Kiss Your Butt Goodbye

On April 3rd of this year I wrote a post entitled “Revealed” which talked about the really stupid things some people say after someone dies, especially words that attempt to shed light on character that, in death, is evident to be completely opposite from the flowery words offered up.

Below is an article regarding the unfortunate passing of Solange Magnano, a former Miss Argentina. In it there is a quote from a close family friend, Roberto Piazza, that truthfully, honestly, and directly speaks what needed to be said. Mr. Piazza seems to have his head on straight, and I wish Ms. Magnano would have sought his counsel before deciding to undergo the knife to enhance her hindquarters.

And if he did have the opportunity to speak into her decision prior to the procedure, I wish she would have listened. Article below…

Ex-Miss Argentina dies after cosmetic surgery
Monday, November 30, 2009
(11-30) 17:37 PST BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) --

A 38-year-old former Miss Argentina has died from complications after undergoing cosmetic surgery on her buttocks.

Solange Magnano, a mother of twins who won the crown in 1994, died of a pulmonary embolism Sunday after three days in critical condition following a gluteoplasty in Buenos Aires.

Close friend Roberto Piazza said the procedure involved injections and the liquid "went to her lungs and brain."

"A woman who had everything lost her life to have a slightly firmer behind," he said.

Magnano's burial Monday was shown on Argentine television.

Dr. Gonzalo Cortes y Tristan said she arrived at his hospital with an acute respiratory deficiency. Her condition deteriorated until she suffered the embolism.

Fraudulent Charges... Again

A couple months ago while doing my routine Saturday morning bill paying, I stumbled upon a charge to my debit card I didn't recognize. A couple hundred bucks charged at a motorcycle and moped store in Belgium. Figured pretty quick it wasn't me.

I called it in to my bank (SunTrust), and the automated voice instructed me to send a letter to them outlining the details and they would look into it. Within a few weeks the charge was reversed.

This morning it happened again. Same place, this time for $305.55, on a different SunTrust account (my business credit card). This time when I called and was instructed to write a letter, I pressed zero and spoke to a live person.

"No. I will not write a letter. I didn't do anything here- you were the ones that either let my data get hijacked, or processed a fraudulent charge for some other reason. YOU write ME a letter and fix it."

They said ok- they would send me a letter that I could sign and return and would take the charge off. Stupid bank.

Calling The Kettle Black

For more than 25 years I’ve been sitting at the intersection of faith and entertainment. I approached this joining of two “roads” when I became a huge fan of Larry Norman, Randy Stonehill and Keith Green as a teenager. These three gents did an amazing thing- they joined contemporary music and melody hooks to social commentary and faith messages in a way that challenged and grew me- heart, mind and soul.

This affected me deeply in various ways. It helped mature my faith, made me more self-aware as a follower of Jesus and how I relate and treat others, and also lit a flame inside of me to join in a movement. A growing chorus of artists and fans that were excited to engage faith and the arts at the same time.

I taught myself guitar and piano, and started to write songs. My goal early on was to follow in Keith Green’s artistic footsteps- piano-based pop/rock with lyrics that delivered a compelling and challenging message. As those skills developed it lead me to participate in a rock band during high school and land a gig handling all the music at a Christian youth camp. Fortunately it became clear to me early on that I wasn’t a good enough musician or vocalist to make writing and performing my vocation, but I knew music would remain a key part of my life.

There is no shortage of people that criticize faith-based music and film. One of the chief complaints, from inside and outside the church, is that the art is second rate, and becomes unpalatable when a “message” is shoved into a song or film and spoon fed to the listener or viewer. Another common refrain is that music and film should be more subtle, gently weaving a great story that may have a moral or thickly veiled message that we can draw from. And from outside the church, besides those types of comments, we also hear things like “I hate Christian movies- too preachy, always shoving values and morals down our throats.” And multiple variations of that, far too many to outline here.

There’s also great criticism of the marketing and promotional machines that are Christian music and film companies. That these folks put to much emphasis on packaging and marketing “MESSAGE” versus “ART.”

I’d like to point out a few items that have come to my attention in the last month- namely that some of these same types of people that despise faith-based music and film for using the arts to push a “message” or “agenda,” are genuine, good old-fashioned bona fide hypocrites.

