How To Waste Your Life

So, it appears I have wasted my entire life.

It was a challenge, and there were times I didn't think I'd be able to do it, but after a thorough inventory I am here to report that I have apparently frittered away enough of my time on this planet that there is no way I can salvage anything of value. Oh, well. At least you can benefit from my experience. Just read and follow these handy pointers.

#1: Be Born Into It

OK, this first one isn't really a pointer at all -- it's just a sad fact of life. If your parents are underachievers, chances are good you will be, too. It's not heredity. It's environment. Nothing could prepare your young mind for failure better than growing up with people who aren't focused on success, tuned into personal growth or interested in making it. It may not seem fair to you that some of us have this advantage, but get used to it: Life isn't fair. If you really want to waste your life you can catch up by following these other tips.

#2: Be Afraid
Be very afraid. All of us have fear: the unknown, rejection, retribution, criticism and failure. Just make sure you don't stand up and confront your fears. When facing a difficult or scary proposition, such as starting a business or asking for a date, remember: Your concerns are legitimate. The results could be devastating, the pain unbearable. Keep this in mind and you'll never get anywhere. As an added bonus you will be able to go through your whole life virtually unknown.

#3: Screw Around in School
Where I come from you have to go to school until a certain age. This is the time of your life you will one day think of as "your youth." Your mind is at its most fertile during these years, and school is an excellent place to stifle any creative thinking. Hang out with friends, cut classes, eat pizza and attend football games and dances. Remember: You don't have to learn anything to graduate from high school.


#4: Go To School Forever
If you didn't follow the advice in Tip #3, you may have graduated from high school and you could now be tempted to get started on some kind of productive career. Go to college instead. You'll get nothing real accomplished there. Also, there is no end to it. You can take ten years to get your first diploma if you want to, and then there is no end to the number of additional degrees you can pile on. A growing number of people are stopping right here at Tip #4 and wasting all the rest of their lives in college.

#5: Avoid Successful People
It may seem self-evident, but don't forget that if you get too close to people who are making something of their lives there is a danger that you will be swept up in that maelstrom of success. These people may appear friendly at first but don't be fooled: They are scary people, they have an agenda and they are liable to suck you into their alien world.

#6: Try the Arts
A career in sculpture or music is almost as wasted as one in academia (See #4 above). There's maybe one chance in a million that you'll be any good at it, and even then you won't be able to earn a living. If you really want to taste the waste, go into pop art, like movies or rock 'n' roll. In those fields you will be competing against other "artists" who may not even be as good as you and who have billions of fans. The odds of producing anything useful? Zip. (Bonus tip: Shooting for a career in sports can also be a monumental waste of time.)

#7: Experiment With Drugs
A lifetime addiction is best, but even if you find that you cannot make a real committment to drugs or alcohol, substance abuse can slow you down for years, often your most productive years. You'll find a wide variety of recreational drugs, from pot to heroin and cocaine. Cocaine packs an excellent double whammy: It wastes your money as well as your life. Those who want to keep it legal will find liquor to be every bit the equal of the heaviest drugs, with a bonus: it can destroy your liver, too.

#8: Be A Team Player
In any enterprise, somebody does the work and somebody gets the credit. The work has to get done, and it's always good sports like you who do the heavy lifting. But the acclaim -- and the money -- generally goes to someone else. Understand that these are two distinct skills: Doing the work, and being known as someone who gets things done. The latter lead lives of happiness and wealth. The former just waste their time.

#9: Play Fair

Treat people with dignity and respect. If you have an unfair advantage, don't press it. Consider the feelings of others. Resist the urge to simply take whatever you want from those who are weaker, less experienced or ill-prepared. Crippled in this way, get out in the world and fight for your share of the action. But fight fairly. This will ensure a lifetime of failure and frustration.

Dream Lover

Last night Linda came to me in a dream.

I was at a race track, watching the ponies. There were people around, but no big crowd. It was broad daylight, hazy sun streaming through a stand of cypress. It felt like early morning, not racing time. The horses were warming up, training. In my waking life, I don't go to race tracks.

I turned to the woman standing with me at the chain link fence. She looked at me and it was Linda. She gave me her sweet smile, the one that always melts my heart, her dark eyes downcast shyly. She pressed her side against my side, so the only place for my arm was around her shoulder. It felt OK there.

We made small talk, but I knew she was dead. I wanted to ask her why she left. I wanted to know if anything hurt. I wanted her to forgive me for...what? I wasn't sure, but I needed forgiveness. I wanted to hold her, take her face in my hands, kiss her eyes.

She turned her head. I heard someone say You know she can't be here.

A pack of horses thundered by. I rode one, and saw Linda, standing at the edge of the track. She was waving and calling to me, something I couldn't hear. I'm sure she would forgive me, if I knew how to ask, if I knew my crime, if I could talk to her again.

But I rode away, around the turn.

Of Stats and Tabs

Geek Alert: This is a Geeky Post!

The things we can do with internet technology. I had this blog for a few months (before I became obsessed with it), and since I read way more blogs than I write, I started to notice that people -- some people, anyway -- were blogging about their blogs. Their own blogs. I suppose this is inevitable. This kind of thing is so new, a lot of us are still going "Wow! I can't believe I just thought up something and now someone in New Fucking Zealand is reading it and talking about it." Anyway, inevitable , and totally OK with me. Just as enjoyable reading, actually, as stories about their pets or their vacations.

But one category of writing about one's own blog had my curiosity up more than certain others, and that is writing about who is visiting your site. People were talking about BlogPatrol and Sitemeter and other such tracking services. I had only a vague idea what these were, and I thought "If they're free, they must be bogus." I decided not to bother with them, a decision that lasted until about a month ago. First I signed up for BlogPatrol. I was horrified.

I found that I could look up IP addresses of visitors to this blog and correlate the time stamp with comments they had left and figure out who was who and when they visited at other times and didn't leave a comment. The amount of information available stops just short of physical measurements, and I think I could get those for a small additional charge. Shocked and revolted, I added Sitemeter to my blog.

Even more info. This time charts showing entry and exit pages, and duration of visits. Quick links back to the home pages of visitors' ISP's, where I could sometimes figure out approximate geographical location (Do not look out your window. That is not me out there in the rented Malibu.)

After each session with one of these "services," I felt like I had just been to a cheap whorehouse. I needed a shower. Damn this weasel-like spying! Could I ever be clean again? But I kept going back. I told myself that I was just doing research, trying to determine the best-liked posts, so that, as a public service I could focus more on those types of stories. But in the end I had to admit to myself, as I now must admit to you, that it was just plain nosy prying.

So, ashamed of myself and with eyes averted, here now is My Pledge to you: I will never try to figure out who you are, where you live or when you visit my blog. (The real question, anyway, is why you visit my blog.) I will always respect your privacy and your personal space. No further effort will be made at tracking anybody here. You will not be stalked just for visiting this blog, unless you ask me to stalk you. Then we'll talk.

