It Ain't Easy Peeing Green

So being "green" is all the rage these days. All we hear in the media is how to conserve, save, recycle and if we don't then we are obviously bad, bad people. Companies are jumping on the green bandwagon in record numbers, most are just using it as a promotional tool. Sending me junk mail on recycled paper does not really qualify as being environmentally sound to me. At least the company that is sending me the advertising can put a cool logo on the mailer stating how green they are.

We, as a society are encouraged daily to conserve, save gas, save electricity, save water, don't pollute unnecessarily. I keep hearing how the world is facing a water shortage. I can see that in the desert parts of the world (like California and Texas) but where the most recent problem has been is in the American South, like Georgia. I am from California originally, where folks have been using "low-flow" toilets and "gray water irrigation" for years. I suppose a water shortage comes as a bit of a surprise in an area normally known for being very moist.

It occurred to me recently that I use a ton of water for flushing the commode. On a good drinking night I imagine I flush a hundred gallons or more down the drain. I therefore have decided to pee green. I don't mean that I plan on eating tons of green substances, or take some medication that will make my pee a nice shade of chartreuse. I am suggesting a return to the outhouse. That quaint shack built over a ditch in the back yard. Then all my waste would simply gurgle into a ditch where it could decompose naturally. No water used at all. All men could do their part by simply whipping it out and peeing behind the garage, anytime. No water, no flushing, no paper products used. Public decency laws could be changed to when the guys are out at the bar, drinking, a quick trip to the alley in back of the place could serve as the green pee area.

With this idea I have done my part to save the earth. I bet peeing green would save tens of thousands of gallons of water each year. If every man did this (yes the ladies are exempted for now) we could float Georgia with the water saved. Of course alleys and the back of garages may end up looking like some back street in Bombay. But what is a little odor and disease if we are saving the worlds water supply? If growing corn to make fuel is a green action to take, even though now there is a global food shortage, then peeing green to save water, even though the gutters may run foul with waste, cant be a bad thing, right?

Now I am making a difference, something has finally come along that I can do. I am not going to buy a Prius, nor am I going to use canvas bags at the grocery store. I doubt I am going to start using an electric lawn mower, and our town does not even offer a recycling program as part of trash pick up, so peeing green is my small contribution to saving our planet.

It is easy peeing green after all.

I Can Tell In Your Face

I have lost some weight in the last six months, 15 lbs in just the past five weeks. I have dropped a pant size, and I feel better. I still have a long way to go, but the diet I am on isn't too hard and there is no reason to believe I will fail. I am craving pizza really bad these days though, some foods are hard to give up.

My girlfriend can tell where I have lost weight, but she has access to my body and a certain intimacy that others do not. I love it when she notices, it makes me smile. Still, it would be nice if others started noticing my weight loss. When I proudly announce that I have lost 30 lbs. since last Labor Day, I get the usual accolades and that is cool, but what I really want is an unsolicited comment. How about "wow Scott you are looking sveldt these days" or maybe "have you lost weight? You look fabulous".

Alas I get nothing of the sort, instead what I hear is "I can tell you have lost weight in your face". Thats great, I wasn't worried about my face, I am worried about my ass. Will you tell me when you can see that I have lost weight in my ass? "Egads, Scott, your ass is nearly gone! Good work!". It is the bane of every fat guy who ever went on a diet, I have been there many times actually. I lose weight in my face, so I have a 16 lbs. head instead of an 18 lbs. head. That is fabulous. Maybe my old hats will fit better. Here is an idea, I can now get a smaller fucking dew rag. Oh and what do you mean when you say you can tell in my face? Does that mean you never look at my ass? Good, just as well you keep it that way I suppose, but really, it would be nice to get some validation on the other body parts that are rapidly shrinking into much smaller sizes.

Today was the first day I added exercise to my diet, yes the fat man went to the gym. It was pretty fun, there were the usual cliques of weight lifters, getting all buff and built, I wonder how many are 'roiding after the workout. There were mostly working folk, people like me who sit on their previously fat asses (not that anyone notices) and stare at a computer screen all day. If it weren't for the 40 minutes at the Y, most office bound Americans would move less than a three toed sloth. I sat on a bike for 15 minutes, the read out said I had burnt 70 calories. Let's see, 70 calories is about the equivalent of a quarter of a slice of pepperoni pizza pie. The math makes my head spin, if I ever want to eat again I will have to spend all of my free time at the gym.

