I Miss My Friend

My best friend moved to England.

I’ve known her over 5 years. I met her when I joined a small company with offices all the way across town. 1 hour commute, every day, minimum. They have any trouble on the 480 bridge and it’s and hour and a half, both ways. By coincidence, she also lived in the same small community on the west side that I did, and her birthday is the day before mine! We got along famously!

Noel is the only person I have ever met who is virtually un-offendable. She knows that anything I say to her, I mean it in a friendly manner. She never takes anything I say, no matter how outrageous, the wrong way. Not that she isn’t just as opinionated as I am! Oh, no! We’ve had some good arguments, mostly over politics. We agree on most things but where we disagree, fireworks! (She tends to yell when she gets excited!)

After working together for about 5 months, I decided that the company and I weren’t going to work out and found another job. We stayed in touch, kinda, for the next year or so but I realized that we weren’t going to stay friends if we never saw each other. I called her and proposed that we start getting together regularly for dinner. Give us a chance to stay up on each other’s lives.

So, we got together every Wednesday for almost 2 years. And I got to hear the Saga of Matt and Noel.

Noel has had a life that makes even the most melodramatic soap opera seem tame and boring by comparison.

When I met her, she professed to being gay and was living with another woman. 2 years later, they had broken up and Noel was all in a tizzy about her upcoming vacation to Spain to meet a man she had known online for several years.

She married him last July.

In between, she reignited an old relationship with the man who fathered her son. He (and his family) traumatized her so badly that she “switched teams” and was a lesbian for 18 years. (That is according to her.)

I got to hear all the gory details every Wednesday night over dinner. I dubbed it “The Saga of Matt and Noel” and looked forward to hearing the latest installment every week.

They simply had too much hurt and time between them and the relationship failed a second time, but they gave it their best shot. I don’t think she could ever really totally forgive him for what went before and I don’t think he ever really believed that his parents behaved as badly as she said they did. It was doomed from the start.

But it was fun to hear about every week! What new, atrociously stupid thing would Matt say? How would Noel over-react?

At least they mostly kept their now-grown son out of it.

And I got to air my problems, as well. There’s nothing like being able to talk a problem over with a trusted friend who won’t be offended or judgmental about what you might say. Noel is the only person like that I’ve ever had in my life and I miss her terribly.

Now, I have no one to say, “Hey! Guess what stupid thing I did?” and have her laugh _with_ me not _at_ me. My SO will laugh at me and be critical. For, as wonderful as he is in so many ways, he is a very critical person. It is best not to give him too many opportunities. Or ammunition.

So, I started a blog. And a private diary. No one reads either but at least it keeps me writing and thinking about writing. I have several half-written books on my computer and several typed up story outlines that need finished. Maybe one day I’ll find the discipline to actually finish something.

And you, Dear Reader, can say you knew me when… :-)

Jimmy 1; Dick 0

Whose more dangerous with a gun, Dick Chaney or Jimmy Carter?

CARTER!

http://emptyage.honan.net/mth/2007/11/jimmy-carter-he.html

Unbelieveable! He took a pot-shot at a relative's pet and killed it!

I'd go hunting with Mr Chaney any day over allowing Jimmeh any where near my kitties!

Especially since Mr. Chaney only shoots elderly lawyers, neither of which I am! LOL

Poor kitty!

What an Asshole!!

LOL

My current favorite LOLwhatever. I laugh every time I see this!

War, What is it good for?

This!

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2007-11-04-afghanistanhealth_N.htm

"Close to 90,000 children who would have died before age 5 in Afghanistan
during Taliban rule will stay alive this year because of advances in medical
care in the country, Afghan President Hamid Karzai said Sunday.
The
under-5
child mortality rate in Afghanistan has declined from an estimated
257 deaths
per 1,000 live births in 2001 to about 191 per 1,000 in 2006, the
Ministry of
Public Health said, relying on a new study by Johns Hopkins
University.
The
U.N. and aid agency Save the Children both hailed the
advances in health care in
Afghanistan.
"This is certainly very positive
news," said the U.N. spokesman
in Afghanistan, Adrian Edwards. "To come from
such low life expectancy to see
this improvement does appear to be an
indication that the work on the health
sector here is beginning to pay
off."
Karzai, surrounded by children at a
news conference in Kabul,
thanked international aid organizations and Afghan
health workers for the
work they've done to raise health standards. He said
89,000 children will be
saved each year because of the improved health
care."

Wow! Think about those 90,000 kids who would have died the next time you hear a Dhimmocrat whine about the War on Islamofacism.

90,000 children. Mind boggling!

Yay, US!!

Getting hit with the STUPID stick!

