Teacher, teacher..

Teach the children well. If you can’t teach, you should be grateful to those who can..etc.  It’s school time again. I’ve been around teachers all my life. My dad was a teacher and I sleep with one*.  I am friends, both Facebook and in so-called real life, with many more. I am not necessarily speaking for anybody besides me.

Here in Nashville, and in Tennessee, veteran teachers have been buffeted and metaphorically  battered by state government and local government (not talking about Principals and folks in the schools).  Start with the stripping of the teacher unions to effectively negotiate, the attack on tenure, thanks to the new evaluation system that damaged morale more than anyone not teacher, or living with a teacher could understand, and now we have the latest insult: new teachers will be guaranteed a certain level of pay (higher than in the past), and current, veteran teachers get no raise.

To be very clear, it is not realistic to expect raises every year (either as a state employee like myself, or a local teacher).  Tenure should not be iron-clad, and a good evaluation process is extremely important to rid the school system of incompetent teachers, and much more importantly, to offer ‘course correction’ for those teachers who are generally doing a good job.  Nonetheless, the way this was all handled over the past few years was destructive. If you are a ‘specials’ teacher (art, music, PE), the basis of your evaluation made even less sense.

The state is tweaking the evaluation process, and I believe that system will improve. What the state and metro should also tweak is their approach to veteran teachers who have been pouring their heart, their time, and in many cases their own money into their jobs.

I laud the passion of my wife, Lynn Ownby Hutcheson, Abigail Reynolds, Linda Summey Slayton, Linda Sabol Hagan and many many others who really do care and should be honored (at least occasionally with a raise and an acknowledgement).

Once again, these words are my own, and my not be endorsed by any of the people listed above.

*uh, I should add I’ve been married to this teacher for nearly 35 years.

‘A budget is a moral document’..

If you believe a political party can be judged by it’s proposed budget, then the Grand Old tea Party evisceration of Planned Parenthood (and no, abortions are NOT funded by the federal government) and their cancer screening services for the lower income women, the slashing of the WIC budget – a program that provides prenatals and infants with nutrition services and works with immunization to make sure that children are fully immunized, speaks volumes. No it won’t pass, but it ain’t remotely pro-life.

 

If anyone is serious about budget slashing, cut out the ethanol nonsense subsidies, the farm subsidies and more important figure out a way to manage medicare/medicaid spending, as well as not funding a project just because it is labeled ‘defense’.

The Bush administration dishonesty regarding funding for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars ‘off the books, while cutting taxes has left us in one of the worst recessions in recent history. Cutting taxes for the wealthiest did little to alleviate the problem. If these tax cuts really helped grow the economy and create jobs, then where the hell are the jobs?

 

I’m not even going to pretend that the Democratic party is seriously attacking budget bloat, but the GOP is doing nothing more than blaming the victims for the mess we are in, instead of trying to rein in the real swindlers who perpetrated the largest fraud in American history.  Income inequity is at the root of many of the uprisings we are witnessing around the world.  Busting unions and taking away nutrition services from pre-natals and infants may win points with the far-right base of the Tea Party, but it’s no way to run a country.

 

A balance between government over-reach and the social Darwinism proposed by the anti-government crowd is sorely needed.  Here’s hoping Obama and reasonable legislators on both sides of the aisle will figure that out..

 

 

What it’s gonna get me to watch the ‘LeBron James Vanity Special’ tonight.

Note: some of this is borrowed from The Sports Guy. I have embellished quite a bit..I AM interested in where LeBron goes because it definitely will effect the next few years of the NBA.

To watch the show I’m not asking, I’m DEMANDING the following:
1) All the GM’s in contention in the room with LeBron
2) A rose
3) Seacrest
4) A table with all of the hats of the teams in contention
5) the frozen head of Ted Williams
6) a song from the losing GMs after LeBron makes his choice – preferably a medley of ‘You’re No Good’, ‘I’m a Loser’, ‘Fat-Bottom Girls’ and ‘Halloween Head’ by Ryan Adams

The show opens with Seacrest introducing the GMs and making jokes about the enormous forehead of Jim Gray (the official host of the show). LeBron descends from the ceiling in some kind of chariot (kind of a reverse Elijah). LeBron dribbles around (with a basketball of course), takes a couple of trick shots, and then begins to eliminate the hats from the table. When he gets to the final two hats, he opens the box holding Ted Williams frozen head, and puts the ‘winning’ hat on Williams cryogenic noggin, and hands a rose to the ‘winning’ GM.

