, Wife kept track of jackets, shoes, reading glasses, room keys and cell phone with remarkable accuracy. On a normal junket Brave Travellers have to set aside a time budget for her to return to her room for many of these lost necessities. If Brave Travellers fail to cooperate, no quarter is brooked and loud public pronouncements will be made. (Regrattably I cannot say with reasonable authority the Timber Lodge Incident is somehow negated as a result of this years' improved tracking of jackets.)
There were other amusing occurances of a less public and blogworthy nature. We are just glad to have Adorable Wife back in the fold, but as soon as she returned Adorable Daughter and family left for an exciting weekend in Omaha. That put us in charge of Fearless Dog. Dog is a great guest and loyal companion but has no tolerance for other creatures--squirrels, dogs, cats, deer, etc., and has sensitive digestion when Adorable Daughter is gone away. The best thing is, though, that he cares nothing for shopping.
Saturday, March 27, 2010
Disarray
The city council passed a budget last week with hardly a ripple in the local journalistic waters. Almost unnoticed for its lack of acrimony the council had an air of stealth as it went about its business. Last year there was a demanding and thoroughly delusional city manager backed by equally delusional councilmen and women on one side of the process and the much-maligned but wiser Mayor on the other.
Somehow confused that he was sitting on a pile of money, former city manager Wayne Cauthen (yeah, they cut him loose) steadfastly insisted his misguided budget was achievable and reasonable. Never very distant from the fore was always a streak of indigence in his demeanor, as if he were felt less respected because of his minority status and was constantly brooding. Maybe because of this he was able to enlist the weaker council members in his support; hell, I don't know--maybe they just agreed with him, because most of them don't seem too bright either. He seemed to have plenty of respect, but just didn't get what services the city really needs.
In opposition was Mayor Mark Funkhauser, a former city auditor who labors under the onus of supporting the Obama administration. Nonetheless he has years of city hall experience that told him and reasonable people there was no way in hell that budget would be manageable. A nasty fight ensued. Compromises were effected, and the city is still here but the city manager abruptly was dismissed several months ago with very little said.
Can't say that I miss him. He never had the professional attitude that is demanded of someone in that line of work. He built an empire of assistant city managers, aides and assistants, actually appointing a "chief of staff." Perhaps we can make a case for the President to have a chief of staff, but a less delusional city manager might get by with two or three assistants and some good department heads. Cauthen didn't get what Funk does: The public wants cops, snow removal and pothole patching, not neighborhood development and organizing.
Despite backing Obama, Mayor Mark Funkhauser is otherwise exhibiting uncommon common sense day after day. He realizes that the livability of the city is fading, along with its tax base. Block after block of the urban inner core is worthless. No one wants to live there, among drug houses, gangs, weed-covered vacant lots and abandoned dwellings. The school district is a mess, administered by a board of union hacks and big-shots. Amid all this people want to feel safe in their homes, want their trash picked up and want the water to run when they turn the tap.
I wonder how much of this the councilmen get. Kansas City is only surviving because of a large surrounding suburban area in the extreme north and south, annexed decades ago mostly as farmland while the core city was still livable. Now it provides the heart of the residential tax base, and the council's biggest issue in three years has been the mayor's wife. Perhaps now, a year before elections, they are just getting around to genuine concerns as witnessed by the smooth budget passage and Cauthen's ouster.
Then there is Power and Light, thought to be the savior of downtown, which may become the next albatross around the city's neck if the enterprise can't make its interest payments and the city has to pick that up too. Hey, thanks Kay Barnes. (Can't imagine what kind of nonsense she would have supported in Congress.) It's a nice area but parking is rare and prices are high. Perhaps the city didn't need this debt at this time, and should have worked to bring offices back downtown from elsewhere in the city. Maybe some big retailers could have been enticed back on to Petticoat Lane. You get some people on the street and the bars and restaurants will follow anyway if the city cleans out the drug dealers and bums. Make it easy for cafes and clubs to open up, cut license fees and permits. Back the inspections off. Get government out of the way.
But that isn't what happened. Kay left a mess for the Funk to clean up. She left him debt, a deluded city manager and a rapidly escaping population and business community. I've heard Funk refer to livability for those of us left here. I hope the council is beginning to get it. Cops, snow removal, pot hole repair. A swimming pool in the summer and a growing--not shrinking--tax base. And maybe a little humility; I'm beginning to think I work for them.
Somehow confused that he was sitting on a pile of money, former city manager Wayne Cauthen (yeah, they cut him loose) steadfastly insisted his misguided budget was achievable and reasonable. Never very distant from the fore was always a streak of indigence in his demeanor, as if he were felt less respected because of his minority status and was constantly brooding. Maybe because of this he was able to enlist the weaker council members in his support; hell, I don't know--maybe they just agreed with him, because most of them don't seem too bright either. He seemed to have plenty of respect, but just didn't get what services the city really needs.
In opposition was Mayor Mark Funkhauser, a former city auditor who labors under the onus of supporting the Obama administration. Nonetheless he has years of city hall experience that told him and reasonable people there was no way in hell that budget would be manageable. A nasty fight ensued. Compromises were effected, and the city is still here but the city manager abruptly was dismissed several months ago with very little said.
Can't say that I miss him. He never had the professional attitude that is demanded of someone in that line of work. He built an empire of assistant city managers, aides and assistants, actually appointing a "chief of staff." Perhaps we can make a case for the President to have a chief of staff, but a less delusional city manager might get by with two or three assistants and some good department heads. Cauthen didn't get what Funk does: The public wants cops, snow removal and pothole patching, not neighborhood development and organizing.
Despite backing Obama, Mayor Mark Funkhauser is otherwise exhibiting uncommon common sense day after day. He realizes that the livability of the city is fading, along with its tax base. Block after block of the urban inner core is worthless. No one wants to live there, among drug houses, gangs, weed-covered vacant lots and abandoned dwellings. The school district is a mess, administered by a board of union hacks and big-shots. Amid all this people want to feel safe in their homes, want their trash picked up and want the water to run when they turn the tap.
I wonder how much of this the councilmen get. Kansas City is only surviving because of a large surrounding suburban area in the extreme north and south, annexed decades ago mostly as farmland while the core city was still livable. Now it provides the heart of the residential tax base, and the council's biggest issue in three years has been the mayor's wife. Perhaps now, a year before elections, they are just getting around to genuine concerns as witnessed by the smooth budget passage and Cauthen's ouster.
Then there is Power and Light, thought to be the savior of downtown, which may become the next albatross around the city's neck if the enterprise can't make its interest payments and the city has to pick that up too. Hey, thanks Kay Barnes. (Can't imagine what kind of nonsense she would have supported in Congress.) It's a nice area but parking is rare and prices are high. Perhaps the city didn't need this debt at this time, and should have worked to bring offices back downtown from elsewhere in the city. Maybe some big retailers could have been enticed back on to Petticoat Lane. You get some people on the street and the bars and restaurants will follow anyway if the city cleans out the drug dealers and bums. Make it easy for cafes and clubs to open up, cut license fees and permits. Back the inspections off. Get government out of the way.
But that isn't what happened. Kay left a mess for the Funk to clean up. She left him debt, a deluded city manager and a rapidly escaping population and business community. I've heard Funk refer to livability for those of us left here. I hope the council is beginning to get it. Cops, snow removal, pot hole repair. A swimming pool in the summer and a growing--not shrinking--tax base. And maybe a little humility; I'm beginning to think I work for them.
Fun and games with your health
March is almost gone, slipping away faster and faster as the month proceeds. With much more going on than in the first two months of the year it is amazing how quickly this period of transition from winter to less winter accelerates through the calendar. I wanted to get one more post in before April shows up.
The fools that we have (hey, not we; I didn't vote for anyone who supported it) elected to represent us in Washington have made the largest power grab in U.S. history by passing a bill providing for national health care. Upwards of two-thirds of the constituents don't want it, at least not in its current form. I just can't think of anything that will kill off a health care system that has developed the greatest patient care in the world more effectively than turning it over to Uncle Sam.
What are these people thinking?
"Oh," you say, "It is good but what good if no one can afford it?"
Actually it is a fairly small slice of people that can't afford it. There are others who do not care to have health insurance although they could work it into their budget if they were inclined. The system we have is clogged with -- especially in the south and south west -- illegal aliens who are here to get free care. They know that they can't be turned away from an emergency room until stabilized, which is all any of them really want. Who pays for that? We The People.
The same goes for Americans who have other priorities than health care. Some have addictions that are costly and leave little room for CIGNA or Blue Cr0ss: cigarettes, alcohol, new cars, house payments beyond means, or maybe they just like to eat all their meals in restaurants which in itself is a health hazard. So when they get sick and show up at the ER, who pays their bills? We The People.
Regardless, the real number of folks unable to afford insurance is small and once again, Washington liberals have separated us all into two groups--the wealthy 10% and everyone else. They refuse to admit there is still a large, functioning, independent middle-class out here. Maybe they do know we're here because apparently they are doing their best to destroy it.
We are told we just can't carry on like this by the same pe0ple who manage nothing well. The Post Office, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, WIC, Fannie, Freddie, Gennie, and the War on Poverty have all been horrible, wasteful and dreadfully expensive flops with no end. Again paid for by We The People.
What should we expect from a group of men and women who are mostly lawyers and have never had to meet a budget, hire and fire people, bring in a payroll, live up to a contract, or stand even for hours on an assembly line?
Think of something the government runs so well that you care to have it in command of your very life. Exclude in that consideration the men and women in uniform of the armed services, as they are folks motivated by unselfishness and sacrifice which is very much the opposite of what has motivated last week's vote.
It was a vote on a bill full of very un-American provisions, the worst of which requires each American to purchase health insurance or pay a large fine--administration of which falls to the Internal Revenue Service. Do they not have enough power as judge and jury as it is?
This hopefully will be the effort's undoing. Attorneys General of approaching half of the states have filed suit against this law as being patently unconstitutional. By what provision of the constitution does the Congress have authority to mandate that a citizen buy anything? If that stands, what else would they require of us?
And by the way, if I can't afford to buy health insurance how will I pay this $5000 fine? Gee, maybe the government will give me the money for both the insurance and the fine! And then, they'll figure they have to pony up for all the illegals in line behind me. Or maybe ahead of me, I don't know. We The People again.
We have thrown the baby out with the bath water. Probably if the government backed completely out of health care altogether we'd be better off. Without Medicare and Medicaid and general welfare, the market would seek it's own level and we'd know the true costs of staying healthy. Some of what truly makes medicine so expensive -- lawsuits, malpractice insurance, government intervention, insurance company regulation, and poor health habits of Americans -- remains ignored because of liberal political alliances or plain ignorance.
There is a case to be made that all of our industrial rivals such as Japan, China, and the Europeans have socialized medicine; that we have to follow suit to remain competitive in a global economy. I maintain these nations have traditionally had government care while we all have cared for ourselves and grown into the greatest industrial power the world has ever seen.
Japan rose in stature, not because their cars are cheaper but because they are good products. The cost of employee health care is built into every car Toyota builds either through the taxes the employees pay on their wages for socialized medicine or for what the employer pays, or both. The cost of American cars not much different. The customer pays one way or the other. If Japanese health care costs less per person there are many variables, aside from the simple fact that the government administers the plan. Having the government do something doesn't make it less espensive, even in Japan.
And with no insult intended toward the Japanese, what have their contributions been to modern health care? What supports research and development of new treatments and therapies in that great nation? Or in Canada, Great Britain, France, Russia, China? Americans--as usual--have lead the world in this too.
Better think twice, Mr. President. Incentive to go into medicine for our brightest people has sustained us well and wrought great things in the past 234 years. It isn't perfect but there are many obstacles to be swept from the path of affordable care without turning it all over to Uncle Sam. Too bad there wasn't an incentive for bright people to run for Congress as well and stuff this whole thing in the dumpster behind a hospital where it belongs. We The People need some help. This isn't help.