On Judge Judy today, there was this guy who maintained the they purchased a plane ticket in July for his ex-girlfriend’s grandfather’s funeral in September. The guy simply never understood why Judge Judy had a problem with that!

LOL!!

The guy seems to have been beaten with the Stupid Stick!

My SO and I love Judge Judy! It’s a great example of how NOT to conduct your life and personal affairs! Never have a joint checking account, with anyone. Never loan anyone money without a written contract for repayment. Never live with anyone without having the arrangements in writing. Never get anyone a cell phone in your name, you will never get them to pay the bill.

Great life lessons.

And you get to laugh at really stupid people!

My life is so much better than all of these people! I’ve made some serious mistakes in my life but nothing as down right dumb as the people on this show. They make me look like a freaking genius!

Spam

Ok, I’m used to and get great amusement from the spam emails I get offering to enhance body parts I don’t have and I just delete the pump-and-dump stock tips, but since when did marijuana dealers get so bold?

The latest, newest spam is offering to sell me “really great shit”!! It claims to be legal but calls the product by several pseudonyms for pot.

Whatever will they think of next??

I'm so proud!

My congressional representative, Dennis Kucinich, declared on national TV lat night that he did, in fact, see a UFO.

What a total nutjob!

Maybe now the idiots on the west side of Cleveland will see this guy for the silly person that he is!

I sincerely hope someone runs against him in the next election! I wouldn’t vote this guy dog catcher! What on Earth is he doing in Congress? And how can he ever be taken as a serious candidate for president? Why isn’t he laughed off the national and local stage? He’s obviously crazy!

That's a good question!!

Question asked by a caller to a local talk-show host:

If an Illegal Alien is an “undocumented worker”, does that make a drug dealer an “unlicensed pharmacist”??

LOL

Good question! Why do we constantly have to deal in euphemisms when it comes to serious, national issues? What dream world do the people who talk this way live in, anyway? It’s not the real world, where the rest of us live.

Giving a serious problem a kinder, gentler name won’t help the problem go away! It only helps avoiding having to deal with it, which, I guess, is the point. If we pretend long enough and hard enough, our magical thinking will make everything better.
Eventually of course, euphemisms take on the original meanings of the terms they replaced. So, what’s the point? Call things by their real names; be accurate in descriptions!

I Hate Snoring!!!

My SO woke me up from a sound sleep Saturday night with his snoring. He was making so much noise both on the in and out breath, it was like trying to sleep with a running lawn mower in the room!

Ok, not that loud but the level of constant noise was the same. I snuck off and tried to sleep in our spare room for a while but I let too much air out of the Select Comfort bed in that room and wound up trying to sleep on the decking. Not too comfy! So, in the end, I went back to my warm, cushy bed and went back to sleep.

I had to kick both cats off the bed before I could lie back down. I had expected that they would come looking for me eventually but I guess the warmth of the electric blanket won out over time snuggling with Mom! Ingrates! They love me only for my body heat!

And I feed them, too.

I suggested to the SO that he go to a doctor and see about reducing the amount of noise he makes while he is asleep. He won’t do so, of course. He won’t go to a doctor when he is in pain! He’s eventually going to end up sleeping in another room, though. I cannot go to work everyday if I can’t get enough sleep!

How selfish does one have to be to continue interrupting someone else’s sleep and never do anything about it?? There’s a sleep clinic around here not too far that I’ve heard about. And his insurance would pay for it! It can’t be a good thing that he stops breathing at night! But he won’t hear about doing anything about this! Gets mad if I mention it!

Don’t get me wrong, he’s a great guy, just goofy about doctors. If I were that way, I’d be DEAD!!

Pity he doesn’t see the point!

Health

I whine a lot here about being tired and not feeling well so I thought I let you know what exactly ails me.

I have dilated, idiopathic cardiomyopathy. Google that last word if you don’t know what it means.

Really scary!!

The term "idiopathic" means that the cause is unknown. No one knows why I have this problem, much less how to fix it.

Basically, this is what you have when you get a heart transplant, making the cure worse than the disease, in my opinion.

Here’s a good explanation:

http://www.cardiomyopathy.org/index.php?id=48

It’s a site from the UK but contains good definitions. Read ‘Ejection Fraction’.

I’ve been told by my doctors that a normal EF is 55 to 70%. Mine is 20%. Last December, when I felt like I was dying, it was <10%. I got a pace maker/defibulator implanted in January (We are the Borg! You will be assimilated!) and my EF has doubled since then. It’s twice what it was but still piss-poor.

As a result of all this, I can no longer do many, many things I enjoy: hiking, camping, dancing, taking a walk, nor many things I didn’t enjoy: house-work, shopping.