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From the NY Times, May 1st 2009:
“Seeking to Save the Planet, With a Thesaurus“ by John M. Broder

WASHINGTON — The problem with global warming, some environmentalists believe, is “global warming.” The term turns people off, fostering images of shaggy-haired liberals, economic sacrifice and complex scientific disputes, according to extensive polling and focus group sessions conducted by ecoAmerica, a nonprofit environmental marketing and messaging firm in Washington.

Instead of grim warnings about global warming, the firm advises, talk about “our deteriorating atmosphere.” Drop discussions of carbon dioxide and bring up “moving away from the dirty fuels of the past.” Don’t confuse people with cap and trade; use terms like “cap and cash back” or “pollution reduction refund.”

EcoAmerica has been conducting research for the last several years to find new ways to frame environmental issues and so build public support for climate change legislation and other initiatives. A summary of the group’s latest findings and recommendations was accidentally sent by e-mail to a number of news organizations by someone who sat in this week on a briefing intended for government officials and environmental leaders.

Environmental issues consistently rate near the bottom of public worry, according to many public opinion polls. A Pew Research Center poll released in January found global warming last among 20 voter concerns; it trailed issues like addressing moral decline and decreasing the influence of lobbyists. “We know why it’s lowest,” said Mr. Perkowitz, a marketer of outdoor clothing and home furnishings before he started ecoAmerica, whose activities are financed by corporations, foundations and individuals. “When someone thinks of global warming, they think of a politicized, polarized argument. When you say ‘global warming,’ a certain group of Americans think that’s a code word for progressive liberals, gay marriage and other such issues.”
The answer, Mr. Perkowitz said in his presentation at the briefing, is to reframe the issue using different language. “Energy efficiency” makes people think of shivering in the dark. Instead, it is more effective to speak of “saving money for a more prosperous future.” In fact, the group’s surveys and focus groups found, it is time to drop the term “the environment” and talk about “the air we breathe, the water our children drink.”

“Another key finding: remember to speak in TALKING POINTS aspirational language about shared American ideals, like freedom, prosperity, independence and self-sufficiency while avoiding jargon and details about policy, science, economics or technology,” said the e-mail account of the group’s study.

Robert J. Brulle of Drexel University, an expert on environmental communications, said ecoAmerica’s campaign was a mirror image of what industry and political conservatives were doing. “The form is the same; the message is just flipped,” he said. “You want to sell toothpaste, we’ll sell it. You want to sell global warming, we’ll sell that. It’s the use of advertising techniques to manipulate public opinion.”

And, Mr. Luntz and Mr. Perkowitz agree, “climate change” is an easier sell than “global warming.”
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And now to wrap this up, I present to you a few bit of “art” that recently graced the airwaves in an effort to shove a message and morality down our throats:

Watch just the first 2 minutes:



And here we see some of the priests and priestesses preaching the message:



And this is just downright painful to watch. Please- give me a tacky toupee-wearing sleazy televangelist over this tripe... at the end of the clip there's even a segment on confessing eco-sin. Do these people realize they have created a RELIGION?

What Causes Global Warming?

THE SUN.

And I can prove it. Every single morning.

Had Enough of Tripe

For the last six months I've been trying to unsubscribe to Pew Research email newsletters. The old unsubscribe process was impossible to navigate- I had to remember my user name and password (I forgot both), and without one or the other I couldn't get off the list. They finally changed their system where I could click a link in the email and go to a simple unsubscribe box. Finally.

This is a screen shot of my final comments to the fine folks at Pew.

A Bird In Hand Is Better Than Two Stuck In Your Grill

I never cease to be amazed by the suicidal dives and swoops birds take in front of my speeding hulking Suburban Z71.

They swoop in from the left or right, mere feet in front of my truck, and I always check to see if the idiots made it through the other side.

I have to watch, since the truck is so big, and I always have the music cranking, so I wouldn't feel or hear anything if they didn't make it.

When I don't see a clear escape happen I know what I'll be doing when I reach my destination- on more than one occasion I've had to peel cute little birdies off the grill.