The fools that we have (hey, not we; I didn't vote for anyone who supported it) elected to represent us in Washington have made the largest power grab in U.S. history by passing a bill providing for national health care. Upwards of two-thirds of the constituents don't want it, at least not in its current form. I just can't think of anything that will kill off a health care system that has developed the greatest patient care in the world more effectively than turning it over to Uncle Sam.
What are these people thinking?
"Oh," you say, "It is good but what good if no one can afford it?"
Actually it is a fairly small slice of people that can't afford it. There are others who do not care to have health insurance although they could work it into their budget if they were inclined. The system we have is clogged with -- especially in the south and south west -- illegal aliens who are here to get free care. They know that they can't be turned away from an emergency room until stabilized, which is all any of them really want. Who pays for that? We The People.
The same goes for Americans who have other priorities than health care. Some have addictions that are costly and leave little room for CIGNA or Blue Cr0ss: cigarettes, alcohol, new cars, house payments beyond means, or maybe they just like to eat all their meals in restaurants which in itself is a health hazard. So when they get sick and show up at the ER, who pays their bills? We The People.
Regardless, the real number of folks unable to afford insurance is small and once again, Washington liberals have separated us all into two groups--the wealthy 10% and everyone else. They refuse to admit there is still a large, functioning, independent middle-class out here. Maybe they do know we're here because apparently they are doing their best to destroy it.
We are told we just can't carry on like this by the same pe0ple who manage nothing well. The Post Office, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, WIC, Fannie, Freddie, Gennie, and the War on Poverty have all been horrible, wasteful and dreadfully expensive flops with no end. Again paid for by We The People.
What should we expect from a group of men and women who are mostly lawyers and have never had to meet a budget, hire and fire people, bring in a payroll, live up to a contract, or stand even for hours on an assembly line?
Think of something the government runs so well that you care to have it in command of your very life. Exclude in that consideration the men and women in uniform of the armed services, as they are folks motivated by unselfishness and sacrifice which is very much the opposite of what has motivated last week's vote.
It was a vote on a bill full of very un-American provisions, the worst of which requires each American to purchase health insurance or pay a large fine--administration of which falls to the Internal Revenue Service. Do they not have enough power as judge and jury as it is?
This hopefully will be the effort's undoing. Attorneys General of approaching half of the states have filed suit against this law as being patently unconstitutional. By what provision of the constitution does the Congress have authority to mandate that a citizen buy anything? If that stands, what else would they require of us?
And by the way, if I can't afford to buy health insurance how will I pay this $5000 fine? Gee, maybe the government will give me the money for both the insurance and the fine! And then, they'll figure they have to pony up for all the illegals in line behind me. Or maybe ahead of me, I don't know. We The People again.
We have thrown the baby out with the bath water. Probably if the government backed completely out of health care altogether we'd be better off. Without Medicare and Medicaid and general welfare, the market would seek it's own level and we'd know the true costs of staying healthy. Some of what truly makes medicine so expensive -- lawsuits, malpractice insurance, government intervention, insurance company regulation, and poor health habits of Americans -- remains ignored because of liberal political alliances or plain ignorance.
There is a case to be made that all of our industrial rivals such as Japan, China, and the Europeans have socialized medicine; that we have to follow suit to remain competitive in a global economy. I maintain these nations have traditionally had government care while we all have cared for ourselves and grown into the greatest industrial power the world has ever seen.
Japan rose in stature, not because their cars are cheaper but because they are good products. The cost of employee health care is built into every car Toyota builds either through the taxes the employees pay on their wages for socialized medicine or for what the employer pays, or both. The cost of American cars not much different. The customer pays one way or the other. If Japanese health care costs less per person there are many variables, aside from the simple fact that the government administers the plan. Having the government do something doesn't make it less espensive, even in Japan.
And with no insult intended toward the Japanese, what have their contributions been to modern health care? What supports research and development of new treatments and therapies in that great nation? Or in Canada, Great Britain, France, Russia, China? Americans--as usual--have lead the world in this too.
Better think twice, Mr. President. Incentive to go into medicine for our brightest people has sustained us well and wrought great things in the past 234 years. It isn't perfect but there are many obstacles to be swept from the path of affordable care without turning it all over to Uncle Sam. Too bad there wasn't an incentive for bright people to run for Congress as well and stuff this whole thing in the dumpster behind a hospital where it belongs. We The People need some help. This isn't help.
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Sunday March 7.
Something has changed.
For the last couple of weeks I have seen weak, tired sunlight on the other side of the shades early in the morning. I also have noticed that when I drive home after work I am in daylight. It is never something that I notice in increments. It just hits me that its not dark any more.
Here in the waning weeks of a very long, cold, dark, winter rich in snow and bitching about snow, the lengthening days give hope that there may yet be a day when we can venture outdoors without life support. Even yesterday and today we could get by most of the day in a light jacket. It is only a temporary respite. There are more days ahead of cold, cold rain, maybe some snow, and low temperatures. But it does appear our annual venture around the sun is still operating--not stalled permanently in late January.
In a month it will be close to tolerable outdoors; in two the trees will have their veil of fresh light green and high school seniors will be cleaning out lockers. And in only a couple of weeks the much-anticipated northern Missouri severe weather season will begin, a sure sign that we are into Spring. If not in name, at least in fact.
Some things break loose in March: the KC Auto Show, the Big 12 Basketball Tournaments, the NCAA 'Big Dance, Lent, Easter; all of them pointing toward more sunshine and warmer weather. As Thanksgiving usually leads us into cold weather, the Final Four lead us out of it.
As I write this the Academy Awards are on, that annual festival of celebrity self-appreciation. Although I don't have a lot of use for the aloof, liberal stars that sneer at our way of life and deride our wonderful country, the Oscars are good for one thing--they mean winter is almost over. Normally I'm not in that big a hurry for it to finish but this March 7 I am cold, tired of being cold and ready to sit in the sun like a reptile and warm up.
For the last couple of weeks I have seen weak, tired sunlight on the other side of the shades early in the morning. I also have noticed that when I drive home after work I am in daylight. It is never something that I notice in increments. It just hits me that its not dark any more.
Here in the waning weeks of a very long, cold, dark, winter rich in snow and bitching about snow, the lengthening days give hope that there may yet be a day when we can venture outdoors without life support. Even yesterday and today we could get by most of the day in a light jacket. It is only a temporary respite. There are more days ahead of cold, cold rain, maybe some snow, and low temperatures. But it does appear our annual venture around the sun is still operating--not stalled permanently in late January.
In a month it will be close to tolerable outdoors; in two the trees will have their veil of fresh light green and high school seniors will be cleaning out lockers. And in only a couple of weeks the much-anticipated northern Missouri severe weather season will begin, a sure sign that we are into Spring. If not in name, at least in fact.
Some things break loose in March: the KC Auto Show, the Big 12 Basketball Tournaments, the NCAA 'Big Dance, Lent, Easter; all of them pointing toward more sunshine and warmer weather. As Thanksgiving usually leads us into cold weather, the Final Four lead us out of it.
As I write this the Academy Awards are on, that annual festival of celebrity self-appreciation. Although I don't have a lot of use for the aloof, liberal stars that sneer at our way of life and deride our wonderful country, the Oscars are good for one thing--they mean winter is almost over. Normally I'm not in that big a hurry for it to finish but this March 7 I am cold, tired of being cold and ready to sit in the sun like a reptile and warm up.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Doin' any hiring?
My luck has run out. After thirty years in the airline business I will be out of work May 27. Our company executive board can no longer endure the losses and is closing our station. Kansas City airlines will be left without a full-service commissary for the first time since modern air service has emerged.
That isn't so much of a shock. There isn't a demand for these services on the short-haul flights which arrive and depart at MCI. The public has long ago given up the luxury of inflight dining. Flight attendants run a drink service, then hold down jump seats during the time they used to serve passengers. That isn't totally unfair, as some have endured pay reductions, downsized crews and layoffs all in the name of survival. A two-hour flight may carry food for first-class passengers, but only on the longest hauls is a complimentary meal served to the rabble in economy class. For several years we have survived on boarding food, ice, and elaborate meals for NFL and major league baseball charters during their seasons.
The 17 of us that are left of the 400-plus employees who once serviced airplanes here have steadily watched service decline as fuel, security and payrolls have gone through the ceiling. The public demands have shifted and with this the air carriers are only too pleased to oblige.
I wonder what some of the folks I have worked with will do. A few are barely literate, having poor reading and writing skills with little prospect of improving either. To what kind of work can they look forward? One is caught with 15 months to retirement. Another is not physically prepared to take on unfamiliar labor. Yet another is partly disabled and has become a creature of routine upon which he depends.
So here we are, victims of change. Not so long ago one might assume that he or she could join a firm, create some value for it and expect to stay there for 30, 40 or more years and retire. Today's climate no longer supports that; just a fact of life. And now I get to close down a second shop in seven years. Maybe that should be my new work--closing down businesses who have outlived their usefulness. Now that is a job I could expect to keep indefinitely.
That isn't so much of a shock. There isn't a demand for these services on the short-haul flights which arrive and depart at MCI. The public has long ago given up the luxury of inflight dining. Flight attendants run a drink service, then hold down jump seats during the time they used to serve passengers. That isn't totally unfair, as some have endured pay reductions, downsized crews and layoffs all in the name of survival. A two-hour flight may carry food for first-class passengers, but only on the longest hauls is a complimentary meal served to the rabble in economy class. For several years we have survived on boarding food, ice, and elaborate meals for NFL and major league baseball charters during their seasons.
The 17 of us that are left of the 400-plus employees who once serviced airplanes here have steadily watched service decline as fuel, security and payrolls have gone through the ceiling. The public demands have shifted and with this the air carriers are only too pleased to oblige.
I wonder what some of the folks I have worked with will do. A few are barely literate, having poor reading and writing skills with little prospect of improving either. To what kind of work can they look forward? One is caught with 15 months to retirement. Another is not physically prepared to take on unfamiliar labor. Yet another is partly disabled and has become a creature of routine upon which he depends.
So here we are, victims of change. Not so long ago one might assume that he or she could join a firm, create some value for it and expect to stay there for 30, 40 or more years and retire. Today's climate no longer supports that; just a fact of life. And now I get to close down a second shop in seven years. Maybe that should be my new work--closing down businesses who have outlived their usefulness. Now that is a job I could expect to keep indefinitely.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Back to Houston
Needing a few days of rest, we invited ourselves down to Houston to visit the wife's brother Tim and and family. They have a beautiful home, aptly appointed for guests and are always gracious hosts. A few days out of the enduring cold of this prairie winter sounded good, so calls were made, passage arranged, clothes purchased and the die was cast.
A week or so ago we shoe-horned ourselves into the smallest commercial jet airplane available with 48 other people and roared off to Texas. This should be a post by itself, but travelling on one of these things is not a pleasant experience. The seat is barely spacious enough. The ceiling is such that one tends to walk hunched in the aisle. Overhead carry-on space is at a premium. To me, it is one step above going there on a horse. Air travel itself is uncomfortable and diminishes the self-esteem, but regional jets take it to a whole new level. Just to stick it to me a bit more--RJ's are built mostly in Brazil. The horse would have been made in the USA, at least.
Fortunately for us we flew Continental Airlines to Houston Intercontinental Airport and it's actually cheaper than Southwest, which flies into Houston Hobby airport. Unfortunately for Tim, Intercontinental is nearly an hour from his house--if the traffic is good, always a very temporary condition in Houston. And, yes, he lives a mere 10 minutes from Hobby, but Southwest stops in Tulsa--a fact unacceptable to his sister who cares little for extra takeoffs and landings while in transit. (Let the record show that I wanted to drive.)
As always they are wonderful hosts. They loaned us their (not so much their as Tim's) 2006 Corvette, just as clean and shiny as the day it rolled of the assembly line. They directed us to Ross Family Stores ("Dress for Less!") across Harris and Brazoria Counties and urged us to visit Galveston. So the wife shopped up to her waist in the Ross stores and various outlet malls, while I sat in the sexy car and listened to Rush and worked crossword puzzles, all the while enjoying the weak February sunshine. We cruised Seawall Road in Galveston, yet another Ross store, and returned home to a fabulous steak dinner. Tim is a terrific cook.