So, my house is a mess most of the time. I scrubbed my kitchen floor last weekend and it took ALL DAY!! I’d work for a few minutes, til I got out of breath, then sit for a little while, then work for a few more minutes, then sit some more. And this is with the nice FloorMate my SO bought me last year! I can’t even begin to scrub a floor by hand!

And I work full-time, as well. Some weekends, I don’t get out of bed til almost 11:00am! And my brother gives me a hard time about it, too.

Most people don’t ‘get’ it. Fortunately for me, my kids and my SO do and don’t expect me to be able to do things ‘normal’ people can do. I can’t even take a shower as often as I would like! I take 1 a week because it exhausts me so.

And I get NO exersize, so I’m overweight as well. Not something I’m pleased about, believe me! And the beta-blockers I’m on make me gain more weight. Lose-lose-lose. Everything except weight! L

If you’ve ever read Little Women, what I have is what killed Beth. It took her years to die after scarlet fever damaged her heart. That would have been me if not for modern medicine.

Midges and Baseball

Hey, Chamberlain:

Midges don’t bite!!

They may look like mosquitoes but they don’t act like them. Worst you’re going to get from midge swarms is a creepy-crawly sensation.

I guess they don’t have insects in New York, do they? Never had to contend with pests living there, huh?

Whiney buncha a-holes! Blaming their loss on some poor, little bugs!

:-)

Gee, does this make us the Israelites and the Yankees Pharaohs’ Egypt?? If so, then don’t we have 6 more plagues to go?

Boston, brace yourselves!! :-D

I hate commercials!

So many of them assume I’m an idiot and talk down to me in a particularly annoying manner. The really annoying ones I make a point to never buy those products! If I’m such an idiot then I’m too stupid to buy their junk!

Sugardale hotdogs has a really annoying commercial on the radio during the Indians’ games. The one woman is fretting over how many hot dogs to buy for their upcoming get together. Her friend assumes she worried about not having enough because her husband ate some large number during the last Dollar Dog night. That would even be sensible, given what a pig the husband is but, No! She’s worried about having too many! She never knows what to do with the left-overs.

Sugardale to the rescue: they have a re-closable package. Whew!

Apparently, no one at their ad agency has heard of Zip-Lock bags. That’s what I keep hot dogs in, anyway. I buy them by the 5 pound package at Sam’s Club and hope for left-overs!

The Ford commercials are also especially annoying. “Have you driven a Ford?!?” they yell at me both from my TV and my radio. Yes, twice a day, thank you. Stop yelling at me!!

I’m glad they didn’t start this ad campaign while I was looking for a car! I would really have had a problem buying my little Focus. I love my little high-mileage econo-box. (Rush Limbaugh reference)

It’s really a fun, cute little car. Exactly what I wanted to replace the huge pregnant-roller-skate of a minivan. Fun to drive, easy to park, quick and zippy.

I know I’m not in the advertisers demographic for most of the shows I watch. The only shows I watch live are sports: baseball and football. I’m not interested in buying a car and I don’t drink beer so most of the ads aren’t aimed at me. Especially football. Those advertisers really assume that their entire audience is male!! And they all drink beer and are in the market for a new car.

And have Erectile Dysfunction! :-) Definitely not aimed at me!

Just like most of my junk email. Either for drugs I don’t need, pump-and-dump stock tips or offers to enhance body-parts I don’t have. Some of those are really funny! Obviously written by a non-English-speaker with a whatever/English phrase book. And none too clear on the concept of what they’re trying to say in English!! LOL!!!

Self-Employment

I’d love to be my own boss!! I’ve worked from home several times and actually end up working more hours, just the hours are of my choice. I’m not really good for much before 9:00 and yet they insist on having me at my desk at 8:00, where I mostly just sit and stare into space, trying to wake up. In the long run, you get more work out of me if you let me set my own hours. But, then, I suppose that’s true for most people.

Two years ago, I tried to start my own business. I make jewelry: www.treasuresbynora.com. I did craft shows that entire year. I still owe money on my credit card from that little venture. And have thousands of beads in a really nice bead case I bought. At least I didn’t pay retail for any of that stuff. Since then, silver prices have gone through the roof!!

Craft shows are a good way to work very hard, be out in the weather all day and not make very much money. People don’t seem to go to shows to actually buy anything. If it’s a festival of some kind, they’re there for the festival, not to acquire things. If it’s a Christmas gift show, chances are that there are 25 other jewelers there, some of whom are flouting the rules and reselling junk they imported from China. Fair competition is one thing but I can’t compete with China! People who put together shows and have 25 jewelers are doing everyone concerned a huge disfavor. No one will sell much, and when they don’t enforce their jury rules, those of us who actually made our own wares will leave angry and never do that show again. There are several shows on my Never Do Again list because of this. Promoters need to have a balance of types of venders and to go by their own rules. If the show is juried and all vendors are supposed to sell stuff hand-made by them, imported junk from China shouldn’t be allowed!!!