Which brings me to Firefox. You may think these topics are unrelated, but stay with me for a moment.

Firefox is a web browser. It's freely available here. I use it because the number one browser, Microsoft Internet Explorer, has a lot of security holes in it, and it is targeted by hackers, who use it to install Trojans, keyloggers, password stealers and viruses on your computer. For those of you who don't know, Internet Explorer (IE) has the ability to use what Microsoft calls ActiveX Controls. Just the name sounds scary, doesn't it? Without going into all the details, this is a harmless technology that can be used either to greatly enhance your internet experience, or to take over your computer.

So several months ago I downloaded a beta version of Firefox, which was called Firebird at that time but I guess they couldn't keep the name because of Pontiac or something. I installed it and started using it instead of IE, although I kept IE on my system because some web pages are designed in such a way that they only work with Internet Explorer (this is also known as Bad Web Design). Long story short, I was delighted with it. It has a built-in popup blocker and a password manager. It automatically imports all your settings from IE when you install it, so switching is no hassle. It is impervious to ActiveX exploits. And it has tabbed browsing.

Tabbed browsing works like this: You can open multiple web pages, and Firefox creates a row of tabs along the top. Click on a tab to view an already-open web page. Hold the Ctrl key and click on a link on a page you are viewing, and that link opens in a new tab. Switch to the new tab when you're ready, and switch back to the original page if you'd like. You can even save a group of sites as bookmarks or favorites, and open them all at the same time in separate tabs, and here is how this connects to the first part of this post.

I have a group of blogs (yes, your blogs) saved as bookmarks in one folder, and when I want to read all my favorite blogs, I can open them all with one click. Then I start at one end of the panel of tabs and read all the blogs and write comments, if I think of any. Along the way I answer the phone, drink coffee, pet the cat, write emails and generally live my life. By the time I get half way through this procedure, some of these blogs have been open, sight unseen by me, in their own tabbed windows, for a long damned time. Hours, maybe.

Do you see where this is going? When I open all these blogs at the same time, the BlogPatrol and Sitemeter clocks start running on all of them at the same time. So to the owners of the ones near the end, when they review their site statistics, it must look like someone is obsessed with their blogs and lingering on them for hours. They could be proud and honored, of course, but most likely they will just get the heebie jeebies, thinking some creep is paying way too much attention to their semi-private musings.

So here are the morals: 1.) Get Firefox. Your computer will be less likely to pick up a nasty virus and transmit it to me, and 2.) if, at bedtime you notice that Jones has been on your site since 8:30 in the morning, don't worry -- I just haven't gotten to your tab yet.

Good Night, Johnny

Johnny Carson, 1926 - 2005

There are dicks and there are Dicks

A guy named Dick wrote these things.

I have only included the highlights here. Glance through it, and I'll tell you why I am including any of this shit here.

50 Things: By Dick

1. The person I love most in life is my son.
2. I pray every day that his mommy dies.
3. I'm actually a nice guy besides #2.
4. I'm overweight and can't stand it anymore.
5. Lost my virginity when I was about 16 or 17.
6. Her name was Eileen Kelly, pretty w/big boobs.
7. In addition to #2, I hate fucking Muslims. Fuck you, you smelly, dirty pricks!
8. I would not mind going into Iraq.
9. This is the longest I think I have ever been with one person where I haven't cheated on them. I still have no desire to do so.
10. The answer to life: Have enough money. Then anything or anyone is yours.
11. I think growing up I turned more jaded and republican, maybe it's the same thing.
12. I love big breasts, God I love 'em.

You can go here if you think you might be able to stomach the rest of Dick's 50 Things, or if you have big breasts and want to show them to a Dick, but I think you get the idea. I immediately clicked on the comment button and wrote to Dick:

"What a nice guy you seem to be! You certainly deserve for your son's mother to die. Hey, why don't you kill her yourself? Then you will be able to teach the kid about hating Muslims, going into Iraq, getting fat, and the fact that you can have anyone you want if you have enough money."

I didn't say how cool I thought it was that he mentions his first fuck by her full name (she'll be so proud!), that he usually cheats on his partners or that he's jaded and Republican and thinks it's the same thing.

I also didn't send my comment. I looked at it, and I looked again at Dick's post, and I realized that if you're a Dick, there's nothing I can say or do that will cause you to reevaluate your beliefs, no matter how patently stupid they may be, and all I would do is hurt the dumb fuck's feelings, and then how would I feel? Instead, because I just can't let things go, I'm venting here in my own blog, poisoning my beautiful Sunday in Paradise.

Weep for me. people. But at least I'm not a Dick.

(And don't miss the invitation in my previous post, from late last night --it's the next one down. Reproduce it, ladies, and send it to you-know-who.)

I Want You to Want Me.

I need you to need me. I'd love you to love me. I'm begging you to beg me.

I wanted to say something deep about love, because I've been reading stuff about it in the blogs I haunt and, hey, I wanted to join in, but I feel like it's all been said more clearly, more poetically, more philosophically and even more cynically than I can say it. I've tried to think of some new twist I can use to pin a definition once and for all on this crazy thing we call love, but none come to mind. Or maybe I just don't care. Nah, that can't be it. We're all looking for love, aren't we? Certainly they are in books and movies, and finding it, too, although it don't always come easy, even for the ruggedly handsome and the terminally pretty.

So maybe I do care. You know, about love. Just not about defining love. It's a powerful force, I won't argue, but when you get all over it and try to explain it, maybe it's possible to break it, or spoil it or something. If you could define it, maybe the familiarity would breed contempt. Wouldn't want that. Anyway, I'm not an expert, but I think I know how it feels, and that's good enough for me.

Not an expert? Get a load of this: It turns out that the greatest love of my life didn't know I had the hots for her for three years. How stupid was I? What the hell was I thinking? Did I expect her to send me an engraved invitation?

You are cordially invited to put your arms around me
at your earliest convenience,
to slide your hands under my waistband in the back,
to caress my butt and reach down slowly
along the crack of my ass
until you can feel the wet between my legs.
A reception will be held between those legs
immediately following the deep soul-kissing,
the hot breath on my neck,
the biting of my nipples,
the licking of my belly
and the sensuous, deep tonguing of my pussy.
Festivities will include
leg-spreading,
cocksucking,
cunt licking,
hard pumping,
sweating,
screaming,
laughing and crying.

Not approaching her at a party could be put down to shyness. Letting it go on for three years -- well, somebody must have been one taco short of a combination plate. Luckily the curse was removed, finally, when I got her into my apartment one night, made charming conversation for, oh, I don't know, way too long, and finally led her to the bedroom. To my surprise, she came along readily, and I had my way with her for what was left of that holy night.