View from Seawall Road
The next day, as Mary Ann shopped in even more Ross stores, Tim rolled me down to Alvin to photograph the Santa Fe depot there. It was recently restored and sits trackside on its original foundation. The brick platform is still in place, its paving stones still bearing the markings of the Coffeyville Vitreous Brick and Tile plant where they were cast a hundred years ago. We all had lunch at a seafood diner which I wanted to bring home with me and dinner at yet another seafood house.
So basically this was a festival of sightseeing, eating and bitching about flying. And then there was the dance club.
Tim and Patty like to frequent a local night club on Saturdays which was as interesting to watch people as the San Francisco airport--and believe me, there is unrivaled entertainment at SFO.
I was left with a few observations on Texas nightlife in 2010:
**The music was so loud as to render any conversation impossible. About half the volume would have been just fine and no one would still have been able to converse. Thirty years of working around gas turbine engines have been hard on the ears, and they continued in the tradition of Pratt and Whitney
**No one danced for much of the first hour we were there, in spite of the incredibly loud pulsating music, except for two girls--with each other.
**The DJ finally broke out the disco and before the fifth note got out, the nerd in the green shirt appeared. Yes, a real nerd in a green polo shirt, thick glasses, jeans and high-top Converse All-Stars. (I can't make this up.) He had unkempt albino hair and a bad complexion but was nimble and his feet barely hit the floor. True to his nerd-ness, he was alone but it didn't slow him down. And he got a few people out to dance.
**This wasn't Studio 54--there weren't many beautiful people. Or even very many regular people. What we had here were a wealth of men in their 60's (or 70's and they were just a young 70?) looking to pick up women, apparently of any age. Lots of pot bellies, bald heads, gray hair--and I think I spotted a Nehru jacket.
**Then we had the obligatory woman pushing 50 with long blond hair, short shorts, knee-high go-go boots and apparently no mirrors at home. I have seen women who at 45 or 50 can pull off that look. She wasn't one of them, but the old guys didn't seem to mind at all. The other women were on the chubby side, and there were copious amounts of Clairol on duty. Patty's son "Tito" and his wife were with us and he mentioned that one of the cougars had pinched his butt. "I wonder what's up with that," he tried to yell over the roar.
"Look around," I told him. ''You're the only game in town.''
**Tim and Patty, pretty much among the younger patrons, were in the club for the first time in a few weeks. They have their favorite table, know all the regulars, and were asking about one fellow who wasn't there. He had suffered a stroke, they were told, pretty much knocking out the dance club. This just wasn't how I remembered night life; we never discussed our friends having strokes.
**One of the two dancing girls decided at one point to be the go-go girl in the cage, and hopped up on one of the shelves wedged into the corners of the dance floor. This was a hefty homely woman, not the stereotyped Paris Hilton in a white miniskirt and white boots. I mention it only because she kicked her shoes off in front of where I was sitting and then there was the whole foot thing going on for a minute. And yeah, I know I'm not one of the beautiful people either, but I keep my shoes on and my pants aren't painted on to my butt.
**And we are still old farts, too, because we left at 10:30. As we were leaving the younger crowd was filtering in and the place was getting really crowded. We headed for the Taco Cabana around the corner for a late dinner. The nerd was still on the floor, dancing furiously by himself, pretty much ignored by the crush of the other people.
**Here we were in Texas and only one old man had a western hat on his head. It never came off. Even thought this wasn't a western themed club, I had expected a few more cowboys. After all, this is Texas.
**Freedom lives on in Webster, Texas! Smoking is permitted in public buildings, so it's up to the owners (what a concept) if they care to make their establishment a smoke free one or not. This club is a smoker's paradise and the two of us hadn't been in one for a long time. We really reeked. I thought we might have to burn our clothes. All that smoke isn't pleasant for a non-smoker (and for some smokers as well) but it was refreshing to see a community left to forge its own destiny, regardless of political correctness. The thing was I really didn't see anyone actually smoking. I still don't know how that happened, but the whole place was fun, funny (except for the guy that had the stroke) and a psychologists' dream.
The following day we crawled back inside a Continental RJ and headed home. They were offering us $300 each for our seats and a later flight, so I suppose we should have jumped on it. Why? It was a sultry, humid, rainy 68 degrees in Houston when we left at 11:45. Landing in KC, it was 30 and--as usual this winter--snowing. As we claimed our massive grip It seemed like 10 years had passed since we had driven the Corvette along the beach in the sunshine. And with the snow drifting into my collar as I hoisted our bags into the back of the car, I caught the faintest whiff of smoke from somewhere deep inside. It's good to be home.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Leggo my Ego!
Now comes before the court one John Edwards, of late candidate for President of the United States, Senator from North Carolina, successful trial lawyer, husband, father--and philanderer. It is for this last that it seems he was most proficient and for which he will be most remembered.
The depth of his self-interest is way beyond that of us mortals. You know, just to begin with, you have to have a pretty substantial ego to be a lawyer. To strive, as your life's work, to extract honestly earned money from companies engaged in legal enterprises--yes, tobacco companies are legal, and sell honest products--to compensate people who claim they didn't know smoking was unhealthy is -- well, nuts.
All the arguments of smoking aside, no one made those folks take up smoking or stay with it. People quit with good results all the time. The point of it all is to overcome this much fairness and rational thinking, a trial lawyer has to have a grand vision powered by a massive ego.
You need a little ego as well if you're running for one of your state's two senate seats. To consider yourself worthy of the upper house over all the other accomplished politicos in your state takes a lot of chutzpah indeed.
And then of course as your ego feeds on the glories heaped upon itself the senate gets a little crowded and small. You have get the ego out where the whole nation can nurture it as you announce you're running for President as the champion of the little guy. (All Democratic presidential candidates claim to be for the "little guy," then they get elected and stick it to him.)
By 2008, in the midst of his second campaign, Edwards' ego was large enough to have its own staff. But his wife was dealing with cancer which did not feed his ego and actually interfered with it. In spite of this Edwards faded out of the spot light in deference to his ailing wife. Well, good for him we thought.
We thought.
Actually he was carrying on an affair with one of his campaign staffers who was eventually with child. The ego was alive and well, but this was just too big and too many yahoos knew too much. The Senator arranged for an aide to claim the baby to throw any wolves off the trail. Only an ego the size of Edwards' would have presumed this would work. Media operatives were suspicious and point-blank asked the Senator what he knew, their fires stoked by the story having broken in a check-out line publication. But Edwards' ego permitted him to lie his way out. After all, the country desperately needed his leadership!
The ensuing media storm has been ferocious. Some are furious that the aide, Andrew Young, dared to subsequently expose Edwards' lies. Edwards, after all, was a big-government Democrat; those who throw stones at big-government Democrats must be soundly and immediately discredited and destroyed in current mainstream-media thinking. Others have apologized for Edwards, explaining his behavior away in terms of an aristocratic, demanding wife who is defined by a violent temper. "Why," they say, "wouldn't he be easily attracted to a kinder, more charismatic woman who makes herself available?"
No one seems to hold Edwards himself accountable except for millions of us out herein flyover country.
Young, who has written a book, is not received warmly by the news shows and pundits who couldn't stuff this one under the carpet for their boy. They are sick that Edwards was nailed so effortlessly by -- of all publications -- The National Enquirer and soon thereafter by Andrew Young and his book. Obama may be the star in the movie about Democratic politics in 2008 but Edwards was their Best Supporting Actor; too close to the top (read: Too Big) to fail.
All of these stories have a life cycle, and this one has run through it. With a little media help Edwards will now lay low somewhere in an exclusive apartment and wait for his wife to die. The Enquirer has snuffed out his political career for now. The only thing he has to be thankful for is that he's not a Republican. If he were, that life cycle would run for years.
The depth of his self-interest is way beyond that of us mortals. You know, just to begin with, you have to have a pretty substantial ego to be a lawyer. To strive, as your life's work, to extract honestly earned money from companies engaged in legal enterprises--yes, tobacco companies are legal, and sell honest products--to compensate people who claim they didn't know smoking was unhealthy is -- well, nuts.
All the arguments of smoking aside, no one made those folks take up smoking or stay with it. People quit with good results all the time. The point of it all is to overcome this much fairness and rational thinking, a trial lawyer has to have a grand vision powered by a massive ego.
You need a little ego as well if you're running for one of your state's two senate seats. To consider yourself worthy of the upper house over all the other accomplished politicos in your state takes a lot of chutzpah indeed.
And then of course as your ego feeds on the glories heaped upon itself the senate gets a little crowded and small. You have get the ego out where the whole nation can nurture it as you announce you're running for President as the champion of the little guy. (All Democratic presidential candidates claim to be for the "little guy," then they get elected and stick it to him.)
By 2008, in the midst of his second campaign, Edwards' ego was large enough to have its own staff. But his wife was dealing with cancer which did not feed his ego and actually interfered with it. In spite of this Edwards faded out of the spot light in deference to his ailing wife. Well, good for him we thought.
We thought.
Actually he was carrying on an affair with one of his campaign staffers who was eventually with child. The ego was alive and well, but this was just too big and too many yahoos knew too much. The Senator arranged for an aide to claim the baby to throw any wolves off the trail. Only an ego the size of Edwards' would have presumed this would work. Media operatives were suspicious and point-blank asked the Senator what he knew, their fires stoked by the story having broken in a check-out line publication. But Edwards' ego permitted him to lie his way out. After all, the country desperately needed his leadership!
The ensuing media storm has been ferocious. Some are furious that the aide, Andrew Young, dared to subsequently expose Edwards' lies. Edwards, after all, was a big-government Democrat; those who throw stones at big-government Democrats must be soundly and immediately discredited and destroyed in current mainstream-media thinking. Others have apologized for Edwards, explaining his behavior away in terms of an aristocratic, demanding wife who is defined by a violent temper. "Why," they say, "wouldn't he be easily attracted to a kinder, more charismatic woman who makes herself available?"
No one seems to hold Edwards himself accountable except for millions of us out herein flyover country.
Young, who has written a book, is not received warmly by the news shows and pundits who couldn't stuff this one under the carpet for their boy. They are sick that Edwards was nailed so effortlessly by -- of all publications -- The National Enquirer and soon thereafter by Andrew Young and his book. Obama may be the star in the movie about Democratic politics in 2008 but Edwards was their Best Supporting Actor; too close to the top (read: Too Big) to fail.
All of these stories have a life cycle, and this one has run through it. With a little media help Edwards will now lay low somewhere in an exclusive apartment and wait for his wife to die. The Enquirer has snuffed out his political career for now. The only thing he has to be thankful for is that he's not a Republican. If he were, that life cycle would run for years.
Monday, February 1, 2010
Home sweet home
It is evermore good to be home. My Las Vegas trip was a disaster for me. I had a combination sinus infection, common cold and bad attitude. Oh, how I didn't want to be there.
I thought at least the dry desert climate would make me feel better but alas it rained off and on and was in the 40's. Cold rain doesn't clear the head. An odd combination of ibuprofen and Day-Quil got me through, along with probably 500 pounds of Kleenex. Nothing much helped the bad attitude except coming home.
Sitting in meetings hour after hour is draining. The lack of activity and the buffet lunches disrupted my feeble attempt to eat well. The worst thing was an incredible lack of coffee.
The hotel didn't see wasting money on in-room coffee makers like most business-oriented hotels offer. Of course this was a resort with a casino, not a Holiday Inn Express. They had a Starbucks counter that opens at six, but I get up at five and like coffee first thing--not an elevator ride and long walk down the hall away. I am still trying to get back to normal.
And of course there is something ironic about listening to a briefing on master labor agreements for employees who haven't had a raise in five years while sitting in a meeting room of a hotel charging a hundred bucks a night to ninety or so people. I know the hundred large this event cost the company wouldn't fund much for hourly wage increases, but they could have bought every single employee a steak dinner or new winter jacket. That would have been money better spent in my humble opinion. Everything else could have been put in a letter.