Unfortunately, most shows don’t seem to realize that by allowing imported junk, they are undermining their credibility with both their vendors and the buying public. Back when I used to go to craft shows as a buyer, not a seller, I hated it when I’d get there, pay the admission price and discover that, even though the show had been billed as all hand-made, most of the stuff was imported junk. Those shows I never attended again. Even shows I attended again, I avoided those vendors as unreliable. Putting out imported junk out like they made it! Like I couldn’t tell the difference! Liars!!

It was dishonest, which was my real problem with it. What else were they lying about?? Once you break trust with someone, it’s very hard to reestablish it!

Maybe I’ll do some more shows next year. Only problem with that is that I gave my van that I transport my tent and 8’ table in to my daughter. The new SUV cant’ accommodate the 8’ table. My SO offered to buy me a folding 8’ table when he wanted this particular SUV so I may take him up on his offer. He also works very hard when we do a show. He’s in charge of “Logistics”: moving heavy objects, setting up the tent, setting up the table, etc. Due to my poor health, I really can’t help him much. I can grab one side of the tent and pull but I can’t snap the locks into place; I’m simply not strong enough. So, he does most of the physical labor by himself. I arrange jewelry on the displays after everything is set up. He even helps me with that! I really couldn’t do it without him!

I’ve done a few indoor shows where they provided a table and all I had to do was set up my displays by myself, especially in the beginning, but now I wouldn’t dream of doing show without him. He’s also good company, giving me someone to talk to when the crowds are thin. He has the most biting observations on shows and the people who attend them! Really funny!

Our usual after-show drink at dinner is a Pina Colada. Red Lobster makes the best ones! Give it a try sometime! :-)

The Birds

When I got up this morning, the back yard was covered in Starlings. There are two 60 foot maples at the rear of the yard. They were crowded with black birds.

And that many birds make an incredible amount of NOISE!!!

My neighbor has a ringer on the outside of his house that alerts him, and the entire neighborhood, when his phone rings. They got a call and a large majority of the birds took off, yelling and screeching. What a racket!

The remainder hung around for another 15 minutes or so before finally joining the rest of the flock down the block. I can still hear them!

The cats weren’t too interested. I watched the birds more than they did. Cookie just wanted to be petted and Klein licked himself, again. I wonder what he’s allergic to??

Cookie is allergic to corn. Try and find a cat food without corn in it! ALL the major brands, including the expensive ones, have corn in them. And she will scratch and chew herself bloody if she eats any of them.

I found some at Pets Mart that she seems to tolerate OK. It’s $18.99 for 12lbs, though. Purina is $8.99 for 25lbs! So, this stuff is very expensive. I’ve looked online and everything she might be able to eat is even more expensive. After the Pet-Food-from-China-is-killing-our-pets-scare, I considered making my own, but I really don’t have the energy. I barely have the wherewithal to cook for us every day!! I can’t see adding cooking cat food to my list of chores as well!!

There are some great pet foods out there but most of the cat food seems to have fish in them. Fish makes my cats puke! They do enough of that as it is! I sent away for some samples and they loved it but then they puked all over the house for the next week so I won’t be doing that!! Too bad. It was very healthy and didn’t use any ingredients from China.

Just fish for puking…

Yech!

Cats

My cats think I’m crazy!

They’re probably right. After all, who gets up at the crack of dawn to go sit in an office all day to earn money for cat food (and other things!) and who gets to stay home and sleep all day?? If life were fair, it would be the other way around!

But, who said life was fair? I don’t even like that word. It’s the ultimate whine from spoiled children who aren’t getting their way; “No fair!” I always asked them to explain their frame of reference, not letting them get away with simply stating that they wanted their way in something. Why was their way better than mine? Explain yourself!! Who says?

Anyway, back to the cats…

Cookie and Klein (named by children, is case you couldn’t tell!), get a can of cat food every night before I go to bed. As a result, Cookie won’t let me out of her sight unless and until they are fed. I’ve gone to bed early a couple of time without feeding them and she’s never forgotten it, nor forgiven me. So, if I leave the kitchen, she follows me. If I go upstairs, she follows me and gives me that “Mommy doesn’t love me anymore” look until I go back downstairs. Or she panics and tries to block me from going up the stairs. Of course, I’m probably just going to get something and step right over her. A 12 lb. cat just isn’t capable of physically blocking my path to any great degree. Or I step on her, resulting in much yelling and hurt looks and apologies from me, even though it was her that got in my way.