Must have been love.

Underground Man

Man, I wish I were anonymous. That guy is everywhere!

I could have been anonymous. This whole thing could have been set up to completely hide my identity. But it didn't occur to me that there might come a time when I would want to hide. This was supposed to be a writing excercise. I actually told my friends about this blog. Don't laugh -- pity me, the fool. Once I considered asking for a real writing job at an alternative weekly newspaper in Los Angeles. They needed someone, and they didn't have a lot of money to pay. Perfect gig for me, I thought. I can write like crazy, I'm used to no money, I have a lot of things to say and my insights will be spellbinding to underground L.A. Then tomorrow the world.

But one of the job requirements was this: When you come for your interview, be ready with proof that you can meet a deadline, not just once, not just for a month, but with perfect regularity, for a long time, and I realized that I couldn't do it. I mean, not that I was incapable of writing on a deadline, but that I hadn't done it, I had a lot of other projects at the time, and I wasn't absolutely certain I could pull it off. This is one of my biggest problems in life, I think -- too courteous. I could have jacked them around long enough to get a few bylines, be invited to a few parties where there would be free booze and loose women, but no, I had to think ahead (for them!) and make the call that Jones was not right for the job.

That was a long time ago, but ever since then I've had it in my mind to someday take a shot at deadline writing. Not that this blog has a deadline, but I figure by writing in it as much as I do I am getting good at cranking stuff out on demand, which is so close to working on a deadline that I can finally be at peace in the knowledge that, hey, there's one more skill I've mastered, on my way to being master of all things.

Also, I have noticed that I feel better if I crank something out that people are interested in, and that causes readers to comment. So I am encouaged to keep at it, in much the same way that a paycheck encourages me to go to work. It's not a paycheck. It's a kick.

I got a kick out of my very first real girlfriend. She's one reason I'd like to be anonymous right now. I was a late bloomer, so I was maybe 15 before I got my hand under anybody's panties, and they were hers. See, I can't say her name, because I'm not anonymous. Why did I fuck this up? I can't start over now. I have blogging buddies now. I will never be able to find new blogging buddies if I stop this blog and start a new, anonymous one.

Anyway, the venue was a '57 Buick Super. The front seat was almost as big as my living room, so while there was a little bit of twisting around, it was nothing like what kids must go through today, in their Miatas. If any kids read this, let me know how you manage to make out. Tell me all the details. I can't remember now the first kiss. Isn't that sad? That first kiss must have been electrifying, because I had been having erections for years, so you know my body was saying find a girl, junior, for quite a while. I mean, I was so ready. I probably don't remember that kiss because I may have blown my load right on the spot, as it were, and I was then preoccupied with concealing what had happened, and filled with shame at what I had done. Thinking back, I realize that I could not have been fooling her, the little bitch.

Ah, but Young Love! For a year and a half we made out wherever we could, mostly in the car, but also all over her parents' house, usually while her parents were there, feigning sleep. I was agitated all the time, at school, at home in bed, trying to study, doing my paper route, thinking about her tits, her soft belly, her very generous behind, her eager lips and tongue. We sucked face and felt each other up thoroughly at every opportunity, but we didn't go all the way. I thought sex without marriage was wrong. She actually attended a Catholic high school. Fucking was out of the question, or so I thought. Geez, I hope she never finds this and looks at the picture in my profile. Oh, lordy.

It wasn't love, but an incredible simulation. It would have been enough to get us hitched, and then the fucking would have begun in earnest. No doubt we would not have tired of it for a few years, during which time many babies might have been born, and bingo! -- instant family! One day we might have looked around and both said "This is not my beautiful house! And who is this person I am tied to forever? Have we ever talked?" I would have grandchildren by now, and they would be listening to hip hop.

But what did happen was that we went to colleges in different cities, and we just... stopped seeing each other. Oh, there are details that I am too ashamed to tell, but suffice to say that our Puppy Love sort of dribbled off. We got together once when we were in college, home for some sad holiday, estranged from each other, and she let me do her, but it was miserable. I knew she was fucking her psychology professor, a worldly older man, and I kept wondering what she thought of me, compared to him. Really miserable, don't make me tell it.

At least ten years after that, I did a little detective work, found her phone number and called her on her birthday. She was surprised but guarded -- who could blame her? We met for lunch, both of us settled now, so you'd think there would be no sexual tension, especially after our miserable final one-nighter. But if she was hot as a teenager (and she was), she was smokin' as a twenty-something single mom career gal, and I found myself in lust all over again. Oh, Christ, I am really stepping in shit here. You don't even know.

To my credit, I was a gentleman. I wore a tie and I paid for everything, even though it wasn't, could not be, a date. In my mind we got a motel room after lunch and I did all the things I should have done when we were in high school, all the things I know now that she would have gladly done with me. In my mind we messed each other up good that afternoon, and every afternoon for a long time, in the park, in elevators, in taxis, on the ferris wheel, on the dining room table, shameless and filthy, wet and breathing hard, not hiding, not concealing anything, flaunting it all, big, bad, dirty fun.

It was a lost opportunity. It probably wouldn't have gone as well as I pictured it, anyway. I promised myself something that day, and I can't say here what it was, because I am findable, and not anonymous. But I still call her every year on her birthday, and sometimes we still do lunch. She should be a grandmother by now, but her daughter is a lot like her, and not cooperating. Our worlds are in different orbits, and between birthdays we spin off into distant voids, where we can't see each other, but the gravity of Puppy Love pulls us back together once a year. I owe her a lot. She wasn't my first time -- she was better than that. She was before my first time.

I might write more about this, but I'm trapped. People could find out about me. I might be exposed. True feelings revealed. Those of you who have stayed behind the curtain, I envy you. Must get underground. I need counseling. I need a violent raquetball game, no thinking, just hitting and scoring. I need a good spanking. I need a fast ride down the coast, big V8 suckin' gas, runnin' hot, I'm a runaway with white line fever, a sunset tryst in a real hotel on the edge of the world, white linen tablecloths, white cotton sheets, white terry robes, love letters in the sand, and I will never, ever grow so old again.

President Bush's Second Inaugural Address

I have received an early transcript.

My fellow Americans,

I love my country. I want you to know that during the first four years of my administration I have tried to do the right thing for America and her citizens. We have done our best for this land that we all love, and God bless you, you have been so kind as to send me back here to Washington, to continue to serve, and that's exactly what we intend to do.

Because you see, my fellow Americans, while we tirelessly worked for the betterment of these United States, and we have been certain of our righteousness, we must now concede that we are human. Mistakes have occurred, wrong assumptions made.