Yesterday on the back home from a post office run a bird got whacked by my truck. I looked in the rear view mirror and saw the feathery lifeless lump in the road.

This morning on the way to the gym I looked to see if it was still in the road where I hit it. As I looked- whack! A bird hit my antenna and ricocheted onto my window, then fluttered up and over my roof and into the windshield of the car behind me.

Stupd birds.

AWOL

I’ve been absent without leave from my blog for several weeks now. Very simple reason… anger and frustration with what’s going on around me. And…

My wife complained that my blog’s gone too political. I take that feedback very seriously because she and my four girls are the only readers I write for. So… I haven’t had much to say that isn’t politically tinged…

My heart and mind has been filled with awe (in the bad sense) and anger at what is happening before my very eyes. Our economy is teetering, our taxes will increase dramatically, my friend (a policeman) has mentioned increases in local suicides, people have lost half their wealth/retirement, the flow of friends and acquaintances letting me know they lost their job and to keep an eye out for them for new opportunities has now hit about 2-5 per week.

How quickly things change. And I doubt this is the change anyone hoped for.

The latest example to me of how insane things have got is the thousands of people protesting government cuts in NYC and California. Loud are the screams when the slop in the public trough dries up. But not to worry- Congress is dipping their ladles into our wallets and future right this very moment and are ready to spread a fresh heap of steaming wealth into the old wooden, cracked and broken trough.

Sir Alexander Fraser Tyler Was Right- We’re In Big Trouble

Here’s an interesting quote that rubs up against every fiber of my being, my whole lifetime of being taught, and believing, that democracy is an almost perfect form of government:

"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government.

It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largess of the public treasury.

From that time on the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury, with the results that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy,

...always followed by a dictatorship."

- Sir Alexander Fraser Tyler

So there it is.

We have reached the tipping point. I truly believe now, for the first time in my life, America’s greatest days may be behind her.

As anecdotal evidence, I put forth these advertisements flooding the internet (see image).

We’re in big trouble.

Stephen Moore: The End of Prosperity

I read a great article in The Limbaugh Letter and wanted to post a particularly interesting segment from an interview of Stephen Moore, Wall Street Journal editorial writer and author of the new book, The End of Prosperity. A timely message as we begin a journey with a president and congress hell-bent on taxing us into prosperity:

“The 1990’s was a great decade. Our book (The End of Prosperity) describes when Reagan came in with a new kind of supply-side pro-free-market philosophy- turning around, by the way, the worst decade of the century other than the Great Depression, which was the 1970’s.

Amazingly , the left is rewriting the history of the 70’s: “If only we hadn’t had Reaganomics, we could go back to those wonderful years of the 1970’s”- when we had gas lines and 25% mortgage interest rates and 14% inflation.”

In any case, Reagan did two things. He cut tax rates very significantly from 70% all the way down to 28%. And he slayed inflation. The inflation rate went from 14.5% down to 3%. We had the greatest boom for 25 years in the history of civilization. No country had ever seen anything like what happened in American from the early 1980’s through 2007. We created $40 trillion dollars of net new wealth over that period. It was an awesome experiment in prosperity.

Now, Bill Clinton’s tax increase did hurt the economy, The evidence is that in the first two years in the Clinton Administration, the economy actually slowed down. But once you had the Republican Revolution in 1994, once you had the combination of Newt Gingrich and Dick Armey running the Congress, then Clinton moved back to the right. That’s when he gave his speech, “the era of big government is over.”
We had welfare reform, we had the capital gains tax cut, we balanced the budget. Those were all pro-growth Regan ideas.

But a lot of the economists that I talk to in the Obama camp look at that period and say, “Look, we can raise taxes through the roof and its not going to hurt the economy.”

That’s a very dangerous idea at a time when the rest of the world is going the other way. China, Sweden, India, my goodness, Russia has a 13% flat tax. How are we going to compete with them with a 40% income tax? It’s a really dangerous idea to be talking about raising taxes right now in the face of the worst economy we’ve had in 25 years.”

ABC Not-For-Families Channel

We have all but abandoned ABC Family Channel, though there might be a few old films and shows that run there we still catch, but its dangerous if you have young children.