So, any place I go in my house in the evenings after dinner requires a 2 cat entourage, just to make sure that I don’t get away without feeding them their treat. They also can’t figure out why I don’t feed them earlier. I do, sometimes. My SO hate the smell of the food (we call it “Stinky Stuff”!) so he has to have gone down to the Family Room for the remainder of the evening after dinner before they get fed. So, they follow me around, giving me the ‘evil eye’ and meowing because I haven’t fed them, yet. So, they think I’m crazy because I do things other than feed them.

Cookie has a fairly accurate clock in her tummy; although it tends to run faster the closer it gets to feeding time. They get fed at 10:00PM, more or less, so I call it her 10:00 Tummy. She has also been known to wake me up in the morning if I should fall back asleep after the alarm goes off. She gets up on the bed and meows in my face to wake me up.

Wonderful way to start the day! A face-full of cat-breath! But my “4-footed alarm clock” has come in handy a few times! Some days, I can sleep through anything! Except a 12 lb. cat standing on me, yelling in my face. That usually gets my attention!! And then I’m only a few minutes late for work instead of the hours that it would be if it were up to me. Not a good way to stay employed! Bosses like you there when they want you there.

In addition, I think my cats think I spend all day in the garage. Well, after all, I go into that room in the morning and come out of it in the evenings. They never really try to get out there. I suspect it smells nasty to them: I park my car in my garage. Cars smell nasty to me; I can’t imagine they smell nice to cats: gasoline, oil, various fluids and all that plastic. Plus, when I had to have my very old and very sick put to sleep this summer, Cissy went into the garage and never came back out! I think they noticed. Klein seems almost afraid of it!

This is all to the good, as far an I’m concerned. The last thing I need to do when I’m on my way to work is play Chase-the-Kitty out in the garage! Cissy did that once and I had to wash her feet as she got into some oil leaked onto the floor by an old car I used to have. She didn’t like that one little bit!! Gave me that hurt look for days!

I used to trim her nails when they got too sharp. She was a very good sport about it and never fought me. Although, she would often leave to go and wash her feet to make sure she still had all her toes, carefully licking them one at a time. You could imagine the monolog in her head: Onnnnnne… Yep, this one’s still here. Twooooooooo…..Yup, the next one’s here, too. Threeeeee……….Yup, this one’s OK as well.

Well, if cats could think in English, that is!!

Play-offs!!!

We’re going to the Playoffs!!

Not quite the best record in baseball but we didn’t miss it by much!

I actually won the opportunity to buy post-season game tickets and have a ticket if there is a 3rd game here in Cleveland. Games 1 and 2 are here, games 3 and 4 in New York and Game 5, if needed, is back here. Much as I would like it to not need 5 games, I really want to go to a post-season game!

And tickets for the next round are much more expensive!!

So, here’s hopin’ I get to go! And that the Indians do well against the Yankees. (Damned Yankees!!) (Still one of my favorite movies!)

Alabama Dinner Jacket

Apparently, there is some debate amongst the pansies that run this country about whether or not to allow Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, President of the Terrorist Nation of Iran, to pay a visit to Ground Zero in New York.

Most of the objections I've read involve his current nutjob activities. My objection has its basis in something from long ago:

Several former hostages have stuck to their identification of AlabamaDinnerJacket as one of the lead inquisitors during their time in captivity. Who are we to doubt them? We weren't there.

Don't get me wrong. He's done and said plenty since then to disqualify him for any sort of Visa that would enable him to go anywhere in America beyond the UN. Until and unless we wise up and kick that gang of thieves out of Turtle Bay, there's not much we can do about him going there.

In my opinion, however, he should be arrested the minute he steps foot outside the UN building for acts committed in 1979.

And Columbia University should lose all Federal funding.

All of it, student aide, research grants, everything.

I don't think they have enough sense to be entrusted with my tax monies.

The Juice

Well, O.J. Simpson got arrested again. Maybe this time they’ll find a jury that will listen to the evidence?

I had to explain to my 23-year-old daughter who he was and why he was famous. She remembers him only from his murder trial, which took place when she was 11. She didn’t even know he played football.

She asked my why the Goldman family had to take away the rights to his confession, currently published in book form, to satisfy their judgment against him. Didn’t he have a lot of endorsements and stuff like that if he was a big football star?

I explained to her that he used to have all those things, similar to Payton Manning (whom she is familiar with), but because he is a multiple-murderer, no company wants him hawking their products anymore.

His trial, unlike most trials, was broadcast for the whole world to see. Usually, we the people don’t get to see the evidence. We have to take the jury’s word for it that the evidence supported conviction or that it didn’t. In this unique case, we got to see the evidence and we know that the jury blew it. We know he was guilty. There was no way he was going to pick up his career after that. We know that, thanks to jury nullification, he got away with murder, twice!