In 2000, I lost the popular vote in this country. A majority of you voted for my Democratic opponent. And yet my party and my lawyers fought this outcome all the way to the Supreme Court, using every bit of legal chicanery at their disposal to take the deciding electoral votes in Florida, a state run by my own brother and whose top election official was the co-chair of my campaign there. My opponent, to head off a potentially disastrous constitutional crisis, graciously conceded defeat when he saw that we would stop at nothing. For these actions I feel only remorse and shame, and I beg your forgiveness.

In 2001 I proposed an enormous tax cut. My financial advisors urged me to call it "tax relief." I proclaimed "The surplus does not belong to the government. It belongs to the people," and through the use of a campaign-style publicity blitz, I sold this idea to you, and my party and my advisors rammed it through the Congress. Only then did it become clear that this so-called tax relief amounted to nothing more than payback to the wealthy CEO's and corporations that have been financing my political career for twenty years and who essentially bought the White House for me in 2000.

My friends, I intend to correct this in my second term. I am proposing a rollback of these huge and regressive tax cuts, and a return to reality-based financing of the federal government. My economic policy up to now has created only more wealth for the already-rich, while hard-working Americans have seen their futures converted to dismal, low-paying fast food jobs. This needs to change, and that's just what we are going to do. The money from my tax-cut rollbacks will go into real investment in education, job creation and job training, and trying to return to some semblance of a balanced budget.

During my first term in office, the United States was attacked by terrorists. Terrorists who had given every indication of their intentions for years, and who we didn't bother even to try to disrupt or apprehend. It is to our everlasting credit that we went after them where they lived, that we destroyed their bases in Afghanistan and toppled the government that sheltered them there. I'm proud of what our brave soldiers accomplished there.

But we quit that fight in the middle and we did not capture their leader. Instead we turned to attack another sovereign nation, wreaking destruction on their country and killing an estimated one hundred thousand of their people, while costing the lives of over 1300 of our own, spending over one hundred and fifty billion dollars and destroying the worldwide credibility of the United States.

I sold this war to you, my fellow Americans, with more propaganda and deception. Everyone knows now that there were no weapons of mass destruction, that Saddam Hussein -- bad as he was -- had nothing to do with the September 11 attacks, and it is to my deep shame that I confess to you now that I knew it all along. We all knew -- Vice President Cheney, Secretary Rumsfeld, Secretary-designate Rice, even Secretary Powell -- but we wanted the war so badly that we were willing to deceive the American public to get it started.

I can't deny that this war has been good for Halliburton and many friends of mine and the Vice President's. But, my friends, war is wrong. It's evil and I will not spend another American life, not one more dollar for the continuance of this killing. I know now that we cannot bomb the world into peaceful democracy. Therefore effective immediately I am ordering my commanders to stand down in Iraq, and to begin converting their operations from death and destruction to humanitarian assistance. We have created a terrible mess in Iraq, and it is incumbent upon the United States to help in whatever way it can to alleviate the suffering and to help restore peace in the countryside and dignity to the Iraqi people. In this effort I'm asking for the support of every American.

My fellow Americans, I admit to you today that there is no "war on terror." Instead, my administration has waged war on the American Way. Through the Patriot Act and the frenzy that engendered it, through reinterpretation of The Geneva Accord and other international agreements, we have become a nation of torturers, a government that "disappears" people, a power-mad, oil-thirsty imperial bully, a pariah among nations, and I say to you this will not stand! As I speak, arrest warrants are being sworn for the top members of my administration: Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Condaleeza Rice, Paul Wolfowitz and others. Within the hour they will be in custody, and real investigations will be undertaken to learn the details of their culpability in these corruptions of American ideals.

Which leaves me.

I stand before you, my supporters and detractors, and I say to you "I have sinned." For the damage I have done, I can expect no les than to be thrown from office, even imprisoned, and if you and the courts see fit to punish me so, I will gladly accept my fate.

I am a lucky man, but I am not a smart man. I was born to great wealth and sent to the finest schools, but I didn't learn very much. I didn't understand all that was happening during my first term in office. Until now, I believed that I was ordained by the Almighty to do the things that I have done as your President. Now I only wish for a chance to right the wrongs that I have committed -- and I have named only a few of them today. I stand before you humbled and ashamed, and I beg you to let me try. I can't promise that I will make no mistakes, but I can tell you this: There will be no more deception, no more hidden agendas. I will try my best to lead a government that is truly of and for the people, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you, and God bless us all.

***************UPDATE*****************

I heard the speech a little while ago, and apparently he discarded the text above and used something else. Oh, well...

Programming Note

Tomorrow (January 19) on NPR's Day to Day magazine show:
"The Perils of Personal Blogging," The tease has a quote from someone who got fired from his job because of his blog. Check your local listings. We all get National Public Radio, don't we?
I wish I could get fired. Then I could write more. Did I say that out loud?

******UPDATE******

I heard the segment this morning (hey, it's Wednesday in L.A.!), and I guess I will have to refrain from talking very much here about my crummy job. It seems a number of folks have lost their jobs, crummy or not, because of their blogs. We are not anonymous, people. It's an illusion. I know two or three ways my real identity could be tracked down by anyone really serious about it (that's why I don't understand why I have not yet heard from Gwyneth Paltrow). I have not tried very hard to hide -- just enough so the casual reader won't bother to figure anything out.

Anyway, if you're in Los Angeles the entire show will be repeated at noon today (Wednesday, 19Jan2005) on public radio station KCRW, 89.9 FM. The segment happens about 28 minutes into the show, and lasts less than five minutes. Or you can go to Day to Day's web site, and hear the audio after 3 PM EST.

And if you think you are hiding yourself real good in your blog, you might want to take a look at The Hot Librarian's post from yesterday. She got found out, apparently through total coincidence, and she is distraught.

We are not doing anything wrong. We are having fun, making connections, learning about ourselves and blowing off steam. It's therapy in a lot of cases. Why should we be fired?

Pigs and Pussies (Bang Bang, Part 2)

Last time I tried this I didn't solve anything.

I started out trying to explain why a person you've just met would go out of his/her way to tell you they are not available, that they are taken, that they are not in the market. This led to my confession that I always took this kind of thing as a personal attack, which got me thinking that maybe I see a lot of women as possible sex partners, and so of course they want to shoot me down, although now I can't see the logic in this thinking.

Anyway, it should come as no surprise that others are wondering about these and related issues, which can be summed up as

The Mystery Dance: What guidelines can we use
to understand The Game of Love?
How can we tell if the object of our lust is similarly interested in us?

This is so important that if you knew the answer, you could -- dare we say it? -- rule the fucking world. At least I'm pretty sure I could. Evidently the studliest warrior and the ringin'est belle are not much more enlightened on this subject than anyone else. They may be getting it more than most of us (or, actually, they may not), but they still don't have a clue how the system works.