I spent some time on the elliptical machine, some weird contraption that is like a bike but you "pedal" with your arms, then I did some traditional weight training. See, I want a big upper body to counter act by big lower body.

Mostly, I can not help but compare the equipment in the gym to ancient torture devices. There are machines there that even look like The Rack. All of them are a form of torture too, because I have been home for all of two hours and I am already stiff and sore. I am sure the morning will feel even more like I have spent time on the Rack. All that is missing is the little bald rat faced man with a lisp asking me to renounce my religion.

Yet I will willingly go back to my torture chamber on Saturday, because my diet and the American Heart Association say I must. Someday I may be able to actually enjoy the fruits of my labors, perhaps even have buns of steel, and then by god, you had better notice.

Business Casual

The dishes had been done, the snow had been shoveled, other chores were completed and it was only noon. My morning had been productive to say the least.

Shoveling snow isn't something I had done in many years. It was fun, as memories of being 12 came floating out of the brilliant white sky. I was 12 years old in 1978, the last time I have seen this much snow in one place at one time.

I was resting my sore back but enjoying the feeling of having done some manual labor when Daisy asked if I wanted to go shopping. I hadn't planned on it really, yesterday our county and most of the neighboring counties were under a level 3 snow emergency, meaning you are subject to arrest if you do not have a compelling reason to be out on the roads. We have literally been snowed in for nearly 2 days so the thought of going somewhere sounded pretty good.

I thought I had dug my car out well enough move beyond the driveway but I was mistaken. I got stuck after having moved 2 feet. My big rear wheel drive Caddy didn't like the snow. After some more shoveling and some pushing (including a neighbors car that was also stuck in the alley) we got underway, in a sunny afternoon, snow and ice sparkling bright everywhere we looked. Fields blazing white in the late winter sun, smooth, deep, crisp and even.

My mission was to visit a K+G mens mart. This chain of mens stores had been advertising a promotion pushing mens No Iron shirts, buy one get one free. I need no iron shirts, since I don't have the time to iron and I suck at it. Daisy can iron a mans shirt quite well but she has no time either and it isn't her job to make sure I have pressed clothing.

Thus I am on a quest to buy a no-iron shirt. We follow the directions found on the website and drive through several neighborhoods to the store. As we drove we saw more urban squalor, the people were more ethically mixed, there were more car lots and strip clubs. I was getting a bad feeling about K+G mens mart. We pull into a parking lot and the storefront before me is giving me a dark vibe, I know the look, and it is not high end retail but more like a K-Mart in a bad neighborhood.

We go inside and visions of Value City are going through my head. For those of you that don't know, Value City is one of those aging department stores that sell faux high end clothing. Racks and racks of cloths under yellowing florescent lighting, weird signs on the walls stating the department. Three foot high plastic letters spelling out MENS etc. The clothing is "brand name" but the brands are pure de classe. Pierre Cardin? Jordache? Izod? Who wears Pierre Cardin these days. The brands sold out many years ago, to sweat shops in Indonesia and mass market mediocrity. If I wanted off the rack blandness I would have gone to Wal Mart. No I was looking for some nice clothes, and while I am always on the lookout for a good value, this stuff was just making me dizzy. The display in front of the store was showing a suit ensemble comprised of a white sport coat, white slacks and some fruity colored shirt. I would like to take this moment to mention I was the only white guy shopping there today.

Daisy made me take a look around but all I saw was faux class, not the real thing but a poor mans swank and glitter. Something a pimp would wear perhaps. We left soon after we arrived and drove to the Mens Warehouse. A crisp young man with a tape measure around his neck greeted us the moment we walked in and was a very big help. He measured me, gave me some advise about shirt sizes that I didn't previously know. Found 4 shirts in my size and extolled the virtues of them in a sensible way. I then mentioned I wanted a versatile and tasteful sport coat. Our nice salesman whisked me off to the racks of coats and instantly produced several candidates that fit perfectly and weren't overly expensive. What a great experience, to be guided in my quest for nice clothes by an actual clothier. This guy listened to what I wanted, then delivered impeccable choices that were high quality yet affordable. Yes I ended up spending a c-note more than I had planned but I am very happy with my purchases.

In the words of Raymond Babbitt K-Mart Sucks.. and so does K+G Mens Mart.