Personally, I hope that this time around Las Vegas can find 12 people willing to look at the evidence and not only at his celebrity. I doubt that this trial will be televised so there will be no playing to the cameras and that should help.

I sometimes wonder how those jurors sleep at night, knowing that they set a murderer free. This man killed the mother of his children and paid no penalty. Has anyone in the media followed the jurors’ lives since the verdict? Has their karma come home to roost, yet? They have some heavy debt to pay.

Ammunition

This just gets funnier every time I see it!

[AFP Caption:] An elderly Iraqi woman shows

two bullets which she says hit her house following

an early coalition forces raidin the predominantly

Shiite Baghdad suburb of Sadr City.

This picture has shown up on every blog I read. Most of the bloggers have pointed out the obvious: the bullets have not been fired. They are still in their casings and in pristine condition.

So, we’re now throwing ammunition at old Iraqi women? For shame! *snicker*

She seems to be the same woman who was all over the ‘net a while back, shown ‘mourning’ for various houses that had been destroyed in various places.

07/26/2006:

08/05/2006:

If both her houses have been bombed into rubble, where did she get another one for ammunition to be tossed at?? This is some rich lady!!

Karl Rove

Karl Rove has resigned his position as advisor to President Bush.

*yawn*

The President’s deputy chief of staff decides not to ride out the rest of his lame-duck term and both side of the political blogosphere get their panties in a twist.

What I’ve never been able to figure out is how this guy got his reputation! He gets the “credit” for all Bush’s ideas from both the right and left. If this is true and Bush’s ideas do in fact originate with Rove, he has to be the most inept politician I have ever heard of!

Where to start?

Harriet Meyers

Medicare Drug Plan

Comprehensive Immigration Reform.

No Child Left Behind

Those are merely the highlights (lowlights?) of his 6 years of horrible proposals. One of the few good ideas was the revision of Social Security to something other than a Ponsi scheme but he left it twisting in the wind, undefined and undefended until the Left and its handmaidens in the media killed it.

And that is my biggest problem with Karl Rove and the advice he has been giving President Bush. Whoever decided that allowing your opponents and enemies to endlessly attack you without ever defending yourself or your policies is a complete and total idiot. A lie repeated often enough and loudly enough without refutation enters the general consciousness. Soon, ‘everybody knows…” and it becomes the truth.

I know that I am not alone in my frustration with Bush and his unwillingness to communicate with the American people. Who told him that his silence was a good idea? Maybe his ‘closest advisor’? The man who gets all the credit for being so wily and conniving by the Left? Talk about an undeserved reputation!!

The Bush Administration is so inept at dealing the media attacks that most of the country still thinks Algore won Florida in 2000! And every lie told since then as been allowed to stand, unchallenged, until the lies are all most people know about their president.

I hope that the right-wing in this country can get it collective head out of its collective ass long enough to find a conservative candidate to run against Hillary/Obama. Much as I like Giuliani on defense, he’s not a conservative on social issues. Romney seems to have flip-flopped around too much for my taste. I like Fred! but he’s still not in the race. What’s he waiting for?

Whoever runs, may he PLEASE be able to utilize the press in an effective way to communicate! The presidency is the ultimate bully pulpit. For gods’ sake, USE IT!!

Cissy 1989 - 2007

I miss my kitty.

One month ago today, my 18-year-old cat, Cissy, lost her battle with lymphoma.

She was diagnosed June 16th. She had been losing weight again. I had been afraid going in that it would be bad news. Weight loss in an elderly cat is never a good thing.

We went to see our vet and I got the bad news: cancer. Non-operable cancer. Well, I wouldn’t have put her through surgery in any case. Getting her teeth taken care of had been traumatic enough. Chemotherapy might help but it’s very expensive and there’s no way to explain to a cat why she feels so bad. So, I won’t torture her with that, either. I decide to simply take her home and enjoy that remaining time we have together.

I spend most of my time at my kitchen table. Cissy started out on my lap, lying across my legs while I watched TV and read blogs on my computer. I think she got tired of my leaning over her and eventually migrated to the end of the table between my elbows where I would type around her. She would purr and butt her head against my face or doze quietly.

I figured that as long as she was strong enough to jump into my lap, she was well enough to keep going. I didn’t want her to suffer unnecessarily but neither did I want to cut her life short.

Thursday morning, she wasn’t asleep in the living room. I looked around for her a bit but it wasn’t unusual for her to be elsewhere at that hour.

About 15 minutes later, she staggered into the kitchen from the dining room. She could barely walk. I picked her up. She was so little!! It really struck me just how much weight she had lost. Even her feet looked smaller. I gave her a snuggle and noticed that she had even stopped shedding.

That afternoon, I made her a vet appointment on the following Saturday. I knew this was probably it.