The whole Vegas thing didn't make sense. They ran the meetings so late that the hotel shuttle over to the strip closed down before anyone could make good use of it and not that many gambled anyway. And for a lot of us, Las Vegas is a two-segment ride on an airplane which burns more time on either end than a meeting held in a hub like Dallas, Atlanta or Denver.
There is a lot I don't understand in life and they're coming out with more all the time so I can't dwell on this very long. But that was four days of my life I won't get back. Maybe that was what caused the bad attitude.
I thought at least the dry desert climate would make me feel better but alas it rained off and on and was in the 40's. Cold rain doesn't clear the head. An odd combination of ibuprofen and Day-Quil got me through, along with probably 500 pounds of Kleenex. Nothing much helped the bad attitude except coming home.
Sitting in meetings hour after hour is draining. The lack of activity and the buffet lunches disrupted my feeble attempt to eat well. The worst thing was an incredible lack of coffee.
The hotel didn't see wasting money on in-room coffee makers like most business-oriented hotels offer. Of course this was a resort with a casino, not a Holiday Inn Express. They had a Starbucks counter that opens at six, but I get up at five and like coffee first thing--not an elevator ride and long walk down the hall away. I am still trying to get back to normal.
And of course there is something ironic about listening to a briefing on master labor agreements for employees who haven't had a raise in five years while sitting in a meeting room of a hotel charging a hundred bucks a night to ninety or so people. I know the hundred large this event cost the company wouldn't fund much for hourly wage increases, but they could have bought every single employee a steak dinner or new winter jacket. That would have been money better spent in my humble opinion. Everything else could have been put in a letter.
The whole Vegas thing didn't make sense. They ran the meetings so late that the hotel shuttle over to the strip closed down before anyone could make good use of it and not that many gambled anyway. And for a lot of us, Las Vegas is a two-segment ride on an airplane which burns more time on either end than a meeting held in a hub like Dallas, Atlanta or Denver.
There is a lot I don't understand in life and they're coming out with more all the time so I can't dwell on this very long. But that was four days of my life I won't get back. Maybe that was what caused the bad attitude.
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Not like Moses at all.
The company has been telling me for weeks that I must go to a meeting of managers from each station, to be held next week in the glittering desert oasis of Las Vegas. In the universe of station managers and corporate directors this is much-anticipated. They will wear expensive clothing and say heady things to the throng, making pronouncements in consultant-speak. Evenings hold the promise of good times at the bar and craps tables.
I don't want to go.
There is nothing I can think of that will interest me less than three days in a corporate prison, captive to suits telling us we must continue to operate "lean" and challenging us to have fewer injuries, accidents, delay time and a richer bottom line. Don't we all know that anyway--that we are supposed to gain efficiency and improve safety? Do we really need three days out of the shop to be aware of that?
I know some of these guys are licking their chops to get there. Perhaps it is to make presentations of successes forged in their shops at home, and get a public pat on the head from a vice-president. Maybe it is to refresh old friendships with former coworkers and acquaintances. Or maybe it is appealing for the prospect of such base activities as unchecked consumption of alcohol, gambling or the engagement of a paid escort. I have worked with folks who just don't do well without their wives to manage available free time.
For me, there are several reasons I balk at all this.
First, I could care less about gambling or the other sins of Vegas. While I love the desert climate, I am happily married and have no interest in professional women; I don't drink much at all; and unlike others who are actual managers, paid well by the company, I am in reality a much lower-paid supervisor-in-charge with scant funds for wagering. (I guess it makes me a joyless person not to take interest in gambling. Aside from not being lucky or skillful, I think I would rather just give a homeless fellow the $25 that most folks say they're willing to lose in a casino outing.) Believe me, I would just as soon be at home with my family from whom I am absent too much.
Second, in other travels I've had with this enterprise, I really haven't cared much for the people I've met. They tend to be pompous, demanding, competitive and arrogant. None of those qualities are endearing; less so in a dying industry which was never respected to begin with. It would be refreshing to meet people in my company who seem grateful just to be working. Not so.
Third, I am just not into this anymore. I would be happy to park cars or pump gas, without concern for monthly budgets and food cost and payroll. With only a few short years until a hopeful retirement, I lack elan for the business or the people who are in charge of it. Sufficient work exists now. Enough words have been uttered by consultants. Leave us alone.
And finally, I noted that the meetings are at a pricey resort just outside the city. Why should a corporation, struggling financially to stay on the good side of its owners, spend $175 a night, plus meals, airfare, and other incidental costs which eighty people will expense? Put it all in a letter. Print a brochure. Have a conference call and interrupt an afternoon instead of a week.
This is the kind of poor corporate judgment that AIG and Lehman Brothers displayed. No public money is involved, but how can the parent company allow this? (I guess I would have a little more respect if they were using a Super 8 and meeting in Dallas at the HQ building. All the HQ people could go home at night, saving a lot.)
The sleep I will lose, the time I will sacrifice and the money just our shop will waste on this venture into the desert is significant. Moses led his people into the desert back to Israel. I am just being led into the desert, period. Moses didn't have to listen to consultants.
I don't want to go.
There is nothing I can think of that will interest me less than three days in a corporate prison, captive to suits telling us we must continue to operate "lean" and challenging us to have fewer injuries, accidents, delay time and a richer bottom line. Don't we all know that anyway--that we are supposed to gain efficiency and improve safety? Do we really need three days out of the shop to be aware of that?
I know some of these guys are licking their chops to get there. Perhaps it is to make presentations of successes forged in their shops at home, and get a public pat on the head from a vice-president. Maybe it is to refresh old friendships with former coworkers and acquaintances. Or maybe it is appealing for the prospect of such base activities as unchecked consumption of alcohol, gambling or the engagement of a paid escort. I have worked with folks who just don't do well without their wives to manage available free time.
For me, there are several reasons I balk at all this.
First, I could care less about gambling or the other sins of Vegas. While I love the desert climate, I am happily married and have no interest in professional women; I don't drink much at all; and unlike others who are actual managers, paid well by the company, I am in reality a much lower-paid supervisor-in-charge with scant funds for wagering. (I guess it makes me a joyless person not to take interest in gambling. Aside from not being lucky or skillful, I think I would rather just give a homeless fellow the $25 that most folks say they're willing to lose in a casino outing.) Believe me, I would just as soon be at home with my family from whom I am absent too much.
Second, in other travels I've had with this enterprise, I really haven't cared much for the people I've met. They tend to be pompous, demanding, competitive and arrogant. None of those qualities are endearing; less so in a dying industry which was never respected to begin with. It would be refreshing to meet people in my company who seem grateful just to be working. Not so.
Third, I am just not into this anymore. I would be happy to park cars or pump gas, without concern for monthly budgets and food cost and payroll. With only a few short years until a hopeful retirement, I lack elan for the business or the people who are in charge of it. Sufficient work exists now. Enough words have been uttered by consultants. Leave us alone.
And finally, I noted that the meetings are at a pricey resort just outside the city. Why should a corporation, struggling financially to stay on the good side of its owners, spend $175 a night, plus meals, airfare, and other incidental costs which eighty people will expense? Put it all in a letter. Print a brochure. Have a conference call and interrupt an afternoon instead of a week.
This is the kind of poor corporate judgment that AIG and Lehman Brothers displayed. No public money is involved, but how can the parent company allow this? (I guess I would have a little more respect if they were using a Super 8 and meeting in Dallas at the HQ building. All the HQ people could go home at night, saving a lot.)
The sleep I will lose, the time I will sacrifice and the money just our shop will waste on this venture into the desert is significant. Moses led his people into the desert back to Israel. I am just being led into the desert, period. Moses didn't have to listen to consultants.
Monday, January 11, 2010
Winter wonderland
Apparently the holidays are over. I have no idea where they went. I know they were here because I have no money left and I put the tree back in the box myself. The rest of it just passed me by.
Well not quite. It snowed. It snowed a lot, several times, starting with the big one on Christmas Eve. It snowed like Jack the Bear. And it got really cold. Minneapolis cold, Fairbanks cold. It is just now approaching freezing for the first time in about two weeks. The snow is not the worst part. The extended zero-degree weather outranks it. All of it is to be expected--for after all it's winter on the prairies--and all the cheery TV weather personalities got their "White Christmas" which they breathlessly had anticipated for two weeks. Maybe they should all church up on my driveway.
But this much snow, this regularly, is unusual here. We've already had over 20 inches, more than all of last year's snows combined. Parking lots are punctuated with semi-truck-high piles of snow. Road crews have labored countless hours behind plows. When the sun is out it's a blinding white world lacking only polar bears. We have had a whole season's worth of winter in about three weeks. And I'm not complaining. If I didn't want winter I would have gone to Arizona a long time ago.
The last few years have had relatively little snow. It seemed the extreme cold was a little less. Then this year the hammer came down, so I guess it all equals out. The climate change fanatics will claim both that the last few milder winters and this arctic one are--in their dememted view--clear signs of drastic climate alteration. I don't think so. I would agree that the climate has changed enough that the glaciers melted, but that might be a function of the earth's axis doing its slow turn--nothing you caused with your Dodge Ram or your Weber ourdoor grill.
It simply seems noteworthy that winter is off to a rather unusual flying start. The last one I remember with temperatures like these, for this long, was in December 1989. Somehow we survived that and Spring came along again. I just regret that the holidays, with all their joy and warmth, go by in a flash and yet they leave us the cold for three long months, which do not go by in a flash. I am pretty sure that the compacted snow on my driveway will be sparkling all winter to remind us of our very own winter olympics.
Now the thaw is under way. I can see patches of concrete and aging acorn husks on the edge of my walk. Warm weather is coming fast!
Well not quite. It snowed. It snowed a lot, several times, starting with the big one on Christmas Eve. It snowed like Jack the Bear. And it got really cold. Minneapolis cold, Fairbanks cold. It is just now approaching freezing for the first time in about two weeks. The snow is not the worst part. The extended zero-degree weather outranks it. All of it is to be expected--for after all it's winter on the prairies--and all the cheery TV weather personalities got their "White Christmas" which they breathlessly had anticipated for two weeks. Maybe they should all church up on my driveway.
But this much snow, this regularly, is unusual here. We've already had over 20 inches, more than all of last year's snows combined. Parking lots are punctuated with semi-truck-high piles of snow. Road crews have labored countless hours behind plows. When the sun is out it's a blinding white world lacking only polar bears. We have had a whole season's worth of winter in about three weeks. And I'm not complaining. If I didn't want winter I would have gone to Arizona a long time ago.
The last few years have had relatively little snow. It seemed the extreme cold was a little less. Then this year the hammer came down, so I guess it all equals out. The climate change fanatics will claim both that the last few milder winters and this arctic one are--in their dememted view--clear signs of drastic climate alteration. I don't think so. I would agree that the climate has changed enough that the glaciers melted, but that might be a function of the earth's axis doing its slow turn--nothing you caused with your Dodge Ram or your Weber ourdoor grill.
It simply seems noteworthy that winter is off to a rather unusual flying start. The last one I remember with temperatures like these, for this long, was in December 1989. Somehow we survived that and Spring came along again. I just regret that the holidays, with all their joy and warmth, go by in a flash and yet they leave us the cold for three long months, which do not go by in a flash. I am pretty sure that the compacted snow on my driveway will be sparkling all winter to remind us of our very own winter olympics.
Now the thaw is under way. I can see patches of concrete and aging acorn husks on the edge of my walk. Warm weather is coming fast!
Monday, December 14, 2009
Deck the Halls...
There are a few things missing to make Christmas official for me besides the tree, lights and presents. Some of them go way back, some are recent. But they all have to be there or somehow it just isn't right.
For those of us a certain age there are the necessary movies to be seen.
*Any time after Thanksgiving, but best on the Friday after, is Miracle on 34th Street. None but the original black-and-white will do. Only John Payne, Maureen O'Hara, Edmund Gwynn and Natalie Wood can set the holiday mood for the ensuing five weeks.