The promotional spots they run for their newer trash programming are packed full of fun family sex, drugs, alcohol and rock-and-roll baby! Woo-hoo!

The tagline for their network says it all … “ABC Family… a new kind of family.”

As in, "we don’t want any of that stupid freedom-inhibiting namby-pamby, modesty, personal responsibility, restraint, purposefulness, careful consideration of friends and acquaintances crap."

"No way, man, we want SEX! Sex for all! And frat parties with lots of beer! Watch the new show GREEK! And check out The Secret Life of the American Teenager (Viewer Discretion Advised)! Yes, more sex and alcohol! Cool!"

These people at ABC Family are not only evil in their programming choices, they’re stupid and actually very out of touch. I caught a television ad for the DVD collection of “The Secret Life of the American Teenager” and if you buy it now, ABC Family will throw in a free digital download of the new album by Jesse McCartney.

First of all, no self-respecting real American teenager would be caught dead near a physical CD, much less a digital version on their iPod, of Jesse McCartney. He’s so 2002.

Secondly, if an American teenager DID want a digital copy of Jesse McCartney, or any other artist, they’d just steal it from a peer-to-peer site or rip it from a friends CD. As if.

“ABC Family… a new kind of pandering degenerate channel. With stupid marketing ideas. Watch us! We’re sorta like MTV now, but with crappy music, shows and promotions.”

How Insignifcant Man Is

Love this article from the UK Telegraph. I've touched on the topic of man made global warming before (here, here, here, here, and here), and am a firm non-believer. A warming athiest so to speak. The news keeps rolling in, doing far more damage to the globabl cultist than that silly Darwin has ever done to dislodge what we are hard-wired to know- there is a God.

2008 was the year man-made global warming was disproved
Looking back over my columns of the past 12 months, one of their major themes was neatly encapsulated by two recent items from The Daily Telegraph.

By Christopher Booker
Last Updated: 5:51PM GMT 27 Dec 2008

The first, on May 21, headed "Climate change threat to Alpine ski resorts" , reported that the entire Alpine "winter sports industry" could soon "grind to a halt for lack of snow". The second, on December 19, headed "The Alps have best snow conditions in a generation" , reported that this winter's Alpine snowfalls "look set to beat all records by New Year's Day".

Easily one of the most important stories of 2008 has been all the evidence suggesting that this may be looked back on as the year when there was a turning point in the great worldwide panic over man-made global warming. Just when politicians in Europe and America have been adopting the most costly and damaging measures politicians have ever proposed, to combat this supposed menace, the tide has turned in three significant respects.

First, all over the world, temperatures have been dropping in a way wholly unpredicted by all those computer models which have been used as the main drivers of the scare. Last winter, as temperatures plummeted, many parts of the world had snowfalls on a scale not seen for decades. This winter, with the whole of Canada and half the US under snow, looks likely to be even worse. After several years flatlining, global temperatures have dropped sharply enough to cancel out much of their net rise in the 20th century.

Ever shriller and more frantic has become the insistence of the warmists, cheered on by their army of media groupies such as the BBC, that the last 10 years have been the "hottest in history" and that the North Pole would soon be ice-free – as the poles remain defiantly icebound and those polar bears fail to drown. All those hysterical predictions that we are seeing more droughts and hurricanes than ever before have infuriatingly failed to materialise.

Even the more cautious scientific acolytes of the official orthodoxy now admit that, thanks to "natural factors" such as ocean currents, temperatures have failed to rise as predicted (although they plaintively assure us that this cooling effect is merely "masking the underlying warming trend", and that the temperature rise will resume worse than ever by the middle of the next decade).

Secondly, 2008 was the year when any pretence that there was a "scientific consensus" in favour of man-made global warming collapsed. At long last, as in the Manhattan Declaration last March, hundreds of proper scientists, including many of the world's most eminent climate experts, have been rallying to pour scorn on that "consensus" which was only a politically engineered artefact, based on ever more blatantly manipulated data and computer models programmed to produce no more than convenient fictions.