Normally, I put cats into a carrier for vet trips. This time, my SO drove and I carried her in my arms. She perked up a bit at the strange surroundings but didn’t meow as she normally does.

The vet confirmed my suspicions. She was down to only 4 pounds! I made the hardest decision in my life.

I’ve never seen any one die before and to watch someone I loved dearly go was very hard. She stopped purring only when she stopped breathing. She went very peacefully, giving no indication that she felt that last shot.

She had a very long, full life. Other cats, friends and men have come and gone but Cissy had been the one constant for a very long time. She was the only one who met all the players in my life. In fact, if I’d listened to my cat, my life would have been a lot happier. She was a terrific judge of character. She was terrified of almost all the men in my life except for my current SO. Him, she liked. We’ve been together over 8 years and he’s been very good both for and to me.

I have her picture in my mouse pad; paws tucked under, curled up in the SO’s rocking chair, looking at the camera. She had the prettiest cat-face and the softest fur I’d ever felt. She was the best mannered cat I’ve ever lived with. I never had to reprimand her for doing anything, even when she was young. She never climbed curtains or sank her claws into anything but her scratching post.

I miss her terribly. I have two other cats but neither of them is a ‘snuggler’. I’ve thought about getting a kitten but I don’t want another cat; I want Cissy back. Besides, my SO, who is not a ‘cat person’, is happy to finally be down to only two cats!

Cissy started life as a stray. Maybe the same fates that brought the two of us together will bring me another friend as well.

Advertising

I know every market has local businesses that do their own advertising. Quite frankly, I TIVO most of the TV I watch and thus do not watch many ads. However, I do watch Indians games live and am thus exposed to local advertising.

I know Cleveland is not unique but there are several local advertisers that simply annoy the hell out of me.

First off, we have Ron Trzcinski of the Original Mattress Factory. Ron, for Pete’s sake, hire an actor! You have a lousy voice and sound like a second-grader reading out-loud in reading group. And he’s everywhere: radio, television, cable. I can’t even get away from this guy by leaving town as he has stores all over the region.

Second up is a local car dealer. I know most cities have local car dealers who make their own commercials and Cleveland is no different. I’d lived here for over 3 years before I noticed that here we have the opportunity to buy a car from a snake (Serpentini), who is “American and Proud Of It!”

Another local car dealer whom I can’t stand and immediate mute whenever he comes on is Eric Sonnie. Sr. He doesn’t content himself with simply extolling the virtues of the cars he sells; he does so AT THE TOP OF HIS VOICE! I was in the market for a new car for about 2 weeks last year. Having some guy yelling at me on television guaranteed that I would NEVER go to his dealership to shop.

And last but not least, we have Fish Furniture. Owner Dan Geller does the voice for his animated self in their ads with two talking fish. I always thought he was putting on the odd, high-pitched, nasally voice I heard in the ads until I saw him in an ad promoting advertising on one of the local cable companies. He really talks like that! How funny!!

All of these local businesses would be better off hiring talent for their ads. Annoying potential buyers is not a great way to increase sales.

Of course, all advertisers would do well to take that advice!

Global Warming

I did the research and wrote this in 2000. It still is relevant so I post it here:

Global warming is a theory that gets a lot of attention from the national media. It is poorly reported, with theories represented as facts and facts that do not support the theories not reported at all. Thanks to the internet, much of these ignored facts are available if you care to look. The following is what I found.

The current crisis-inducing number being reported is a rise in global temperatures of less than 1 degree Fahrenheit. What you are not told is that half of this rise occurred in the first half of the century when CO2 levels were rising very slowly. Since the 1950’s there has been a rapid rise in CO2 amounts with no corresponding rapid rise in surface temperatures. These temperature readings also do not take into account the Urban Heat Island phenomenon. This is caused by many weather stations now being located at large urban airports surrounded by acres and acres of heat-retaining tarmac. Temperature readings taken from within these Islands can be 10 degrees higher that the surrounding countryside.

In addition, the earth is a big place. Using widely separated point sources of data to determine a global average is not accurate. In the 1980’s satellite data showed no net cooling or warming. The 1990’s show a similar trend. Weather data have been kept for only the past 100 years or so. Climate happens over thousands of years. We have not collected enough data to accurately predict next Wednesday’s weather much less what the weather will be like in 50 or 100 years.

Climatologists use models to predict weather. The models used are by necessity much more simple than the actual weather systems. The mathematics are not available to represent all of the many, many variables. These predictions, especially for the long term, amount to little more than guesses.