Seacrest interviews the crest-fallen ‘losing’ GMs. An army of small children (possibly the offspring of Shawn Kemp) rappel down the forehead of Gray. The show closes with the medley from the losing GMs while LaBron and the winning GM ascend into basketball heaven.

Otherwise, I’m just gonna get the news from my phone and skip the foreplay..

An appreciation, after the cascade, of Patty Griffin

Anyone who can read and/or hear in any fashion knows that we’ve been deluged with a cascade of famous people passing on..many of us have faced loss on a far more personal and poignant level. We often declare to others and to ourselves that THIS TIME we’ll treat others better, appreciate the small things, live life more fully, etc etc etc, only to find ourselves back in the rut of the day-to-day rinse lather repeat rhythm that weakens the resolve to climb higher and seek the noble.

It really is hard to change. I’ve promised myself that I will..and maybe I’ve grown (perhaps you more than I), but it’s easy to norm, and pretty natural.

After my friend Robert died, and I wrote an appreciation AFTER the fact, I have vowed to appreciate my friends more, openly and, at times, in writing. Patty Griffin isn’t really my friend, even though I wish I knew her. There are few celebrities I really want to meet. I think I’d have little to say and perhaps I’d be disappointed that they really aren’t much different than most.

Patty G is a singer and a songwriter of the highest level. I’m not sure what I’d say first, but I’d love to sit on the front porch with a coffee or some other brew and just delve into what she finds interesting. I’d love to tell her that ‘Long Walk Home’ should be taught in English classes everywhere because it’s a great short story in song, with hints that can be richly explored. I want to tell her that the first time I heard ‘Flaming Red’ in a Borders Book store listening station in Knoxville I knew I had found someone who moved me as much as Otis Redding and Sam Cooke did when I was a kid listening to WLAC on my transistor radio.

I love that Patty has such a big voice in such a small frame. I love the flaming red hair and when she croons and when she rocks. I’ve been to many of her shows, including the Ryman Aditorium concert that was later released as a concert CD (I told my wife after the show that this would make a great recording – I’m such a genius), a concert that made the audience members laugh, cry and actually shut up with the chatter. You really could have heard a pin drop. She’s that good.

‘Oh Heavely Day’ still brings chills. Nothing but ‘Blue Skies’ still elevates my spirit. I just wanted to say all this while someone I appreciate and adore is still with us…

Thank you, Patty.

The Angina Monologues – Chapter 1, in which the narrator is asked to ‘Turn it Down’ (repeatedly)