Thirdly, as banks collapsed and the global economy plunged into its worst recession for decades, harsh reality at last began to break in on those self-deluding dreams which have for so long possessed almost every politician in the western world. As we saw in this month's Poznan conference, when 10,000 politicians, officials and "environmentalists" gathered to plan next year's "son of Kyoto" treaty in Copenhagen, panicking politicians are waking up to the fact that the world can no longer afford all those quixotic schemes for "combating climate change" with which they were so happy to indulge themselves in more comfortable times.

Suddenly it has become rather less appealing that we should divert trillions of dollars, pounds and euros into the fantasy that we could reduce emissions of carbon dioxide by 80 per cent. All those grandiose projects for "emissions trading", "carbon capture", building tens of thousands more useless wind turbines, switching vast areas of farmland from producing food to "biofuels", are being exposed as no more than enormously damaging and futile gestures, costing astronomic sums we no longer possess.

As 2009 dawns, it is time we in Britain faced up to the genuine crisis now fast approaching from the fact that – unless we get on very soon with building enough proper power stations to fill our looming "energy gap" - within a few years our lights will go out and what remains of our economy will judder to a halt. After years of infantile displacement activity, it is high time our politicians – along with those of the EU and President Obama's US – were brought back with a mighty jolt into contact with the real world.

I must end this year by again paying tribute to my readers for the wonderful generosity with which they came to the aid of two causes. First their donations made it possible for the latest "metric martyr", the east London market trader Janet Devers, to fight Hackney council's vindictive decision to prosecute her on 13 criminal charges, ranging from selling in pounds and ounces to selling produce "by the bowl" (to avoid using weights her customers dislike and don't understand). The embarrassment caused by this historic battle has thrown the forced metrication policy of both our governments, in London and Brussels, into total disarray.

Since Hackney backed out of allowing four criminal charges against Janet to go before a jury next month, all that remains is for her to win her appeal in February against eight convictions which now look quite absurd (including those for selling veg by the bowl, as thousands of other London market traders do every day). The final goal, as Neil Herron of the Metric Martyrs Defence Fund insists, must then be a pardon for the late Steve Thoburn and the four other original "martyrs" who were found guilty in 2002 – after a legal battle also made possible by this column's readers – of breaking laws so ridiculous that the EU Commission has even denied they existed (but which are still on the statute book).

Readers were equally generous this year in rushing to the aid of Sue Smith, whose son was killed in a Snatch Land Rover in Iraq in 2005. Their contributions made it possible for her to carry on with the High Court action she has brought against the Ministry of Defence, with the sole aim of calling it to account for needlessly risking soldiers' lives by sending them into battle in hopelessly inappropriate vehicles. Thanks not least to Mrs Smith's determined fight, the Snatch Land Rover scandal, first reported here in 2006, has at last become a national cause celebre.

May I finally thank all those readers who have written to me in 2008 – so many that, as usual, it has not been possible to answer all their messages. But their support and information has been hugely appreciated. May I wish them and all of you a happy (if globally not too warm) New Year.

Words That Irritate

Just over a year ago I wrote a post about verbal pet peeves- the phrases I hear people say that DRIVE ME CRAZY. How interesting to read a news item today that covers the same subject, from Oxford. I seem to keep pretty good company.

Enjoy- it's a quick read:

Oxford compiles list of top ten irritating phrases
A top 10 of irritating expressions has been compiled by researchers at Oxford University.
By Charlotte Bailey

The researchers who compiled the list monitor the use of phrases in a database called the Oxford University Corpus, which comprises books, papers, magazines, broadcast, the internet and other sources.

The database alerts them to new words and phrases and can tell them which expressions are disappearing. It also shows how words are being misused.

The book's author Jeremy Butterfield says that many annoyingly over-used expressions actually began as office lingo, such as 24/7 and "synergy".

Other phrases to irritate people are "literally" and "ironically", when they are used out of context.

Mr Butterfield said: "We grow tired of anything that is repeated too often – an anecdote, a joke, a mannerism – and the same seems to happen with some language."

The top ten most irritating phrases:
1 - At the end of the day
2 - Fairly unique
3 - I personally
4 - At this moment in time
5 - With all due respect
6 - Absolutely
7 - It's a nightmare
8 - Shouldn't of
9 - 24/7
10 - It's not rocket science

I must admit I've recently used six or seven of these.