I noticed that there's a guy named Dallas who has a crude theory that he uses to explain everyone's behavior. His theory is that we all automatically put everyone we meet into a hierarchy of fuckability. All of us do this. To everyone we meet. He states his case in a mildly amusing way, but he's wrong, of course. Go read about it. Go now, if you like. I'll wait. Warning: This theory is a little bitter.
**********************************************
Dallas has created an elaborate web site to explain his theory, and give him a hand for all his work. If you don't want to read all 12 pages of it for yourself, here's what he says: When a man meets a woman, he subconsciously decides how much he wants to have sex with her, and places her on a rung of his "ladder" in a position corresponding to his desire for her. He's always looking to get it on with someone as high up on his ladder as possible, and will drop someone lower if someone higher enters his life or becomes available. Women do the same, only they have two ladders. The second one is for guys they like but will never fuck -- the "friends" ladder.

Everyone does this, and they make their judgements based on the, er, basest of criteria. Men go almost entirely for physical hotness and sexual availability, and women are looking mainly for guys with a lot of money, although hotness counts somewhat. Oh yeah: anyone who says they are looking for intellectual stimulation, good sense of humor, stability, etc. is just flat out lying.

Personally I think this is kind of a scary way to look at what is, essentially, Life, and I instinctively back away from it. I have jokingly said here that all men are pigs (or maybe someone else said it?), and in a way that statement kind of helps to understand The Dance. It brushes aside nuance and lets us focus on the fundamentals, so we can cope with what's happening. But I hope no one thinks I really believe there is no nuance or free will in our interactions. I don't know if there is a sure-fire way to know what that cutie-pie across the room might be thinking about you. You have to try to turn off the filters, let the truth flow into you, and then you have to act on what you think. The chance that you might be wrong is where the excitement comes from. And maybe the hope that you might be right is the reason for living.

Looking at Dallas' web site, I can see that Dallas (and maybe a few friends), over many cocktails, had a lot of fun putting his ladder theory together and coming up with examples of how it works in real life. But just because you have diagrams, graphs and charts does not make your premise true, especially if the research that generated the graphs comes from one guy's opinions. I think he should stop theorizing pretty soon, and go out and find a girl.

My Bad, Part 2

Did I lead off on Martin Luther King Day with a piece on The Beatles?

Not exactly, I guess, because I wrote my Monday morning post on Sunday night. Still, my bad. Let me just say that MLK is one of my lifelong heroes, and one of the most important and inspiring voices of the 20th century. I think his mug should be added to Mount Rushmore. Why do we kill these people?

She Was Just Seventeen

I was a teenage girl in 1964.

I had a bouffant hairdo. I wore teardrop-shaped black framed eyeglasses, a plaid pleated skirt and knee socks, and when I saw The Beatles on stage at The Ed Sullivan Show, I was transfixed and transformed.

No, I am not transgendered. I just saw a DVD of The Ed Sullivan Show from February of 1964 and September of 1965. This is my way of saying that finally, after forty years, I really saw what those screaming girls saw on those nights.

For three consecutive Sundays in February, Ed presented The Beatles in live stage performances of their earliest hit songs: "I Saw Her Standing There," "I Want to Hold Your Hand," Please Please Me," "Twist and Shout," and more. The studio audience was made up of hundreds of teenage girls who, at least for those moments, became part of history. For they saw the future in this odd-looking band, and they responded to it so viscerally that America was shocked, and their boyfriends angered and jealous.

I, a musician, didn't see it. The vocal mix was bad. Their hair was completely out of line. Their pants were too tight. They wore faggy high-heeled boots! None of that mattered. What I didn't see was the immense talent -- songwriting, arranging, singing, playing -- but more than that, I failed to see the magic.

Magic doesn't happen very often, and if you're an analytical type like I am, and uncomfortable with change as I used to be, sometimes it goes right over your head. The girls in the theater and all over America on those nights were ready for magic, ready to see it and feel it. They screamed, they wept, they held their faces in their hands, they were spellbound. Their reaction looked sexual, and no doubt on some level it was. But really they were reacting to being touched, deep in their souls, in a direct, truthful, fun way that had -- dare I say it? -- never happened before. The world was changing, and these girls were among the first to notice.

Of course I came to realize that The Beatles were special. Like many millions around the world, I became a huge fan. But this evening, watching this primitive black and white television show, shot with cameras that had vacuum tubes, for God's sake, I felt the magic, and it nearly drove me to tears. Hey, I have admitted here that I am somewhat in touch with my feminine side. Deal. Watching these performances, I was touched by the magic. I was joyous like a kid, like the kid who watched these shows live forty years ago, only this time I got it.

If you love pop music, and you want to see some roots, get this DVD, and maybe you'll get it, too.

Must Have Forgot My Meds

Man, I wish I could just take a pill and be happy.

You think it's easy being an intelligent, introspective man? Let me tell you, it's a tough gig. I have to engage in so many activities to keep my mind off the waking nightmares that stalk my mind: tsunamis, neoconservatives, office politics, nepotism, what others might think of me, bills, money, mortality (mine), fear of artistic/financial/social/sexual failure.

In order to avoid dwelling on these things I have to go to movies, make movies, work out, play guitar, build or upgrade a computer every six weeks, make and drink pot after pot of gourmet coffee, telephone friends, write songs, sing songs and jack myself off with this blog (and sometimes without it). Even staying busy at my crummy job gets me through the day.

Sitting idle for more than a few minutes turns my mind inward, and it's dark in there. I wonder if other people have that darkness, too, and if they're afraid of it. Is everybody on the treadmills at the gym running from something? (Disclaimer: I don't go to a gym. I see these people through the windows. The whole gym thing is another post.) Or are they just working out? I wish I knew. I wish I knew if the chaos inside me is inside everybody. Sometimes I'm sure it is, and other times I think I'm the only one.

Most Saturdays I spend completely alone, just me and whatever blows through my mind, so if I'm smart I get a few diversions going. Today I was only half-smart, which is what led to this little outburst. I enjoy most of the activities listed above (except for working and working out -- hmm, seems to be some kind of connection there...) but I wonder how I can hit that state of feelin' alright naturally. High on life, as it were, not evading the demons, just not even fucking knowing about them.

And now for some cheery lyrics by Leonard Cohen:

I'm not looking for another as I wander in my time,
walk me to the corner, our steps will always rhyme
you know my love goes with you as your love stays with me,
it's just the way it changes, like the shoreline and the sea,
but let's not talk of love or chains and things we can't untie,
your eyes are soft with sorrow,
Hey, that's no way to say goodbye.

Silver Nose

No matter how many times I read the letters "LOL" on the internet,

in chat rooms, IRC, blogs and email, I still get only a few opportunities a year to actually laugh out loud at something I see on line.

Thanks to Rene (the Kicking Bitch) for providing this one.

Skin

The comments section of the previous post sets a new record for revision99.