I’m 12 years old and I hear ‘Like A Rolling Stone’ on the radio and I rush over to Zibart’s in Green Hills and I buy the single, and I play that sucker about 200 times in a row trying to figure out what this mad genius is talking about and then I turn the single over and it’s something called ‘Gates of Eden’ and I play that roughly the same number of times and it’s even more obscure, and somewhere in the middle of all that comes my mother’s voice asking me to PLEASE turn that awful music down and why would anyone want to listen to that, and then I turn it down a little bit, but that amazing Al Kooper organ just moves me so much and then I turn it BACK UP to 11 and the mother’s voice gets a little louder and I realize that I’m risking hearing my freakin’ father’s voice, which I do not want to hear in that context, so I turn it down, but in my heart, Dylan is ringing off the walls and peeling the paint on my closed bedroom door. The Beatles are on the hi-fi and they are twisting and shouting and I’m about to just explode because it’s that part of the song where they all go ah-ah-ah-ah in harmony each time going a little higher and I’m going a little higher even though the properties of marijuana are, as yet, unknown to me, and I’m singing my little butt off even though in no way, shape or form could my caterwauling be misconstrued as really singing, and I’m so happy I forgot that I had to go to church like 7 straight nights for a gospel meeting in which I will personally be stared at by 37 old women who are badgering me to be baptized but I’m stubborn like that and besides Bob Dylan saved me, John Lennon saved me, Chuck Berry saved me and I”m just about to start speaking in musical tongues when my mother’s voice high-pitches me upside the head: TURN IT DOWN. What’s a young skinny boy supposed to do? I can’t sing in a rock and roll band, but I’m starting to realize that I had the music in me, even if it is somebody elses music, lyrics and beat, and why do I have to turn IT DOWN? It’s my life, it’s alright ma, I’m only exceeding everything I knew before. I’m 16 and driving the Old’s wagon down the road and I”m picking up a date and I’m listening to Mick tell somebody to get off his cloud and I pick somebody up and they ask me to please turn it down and I want to say, IT”S THE STONES, but I realize that I won’t be going on many dates if I start yelling on one of my very first ‘car’ dates, so I turn it down, but I know already that this girl can’t be THE ONE because she wants me to turn down the Stones, the greatest rock n’ roll band that ever existed in 1968. I’m in love, I’m in college and her name is Gail and she appreciates the music and she grew up with the music playing loud, but she is tired of the loud and I’m trying to get her to understand that Lowell George is a freaking genius and she smiles and says yes, he’s good, but it is too loud and like a good boyfriend, I turn it down. Didn’t anyone understand that they were tearing another little piece of my heart?. My kid is about 5 months old and I’m married and it’s not my college girlfriend and I’m happy as the kid in Almost Famous and I’m arguing with my wife that if the kid is spoiled by having the music turned down low, he’ll never be used to hearing music correctly and he’ll cry at the drop of a turntable needle, and of course I lose that argument. Will I ever get to TURN IT UP? Many years later and the kids are grown (the very same damn kids who asked me to TURN the car radio down when I was driving them places) and we are not in a ‘good place’ and I feel at the end of a rope and I don’t know what to give (helpless, helpless, helpless) and I don’t know what to do, and then I hear this Patty Griffin song with tinge of gospel and a lot of soul and I sure she’ll love it and I can’t wait to play it for her when we go out on a Friday night and I’ve got it ‘cued’ up on the car CD player and I know she’s going to love it and we take off in the car and I crank it up thinking that this is my perfect gift to her, and of course she asks me to turn it down, and my heart just breaks in 15 places and I just want to turn around, go home and turn up some Stones, but you know the rest.

What kind of idiot are you? It’s a pseudo Facebook quiz!

I’m not expecting you to answer any questions, because why would idiots answer questions (not that anyone reading this is an idiot)? They would assume, make silly-wild-ass guesses, postulate based upon nothing more they heard on talk radio or something their uncle told them when they were nine and it stuck for no other reason than the opinion came along with a stick of gum.

Do you forget to use your turn signal when you are changing lanes in heavy interstate traffic?

Do you forget to turn OFF your turn signal after you’ve driven a mile since you changed lanes?

Do you speculate on pivotal plot points OUT LOUD during the movie when others are merely content to silently contemplate those very points?

Do you repeat the same exact thing you just said three or four times, each time more loudly, when no one responds not knowing you are being ignored?

Do you yell at your computer when it’s moving too slowly for your taste?

Do you use anger to underline your point even though anger is the very thing that makes the person you are talking to quit listening?

Are you afraid to admit you like some TV show/movie/book/song/play just because the people around you are mocking that very piece of art?

Do you choose not to say I love you when it would be quite beneficial to the one you love?

Do you keep talking long past the time when it would be really good to just be quiet?

Do you avoid it hoping that maybe someone else will just up and do it?

Do you assume your friends know how much they mean to you just because you think about how much they mean to you?

Does fear stop you from doing the thing you need to do the most?

Do you really think you are in control?

Well, I’m one or more of that kind of idiot. You get to decide about yourself.

Magdalene House – A great way to designate your United Way contributions

I don’t know about you, but where I work, it’s that time of year where we have a chance to donate to the United Way. If you haven’t specified your United Way donation, or haven’t decided to donate yet, I urge to consider the Magdalene House. Magdalene was started in 1977 by Becca Stevens. Becca is a hero. Listen to what they do (and consider that their success rate is over 90%):

Magdalene is a two-year residential community founded in Nashville, Tennessee in 1997 for women with a history of prostitution and drug addiction. Magdalene was founded not just to help a sub-culture of women, but to help change the culture itself. We stand in solidarity with women who are recovering from sexual abuse, violence, and life on the streets, and who have paid dearly for a culture that buys and sells women like commodities. At no cost, we offer women a safe, disciplined, and compassionate community for two years, paid for by the gifts we receive from individuals and private grants. Magdalene stands as a witness to the truth that in the end, love is more powerful than all the forces that drive women to the streets.