0.000193%

Zero point zero-zero-zero-one-nine-three. Do you know what that minuscule number represents?

The total percentage of likely voters in the United States that have been polled, since the completion of the conventions, about whom they would vote for in the presidential election.

That is an incredibly small number. 27,388 people to be exact, according to RealClearPolitics.com. That number is about ONE HALF the total population of my little town of Franklin, TN. And that’s supposed to represent the gazillions of voters that are spread from Hawaii to Alaska, Florida to Maine and to dozens of foreign nations where our citizens and soldiers live?

I just don’t get it. So many people live and die by the polls, yet year-in and year-out they’re shown to be just so much fluff.

I have NEVER been called by a pollster. No one I know has been. And, if they did, we wouldn’t answer it because we have caller ID and we don’t know who these stupid UNKNOWN numbers are.

There’s Never A Cop Around When You Need One

Or so I’ve always thought. Friday night it turned out there was.

I spent last week in Los Angeles, working at my office (or more accurately, cubicle) out on the west coast. I had a great week pulling off a major presentation in front of a large group of sales execs, a multitude of meetings and discussions moving projects forward, and of course my regular working dinners (reading scripts) at my fave Culver City restaurants. Those would be Sakura House, Beechwood and Thai Dishes (for their amazing Kang Ka Rhee Chicken).

I arrived home to the Nashville airport courtesy of Southwest airlines about 30min later than the planned arrival time. Picked up my car and jetted home for what I hoped would be an hour of relaxation before I had to pick up my oldest daughter at church after midnight (she was at a youth group music jam/root beer party).

As soon as I walked in the door K called to say the party was a bust and she wanted me to pick her up early. So, back in the car with barely time for a bathroom break, and off I went for the one hour round-trip departing my garage at 11PM.

As I drove through downtown Franklin I spotted a couple kids standing in the parking lot behind Starbucks. Or more accurately, spotted a couple teenagers with dropped trousers peeing onto the Starbucks wall/back door in the parking lot. Disgusting. Right in the open with bright parking lot lights bathing them in accusatory shades of flickering yellowish fluorescent luminosity. I thought about how fun it would be to be a policeman right then and surprise them in the act. There’s never a cop around when you need one.

And then, at that moment, as I looked back to the road in front of me, I saw Mike approaching in the opposite lane.

Mike is my sister-in-law’s boyfriend. And, a Franklin city police officer. I rolled down my window in a split second and wildly pointed with my left hand towards the Starbucks parking lot. Mike saw me, recognized me, smiled, and then saw my finger pointing to his right. As I drove by slowly I saw the back of his cruiser as he stopped in the parking lot entrance, and the mean look on his face as he got out of his cruiser and yelled “what the h*** are you boys doing?”

Ha!

I picked up K and told her what happened. We both hoped the scene would still be playing out when we drove by on the way home. And it was… in grand fashion. There were 4 police cars with lights flashing and two teenagers looking mighty sorry. Found out this morning that Mike was forgiving enough not to arrest them for public indecency and urinating in public, but did have both boys call their fathers to have them picked up in the parking lot, with a regiment of policeman watching, and pointing out to the dads the wet spots on the Starbucks wall.

Pretty fun night.

Can We Drill Ourselves Out Of This Problem?

70 miles from picturesque Key West, Florida, China is actively exploring oil fields and pumping “American oil” right from our backyard.

And so is Canada.

U.S. companies are barred from working in this area because of Democrats. Furthermore, they are preventing us from drilling in remote and human-less arctic Alaska... and of course we can't build any new refineries or nuclear plants.

If I hear one more goofy politician or pundit say "We can’t drill ourselves out of this problem” one more time I think I'm going to have blood spurt from my eyeballs.

Pardon me… we have global demand exceeding supply and driving oil and gas prices up, and we can’t drill for more oil that our nation owns and doesn’t have to import, and that wont help the problem?

Saying we can't drill ourselves out of this problem sounds about as stupid to me as if someone said “We know you have several small painful cuts and scrapes on your body, but you cant just put a Band-Aid on the problem.”