*The modern classic, Christmas Vacation, is essential as well. Chevy Chase is a bit of a horse's ass but I have to admit he was good as the hapless Clark, trying to deliver the perfect family Christmas to his clan. I don't know, somehow I can identify with him -- and his failures, mostly. That could easily have been me sorting through hundreds of bulbs, searching in vain for the one that killed the whole show. There are hundreds of quotable lines from that movie.
*White Christmas. When I was a kid, the Wichita TV stations we received inexplicably ran this on New Year's Eve. It didn't make any difference. White Christmas kind of rounded out the holiday experience but it unfortunately always reminded me, on New Year's Eve, that school was about to resume.
*Go ahead and laugh. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer still has a place in the holiday schedule. If you feel you are too old and dignified to watch this, kids around or not, you are cold-hearted, without spirit and probably smell of Ben-Gay and Mentholatum.
*A few others--Going My Way, A Christmas Story and A Christmas Carol. If you can say it was truly a great holiday season without at least one of these you probably gave out gift cards as presents. My Christmas Carol, by the way, is the one with George C. Scott. He was another horse's ass in person, but he evermore made me believe he was Scrooge.
It isn't just movies. You have to get the L.L. Bean catalog to look through, and imagine getting and wearing all their great winter clothes for the next three months until Spring breaks. Like that would ever happen. Then there are the classic Hickory Farms and Harry and David food catalogs, loaded with ridiculously expensive gift boxes of sausage, pears and jellies. It is all good but Harry and David are sure proud of their products. People love to get them though. I recall my dad received a couple of these jewels every year the last week before Christmas. I don't know who sent them; I just remember I was happy they did.
A couple of other things: you have to go to a party and you have to go look at the lights on the Plaza. A party doesn't hold as much as it used to. Often as not, we'll get a work-related invitation and don't know anyone else there, or it is so out of our league {read: classy) that we are the brown shoes to the social tuxedo. Or both, with us completely unsure why we were invited to begin with. The parties were more fun when they were people we knew, but the people that know us won't invite us to their parties any more so we just operate on the outer edge of any kind of society.
Who cannot be moved by the sight of the Country Club Plaza set aglow by miles of colored lights? If you don't have to work there it's a true holiday icon. With all the shop windows to explore and the bustle of people everywhere, an evening there during the season reminds me that some things never change. All of the sights and aromas of holiday shopping are part of the complete experience. Of course, the Plaza has a lot of high-end stores which have nothing I could afford to buy, let alone give as a present. It is just fun to cruise through and watch the high rollers spend their money.
You don't have to have the glowing tree and a lot of expensive presents (athough there is a lot to be said for them) or rich friends and a crowded social calendar. Sometimes it's just staying up and watching an old movie late at night that truly makes it Christmas. And going back to work the next day to remind you that Scrooge is out there too.
For those of us a certain age there are the necessary movies to be seen.
*Any time after Thanksgiving, but best on the Friday after, is Miracle on 34th Street. None but the original black-and-white will do. Only John Payne, Maureen O'Hara, Edmund Gwynn and Natalie Wood can set the holiday mood for the ensuing five weeks.
*The modern classic, Christmas Vacation, is essential as well. Chevy Chase is a bit of a horse's ass but I have to admit he was good as the hapless Clark, trying to deliver the perfect family Christmas to his clan. I don't know, somehow I can identify with him -- and his failures, mostly. That could easily have been me sorting through hundreds of bulbs, searching in vain for the one that killed the whole show. There are hundreds of quotable lines from that movie.
*White Christmas. When I was a kid, the Wichita TV stations we received inexplicably ran this on New Year's Eve. It didn't make any difference. White Christmas kind of rounded out the holiday experience but it unfortunately always reminded me, on New Year's Eve, that school was about to resume.
*Go ahead and laugh. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer still has a place in the holiday schedule. If you feel you are too old and dignified to watch this, kids around or not, you are cold-hearted, without spirit and probably smell of Ben-Gay and Mentholatum.
*A few others--Going My Way, A Christmas Story and A Christmas Carol. If you can say it was truly a great holiday season without at least one of these you probably gave out gift cards as presents. My Christmas Carol, by the way, is the one with George C. Scott. He was another horse's ass in person, but he evermore made me believe he was Scrooge.
It isn't just movies. You have to get the L.L. Bean catalog to look through, and imagine getting and wearing all their great winter clothes for the next three months until Spring breaks. Like that would ever happen. Then there are the classic Hickory Farms and Harry and David food catalogs, loaded with ridiculously expensive gift boxes of sausage, pears and jellies. It is all good but Harry and David are sure proud of their products. People love to get them though. I recall my dad received a couple of these jewels every year the last week before Christmas. I don't know who sent them; I just remember I was happy they did.
A couple of other things: you have to go to a party and you have to go look at the lights on the Plaza. A party doesn't hold as much as it used to. Often as not, we'll get a work-related invitation and don't know anyone else there, or it is so out of our league {read: classy) that we are the brown shoes to the social tuxedo. Or both, with us completely unsure why we were invited to begin with. The parties were more fun when they were people we knew, but the people that know us won't invite us to their parties any more so we just operate on the outer edge of any kind of society.
Who cannot be moved by the sight of the Country Club Plaza set aglow by miles of colored lights? If you don't have to work there it's a true holiday icon. With all the shop windows to explore and the bustle of people everywhere, an evening there during the season reminds me that some things never change. All of the sights and aromas of holiday shopping are part of the complete experience. Of course, the Plaza has a lot of high-end stores which have nothing I could afford to buy, let alone give as a present. It is just fun to cruise through and watch the high rollers spend their money.
You don't have to have the glowing tree and a lot of expensive presents (athough there is a lot to be said for them) or rich friends and a crowded social calendar. Sometimes it's just staying up and watching an old movie late at night that truly makes it Christmas. And going back to work the next day to remind you that Scrooge is out there too.
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Merry Christmas 2009
Here is our annual Christmas letter, just slightly early this year. I have noticed over the last few years that the number of family Christmas letters we receive has fallen off a little, and I really don't know why? Of course, I'm surprised when we get cards or letters from anyone at all.
Hello Friends,
With another year having evaded us we know you are all anxious to hear what direction our lives have taken, which frankly—if true—does not speak very highly of any of you. So put down your US magazines because we bring Christmas Greetings from the swamp of banality here in America’s heartlands.
While many of you may be misled by the opulence of our daily lives we actually have very simple existence. Mary Ann still trudges in to St. Pius to lead the Advancement Team which in turn struggles to lead the Board, Principal and interested Alums into the 21st Century, often with mixed results. In the last year, fund raising has lagged in priority as Mary Ann has become increasingly responsible for cleaning toilets and setting up folding tables. She does a wonderful job, attacking each fecal-encrusted American-Standard with the same credo that took her to these heights: “Any job worth doing is worth doing right!” Pity the poor fat-ass who fouls the faculty toilet if she ever finds out who it is.
As the business has sufficiently deteriorated, LSG felt comfortable leaving Bob in charge of the shop and promoted their manager out of Kansas City. Awash in a sea of dark-ages European accounting and ever-deepening governmental regulations he once again suffers with accountability. Not unlike the President, he spends money he doesn’t have doing things the owners really don’t want done. But unlike the President, he knows that Lufthansa may eventually come to their senses and demand their keys be returned. Other than listening to everyone’s problems and working weekends, the steady stream of government inspectors and arrogant customers have created an ideal work environment. Part of life is a daily mantra just to be thankful to be working, but hardly anyone believes this who has been in any part of the airline industry.
Katie has fared somewhat better. No, she still baby sits both in a physician’s office and at the local Methodist church, but she is alive. In January, only months after having found a car with which she was truly in love, she was forced off a freeway onto the icy shoulder. Losing control on the ice she careened back across all three lanes of I-635 facing back the wrong way as she came to rest on the center barrier with her beloved chariot in ruins. “It gave its life for me,” she intoned. She acquired another car, lost fifteen pounds, joined a gym and continues to not cook, feeding mostly on crap from fast-food emporiums.
Liz and family have enjoyed the usual trappings of youth: childhood sicknesses, squabbles, injuries, etc., but the real highlight of their year came in October when Brett’s company suddenly terminated his job. Having been recruited to this company by a fellow member of the parish less than a year prior, Brett was repaid by having his insurance immediately cut off. Once the shock subsided he secured work as a limo driver. As usual, and true to life, he says lawyers are the worst tippers. Their kids are fine: Robbie is all about sports; Annie is all about being a Princess; Stevie is all about having a driveway on which to pee.
In spite of protests from the Governor and tourism office, we all went back to Colorado for our week in the mountains. It was a great week, but this year we were visited by bears raiding nearby trash containers at night. Mary Ann thought it great fun to have them around, and one even strolled past her in downtown Estes Park. Bob thought it more prudent to not stand on the deck at night, take their pictures and otherwise attract the bears’ attention as they have a limited sense of humor. We did not have the food of kings in our cabin, but bears are happy to eat crap too. Steve gleefully acquired and used a Whoopee cushion which finally split open from fatigue. He tearfully told everyone he would never, ever have another one.
Just this once, we approached the lives of real people when Mary Ann was notified she had been nominated for – and won – a civic award in the memory of Anne Robb Townsend, an honor to which she replied a gracious “Yeah, OK” to Guy Townsend when he called. With something akin to Cousin Eddie visiting the Griswold home, the whole family was invited to the River Club for the presentation ceremony wherein we were treated to drink from clean glasses and sit on unstained furniture. The River Club, we noticed, had an armed guard at the door ostensibly employed to deny entrance to people like us.
Apparently Mary Ann’s dedication, stamina and help from heavy-hitting seniors iced her win. We’d like to say the award changed her life, and it did in that her peers perceived her somehow able to clean more toilets than ever before. Mary Ann’s photo will be in At Home in the Northland, but few we know will see it as this magazine is distributed only to elegant households earning $200,000 annually and up. Of course that means we won’t see it either.
With Brett still out of work, uncertainty in the airline business, and the unbroken line of foul toilets into the horizon it has been a challenging year. We are too young to retire, too useless to find other work and pretty much unmotivated as well. So it’s good to get our letter out first this year before we receive the news from all those untouched by the stench of life that we know so well--and to which we always feel obligated to mockingly reply. With people all around us turning 60--and up—now we have to worry about ear hair and varicose veins. It isn’t looking good for us right now, but hell, it never looked good anyway, so Merry Christmas. Now let’s go take our country back!
Hello Friends,
With another year having evaded us we know you are all anxious to hear what direction our lives have taken, which frankly—if true—does not speak very highly of any of you. So put down your US magazines because we bring Christmas Greetings from the swamp of banality here in America’s heartlands.
While many of you may be misled by the opulence of our daily lives we actually have very simple existence. Mary Ann still trudges in to St. Pius to lead the Advancement Team which in turn struggles to lead the Board, Principal and interested Alums into the 21st Century, often with mixed results. In the last year, fund raising has lagged in priority as Mary Ann has become increasingly responsible for cleaning toilets and setting up folding tables. She does a wonderful job, attacking each fecal-encrusted American-Standard with the same credo that took her to these heights: “Any job worth doing is worth doing right!” Pity the poor fat-ass who fouls the faculty toilet if she ever finds out who it is.
As the business has sufficiently deteriorated, LSG felt comfortable leaving Bob in charge of the shop and promoted their manager out of Kansas City. Awash in a sea of dark-ages European accounting and ever-deepening governmental regulations he once again suffers with accountability. Not unlike the President, he spends money he doesn’t have doing things the owners really don’t want done. But unlike the President, he knows that Lufthansa may eventually come to their senses and demand their keys be returned. Other than listening to everyone’s problems and working weekends, the steady stream of government inspectors and arrogant customers have created an ideal work environment. Part of life is a daily mantra just to be thankful to be working, but hardly anyone believes this who has been in any part of the airline industry.
Katie has fared somewhat better. No, she still baby sits both in a physician’s office and at the local Methodist church, but she is alive. In January, only months after having found a car with which she was truly in love, she was forced off a freeway onto the icy shoulder. Losing control on the ice she careened back across all three lanes of I-635 facing back the wrong way as she came to rest on the center barrier with her beloved chariot in ruins. “It gave its life for me,” she intoned. She acquired another car, lost fifteen pounds, joined a gym and continues to not cook, feeding mostly on crap from fast-food emporiums.