I can’t say it any better than that. Here’s a link to the Magdalene site (including a way to donate directly): Magdalene

Oh dear lord, the liberals are coming, the liberals are coming..

Scene: A seemingly forsaken warehouse somewhere in the south side of Chicago. We see stairs leading to the basement..if we look closer, we see a sign – ‘Terrorists Entrance’. We peek inside…around a red-stained round table sit a dazed looking Barack Obama, William Ayers, the ghosts of Huey Newton and Harvey Milk sharing a bench with Angela Davis, along with a lot of other shadowy sketchy-looking leftist-types all wearing ‘Che’ t-shirts sipping on some concoction that appears to have beets as the key component…listen closely:

Obama, in a trance-like whisper: ‘Yes, William Ayers, the word ‘Allah’ will be substituted for ‘God’ on every government building and all coinage’.

Harvey Milk pours forth: ‘And, Barack, don’t forget the boy scouts..you’ve GOT to demand gay scout masters..in fact, that should be mandatory, and the military…not just don’t ask, don’t tell, but the military should be 100% gay. The fighting elan factor would never be higher..the comraderie, the themed uniforms, the life in the trenches…you’ve GOT to do this Obama’.

Obama nods his head.

Angela Davis rises, fist upraised and her heart uplifted…’and abortion..not just on demand, but as a demand, for all women who want to raise their children as Christians or as heterosexuals’.

‘Yes, Sister Davis’, Obama says without blinking, with a thousand yard stare seen more commonly in the nearby shooting galleries.

‘And Brother Obama’, a wispy Huey intones, ‘only atheists on the Supreme Court, and they really should be Muslim atheists, if you know what I mean’.

Angela raises her fist towards Huey and in a sharp voice barks, ‘They need to be female lesbian Muslim atheists Huey’, while Harvey milks his beet frappe, nodding to a Joy Division tune only he can hear.

‘Back to the Boy Scouts’, a leering Ayers rang out ..’we should only allow DWARVES instead of boys..boys should be in re-education school learning why white males are the lowest form of carbon-based life in existence’

‘Sing on bother William’, a surprisingly spry Newton spat out a fig and spoke some more, ‘And those Bush-Cheney bastards..let’s break into the archives, find all the things they did wrong and send em’ to Folsom prison. Maybe one of our pyrotechnical friends will conjure up a burning bush, if you know what i mean’.

Chuckles all around the table.

Ayers scratched his head and exclaimed..’oh yeah, those dwarf fake boy scouts..they’ve gotta be GAY’!!

Amens abounded, bouncing off of the posters lining the wall – Mao, Fidel, Ted Kennedy, Stokely Carmichael, and Dave Kopay.

‘What about gay marriage?’, chimed in Milk. ‘Don’t you think that people should sign some kind of document stating that they have had at least a gay thought before they are allowed to be married’?

‘Marriage, smcarriage’ snorted Angela D. In a free and open society, the ashes of chattle-dom should be buried along with Christian broadcasting, and Christian schools’!

Ayers aired out a hearty ‘Amen’, sista D’, before glancing over at Obama to make sure he was still under hypnosis. ‘We better hurry up, we gotta get Brother Barack over to Grant Park for the biggest speech of his life’.

‘You’re right’, Harvey Milk-ed, but one more thing: ‘All TV shows must contain at least two egregiously pornographic scenes and no violence’…

At that, Obama awoke with a smile on his face…’my dreams have come true…watch out America’.

A scant moment later, Barney Frank drove up in a black limo, and whisked Obama away to make the speech of his life..

uh, i’m kidding, you know. It’s going to be ok, really..I promise.

And you want to be my ‘Help America Vote Act of 2002’?