Give Me My Money Back!

I got a letter a couple weeks ago from a class action settlement management company regarding a refund due to me as an international traveler between 1996 and 2006.

It seems there were some aggressive fees charged by credit card companies for overseas purchases and cash withdrawals and some law firm somewhere saw huge bucks in their future filing a lawsuit on our behalf.

The letter asks if I am willing to settle for a one time immediate refund of $25 (which they REALLY want me to do so the lawfirm can keep the rest of what is really owed me), or if I prefer, I can spend my time filling out various details to back-up any claims that I traveled extensively to get a bigger refund which will take months and months to get.

Hopefully this check will come along about the same time as my tax rebate from the US government as part of the new economic stimulus plan (that, incidentally, John McCain didn’t vote for, thank you very much).

This got me thinking about another class action suit that could be filed on behalf of consumers that might yield huge refunds. And I had this thought when I typically have my lame and stupid thoughts- while on the treadmill wishing 45 minutes would go by faster. My mind starts to wander in an effort to ignore the pain in my legs.

Is the electricity that is required to make that metal dial spin around in my electric meter charged to me? I mean, if the electric company wants to monitor my electricity usage so they can bill me, isn’t the cost of the electricity that makes that thingy go round and round their responsibility? They put it there to record my personal usage of electricity.

If I am getting charged for it, I think that’s fraud. Its stealing. The electric company is stealing from me. I researched the amount of electricity it would take to move that metal dial (about 15Watts), multiplied that by 24 hours to get the total Watt-hours (360WH), then multiplied that by 365 days (131,400WH), and then divided that by 100 to get the total Killowatt-hours (1,314KWH).

According to the US Department of Energy (in 2006), the average cost of consumer electricity was 9.86 cents/KWH. So, that means that little metal dial spinning around my electric meter costs me about $130 a year. Multiply that over the last 23 years my parents have not been paying the electric bill, and I should see somewhere around a $3,000.00 refund.

I’d like a refund from the Middle Tennessee Electric Company please. If possible by this spring when I get my tax rebate and international bank fee refund.

Now that’s what I call an electrifying economic stimulus plan.

Corrupted Youth?

I found these two unrelated articles about Israel to be, in some ways, quite related. I read them on the same day and simply connected the dots. At least in my own mind.

Is it reported that officials from the Israeli government invited the two surviving Beatles (Paul and Ringo) to perform at the 60th anniversary of the country’s creation this May. This seems to be some sort of apology for what the government did some 40 years ago.

Apparently the Beatles had been booked to appear in Israel in 1965, but government officials refused to grant the necessary permits, citing concerns that the band could corrupt the morals of Israeli youth.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/948893.html

Fortunately for Israel, the avoidance of the evil Beatles music played live in the Holy Land has saved the youth and kept them pure and white as the wind driven snow.

Or did it?

Moments after reading this article I stumbled on this one:
Israeli Knesset member Zeev says: “Gay 'plague' could destroy Israel”

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3500042,00.html

Perhaps if the Beatles back in 1965 had been allowed to perform songs like “And I Love Her,” “She Loves Me” and “Girl” they wouldn’t be having these problems now.

Announced Shoplifting

Earlier this week I wrote a post about how I told AT&T I was about to walk out of their store with merchandise without paying for it unless they at least recognized that I was standing at the counter and started to help me.

I thought of this tactic because of some shoplifting I DID do a year and a half ago at a beach store in Ft. Walton Beach named Wings.

We were at the beach for vacation and decided we needed a few new toys for the beach. A couple foam wave runners, a new shovel and some sand toys, and a few other things. All in about $50 worth of stuff.

I went into the store late morning one day and there were hardly any customers- but there were plenty of staff. Probably 6 or 7 of them all in that 18-24 year old range. There were a couple in the back sitting on top of the air-brushed tee shirt counter, a couple out front smoking cigarettes, and a couple more on the far side of the check-out counter talking away about some party or other.

I brought my purchases up to the counter to check-out and stood there for a minute or so while listening to the two clerks chat away. They didn’t even look at me.