Liz and family have enjoyed the usual trappings of youth: childhood sicknesses, squabbles, injuries, etc., but the real highlight of their year came in October when Brett’s company suddenly terminated his job. Having been recruited to this company by a fellow member of the parish less than a year prior, Brett was repaid by having his insurance immediately cut off. Once the shock subsided he secured work as a limo driver. As usual, and true to life, he says lawyers are the worst tippers. Their kids are fine: Robbie is all about sports; Annie is all about being a Princess; Stevie is all about having a driveway on which to pee.
In spite of protests from the Governor and tourism office, we all went back to Colorado for our week in the mountains. It was a great week, but this year we were visited by bears raiding nearby trash containers at night. Mary Ann thought it great fun to have them around, and one even strolled past her in downtown Estes Park. Bob thought it more prudent to not stand on the deck at night, take their pictures and otherwise attract the bears’ attention as they have a limited sense of humor. We did not have the food of kings in our cabin, but bears are happy to eat crap too. Steve gleefully acquired and used a Whoopee cushion which finally split open from fatigue. He tearfully told everyone he would never, ever have another one.
Just this once, we approached the lives of real people when Mary Ann was notified she had been nominated for – and won – a civic award in the memory of Anne Robb Townsend, an honor to which she replied a gracious “Yeah, OK” to Guy Townsend when he called. With something akin to Cousin Eddie visiting the Griswold home, the whole family was invited to the River Club for the presentation ceremony wherein we were treated to drink from clean glasses and sit on unstained furniture. The River Club, we noticed, had an armed guard at the door ostensibly employed to deny entrance to people like us.
Apparently Mary Ann’s dedication, stamina and help from heavy-hitting seniors iced her win. We’d like to say the award changed her life, and it did in that her peers perceived her somehow able to clean more toilets than ever before. Mary Ann’s photo will be in At Home in the Northland, but few we know will see it as this magazine is distributed only to elegant households earning $200,000 annually and up. Of course that means we won’t see it either.
With Brett still out of work, uncertainty in the airline business, and the unbroken line of foul toilets into the horizon it has been a challenging year. We are too young to retire, too useless to find other work and pretty much unmotivated as well. So it’s good to get our letter out first this year before we receive the news from all those untouched by the stench of life that we know so well--and to which we always feel obligated to mockingly reply. With people all around us turning 60--and up—now we have to worry about ear hair and varicose veins. It isn’t looking good for us right now, but hell, it never looked good anyway, so Merry Christmas. Now let’s go take our country back!
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Random thoughts.
Once in a while, the well fills up with crap from the barnyard and I have to clean it all out to make room for the water. That was a metaphor; for those literalists among you I simply have to rid myself of the pile of random thoughts that accumulate in my head in order for me to think.
For instance: A government panel just announced that most women should delay mammograms until age 50 or later, in complete and utter opposition to modern medical practice. Countless women have intercepted breast cancers at all ages due to early detection. It appears this is the first step to government rationed care: saying really stupid things and saying it often enough at high levels so everyone will think it's true. So where is the outrage from the National Organization of Women?
Is there a mathematical correlation between facial hair, beer-drinking and camouflage-wearing?
Peyton Manning is better in commercials than professional actors. He is actually funny.
Sarah Palin comes off as a bright, strong and energetic person, well-versed in issues of the day. Understandably her opponents and the mainstream press (one and the same) have tried to make her into a shallow Barbie-doll, moved up onto the national stage only to cash in on her good looks. Tina Fey heartily enjoyed perpetuating this concept with her SNL impersonations. If the National Organization of Women purports to be a voice on behalf of women, where is their outrage at Palin's dissing?
Why is the 'delete' key so close to the 'end' key and the arrow keys? Put it up on the top row where it won't be erroneously hit. By me.
Why do airlines have dining service departments with up to fifty employees? They don't board food on any but the longest flights, mostly those going overseas. Does anyone wonder why they don't make money operating like this?
Who was the first person to realize that a rattlesnake was poisonous?
The people running our government(s) remind me--as I have said before--of the fat kid guarding the pie. Like Ronald Reagan said, don't believe anyone who says "Hi, I'm from the government and I'm here to help."
The forecasters always give rain probability in percentages; shouldn't it always be 50%? Either it will rain or it won't.
When the coalition forces drove the Taliban out of Afghanistan in the months after 9-11, the Islamic government which had oppressed its own women for years was replaced by one that brought women into the present. Women could hold jobs, be seen in public, wear clothes of their choosing and attend school. The Taliban didn't even permit women to go to freakin' school, people. Again, where was the outrage from the National Organization of Women? They are too shy and retiring to comment on the abysmal treatment of their sisters in that Seventh-century land? Amazingly NOW could not bring themselves to cheer the betterment of Afghan women as a byproduct of dislocation of terrorists. I guess the Afghan women weren't clamoring for abortions?
I do not understand why I have 500 CD's and only four cases for them. Where do they go?
Ron White is a funny, funny man, but he's 50+ years old so it's time to give up pot, Ron. Stick to the scotch--it's legal and will mess you up just as bad. Of course, I'm sure you know that by now.
99% of lawyers give the other 1% a bad name. It pains me to say that because my daddy was a lawyer. I am certain however that he would be as appalled as I at the state of legal affairs in this country. Lawyers advertising like payday loan companies, lawyers proudly--with straight faces--speaking in defense of criminals who have done unspeakable things, lawyers overtly waiting for
nothing more than their opportunity to run for public office. I really wish state bar associations would police lawyers. Physicians do it.
My wife has taken to putting wallet size pictures of me under the kitchen sink. No roaches, no mice; hell, nothing can live under there now.
Cell phones are getting to be a problem on the road. The state should force women to get an endorsement for their driver licenses allowing them to talk and drive. Women, I say, beause men don't use cells on the roll so much. Women turn the key and fire up the Sanyo. Then they cruise around the parking lot at all of 2 miles per hour.
I don't know, I could be wrong, but he National Organization of Women may not actually be all that interested in the welfare of women. They selectively choose women to support: never conservatives, never women who benefit from the victories of the United States Army operating under a Republican president, never women who speak out against liberal politicians. Should they not change the name of the club to National Organization of Liberal Women? Call a spade a spade.
Everyone knows who Columbus was, but no one knows the names of the folks on the dock who were laughing at him.
Liberals are an odd bunch. They don't like to produce anything (well, poetry or water colors, maybe) but they like to run things. They don't care much to be in manufacturing, service, military or financial industries being suited only for lawyering and government work. They love to tell the rest of us how we should be. Anyone who tells them how they should be is denounced and in some countries, awarded the Order of Heavy Industry and sent to Siberia. Believe me, if it ever happens, the Black Helicopters will come from the Left.
Dave Barry says, correctly, that folks who always want to tell you about their religion almost never want you to tell them about yours.
This is a great country. Either the hand of God or an accident of birth put us all here but how lucky we are. We can bitch about the government and not fear for our freedom. We have flush toilets and air conditioning. If you want to quit your job and move to New Mexico and sit cross-legged in the sun on the desert, you can do it and no one can stop you. You do not fear anything as long as you obey most of the laws and stay out of the bad parts of town and mind your own business. Much of the world can't even comprehend any of this. We take a lot of it for granted and shouldn't because it would go away if not for some gusty folks in the armed services. So thanks, God. It's nice to be able to clean out the well.
Happy Thanksgiving.
For instance: A government panel just announced that most women should delay mammograms until age 50 or later, in complete and utter opposition to modern medical practice. Countless women have intercepted breast cancers at all ages due to early detection. It appears this is the first step to government rationed care: saying really stupid things and saying it often enough at high levels so everyone will think it's true. So where is the outrage from the National Organization of Women?
Is there a mathematical correlation between facial hair, beer-drinking and camouflage-wearing?
Peyton Manning is better in commercials than professional actors. He is actually funny.
Sarah Palin comes off as a bright, strong and energetic person, well-versed in issues of the day. Understandably her opponents and the mainstream press (one and the same) have tried to make her into a shallow Barbie-doll, moved up onto the national stage only to cash in on her good looks. Tina Fey heartily enjoyed perpetuating this concept with her SNL impersonations. If the National Organization of Women purports to be a voice on behalf of women, where is their outrage at Palin's dissing?
Why is the 'delete' key so close to the 'end' key and the arrow keys? Put it up on the top row where it won't be erroneously hit. By me.
Why do airlines have dining service departments with up to fifty employees? They don't board food on any but the longest flights, mostly those going overseas. Does anyone wonder why they don't make money operating like this?
Who was the first person to realize that a rattlesnake was poisonous?
The people running our government(s) remind me--as I have said before--of the fat kid guarding the pie. Like Ronald Reagan said, don't believe anyone who says "Hi, I'm from the government and I'm here to help."
The forecasters always give rain probability in percentages; shouldn't it always be 50%? Either it will rain or it won't.
When the coalition forces drove the Taliban out of Afghanistan in the months after 9-11, the Islamic government which had oppressed its own women for years was replaced by one that brought women into the present. Women could hold jobs, be seen in public, wear clothes of their choosing and attend school. The Taliban didn't even permit women to go to freakin' school, people. Again, where was the outrage from the National Organization of Women? They are too shy and retiring to comment on the abysmal treatment of their sisters in that Seventh-century land? Amazingly NOW could not bring themselves to cheer the betterment of Afghan women as a byproduct of dislocation of terrorists. I guess the Afghan women weren't clamoring for abortions?
I do not understand why I have 500 CD's and only four cases for them. Where do they go?
Ron White is a funny, funny man, but he's 50+ years old so it's time to give up pot, Ron. Stick to the scotch--it's legal and will mess you up just as bad. Of course, I'm sure you know that by now.
99% of lawyers give the other 1% a bad name. It pains me to say that because my daddy was a lawyer. I am certain however that he would be as appalled as I at the state of legal affairs in this country. Lawyers advertising like payday loan companies, lawyers proudly--with straight faces--speaking in defense of criminals who have done unspeakable things, lawyers overtly waiting for
nothing more than their opportunity to run for public office. I really wish state bar associations would police lawyers. Physicians do it.
My wife has taken to putting wallet size pictures of me under the kitchen sink. No roaches, no mice; hell, nothing can live under there now.
Cell phones are getting to be a problem on the road. The state should force women to get an endorsement for their driver licenses allowing them to talk and drive. Women, I say, beause men don't use cells on the roll so much. Women turn the key and fire up the Sanyo. Then they cruise around the parking lot at all of 2 miles per hour.
I don't know, I could be wrong, but he National Organization of Women may not actually be all that interested in the welfare of women. They selectively choose women to support: never conservatives, never women who benefit from the victories of the United States Army operating under a Republican president, never women who speak out against liberal politicians. Should they not change the name of the club to National Organization of Liberal Women? Call a spade a spade.
Everyone knows who Columbus was, but no one knows the names of the folks on the dock who were laughing at him.
Liberals are an odd bunch. They don't like to produce anything (well, poetry or water colors, maybe) but they like to run things. They don't care much to be in manufacturing, service, military or financial industries being suited only for lawyering and government work. They love to tell the rest of us how we should be. Anyone who tells them how they should be is denounced and in some countries, awarded the Order of Heavy Industry and sent to Siberia. Believe me, if it ever happens, the Black Helicopters will come from the Left.
Dave Barry says, correctly, that folks who always want to tell you about their religion almost never want you to tell them about yours.
This is a great country. Either the hand of God or an accident of birth put us all here but how lucky we are. We can bitch about the government and not fear for our freedom. We have flush toilets and air conditioning. If you want to quit your job and move to New Mexico and sit cross-legged in the sun on the desert, you can do it and no one can stop you. You do not fear anything as long as you obey most of the laws and stay out of the bad parts of town and mind your own business. Much of the world can't even comprehend any of this. We take a lot of it for granted and shouldn't because it would go away if not for some gusty folks in the armed services. So thanks, God. It's nice to be able to clean out the well.