The Cat Hasn't Moved

My cat hasn't moved all day. Good old Brinkley the kitty has found a nice spot directly on top of my daughters sweater that is laying on the bed, to sleep the entire day. This is not unusual behavior for a cat, I know cats sleep 80% of their lives. It must be nice, to go eat when you want any time of day or night, to have an unlimited supply of fresh water, then to get rubbed by your humans and sleep. Today the cat has just laid around from dawn till late evening. He sometimes gets excited at night, being a nocturnal creature by nature and all, but the setting sun has had no effect on him this day. No, he is just as lazy now as he was early this morning. Sleeping or laying on the same spot for hours on end. The three toed sloth doesn't move much either, here is some data regarding one of the laziest animals on earth (besides the man you know who behaves similarly on Sundays.) :

..Sloths are among the most somnolent animals, sleeping from 15 to 18 hours each day. They are particularly partial to nesting in the crowns of palm trees where they can camouflage as coconuts. They come to the ground to urinate and defecate only about once a week...

I assure you, Brinkley defecates more often than a Sloth but really doesn't move much more. Oh sure, occasionally he gets in the mood to play, but being a dotted upon house cat, he sleeps at least as much as the typical Sloth. Every once in a while, I have one of those weekend days when I get out of bed in the morning then go take a nap, or get up and camp on the sofa for a snooze. I imagine this is what a Sloth does for a living. The cat recently got up from his chosen spot for the day (on a piece of clothing) and promptly laid down on the floor. Oh the exhaustion he must be feeling!

If I were of a mind to believe in re-incarnation I would likely be a house cat. There cannot be a better life out there for any of God's creatures. I mean what could be better than a regimen of eating, sleeping, getting affection, sleeping some more then eating?

A cats life must be hours upon hours of blissful sleep punctuated by moments of delicious food and love from the humans. Oh what a hard life.

As a human male living with a partner of the opposite sex, I am certainly not entitled to the same privileges as the cat, if I slept all day and did nothing all the time, every day, I would not be welcome here anymore. The cat gets a pass because he doesn't have opposable thumbs. The cat has no expectation placed upon him. The cat will never be a beast of burden, nor be expected to do the laundry.

The cat truly has it made.

This is just over half way to my goal of posting 30 times in 30 days.

D. None of the Above

"..if you choose not to decide you still have made a choice.." ~ Rush (the band not the commentator)

You Are What You Eat

If we are what we eat, then I am a cross between a slab of bacon and a block of cheese, nothing green in sight. That is until about a week ago when I decided to join Daisy in an effort to diet. So now I am committed to diet to the point of emaciation, a 50 lbs. goal! I will be so sveldt and sexy Daisy won't know what to do with me (although I bet she figures something out).
So goodbye Cheezit ®'s and hello diet food. Here I have reviewed some of the weird as well as familiar foods that have become a part of my daily nourishment.




Breakfast: Granola
The 90 calorie whole grain granola bar, made by that freaky Quaker dude, that stands around in school playgrounds ostensibly handing out healthy snacks for the children with his stony, plastic expression. This granola bar is 2 points in the Weight Watchers pantheon of numbered foods. It is about the size of a large eraser, in fact I always eat two. One gets stuck in my teeth and I derive no immediate nourishment from it, only later as I finally get it all out of my molars do I really feel I have eaten it.
I have two of these each morning for Breakfast. Note that I wake up ravenous each day. It is the hungriest time for me. Lord knows there is nothing like sleeping to work up a healthy appetite.
They taste good and provide a boost of carbo energy, after I get the first one out of my teeth and into my belly that is. I like them. Rating: 8

Breakfast: Banana
In addition to my granola snack, I eat a banana each morning, since I eat on the run, the back of my car smells like the primate enclosure at the zoo because of the peels I have yet to remove to the bin. You really can't go wrong with a banana. It may well be The Worlds Most Perfect Food. Better by far than the Incredible Edible Egg, and less fat than the Other White Meat (no Carp isn't the other white meat) sadly, it is seldom Whats For Dinner.