Like George Costanza running for the phone with his pants down to his ankles, voting officials in six states are displaying the competence of FEMA in New Orleans in their rush to ‘help voters’ and comply with the ‘Help America Vote Act of 2002’.  According to the New York Times, officials in six states are so busy illegally purging the voter rolls that for every new voter registered in the past few months, two voters are removed.    In three states – Colorado, Louisiana and Michigan – the number of voters removed from the rolls far exceed the number of voters who died or relocated.  George Orwell would be SO proud.

Apparently, in a gust of sheer democratic frenzy, voting officials decided to use records from the Social Security Administration as a primary means of removing voters from the roles, despite an agreement that the SSN numbers were to be used ONLY as a means of LAST resort.  SSN officials are worried that many voters are going to be blocked from voting, even though voting rolls are not supposed to be pared 90 days before the election unless the voter has died, moved out of state or have been declared unfit to vote.

I don’t know what is more troubling – a confused angry mass of people who will be denied their inalienable right to vote or the fact that SSN numbers are considered somewhat inaccurate by the very administrative body that deals runs the SSN joint.

Nobody is saying that this is a ‘GOP’ or ‘Democratic party’ conspiracy, but truth be told, the Demo get out the vote push this year is supposedly harvesting a lot more votes than its Republican counterparts.  It seems pretty obvious who is gonna lose the most votes, come election day.  We are talking about hundreds of thousands of votes.  My memory is fading admittedly, but I do believe in 2000, a few THOUSAND votes made all the difference.

Bottom line, the axiom that has rung true for eight years continues to carry the day: If you appoint people to run government agencies who don’t believe government can work, their prophesies will be fulfilled.

If this is an alternative universe, I wanna stay – GO VANDY!!

best football team in Tennessee

I can see the Head Start Building from my front porch!

Katie Couric: What does that have to do anything?

JH: Katie, it’s about the start, it’s about the head, if you don’t have a head, you really can’t start, can you?

KC: Have you ever even been IN the Head Start Building?

JH: Katie, I know there are heads in there, and I know that kids are starting. When you put those two things together: ‘the head’ plus ‘the start’, do you really have to be in the building to understand the concept?

KC: Let me give you another chance. What do YOU have to do with Head Start?

JH: Katie, many people, in my opinion, in starting, with heads, by the way, need more starting, not more heads getting in their way like big government getting in the way of our healthy economy. Katie, it’s synergy, it’s about the heads and, oh yes, it’s about making jobs, making jobs for starters, with heads, who synergize and make more jobs.

KC: I’m still not really understand your part in all this.

JH: Katie, I CAN SEE THE Head Start Building! I can see the young starters, the heads, the starts, and I can see if anybody attempts to enter that building that does not have the best interests of our heads and our starts making jobs building synergy and being the kind of Americans that don’t have to organize their communities, they ARE their communities.

KC: Once again, have you EVER been in the Head Start Building, talked to anyone in the building, helped anyone in the building or picked up a piece of trash in front of the building?

JH: Katie, many times, I’ve been heading..haha, thats a good one, by the Head Start building and I have seen trash, I have seen litter, and I’ve thought, I can start by picking up the trash and seeing that each one of us if we do something ordinary, not like going to a fancy college or university, but by being ordinary people with ordinary heads, ordinary starts, and big hearts, we can turn this thing around.

KC: uh, thanks, John, you’ve given me a real heads-up as to your involvement with that center. Do you ever plan to go in there, John?

JH: Katie, ordinary people doing ordinary things, starting and heading out the door, don’t you think we matter? Don’t you think it’s the great middle class, caring, hoping, jobbing and somesuch…isn’t that what it’s really all about?

KC: wtf???