Happy Thanksgiving.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Fading memory
Two days ago, November 15, marked fifty years had elapsed since the shotgun murders of the Herbert Clutter family in Holcomb, Kansas. Four gentle, decent people were killed by intruders who mistakenly believed a large amount of cash was held in a safe in their ranch home. The killings shocked all of us in Kansas from border to border and beyond, all the way to New York where they caught the attention of Truman Capote. Capote rushed to Kansas and immersed himself in the subsequent investigation later turning it and the trial into a 'nonfiction novel,' a new literary genre, hugely successful as both a book and motion picture.
I remarked on this passing of a half-century to several people and was met mostly with blank stares. Many had not heard of the murders, book or movie. Others were aware, at least in name, but had not a hint of the significance which they held, at least for me.
Even had these deaths not been immortalized in print and on film, they are still remembered in Kansas for their sheer brutality. Four people, very much without enemies and known for their kindness were killed at home by strangers for no apparent reason. Crimes like this didn't happen in Kansas, or in the United States for that matter. It forced us all into a new era, less pastoral, less friendly and less sure.
Almost everyone in the state knew someone who knew the victims; our minister was acquainted with them. Elementary school kids like me and my peers talked nervously about the news on the following Monday and even discussed it in class. Teachers and students alike all seemed to need to talk through it, as though in therapy. In El Dorado, 250 miles east of Holcomb, the local paper opined the treacherousness of the crime and interviewed citizens who had a connection to the fallen, or who just had an opinion. Doors that had gone unlocked were secured, and porch lights burned. In some ways, it happened to us, too. Kansas was a small enough place to be a village; a brotherhood. When the perpetrators were identified, everyone, everywhere purported to have seen them pass through that day. News reported the progress of the investigation daily, whipping the already frightened public into near-hysteria.
After six frantic weeks the intruders were apprehended, tried and imprisoned. Not until I was in high school, more than five years hence, were they hanged for their crime. That was in 1965; a year later Capote's In Cold Blood --after a preview in the New Yorker --became an instant best-seller. The Clutter name was known far and wide as a result. The movie followed shortly after.
A following developed as it does occasionally for notorious crimes with even greater intensity due not only to the viciousness of the acts but because they were subjects of a movie. It was filmed on site in Holcomb and Garden City, and here in Kansas City as well, where the murderers planned and embarked on the fated journey to western Kansas. If the book left a few people in the dark about what happened, the movie turned on lights for them. Both took the whole country by storm, and parts of the world too.
As anniversaries of the crime passed, the principals of the investigation were sought for interviews and the physical evidence-the spent shells, rope, crime scene photos, etc.-were in demand. The last person to see the family alive, Bob Rupp, was stoic, refusing to discuss his memories for the morbidly interested, and the surviving two older sisters of the fallen family were equally silent.
Curiosity became a sore point in Finney County as the entire community resented the exploitation of the deaths of four of their own. Many resented the portrayal of the killers in In Cold Blood as victims of life's lottery and the lack of depth given the vanquished family. When it has been noted in the press, the details of the crime and investigation are often in error and go unchallenged.
Time goes on and even fifty years distant, enthusiasts still pull up to the driveway of the old Clutter home. The current owner estimated they come twenty time a month or more. But in recent years the community seems to have come to grips with its notoriety. The two Clutter sisters have granted interviews. Bob Rupp has openly begun to talk about his painful memories on learning his then-girlfriend Nancy Clutter was shot to death in her own bed. And Holcomb itself has erected a memorial to the family, not because they died, but because they lived and in their own personal success provided much to the town, county and state.
Had Capote never written his book, had the movie not been filmed--fewer would know of the senseless brutality that occurred in 1959. But it wouldn't have made it less vicious or depraved. Those of us who remember the crime for itself and not for what Capote made it, won't forget the loss of innocence it marked. Many who knew personally knew the family are now gone. When my generation is gone and who will remember the shock and grief and fear which gripped an entire state?
There have been brutal, horrific crimes since, but America is desensitized--perhaps in part because of what occurred in Holcomb. I guess that is what discourages me when I think that few apparently know what happened that night. Under today's laws I wonder if the killers would have been caught; if caught I wonder if they would have been convicted; if convicted I wonder if they would have been hanged. Let's hope, even if the name 'Clutter' is forgotten, that we have learned something. I think it's a name people should know.
I remarked on this passing of a half-century to several people and was met mostly with blank stares. Many had not heard of the murders, book or movie. Others were aware, at least in name, but had not a hint of the significance which they held, at least for me.
Even had these deaths not been immortalized in print and on film, they are still remembered in Kansas for their sheer brutality. Four people, very much without enemies and known for their kindness were killed at home by strangers for no apparent reason. Crimes like this didn't happen in Kansas, or in the United States for that matter. It forced us all into a new era, less pastoral, less friendly and less sure.
Almost everyone in the state knew someone who knew the victims; our minister was acquainted with them. Elementary school kids like me and my peers talked nervously about the news on the following Monday and even discussed it in class. Teachers and students alike all seemed to need to talk through it, as though in therapy. In El Dorado, 250 miles east of Holcomb, the local paper opined the treacherousness of the crime and interviewed citizens who had a connection to the fallen, or who just had an opinion. Doors that had gone unlocked were secured, and porch lights burned. In some ways, it happened to us, too. Kansas was a small enough place to be a village; a brotherhood. When the perpetrators were identified, everyone, everywhere purported to have seen them pass through that day. News reported the progress of the investigation daily, whipping the already frightened public into near-hysteria.
After six frantic weeks the intruders were apprehended, tried and imprisoned. Not until I was in high school, more than five years hence, were they hanged for their crime. That was in 1965; a year later Capote's In Cold Blood --after a preview in the New Yorker --became an instant best-seller. The Clutter name was known far and wide as a result. The movie followed shortly after.
A following developed as it does occasionally for notorious crimes with even greater intensity due not only to the viciousness of the acts but because they were subjects of a movie. It was filmed on site in Holcomb and Garden City, and here in Kansas City as well, where the murderers planned and embarked on the fated journey to western Kansas. If the book left a few people in the dark about what happened, the movie turned on lights for them. Both took the whole country by storm, and parts of the world too.
As anniversaries of the crime passed, the principals of the investigation were sought for interviews and the physical evidence-the spent shells, rope, crime scene photos, etc.-were in demand. The last person to see the family alive, Bob Rupp, was stoic, refusing to discuss his memories for the morbidly interested, and the surviving two older sisters of the fallen family were equally silent.
Curiosity became a sore point in Finney County as the entire community resented the exploitation of the deaths of four of their own. Many resented the portrayal of the killers in In Cold Blood as victims of life's lottery and the lack of depth given the vanquished family. When it has been noted in the press, the details of the crime and investigation are often in error and go unchallenged.
Time goes on and even fifty years distant, enthusiasts still pull up to the driveway of the old Clutter home. The current owner estimated they come twenty time a month or more. But in recent years the community seems to have come to grips with its notoriety. The two Clutter sisters have granted interviews. Bob Rupp has openly begun to talk about his painful memories on learning his then-girlfriend Nancy Clutter was shot to death in her own bed. And Holcomb itself has erected a memorial to the family, not because they died, but because they lived and in their own personal success provided much to the town, county and state.
Had Capote never written his book, had the movie not been filmed--fewer would know of the senseless brutality that occurred in 1959. But it wouldn't have made it less vicious or depraved. Those of us who remember the crime for itself and not for what Capote made it, won't forget the loss of innocence it marked. Many who knew personally knew the family are now gone. When my generation is gone and who will remember the shock and grief and fear which gripped an entire state?
There have been brutal, horrific crimes since, but America is desensitized--perhaps in part because of what occurred in Holcomb. I guess that is what discourages me when I think that few apparently know what happened that night. Under today's laws I wonder if the killers would have been caught; if caught I wonder if they would have been convicted; if convicted I wonder if they would have been hanged. Let's hope, even if the name 'Clutter' is forgotten, that we have learned something. I think it's a name people should know.
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Show Me
Piedmont DepotOnce a year I go out into the hinterland and search for railway stations which have been preserved, however temporarily. Some are sadly in disrepair and others are used by their companies as storage or workshops. A few are preserved by proud communities for a variety of purposes. This year's excursion was entirely within the boundaries of Missouri, my home state since 1974.
Touring the Show-Me state this year was a tour of discovery. Not so much because of the depots I found to be in--or sometimes not in--existence, but because of the things I observed while cruising the back roads. For instance:
1. The roads in this state are either very good (M13, US 60, US 67) or very inadequate (pretty much the rest of them.) The further north you go in Missouri, the better the roads. Where I was, down south, they are up-and-down, winding and curving affairs with no shoulders and steep dropoffs. You are always at the mercy of the slowest driver 
who is easily identifiable, leading a string of cars at 35 m.p.h. endlessly through the forests. Some of these roads are fairly smooth. Some cry for help. None will attract tourists.
who is easily identifiable, leading a string of cars at 35 m.p.h. endlessly through the forests. Some of these roads are fairly smooth. Some cry for help. None will attract tourists.US 67 NW of Poplar Bluff
2. There is an obsession here with deer. Many in the Midwest are deer hunters; some like to think they are deer hunters -- then there are the yahoos who just like to shoot things and call it hunting. Out in the sticks it is approaching unhealthy. Convenience stores are named "Deerschnaks" or "The Buck Stops Here". There are tree stands everywhere. Every store sells something related to deer: salt licks, camo suits, guns (gun shops are everywhere), hunting licenses, trucks and trailers. Cafes advertise deer dinners. Banners proclaim churches selling box lunches for hunters who intend to disappear into the woods for a long time. Down in Texas County, Butler County, Ripley County--it's all about deer.
3. Parts of rural Missouri are pretty but the residents don't seem to know that and regard the Ozarks as their personal trash barrel. I have never seen so much litter--not in Kansas or Oklahoma, not north of I-70, not in Platte County--but it's all over in Show-Me south. This is a shame; it really detracts from the rustic, unspoiled appearance of these areas.
4. There is a fortune in beer cans in that litter. No matter the price of aluminum. It's a fortune.
5. Missourians seem to hit a lot of animals with their cars down there. An unprecedented number of possum, deer, raccoons, birds and a few unidentifiable remains--hundreds and hundreds of pounds of them--graced the roads. The one animal that seems to have learned to coexist with cars is the squirrel. I saw no squashed squirrels.
6. The best of the roads are limited to 65 m.p.h. for some reason. Decent, four-lane divided highways cry out for 70 but don't get it. It's like the state officials know they are going to under-maintain the roads; this way they don't have to go out and change the signs when the crumbling begins.
7. In Poplar Bluff, you must drive a pickup truck. It's The Law. You have two choices: gas-fired with dual tires in back, or diesel, about five feet off the ground. The truck should always have a thick coat of road dust, mud and dead bugs. No one had new cars. I don't even remember seeing a dealer.
8. Out in the country it is common to see a new, or newer, home with a nicely manicured lawn across the road from a cluster of decaying mobile homes in various states of disrepair. These trailers always have orbiting satellites of old cars, inoperable washing machines, more big dirty pickup trucks, and collapsing corrugated tin sheds. There are occasionally decent looking mobile homes with wooden steps, but it appears most are barely habitable. There is always a nice RV nearby; maybe that is where the people actually dwell.
There are some great towns and places in southeast Missouri. Piedmont is a pleasant, picturesque place on the banks of a clear Ozark creek. Ironton is another, and Mountain Grove is a clean, prosperous town. Most towns don't fare as well as these have. The streets are in poor repair, homes are unkempt and there look to be few sources of employment.
Most of the depots I sought were in decent condition; a few were gone or
couldn't be located. But I will never forget trying to find them on the back roads of
Missouri at much less than the posted speed limit of 55 m.p.h.
Along M-49 near Mill Spring
Monday, October 12, 2009
Dynamite!
I can no longer be silent. Just as with the Academy Awards, Grammys, Emmys, and the endless other once-honorable distinctions that teem around us, I see the Nobel Awards have become phony and political beyond question.