How can I fault the banana for anything other than the inconvenient waste when the fruity meat is gone and I have a peel to dispose of? Since it is bio-degradable and all, I have often thought about chucking it out the window, but I am always afraid the commuter in back of me will lose traction when they run over it causing an embarrassing incident on the highway.
Bananas are way good and so good for you. Rating: 10

Anytime: Rice Cake
With a point value of one (1) this unnatural snack food should be a boon for satiating any and all munchie attacks that may occur. As it turns out I do not like them very well. I bought the white cheddar cheese flavored disks. Believe me they are no substitute for real white cheddar, nor cheddar popcorn, or white cheddar cheezit's or anything for that matter. The flavor isn't bad but eating one of these is a bit like consuming Styrofoam. I may as well put some cheese flavoring on a bag of packing peanuts (theres the UPS store, lets pull over and get some grub!). They are messy too, leaving crumbs all over my shirt, no matter how carefully I put them in my mouth. I tried to eat one in the lunch room at work last week. I had to back away from the table and lean forward a little so as I ate the crumbs would harmlessly hit the floor instead of my shirt. I can only imagine what I looked like. I have since declined to eat them at work. Very much like a foamy air filled hockey puck. Rating 2.

Lunch: Yogurt
Here is a lunch I can support, I usually eat a healthy sandwich or a frozen reduced calorie and fat frozen entree, then enjoy this creamy goodness for desert. I am not sure how they make skim milk culture with Aspertame in it taste so good but thank god they do. I am sure I would just as soon be fat if I couldn't have yogurt.

Oddly enough, I seldom eat the stuff when I am not on a diet, I mean why eat yogurt when it is ok to have ice cream or boston cream pie. As an added bonus I do not have to pick it out of my teeth later.

This diet staple is a winner. Rating 10



Dinner: Turkey
You knew this one was coming. The savior of dieting beef eaters everywhere. You have heard the line in recipes, "for a low-fat alternative to beef, replace with lean ground turkey". That theory only works partially. Tonight I had turkey sloppy joe's. They were quite good and will probably become a family favorite. This is only because with tomato sauce and seasoning you cant really tell what kind of meat it is. It could be rats assholes (2 points) and still taste good smothered in sloppy joe goodness.

We do several things with this versatile and healthy meat. Everything but eat it plain, that would be truly tastless. What happens to turkey when it is ground? It does not remind me of Thankgiving at all. It is also nearly as expensive as beef with many designer brands catering to the diet / healthy eating crowd. Put a green label on it and some clever packaging and suddenly it is trendy and healthy and a $1.00 more than it should be.
Overall a good diet food. Rating: 7

Dinner: Salad
My dream salad: iceberg lettuce, mushrooms, onions, croutons, cheese, more cheese, bacon, ham, bean sprouts, more bacon, chopped eggs, all unrecognizable due to the thick layer of full fat ranch dressing pumped over the top. The reality is we eat alot of salad these days, and not dream salads either. As it turns out there are a gazillion different kinds of lettuce and they are quite good. Who knew? Years ago there was one type of salad and it only had the ubiquitous iceberg. I love the color and texture of having many types of leaves in my salad. Gone is the cup o ranch, replaced by a spray bottle of dressing. The good news is 20 sprays of Cesar flavored dressing like product is 0 points. Pretty good stuff though and it lets the flavor of the weed tops come through.

Decent diet food. Rating: 8


Condiments: Butter Stuff
I cant believe it exists, let alone it's not butter. The height of fake food technology is the butter spray and the butter powder. It is remarkable how good these products taste really, yay chemistry. However, these condiments have never seen a dairy. I have no idea what the spray on butter is made of. I only hope I look like Fabio if I eat enough of it. The powder is really good on potato's. Not as good as real butter, but then again few things are as tasty as butter. It will suffice to make the mostly bland foods that are on the diet list palatable and someday when I am in "maintenance" I can eat butter again.

I might be able to snort the powder, and get a butter flavored high. Just roll up a $100.00 bill and pretend it is 1979 and get down with butter flake. (the bee-gees optional)

The spray packaging reminds me of cleaning solution or hair spray, tastes fine, but I am having some trouble with the concept of spray on food. The package says in proud letters that it is the original. Yes, whoever invented the spray on, oil like, butter flavored goo was definitely an original. Who thinks of this stuff?

Very weird but tasty. Rating: 7

So that is my rundown of diet foods for tonight. I am not hungry, I have eaten well, and with a little luck I am losing pounds even as I write. Soon I will be spray painted leafy green milk curd with turkey feathers and whole oats. We are what we eat.

This is day 8 of my pilgrimage to blogging nirvana.