I'm sending out love to everybody who is reading it and to all who joined in. I will revisit the topic of pigs and pussies again soon (maybe today), and in the mean time the comments section there remains open.

Readers of those comments will be heaving a huge sigh of relief for me, for themselves, and for the world, as I was almost talked into posting naked pictures of myself. Fortunately, it was revealed to me at the last second that someone was having me on, and a crisis was averted.

I started this thing before the U.S. presidential election of 2004, because I had to say a few things about politics, a subject I am interested in. But I don't have time to do the research to back up my opinions, what with trying to earn a living and all. Today I heard a columnist with the Chicago Sun-Times on the radio saying he worked as a street reporter for twenty years before he had earned the privilege of stating his opinion in print. And that's the way it should be. There are too many political pundits today who have never been anything but pundits. They are not seasoned in news gathering and they don't know what has gone before, so there is not enough depth to their writing. Some of them are good writers, but I think I am coming down on the side of "Make them work for it." As a corollary, I had to get out of the pundit business, and fast.

I still believe what I believe, politically speaking, and of course I'm absolutely certain I'm right. I mean correct. But putting it down here without being prepared for instant attacks and rebuttals from, like, EVERYONE IN THE WORLD, is just blogger suicide. Blogicide. I'd get killed, and then I'd whine, start to cry, become morose and alienated, and, well, we all know how easy it would be for me to get automatic weapons. Nuff said.

So I backed off politics and fumbled around for a few weeks, typing a few things here and there, but mostly becoming obsessed with reading the blogs of others, a pastime that continues to derail all my efforts to be productive in any way. So anyway I'm drifting away from politics and just sort of raving about nothing, trying to be nice so other bloggers will like me, and I am dumbfounded when I come upon a request, nay, a demand, for naked pictures. Go look at the previous comments section if you don't believe me.

Up to this point the commenters are keeping it real and the commentary is pretty gown-up, considering the subject. I try to counter with a grown-up appeal to enlightenment and intellectual questing, but this commenter, it seems, won't take no for an answer. Desperate, I start to think how I can satisfy this bizarre demand, as I always aim to please. I don't have any naked pictures of myself. But I do have a tripod and a camera.

I'm trying to remember how the guys posed in that copy of Playgirl I saw, but I keep thinking of the line the Playgirl art director used when she was interviewed in Rolling Stone. Trying to describe the perfect photo, uh, package, as it were (stimulating yet legal), she said she was looking for "maximum tumescence in repose." My heart starts to palpitate as I picture my tumescence maximized, but in repose. The picture is not a pretty one. But I think "This reader is challenging me. I am going to call her bluff."

So I gave in, and I put it in writing -- keep watching, and I'll give you some skin. But as I said above, somebody chickened out, and it wasn't me. Now she's trying to act like it was all a joke, but I didn't see any smilies or anything. On the other hand, thank God she let me in on the joke, before I embarrassed myself and icked everybody out.

Bang Bang, She Shot Me Down

I may be frisky and flirtatious, BUT I'M TAKEN!

I was reading tonight in the blog of, that's right, a 30-year-old woman about how she met this other woman who let it be known that she was of the lesbian persuasion. No problem, except that the new girl repeatedly brought up the fact that she was not available, as in "I already have a girlfriend." One of the comments on this blog (Blogger and Commenter -- you know who you are) touched a nerve that I have had exposed for most of my life and that can be summed up as "Waaah! Why are you telling me this? Are you trying to hurt me or 'get' me in some way? Are you trying to one-up me or something? Am I such a rotten companion that you don't even want me to make a try for you?"

To put it another way, it's all about me.

Yes, I'm that sensitive about my own feelings, and that insensitive to yours. Hey, once you break down and admit you love me (you know you want to), that's different. Then I am totally in touch with my gentle, poetic side. But in normal social situations, keep your boyfriends or girlfriends to yourself.

Examining this syndrome to a depth that I have never bothered to do before, I see that it is another example of my insecurity and lack of confidence. I mean, maybe I am talking to someone who is exuberant about her loving, committed relationship, and she is merely trying to share her joy with the world, including me. Why would I immediately have to get defensive about it?

The fact that I usually think the "I'm not available" remark, however it's expressed, is a jab AT me also suggests that I view a LOT of women as potential -- say it with me -- sexual partners. Maybe I do. Maybe it's more obvious than I thought it was. I no longer look directly at the breasts when addressing a woman, and I feel like I'm being a gentleman, and I quit that pubic-hair-on-the-coke-can routine right after the Clarence Thomas hearings. But, hey -- boys will be boys, and they will be IN YOUR PANTS, girls, if they can. So that's it: I feel busted, and guilty. As polite as I tried to be, I had filthy intentions, you saw through them and DERAILED MY TRAIN. Caught red-handed trying to follow God's Plan. Oh, the shame. But I'm feeling better already, having confessed.

You know who I admire? The guys who see all women as potential sexual partners, win some and lose some, and don't get too fucking mental about it, like I just did. I don't understand women (You've never heard that before, eh?). They have a million ways of shooting you down. I should know by now that I don't have to make up new ones of my own.

Note to the blogger who got me started on this track: Yowzah! You must some hot mama! You even make the girls nervous.

Sex, Blogs and Rock'n'Roll

I've only been a blogger for a short time, and I am finding that I enjoy reading blogs more than I do writing them.

Maybe it's because I am not as clever as I thought I was, and when I re-read my posts I am usually disappointed. Either it's not funny when I thought it was, or I wandered off the point somewhere in the middle and never got back to it, thus making the whole thing look like a 7th-grade essay, or I just didn't find the words to say what I meant. I used to have a great vocabulary, but I lost it gradually after coming to the realization that a lot of people had no idea what I was talking about. I started speaking in plain English, and gradually forgot all the big words. See, I don't even have a big word meaning "big words." But I used to.

Now that I'm writing on the internet -- I should say now that there IS an internet -- plain English is not that important. People can look up anything they want -- even get it translated from some other language into English. Plain English, if they want. So I don't have to talk down. I could use all the polysyllabic verbiage and circumlocutory constructions I wanted. But now plain is the only way I can talk. So my blogging is a little, um, boring.

On the other hand, I have read hundreds of other peoples' blogs, and they are funny, intelligent, well-researched AND they freely use big words that I understand but can never think of when I want to. They are also poetic, god damn them, and dirty, god bless them. Yes, sex blogging: How I love it. The filthy details of randy midwestern housewives' masturbatory fantasies, and how they become my masturbatory fantasies.

I have noticed that all blogs are written by 30-year-old women. This, I suppose, should not surprise anyone. Who writes diaries? Who are the diarists in your life? Girls, then later women. Enter blogging. Wow! Diaries that others can read, but they are just as private as any journal under lock and key because no one knows who you really are!! So you can keep your secrets while you reveal them. And you can lie about your exciting life and your dates with Brad Pitt or Gwyneth Paltrow and hey -- it might be true.