Carolyn Maddux

Carolyn King Forrister Maddux
‘Come on up for the rising‘ – Bruce Springsteen The mother of some of my closest friends passed away last Saturday night. To some of you, she was the mother of ‘the playwright’ (Vali Forrister). Others knew her from her church. Many of us knew her as a friend, a wit, an encourager and a universal mom. When Lynn and I were in the middle of the ‘raising teenager’ years, Carolyn often lifted our spirits with expert advice or just with a knowing smile. It’s perhaps a trite analogy, but the ripple effect of Carolyn’s life extends internationally, and across the USA. She lives on through her kids, grand-kids, and great-grand-kids, as well those of us who were lucky to have known her. It was time for her to go, but I’ll miss her terribly. The obit from the Tennessean speaks volumes. MADDUX, Carolyn King ForristerAge 82. August 9, 2008. Preceded in death by husbands, Vardaman Forrister and Frank Maddux. Survived by children, Kimble Forrister and wife Calli Patterson of Montgomery, AL, Brad Forrister and wife Cathy of Nolensville, Dirk Forrister and wife Mimi Turnipseed of Boulder, CO, Sky Forrister and wife Louise of Llano, TX and Vali Forrister of Nashville; step sons, Rob Maddux of Nashville, Tim Maddux and wife Holly of Resistencia, Argentina, Vin Maddux and wife Ellen of Franklin; twenty six grandchildren; two great grandchildren; sister, Babs Brooks and husband Deems of Warrensburg, MO. Born on Elkins Avenue in West Nashville to Verner C. and Clara King. Lifelong enthusiasm for learning, missions and scripture. Teacher to multiple generations from Lipscomb High School to Otter Creek kindergarten to English Language Learners at Hillsboro High School; from ladies Bible classes at Berryville, Lebanon Road, Smith Springs and Otter Creek churches of Christ to creating Bible programs in Belize, Guatemala and at Camp Shiloh in New Jersey. Passionate about her relationships with church, the Lipscomb community and especially her family. Her hunger for learning and for scripture was contagious to the many women she mentored. Special thanks to the family at Otter Creek Church, who sustained her body and spirit. Service 11 a.m., Wednesday, August 13, 2008 at Otter Creek Church, 409 Franklin Road, Brentwood. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations be made to a cause about which you have Carolyn’s level of passion. Visitation with the family on Tuesday, August 12, 2008 from 3-8 p.m. at WOODLAWN-ROESCH-PATTON FUNERAL HOME, 660 Thompson Lane, Nashville, TN, (615) 383-4754.

What has caffeine and lives in Germantown?

Hallelujah, coffee at last, coffee at last.  The coffee has come to Roos(t), in the Kat haus known as ‘DrinkHaus’ (the owner is Kat Roos, who also lives in Germantown), down on Madison in downtown Germantown.  I’ve been living in the general neighborhood for four years now, and for each of those roughly 1,460 days I’ve wished that we had a coffee house in the neighborhood.

My dream (and more importantly, Kat Roos’ dream) has come true.  The DrinkHaus opened today.  I started with a gelato (as in mmmmmmmm).  I’ll be moving to coffee as I trek to work each day (Kat has conveniently placed her business right on my way to work).

The place looks great, smells great and is already busy.   Occasionally, dreams do come true!

When God teaches patience, or, Job never went to the 8th Avenue Kroger

I suppose I have many faults. Probably a few I can’t name, but ones my family could probably recite in their sleep. I’m often quick to anger, but in my heart of hearts, I’ve gotta believe that lack of patience is my top-of-the-charts, slow burning, double-grinding-stomach-churning crime of gnashin’.

To teach me and my fellow im-patient-aires, God gave man free will to invent shrink wrap on CDs with that white strip on top, the Department of Motor Vehicles, Pancake Pantry lines, and his coup de’ grace, the coup de’ (nash)ville – the 8th Avenue Kroger.

I knew better than to purchase Springsteen concert tickets over there. I knew, I knew, I knew, but it was closer than any TicketMaster outlet I know about, and I was in a hurry to score my fix of ice cream from the Pied Piper, so I went, and I stood and stood and stood. When I finally made it to my turn in the barrel, the two customer service (if you think of customer service roughly the way Jack the Ripper considered women of the night) representatives argued over who was going to have to handle my order. Nobody really likes TicketMaster (I do understand this part).

When the loser of the five minute battle finally sauntered over to the terminal to serve me, I told him I wanted Bruce Springsteen tickets. He said sure, and then proceeded to stare at his terminal for approximately four minutes (I was really hoping that Kroger had sprung for those telepathy ESP-type terminals where the brain waves were actually sending messages to the terminal, but alas, the time spent was attempting to ascertain what exactly a ‘Bruce Springsteen’ concert actually was)…finally, he looked up and asked me if I knew where Springsteen was playing. I told him Sommet and he said ok, and then went back to another period of thought and concentration.