Blather, Banality, and Pablum V.1.0

I am late to be blogging about the campaign. I realize there are hundreds if not tens of thousands of blog posts already out there that have said much the same things I am writing here tonight, but these are my words and it is my blog, so that makes it original. I needed some time to get fed up with the whole lot of them. My friends at NPR have to take some of the credit for that, they fill the airwaves with endless prattle about the Primaries, all day, every day. Here are my thoughts about the candidates.

Hillary Clinton
I can hardly stand to listen to this woman speak. She reminds me of a stereotypical nagging wife or mother when she speaks. This may be because she is likely both. I can overlook how she sounds in the radio speakers or on T.V. if her message makes sense, and it doesn't.

I have a long standing negative bias against Hillary, because of her history in the White House with Bill. I didn't share the joy for the eight years she and her husband were in office. I worked hard, had good times and bad, and lived my life. I did not get rich, I didn't suddenly get subsidized health care, I didn't buy an SUV with all the abundance that the Clinton's supposedly brought our nation. I just hung in there and lived, much the same way I did when George the 41 was in office. It just doesn't matter that much. I never thought a couple from Arkansas were terribly qualified to be the President and First lady, I mean have you ever been to Arkansas? I remember thinking she was a parody, trying to legislate by her husbands side. It was novel for awhile but became very annoying. I don't know anyone who voted for Hillary. Now is our chance apparently.

I could go on about her husbands bad traits but he is not running again (ostensibly anyway), no, this is about Hillary Clinton, and there is no way I could support her. Besides being way too liberal for my tastes she seldom has a good idea in her head, at least based on what I hear her say. What I hear her say is whatever the voters want to hear. Today she was in Ohio, speaking to a group of Union workers. The sound byte went something like this "This election isn't about words alone, but work, lots of hard work to get America working!" (sic) This brought the obligatory waves of adulation and cheers from the assembled group. I just rolled my eyes, how can you fight platitudes with another platitude. I would also like to point out that unemployed auto workers in Youngstown notwithstanding, America stands at around 5% unemployment. Every freshman economics student knows that is easily considered full employment. She also went on to say she had a plan to help our sub prime mortgage foreclosure stricken state. Hillary wishes to put a moratorium on foreclosures for 90 days. Well that is fine Hillary, how exactly do you plan on forcing a private institution to not reclaim it's property. I am sorry for the families that got into trouble with mortgages way over their head, but I fail to see how the government can interfere like that. I doubt it is legal to step in and say.. "bank you cant get your money back on a bad loan because Hillary passed a law that says you cant". The only government solution I can think of is a huge subsidy so the bank doesn't go out of business waiting to get it's money back. I almost hope she is the nominee, just to see how far out in left field the Democratic party can get.

John McCain
I have a conservative attitude regarding many issues, not all of them as you know from previous blogs, but typically a conservative makes more sense to me. I do not like John McCain much, it would seem he is the only choice left for the other side of the aisle. Old John doesn't know what he is, he has frequently said whatever needed saying at the time to garner favor, even throwing his supposed conservative values under the buss in an effort to seem more moderate and appeal to the vaunted "swing voter" or Independent. Maybe John was trying to seem more palatable to liberals, so they would save some mud for each other and not sling it all at him. Then there is the way he speaks, John McCain sounds like an Episcopal minister. He sounds exactly like a dottering ederly clergyman, explaining how the love of God can save my soul. Either that or Mr. Rogers, "..I can fix the economy, can you say economy? We will win the war in Iraq. Now, are you ready to go to the land of make believe?.." Once again not a good choice.

What about a leader? What about someone who gives Americans some credit and chooses not to say any old thing that seems right at the moment. Is it really so hard to carefully think out a platform, believe in your mission, then LEAD people to think the way you do? What about giving us real choices and ideas instead of pablum and noise.

Tomorrow I will pick on Obama and Huckabee, and yes W. even though he isn't running, he finally deserves some barbs from me.

This is day 6 of my ongoing attempt to write a blog every day for 30 days.