There is also no data to support the hypothesis that CO2 causes warming. Data has been obtained from Antarctic ice core samples that go back 180,000 years and suggests that temperatures cause CO2 levels to change, not the reverse. The samples show that CO2 levels 120,000 years ago were the same as they are now. We can safely assume that it was not warm enough to melt the Antarctic ice sheets since we can take samples of ice that existed that long ago. The presence and effects of water vapor and ozone on possible temperature change far outweighs that of the much-maligned CO2. Also left out of the theories are the effects of solar activity on the earth as a whole. When solar activity goes up, the temperature of the earth increases. Solar activity has been increasing for the past 300 years from a low that caused a mini ice-age in the 1700’s. Geological findings indicate that the Earth’s temperatures are finally approaching levels believed to have been the norm prior to the unusual lows of the 1700’s.

Finally, remember that it was as recently as 1974 that these same climatologists were telling us that we were headed for another ice-age and we were all going to freeze to death!!

References:

http://web.ukonline.co.uk/Members/ad.johnson/text/grnhscon.htm

http://www.greeningearthsociety.org/climate/

Immigration

I know this is a divisive issue. Please remember that Americans are not against immigration. We’re all descended from immigrants. What we are against is the flouting of the rule of law.

We are a nation of laws and all persons are to be treated the same before the law. I realize this doesn’t happen 100% of the time but it is the ideal for which we should strive. Giving 12 million law-breakers a pass would set a horrible precedent.

Immigrants are welcome. Enforce our present immigration laws. Enforce our borders.

No, I am not advocating mass deportations of the illegal aliens already here, however, if you enforce the laws currently on the books and make it impossible for them to get jobs, they will self-deport. Make it unattractive to come here illegally.

Too many municipalities have declared that they will not enforce federal immigration laws. Who gave them permission to pick and chose which laws to follow and which laws to ignore? The whole premise is ridiculous! Suppose they just decided to ignore, oh, say, the first amendment. The mayor and city council doesn’t like what is being printed about them in the local paper so they shut it down. Same for the local TV stations. Think Chaves of Venezuela here. Think that would get some people excited? You bet it would! Why do these cities get a pass for ignoring immigration laws?

Congress has the authority to insist that the laws be followed. Any city that refuses loses all federal money. Simple as that. And not just disaster aide, although that is a good start. All federal money: education, Medicare, welfare, food stamps, Section 8 housing assistance, etc. You get the idea. Think they’d still ignore the laws? I’m guessing not.

Prepositions

Am I the only person in America who understands the correct usage of prepositions??

Here in Ohio, we were bombarded by a radio commercial enjoining us to contact our state legislature in support of legislation to give a choice in cable TV service. Only problem was, this commercial drove me absolutely nuts! It phrased it as a “choice to cable TV”. Arrgh!!

I was reading a financial advise website when I came upon this phrase: “Although the spouse with the bad credit may be resentful for this kind of treatment,…” No, the spouse may by resentful _of_ this kind of treatment.

One of my favorite books is “Eats, Shoots and Leaves” by Lynn Truss, a Brit, with a no-nonsense yet hysterically funny take on punctuation. I highly recommend it!

Wimpy Allah

This god, “Allah”, has to be wimpiest god ever to spring from the mind of Man.

Most gods are attributed with Omniscience, Omnipotence and Omnipresence. This guy can’t take care of himself at all, requiring gangs of murderous thugs to do his dirty work.

In addition, he’s obviously very shallow-minded and petty, spending enormous amounts of time worrying about what people are wearing, especially women. He seems particularly afraid of women. Or maybe that’s just his insecure male followers.

In any case, I prefer my gods to be secure enough in their own Omniscience, Omnipotence and Omnipresence that my manner of dress or dietary habits don’t impact upon their behavior.

Eco-Nazis

PROUD NON-RECYCLER

Fighting

ECO-NAZIS

One can at a time.

Truthers

Just spend a few minutes perusing a 911 Truther website. There’s a part my life I can never get back!!


Some questions for this guy and all the others (Rosie?):

If the clearly observed phenomena of the buildings collapsing are so wrong, how do you know so?

How many 110-story buildings have you watched collapse?

How many buildings have you watched get hit by airplanes?

How many buildings have you watched burn after getting hit by aircraft?

Just what is your basis of comparison?

“Models” made of chicken wire or rabbit cages are nowhere near comparable to the real thing. Setting such a thing on fire and having it not collapse is not proof that the real thing would react the same way.

Just because you can show a “model” of an airplane in Fight Simulator does not guarantee that the model is accurate! Flight Simulator is a GAME. Total accuracy in its airplane representations is not necessary for the enjoyment of play, which is its whole purpose for existence. Get some pictures of real airplanes for comparison! Then, if you spot anomalies, you might just have something.

The really scary part is that this guy claims to be a scientist! Hey, dude! Ever heard of the Scientific Method?? Check it out sometime!