But back to 30-year-old women. OK, they aren't the only bloggers, but they might be half of all bloggers. When do they find the time to put together these witty, sexy, smart rants? It takes me a week to write five paragraphs, and they are knocking out daily posts, while they raise three children alone, hold down a full-time job, attend law school, read voraciously and pursue two or three potential boyfriends, all of which activity shows up instantly in their blogs. I am ready to submit. Women are truly superior beings. I get it. I humbly request to serve at your feet.

And now, because I read more than I write, I feel like I have all these new acquaintances, people who know me, and I know them, and we chat a little every few days, and we get each others' jokes, and we are concerned for each others' emotional and physical health. If someone posts pictures I study them as if they are of my sister's wedding, and comment on them as if anyone gives a shit what I think of them. Some of the 30-year-old women have man-trouble, and I am right there with my wise advice, which is about as useful as tits on a bull, and I fervently hope no one takes it seriously, or I could have some real liability, but I feel like it's OK to give advice and if I have a breakthrough maybe I will even ask for some, too, because, you know, I feel like you are all my pals.

Except that you're not my pals, really, and we really don't know each other, and I only think I know who I am dealing with because I have -- in many cases -- accepted more or less at face value who each of my blogging buddies says (s)he is. And this makes me pathetic, I guess. Not that I don't have any friends in real life. I have lots. Ok, two. But still, I know they would go to the mat for me. How many of you would do that? All right, then.

My Bad, Part 1

OK I apologize for the previous post.

I didn't watch every fucking second of the Today Show this morning, because at some point I had to take a shower (etc.) and get dressed, but at no time did I see anything about the guy they pulled out of the Los Angeles River the other day. Everything seemed to be preempted by the Brad and Jennifer breakup. There were at least three segments, maybe more, devoted to this. What's the deal? He's prettier than she is, but he can't act. Oh, wait: Her name is Jennifer, so she's probably been drafted to be Affleck's next squeeze. Good luck to all three of them.

Flood Channel rescue

Every time it rains in Los Angeles, someone falls in the flood channel.

As noted here, there is no good reason for this, except that it makes for an excellent couple of hours of reality TV, as a million firemen try to save the clown while the video cameras roll. Anyone who wants to see this spectacle, please tune in to The Today Show on Tuesday, January 11 (NBC). Our local NBC affiliate has been teasing the fact that one of the numbskulls who fell in and got rescued is going to be interviewed, hopefully by America's cutie pie Katie Couric. They have some great footage of the rescue. This will be good television, people.

Heart of Dorkness

OK, I'm a geek.

I admit it: I know a lot about computers: I build them, I fix them, I experiment with them, I try lots of different software and hardware, not all of it absolutely necessary to my survival. OK, almost none of it really necessary. OK, none of it.

Two or three weekends a month in my town, we have a humongous computer swap meet, a tribal gathering of hundreds of fly-by-night vendors*, thousands of bargain hunters, pocket protector types, retired engineers, students, geeks and cool guys like me, all searching for that hard-to-find ISA SCSI adapter, that one magical piece of software the will change their lives, or maybe a brand new computer because they have had it with the old one crashing all the time.

This mob crowds into exhibit halls at the L. A. County Fairgrounds, which is in Pomona, California, as far away from Los Angeles as you can get and still be in Los Angeles County. Usually the "computer show," as most people call it, occupies two high-ceilinged football-field size buildings at the fairgrounds, and despite the enormous space available the crowd is shoulder-to-shoulder within minutes after the gates open at 10 AM, and it stays that way until closing at 5 PM. The treasures for sale are previous-version software applications, OEM peripherals, beige-box computers, off-brand flatbed scanners, oddball cables and adapters, motherboards, sound cards, hard drives and all the individual components needed to build a PC from scratch. On a good day it is a chaotic bazaar, a sweaty, shouting, frustrating, pushing and shoving experience. Saturday was not a good day.

On that day I drove forty miles of bad road through a torrential downpour to get to the fairgrounds. My mission: Find a software firewall to protect my home network (I said I was a geek), and buy it cheap. My home is a fortress, digitally speaking, and I guard my network jealously. The old firewall was, well, old, therefore possibly breachable, and I had planned this trip for more than a week. Who knew the Storm of the Century would be going on? OK, the century is young, but still. I could have called it the Storm of the Millenium, so lighten up. When I parked the car, the rain had let up a little, and I hopped out and headed for the gate.

For some reason, this was the day the promoters of the event had decided to tighten up security, and I mean they tightened it up. 600 mild-mannered technophiles were standing in line in the rain, while two rent-a-cops checked everybody for weapons! They had an airport-style walk-through metal detector and metal-detecting wands! Almost everyone had to go through two or three times, because, you know, this wasn't fucking LAX, and no one was expecting to be scrutinized. Shucks, we were just there to shop, not hijack the fairgrounds. It took almost a half-hour to get to the front of the line, during which time the storm kicked up again, drenching all of us. A somewhat overly friendly older man with a striped umbrella struck up a conversation with me, and edged close enough to shield me from the rain. I was feeling a little nervous about this attention, but any port in a storm. Five minutes after the rain died down I had to remind him that it was OK to close the umbrella, and get the hell away from me. Call me a tease, or an umbrella whore, if you must. After a while we noticed that there were three lines, and the other two were going much faster than ours. They were the lines for the Easyriders Bike Show and the LA Tatoo and Body Art Expo '05, which were taking place concurrently with the computer show. We passed the time debating whether it would be OK to stand in the faster, shorter lines, since it appeared that everybody ended up in the same place once past the gates, but the signage was clear -- Computer Fair Here -- and being the law abiding computer nerds that we all were (except me, I'm not a nerd), we decided to stay put. I noticed that all the babes were in the other two lines, and had to ask myself again "Where did I go wrong?"

Finally at the metal detector I emptied my pockets into a little plastic basket and went through the gate, which sounded an alarm because of... my belt buckle, maybe? But no matter, because the rent-a-cops had found my pocket knife in the basket, a miniature Swiss Army knife with a 2-inch blade, used primarily for cleaning fingernails and opening mail. They got so excited about the knife that they forgot to use their wand on me to find out why the alarm had gone off. They escorted me to a girl seated at a folding table and told me I had to give the knife to her, but that I could have it back upon leaving the venue. Thanks guys.

The girl took my knife and my name, and placed the former in a little ziplock plastic bag and the latter on a list of names. She tossed the baggie containing my knife into a cardboard box on her table, wrote my number on a card and let me know that I would have to present the card to her (and picture ID, please) to get my knife back. I was number 34, and I could see in her box that almost all the other "checked" items were knives like mine, in identical baggies with small numbers on them.