I politely interrupted and said hello. I asked if one of them could please ring me up. One of the girls looked at me and informed me that she was on lunch break. She then left the front desk with the other girl and they went to the back. I was standing alone at the front counter. I then wandered to the tee shirt area and asked if someone could help me. The guy said he wasn’t a cashier, but would find someone to help me. He disappeared into the same back room door the two girls had just entered. I stood there a minute or so but no one came out.

I went to the front desk and waited. And waited. About 5 minutes. I then announced to the store (about the only employee that could hear me was the other guy sitting at the tee shirt counter) I was going to leave without paying. I waited another minute and then walked out with the booty. As I did I ran into a couple staff people coming into the store after a smoke break and told them what I was doing and could they help me. They said they were on break.

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Church Art

I’m a doodler. I do my best thinking, my best pondering and decision making when I’m doodling. Or rather, when I am thinking deeply and making big decisions, I doodle. I guess that would be more accurate.

One of the places I end up doodling the most is at church.

I am totally engaged in what my pastor is saying, and process it all better while drawing meaningless shapes on a piece of paper. Much more so then when I just watch him (or anyone speaking). Not sure why- it just works that way.

I thought I would share with you my doodling masterpiece that has been a work in progress for several months. I collect the sermon notes from each week, fold them, and put a rubber band around them. Earlier this year I doodled on a bulletin and liked the way it looked, and so folded it around the other sermon notes and it took on a life of it’s own as a book cover of sorts. Since then the doodling on that cover has expanded to occupy almost the entire surface on both sides, and it also bears witness to the different weeks at church when I had different pen ink colors.

650 Girls

Our girl A had a doctor’s appointment a few weeks ago. Several years ago, as in infant, she became very ill and had to have emergency surgery. Since then we have always kept an extra special eye on her health.

She has always been petite, and even early on she was projected to be a small girl, but we have been a bit concerned about her lack of weight gain lately. She’s a picky and light eater, and we have to encourage her constantly to finish her food. She seemed to have been making some progress, and this recent appointment was a check-up on her weight.

Meanwhile...our doctor’s office recently made a decision to pawn off the more routine work done by nurses to a less expensive group of workers they affectionately call the “650 girls.” These are young, inexperienced teenagers and temporary workers that get paid $6.50 an hour. One of these checked in A (used to be done by one of the nurses). The friendly 650 girl took A’s temperature, checked her blood pressure, weighed her in, recorded basic information, and led Michelle and A to a patient room to wait for the doctor. Michelle noticed that the girl seemed to be a bit unsure of what she was doing, and stumbled through the pre-appointment procedures.

The doctor came in and noted A’s wight loss over the last several months- about 5 pounds. She told Michelle she was concerned and ordered up some extensive blood work. About $700 worth of labs that should give us a more complete look at A’s health and identify any problems she might have.

The blood work came back, and the doctors office called. There is concern A might have something called Celiac disease. It’s a digestive disease that damages the small intestine and interferes with absorption of nutrients from food. People who have celiac disease cannot tolerate a protein called gluten, found in wheat, rye, and barley. Gluten is found mainly in foods but may also be found in products we use every day, such as stamp and envelope adhesive, medicines, and vitamins. If she has it, it will completely change her diet and lifestyle.

The interesting thing, the doctor said, is that A only has 2 of the 5 symptoms (weight loss, and she's shorter than average), and one of the key symptoms- anemia- is not present. A’s iron level is fine which seems to indicate she has no problem absorbing nutrients. The doctor ordered a visit to a specialist and a rather invasive and expensive procedure to “rule it out.”

We know A is thin, but it just does not make sense that she is several pounds lighter than her younger sister- she just doesn’t look it. So, on a hunch, Michelle bought a new scale from Target. With the digital scale purchased and unpacked, the weigh-in began. According to the scale, A was actually 10 pounds heavier than the 650 girl had recorded. Michelle had a flash-back. She remembers seeing the metal bar on the doctors scale (there are bars for 100’s and 10’s and then that little sliding doohickey for 1’s) sitting on 50, not 40. So we think the pleasant and "inexpensive" 650 girl will cost our doctor a pretty penny when we send them the bill for A’s unnecessary blood work.

What a bunch of worry, stress and crap for nothing. Thank you very much.