Finally his fingers started on the keyboard and he asked me how much I wanted to spend on tickets. I thought it wise if he told me actually how much the tickets were going for, and we soon agreed that would be all for the best.

‘Ok, we have $29.00 tickets, $65.00 tickets and $97.00 tickets’. I figured the $29.00 tickets were probably on the roof at Rippys or over at Tootsies, so I opted for the $65.00 tickets. He showed me where my seats would be and I said ‘cool’ and after around 73 more key-strokes he smiled and said: ‘That’ll be $235.00’ and I said, ‘No it won’t’, and he said, ‘That’s what the computer came up with’ and ‘I said try again’, so he said, ‘For 65 bucks you get behind the stage’ and I sighed, and said ‘Lets go for the $95.00 tickets, where can I sit for that?’, and he showed me the chart and the seats were on the side high enough to see over the crowd and I said ‘fine’ and he said, ‘great’ and then he keyed about 50 more keystrokes and there was this whirring noise and the tickets printed and I paid my money and then I looked at my tickets and they were sure enough, slightly behind the stage on the side, and I said ‘uh, these are not where you said where they were going to be’ and he said ‘that’s what the computer gave you’, and I said ‘what can we do about this?’ and he said ‘I can sell you more tickets but I can’t give you your money back’ and then I realized it was God moving in his super-duper mysterious way teaching me patience and so I merely said ‘this is so sad’ and walked out. I practiced my new-found patience skills by not cursing audibly, and I am going to see The Boss, or, at least the back left quadrant of The Boss.

This patience thing is a real bitch, you know.

Why I love baseball part 285

Foul play!

Vodpod videos no longer available.

more about "Why I love baseball part 285", posted with vodpod

Ting ting, uh, attention please..I’d like to interrupt this prolonged blogging hiatus

by proclaiming that the best summer song of many seasons is ‘That’s Not my Name’ by the fabulous ‘The Ting Tings‘.  I’m not kidding.  It starts out a little like ‘Hey Mickey’, but it quickly moves into infectious compulsory-dance mode after a minute or two.  The last two minutes of the song just kills me.

You may not have heard it here first, but i just had to say it.  Now..go back to whatever it is you’re doing.

5:46 seconds of late-night zen

Sigur Ros…mmmmmm

Vodpod videos no longer available. from www.youtube.com posted with vodpod

Lima or bust, or, Don´t EVER travel with me

We made it to Lima late last night, unbelievably.

If you are ever tempted to request me as a partner for The Amazing Race, don´t.  The same luck I regularly bring to the Predators (attended 9 games this year, coinciding with 9 losses), I bring to travel.

Earlier this year,  I missed the Super Bowl after being bumped from an overbooked flight.

Friday night we made it to Atlanta for a Saturday afternoon flight.  We shared dinner with friends along with a tornado right down the road.  Batten down the hatches and the airport.  Saturday flight delayed until late Saturday night.  Made it to Miami in just enough time for a connection to Lima.  Flight cancelled due to mechanical failure.

We are in freaking Miami, but A Airlines put us up in Fort Lauderdale, over 20 miles from the airport.  We passed nearly 100 hotel-motels on the way to F. Lauderdale.  We were told breakfast at the hotel was on A Airline´s tab.  WRONG.  Pissed, and raring to go, we were hauled back to the airport in time for our flight, only to find that a baggage handler had been mangled somewhat by the machine loading the baggage onto our airplane..flight delayed indefinitely.  Sympathy meter for the baggage handler by this time in our trip: low.

We finally take off and made it to Lima 54 hours after we left town.  Gilligan´s crew had nothing on us.

Grateful to be here with our wonderful daughter.  Lima is an amazing town, with ginormous plazas and beautiful beaches and granite mountains.  The taxi drivers apparently each have some kind of guardian angel individually taking watch, because you have never seen anything like Lima taxis, and that counts the NASCAR circuit.

Ciao

I Will Follow You Into The Dark – Kinagrannis

A little late night zen..I like these sister harmonies.

Vodpod videos no longer available. from youtube.com posted with vodpod

Once a month…

I’m wrong.  Just wanted to acknowledge my mistake and move on…you know, like professional athletes and politicians do..say I was wrong and ask the nation to move along.