The fairgrounds are big -- 487 acres, to be exact, and I walked about two blocks (through the rain) to the first of two exhibit halls. My elderly protector with the umbrella was nowhere around, probably having been detained by the guards for carrying an umbrella. I was getting wet, and I was no longer packing my weapon, but looking around at the bikers and the body art people I was relieved to know that we were all similarly disarmed.

Once inside the actual computer show, and confident that terrorists weren't about to hold us all hostage by threatening to beat us with umbrellas or clean our fingernails with little Swiss Army knockoffs, I made quick work of my mission. I got the new firewall and headed for the door, when I noticed a disturbing anomaly: One of the largest booths, surrounded by one of the largest crowds, was selling knives! Buck knives, gut hook knives, fillet knives, carving knives, "police" knives, hunting knives, daggers, non-reflective stealth tactictal knives, "assisted opening" knives as well as a wide selection of samurai-type swords and shorter blades. Outside, the guards were confiscating knives. Inside, the vendors were doing their best to replace them. I had to leave my 2-inch blade at the door, but I could walk out with a fully functional switch-blade if I wanted to.

I didn't want to, though. I still had to get back to my home network with my new firewall, and it was raining harder every minute. So I beat feet back to the main gate, stopping to get my pathetic little pocket knife. By this time the girl had figured out that, while it was pretty easy to officiously confiscate and toss peoples' stuff into a box, it was a little bit more demanding to retrieve said stuff and return it. She was frazzled from pawing through her box of identical-looking knives in baggies with tiny little numbers on them. It took way longer to find my knife than it had to toss it in the box, and while she was looking more people were pushing their numbered cards at her and asking for their stuff back. One guy suggested that we be allowed to look for our own stuff, but she didn't like that idea, so we just had to wait. This part of the stupidity was totally her fault, but she was too innocent to harrass, and I was a little peeved at the guy who informed her about the brisk knife and sword sale that was going on inside and repeatedly asked "Are you aware of that?" as if she should do something about it, and pronto.

I don't know why you'd set up a knife booth at a computer show. Maybe somebody misunderstood what the term "hacking" means. Or maybe somebody thinks that computer geeks need weapons, or want them. From the look of things on Saturday, they might be right. I also don't understand why you'd want to frisk people who only want to shop -- I thought the President said we had to shop, or the terrorists would win. If the terrorists' goal was to cripple our country by making us all stupid, it looks like they are on to something out in Pomona.

In the meantime the real security is at my house, on my network. Just try to hack me.

*To be fair, the vendors at computer shows are honest and hard-working. I just wanted to use the phrase "fly-by-night."

Slippin' and Slidin'

Here's a picture of my commute this morning.

Raining in L.A. Who knew? You are looking at the 405, known in some quarters as The San Diego Freeway, although this picture was taken more than a hundred miles from San Diego, and going away.

Brake lights. Tailgaters. Lane-changers. People in big fucking hurries. Every couple of minutes a full-on, gut-wrenching, heart-in-the-throat near-disaster. Some asshole steering with his knees, shooting pictures with a digital camera while trying to drive.

I got the camera out too late to shoot the cause of the big traffic jam I ran into: One or more bozos driving as if it weren't raining, spinning out, blocking lanes for a half-hour while the rest of us fumed and crept along. Of course, given a chance, the rest of us would have screwed it up ourselves, because it never rains in Los Angeles, so we don't know how to drive in the rain. Top that off with an oil slick that has been forming on the roads for five years (since the last wet winter) and you've got a recipe for Happy Fun on the 405.

Hot Tramp, I Love You So

Lord, take me downtown -- I'm just lookin' for some tush...

So I've got this MP3 player, and I ripped about 350 songs and dumped them all in there. It's not an iPod - it's better than that. 20 gigabyte hard drive (that's 5,000 MP3 songs, yee-ha!), 14 hours between charges, plays like five different formats, has an FM tuner, creates MP3 files on the fly, has a built-in voice recorder (Note to self: Figure out some way to pay for this.), gen-you-wine leather case, comes with a remote control and about fifty little gizmos, adapters and attachments, hooks up to my USB2 port (is the cable included? Yes!), requires no special software - just drag and drop the music. It's so fancy that it has a New York style belt clip: You have to unbuckle and thread your belt through it, so if anyone wants to snatch it and run they will have to take my pants off first.

I knew I was going to be doing solitary work today -- stuff that must be done alone, mind-numbing stuff that I dread, so I took my player to work with me, got myself all hooked up, stuck the little buds in my ears, set the thing to play every song at random, and I was partyin'!! I was takin' care of business, I was shakin' it like a Polaroid picture, I was watchin' the detectives, I was born in the U.S.A.!

The hours flew by, the work got done as if by someone else, while I rocked out in my own private stadium. And where else would you hear "The Israelites" by Desmond Dekker and the Aces back to back with The Heartbreakers' "Room at the Top" followed by the classic Tom Waits "Filipino Box Spring Hog?" Sweeet.

Until I was 20 minutes late for the staff meeting because I couldn't hear them paging me. I couldn't hear anything, because I was rockin'. Someone finally came and got me, and I was busted taking the earbuds out -- oh, that meeting. But in the immortal words of Keith Richard -- or was it Pete Townsend? -- "Fuck 'em if they can't take a joke."

Social Security

In which I get double mileage out of one rant.

This post originated as a comment I made on someone else's blog. It was in response to his occasional whining about how Baby Boomers are trying to steal his Social Security income. Since he is only thirty years old I think he could find some more immediate worry, but that's blogging.

Anyway, after I posted my comment, I read it and enjoyed it so much I thought I'd put it here, too, because I want to put something here today but I'm busy baking persimmon bread. The post, with minor edits:

You should relax about Social Security. Nobody would be more at risk in this regard than the baby boom generation, if there were a "Social Security Crisis," which there is not. The system needs a minor tweak, perhaps the funding of one less high-tech bomber per year, but the current crop of "leaders" wants to dismantle our system of a low-yield but secure federally managed plan and replace it with a scheme to shift the retirement savings of the nation into -- surprise! -- the pockets of investment bankers and CEO's, with the caveat that if you happen to invest in, say, an Enron or an MCI, you can kiss your life savings goodbye, but you should starve happy because you had the opportunity to act as a rugged individual. To get guys like me to shut up and let it happen, they propose to spend 2 TRILLION dollars (your kids will pick up the tab, OK?) to fund the transition.
The good news is that inevitably even the Christian Right will wake up and start to object to this kind of foolish spending. The bad news is that the beneficiaries of this scam will be isolated in walled and guarded cities by then. OK, not really, but their money (which used to be ours) will make them untouchable.
Your enemies are not hippies or boomers, who have been paying for fifty years to keep Social Security afloat. Your enemies are your elected officials.

Happy New Year to all. Thanks for checking in.