Last year, with the presentation of the Nobel Peace Prize to Al Gore, they stood on shaky ground. He did little-to-nothing toward world peace. He did produce a film of questionable credentials which advanced an unproven premise that humans are completely responsible for all bad things in nature. Global warming, ozone depletion, destructive hurricanes, rising sea levels--Al says they are all our fault. It's us driving our cars, breathing, and the cattle we eventually eat are farting out in the Texas pastures. (Never mind that the earth has been warming a long time. The glaciers are gone, right? And the most prevalent greenhouse gas is neither carbon dioxide nor California smog--it's simple water vapor.) Al, with the straightest of faces, bent over and accepted his laurel last year, having spewed misinformation everywhere and misled perhaps millions of gullible individuals.
And it had nothing to do with world peace. It just barely had anything to do with truth.
So now the Nobel committee has given the same Peace Prize to President Obama this year, a move so preposterous that even the mainstream media outlets are taken aback.
"What's he done in nine months?" they ask.
Actually, nothing. He hasn't done a thing. That's probably good because his goals are just all real bad for America. Think of something the government has done well; so well that you want them to do more for you. Like manage your health care, manage the money we are taxed, secure our borders, protect our way of life. The President wants government to regulate our banks and industry but he can't seem to realize he is selling us out. His own administration is spending far more than it takes in, growing our debt so fast and deep that our grandchildren will be paying it off too. And not a single problem has been solved, or even ameliorated. Some are worse.
So they give him the Peace Prize? For what? To whom has he brought peace? America? Hell no. He has ignored the Afghan war since he was elected. He has met with his general only three times in nine months. He can't seem to decide if he should commit more troops--which the Army has requested--to make some progress in the war, or throw in the towel.
So somehow the Nobel people have made this award. The nominations had to be in last year, before he was actually elected. (How did that work? Whoever wrote his nomination was certain that he would be Nobel-worthy before he actually lifted a pen to sign something?) He was nominated without yet having bowed before a Saudi prince or insulted policemen everywhere.
Everyone has said they want peace. All past presidents for eons back have said they want peace. Obama says he wants peace but he gets the Nobel prize for it. With last year's award to Gore and this one to the President does anyone besides me think the Nobel prize has become a political apple?
Like the Oscars, the Nobels no longer represent a recognition of the best in a field. They are phony politically-correct shows of guilt carried by tired old liberals who have worked their way into every freaking part of mainstream life. And with liberals its all about intent, not results. When the libs took over public education, if kids tried to do well, but failed anyway, then the libs felt they should be treated just the same--better maybe-- than students who really did do well. So that is what the Nobels are--prizes for good intent. We all want peace. Shouldn't we all get a Nobel prize?
Last year, with the presentation of the Nobel Peace Prize to Al Gore, they stood on shaky ground. He did little-to-nothing toward world peace. He did produce a film of questionable credentials which advanced an unproven premise that humans are completely responsible for all bad things in nature. Global warming, ozone depletion, destructive hurricanes, rising sea levels--Al says they are all our fault. It's us driving our cars, breathing, and the cattle we eventually eat are farting out in the Texas pastures. (Never mind that the earth has been warming a long time. The glaciers are gone, right? And the most prevalent greenhouse gas is neither carbon dioxide nor California smog--it's simple water vapor.) Al, with the straightest of faces, bent over and accepted his laurel last year, having spewed misinformation everywhere and misled perhaps millions of gullible individuals.
And it had nothing to do with world peace. It just barely had anything to do with truth.
So now the Nobel committee has given the same Peace Prize to President Obama this year, a move so preposterous that even the mainstream media outlets are taken aback.
"What's he done in nine months?" they ask.
Actually, nothing. He hasn't done a thing. That's probably good because his goals are just all real bad for America. Think of something the government has done well; so well that you want them to do more for you. Like manage your health care, manage the money we are taxed, secure our borders, protect our way of life. The President wants government to regulate our banks and industry but he can't seem to realize he is selling us out. His own administration is spending far more than it takes in, growing our debt so fast and deep that our grandchildren will be paying it off too. And not a single problem has been solved, or even ameliorated. Some are worse.
So they give him the Peace Prize? For what? To whom has he brought peace? America? Hell no. He has ignored the Afghan war since he was elected. He has met with his general only three times in nine months. He can't seem to decide if he should commit more troops--which the Army has requested--to make some progress in the war, or throw in the towel.
So somehow the Nobel people have made this award. The nominations had to be in last year, before he was actually elected. (How did that work? Whoever wrote his nomination was certain that he would be Nobel-worthy before he actually lifted a pen to sign something?) He was nominated without yet having bowed before a Saudi prince or insulted policemen everywhere.
Everyone has said they want peace. All past presidents for eons back have said they want peace. Obama says he wants peace but he gets the Nobel prize for it. With last year's award to Gore and this one to the President does anyone besides me think the Nobel prize has become a political apple?
Like the Oscars, the Nobels no longer represent a recognition of the best in a field. They are phony politically-correct shows of guilt carried by tired old liberals who have worked their way into every freaking part of mainstream life. And with liberals its all about intent, not results. When the libs took over public education, if kids tried to do well, but failed anyway, then the libs felt they should be treated just the same--better maybe-- than students who really did do well. So that is what the Nobels are--prizes for good intent. We all want peace. Shouldn't we all get a Nobel prize?
Monday, September 21, 2009
Transition
With the resumption of school nearly a month behind us and the advent of Autumn at hand, let us pause briefly as we often do to reflect on the summer from which we are transitioning. Kids trudging back to class is always a milestone in the year, a time to look for changes in the routine.
It's too bad that we couldn't see it coming in order to anticipate it. This was a great summer. Rarely too hot. Rarely tropically humid. Almost always a light breeze and just enough rain to keep the lawn green all summer. [Usually by mid-July the grass has surrendered to an unrelenting sun and turned a straw-broom color.] In Kansas City they say we never broke 100, but I think we did briefly on my thermometer back in June during a short heat wave. Still there was much deck time during pleasant evenings.
But it hasn't all been about the weather. The economy is slowly, steadily recovering from Barney Frank's recession. The stock market's creaky climb is not the sole evidence. Look around--there are more people in restaurants, stores and car lots. Not where it needs to be yet, but better.
Perhaps the most positive thing has been the spirit and indignance shown by Americans this summer. All throught August, in 'town hall' meetings all over the country, constituents have stood up to their government. Defiant at the prospect of having politicians in charge of their health care decisions, Americans turned out in droves to say 'NO' loud and long to the Senators and Congressmen who cared to hold forums. It wasn't just a few here and there across the country and they weren't paid or organized to appear -- unlike proponents of socialized health care who called in markers from friends at liberal labor groups and community 'activist' enterprises, bussing in as many as possible to make the forums friendly to Democrat politicians; sometimes under the unspoken threat of violence. Few were intimidated and spoke their minds, most at a loss to think of anything the government has done so well that it should assume administration of their health care.
Those legislators who hosted events--if they were really listening and not just providing eye candy for TV news--should have got the message that socialized medicine is not a done deal for many of us, particularly with provisions funding abortions on demand, denial of care based on longevity and illegal alien coverage. Are they just crazy in Washington? And through all of this they tell us , "Don't be concerned, it won't raise taxes." Oh, come on! Not even Democrats will believe that.
God Bless those who attended the meetings and forced the truth.
Another great thing about the summer is that all of this health care discussion caused a large drop in the President's approval ratings. No other President has plummeted this low this early in a first term since they started watching. Indeed, folks are beginning to see the real Obama and what his 'hope and change' for America are. They, like me, don't care for it at all.
Of course as the summer wore on there were noted deaths: Michael Jackson, Walter Cronkite, Farrah Fawcett, and Ed McMahon. Those under forty are challenged to remember much about Walter Cronkite but because he was an area native and attended the University of Missouri for a while it drew even more play here. Cronkite, for those my age, was something of a trusted father figure but in his waning years as a news broadcaster he undeniably developed a clear left wing view which he had difficulty in concealing. Still he was the last of the old guard in TV news before the pretty boys all took over. He had actually grown up in the business and helped shape it, moving from print to radio and then TV as it grew.
At our house we had the much-anticipated Colorado vacation, always in at least a little doubt until right up to the last minute before we leave. Many times in the past, things happened at work to foul our departure but it was pretty smooth this year. Mary Ann's birthday / birthday week / birthday month went well. Annie and her brothers continue to grow. We had the trees trimmed and it made a world of difference around the house. One of Mary Ann's friends opened a restaurant nearby and it seems to be doing well.
Now the equinox is passing and we are headed into Autumn, a little reflective on the greatness of what has been. But let's anticipate the promise of fall weather, always the gem of the midwest seasons. And football! If only the Chiefs would cooperate. But at least the Jayhawks seem to be headed for good things this fall. Rock Chalk!
It's too bad that we couldn't see it coming in order to anticipate it. This was a great summer. Rarely too hot. Rarely tropically humid. Almost always a light breeze and just enough rain to keep the lawn green all summer. [Usually by mid-July the grass has surrendered to an unrelenting sun and turned a straw-broom color.] In Kansas City they say we never broke 100, but I think we did briefly on my thermometer back in June during a short heat wave. Still there was much deck time during pleasant evenings.
But it hasn't all been about the weather. The economy is slowly, steadily recovering from Barney Frank's recession. The stock market's creaky climb is not the sole evidence. Look around--there are more people in restaurants, stores and car lots. Not where it needs to be yet, but better.
Perhaps the most positive thing has been the spirit and indignance shown by Americans this summer. All throught August, in 'town hall' meetings all over the country, constituents have stood up to their government. Defiant at the prospect of having politicians in charge of their health care decisions, Americans turned out in droves to say 'NO' loud and long to the Senators and Congressmen who cared to hold forums. It wasn't just a few here and there across the country and they weren't paid or organized to appear -- unlike proponents of socialized health care who called in markers from friends at liberal labor groups and community 'activist' enterprises, bussing in as many as possible to make the forums friendly to Democrat politicians; sometimes under the unspoken threat of violence. Few were intimidated and spoke their minds, most at a loss to think of anything the government has done so well that it should assume administration of their health care.
Those legislators who hosted events--if they were really listening and not just providing eye candy for TV news--should have got the message that socialized medicine is not a done deal for many of us, particularly with provisions funding abortions on demand, denial of care based on longevity and illegal alien coverage. Are they just crazy in Washington? And through all of this they tell us , "Don't be concerned, it won't raise taxes." Oh, come on! Not even Democrats will believe that.
God Bless those who attended the meetings and forced the truth.
Another great thing about the summer is that all of this health care discussion caused a large drop in the President's approval ratings. No other President has plummeted this low this early in a first term since they started watching. Indeed, folks are beginning to see the real Obama and what his 'hope and change' for America are. They, like me, don't care for it at all.
Of course as the summer wore on there were noted deaths: Michael Jackson, Walter Cronkite, Farrah Fawcett, and Ed McMahon. Those under forty are challenged to remember much about Walter Cronkite but because he was an area native and attended the University of Missouri for a while it drew even more play here. Cronkite, for those my age, was something of a trusted father figure but in his waning years as a news broadcaster he undeniably developed a clear left wing view which he had difficulty in concealing. Still he was the last of the old guard in TV news before the pretty boys all took over. He had actually grown up in the business and helped shape it, moving from print to radio and then TV as it grew.
At our house we had the much-anticipated Colorado vacation, always in at least a little doubt until right up to the last minute before we leave. Many times in the past, things happened at work to foul our departure but it was pretty smooth this year. Mary Ann's birthday / birthday week / birthday month went well. Annie and her brothers continue to grow. We had the trees trimmed and it made a world of difference around the house. One of Mary Ann's friends opened a restaurant nearby and it seems to be doing well.
Now the equinox is passing and we are headed into Autumn, a little reflective on the greatness of what has been. But let's anticipate the promise of fall weather, always the gem of the midwest seasons. And football! If only the Chiefs would cooperate. But at least the Jayhawks seem to be headed for good things this fall. Rock Chalk!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