It's A Place to Live

This afternoon we drove to a big Best Buy store to buy a new toy, a pen tablet, so I could work on Daisies new blogger template. The store is in an up and coming neighborhood on the east side of Columbus, Ohio. This is one of those areas that is growing fast with new money, floods of families with small kids, a husband with a good job, a soccer mom with a mini van. A few years ago this town was small, quaint, and surrounded by corn fields. Today there are upscale grocery stores, nice places to eat, theaters and malls, and an explosion of new housing.
Every one of these developments is trying to convey an upscale image. You know the place, there is a nice landscaped lawn area facing the road, with a semi circular rock wall, lit appropriately of course. On the wall are some big brass letters spelling out the name of the development. Here we have "The Reserve at Cross Creek" or "The Trails at Morgan Farm", there was even a "The Residences at Turnberry". Give me a break, what these developments are really mcmansions (read: sub-prime issues) plopped down in a former soybean field and gussied up with some landscaping and the obligatory rock wall with lettering. It should be "Sub Prime Acres" or "Pretension Prairie" how about "The Residences at Cookie Cutter Acres"?
I wonder at the sorts of people that buy into this sort of pseudo luxury spin builders put on these developments. Do they get some sort of satisfaction, living in a house that is too expensive, 2 feet from the neighbor, with cul de sacs with nothing but surveyors flags to show where more mc mansions will someday go. Since it has a fancy name, that must mean it is a good neighborhood, gee lets borrow too much money and buy it.
I live in a block of homes that have no name, unless it would be "the slums on fair" or "po folks estates". My neighborhood at least has some character, and some life, and we aren't in over our heads on the mortgage.

This is day three of my quest to post every day for 30 days.

Blog Fodder, indeed..

Well now I went and did it, I joined a "challenge" where one blogs everyday for 30 days and then gets some minor recognition on a site www.nablopomo.com apparently the name stands for National Blog Posting Month, which used to be November, but now it is every month. So here we go, I who seldom posts to this blog, have now committed to posting every day for a month. Check it every day till March 16th.

Yesterday was Valentines day, it is a day that always creeps up on me and subtlety nags me to honor it with my someone special. I do not hate the day, I only have trouble with the concept. I love my girl each and every day of the week, I am sure to let her know I love her every day too, with words and actions. It is easy and natural and I do not need a pseudo holiday once a year to express my love for her. To her credit, she feels much the way I do, we simply exchange a few niceties and move on, fun but totally unnecessary.

I decided to get her some roses, big pretty roses. Since I have only given her flowers on a few occasions in our relationship, it is still a special thing, not tired or cliche. However, I was guilty, I had waited till the last possible moment to get any gift at all and I was on my way home from work when I stopped at the local florist. They were packed to the rafters with customer too. The building was heaving with every working man in town on their way home from work, looking lost and slightly uncomfortable in the store, frantically looking for the right bouquet.

There were blue collar types, construction workers, business men and professionals, all with the same blank stare and desperate desire to get something to honor their mate, and maybe not spend too much money, and get the hell out of there before the traffic got to heavy for the commute. I stumbled around some, as I didn't understand the system at first. I mean there were cooler doors full of flowers, some in bouquets, some stand alone, others wrapped, some in vases.

Once I figured out that I could get my flowers ala carte, I proceeded to choose a dozen red roses. I mean what could be more romantic than red roses? Well.. two dozen red roses thats what! A dozen roses is fine for making up after you stayed out too late and came home stinking of booze and cigarettes, then spending Sunday sick, tired and farting all over the house. No, a dozen roses wont do it when the point is to honor your lover.

Two dozen roses however, now that is an entirely different story. Sheer quantity and cost covers the fact that you only thought to buy something on your way home from work on the special night. It says, I really, really, really, love you baby. In all seriousness, two dozen roses even impresses me. They are flat out gorgeous and displayed proudly in the living room on the mantle. Funny how 12 more of something is suddenly not cliche or standard, but special.

The fact is, when she looks at those roses, for a fleeting time, as they will eventually die and fade, I hope she sees 24 reminders that I do love her, even though I am crippled by being a man, and not terribly sentimental.

I dont have a very good history with Valentines day, I left my cheating wife on Valentines day, after a big fight I said good-bye on Feb. 14th 2000. I never looked back. Since then I have broken up with two women with whom I was in a relationship, either on the 14th or within a day or two. I didnt mean to do it on that day, it was pure coincidence, really. I think February is partially to blame, the limbo between winter and spring, the gray days and cold nights, the colorless slog to the end of winter.

So I do not feel so bad on one level, there were hundreds of other men doing the same thing I was doing at the florist yesterday. "Oh I better get something for the woman on the way home", we all were in the same sad situation, but I would bet to a man, our hearts were in the right place. Maybe we hadn't thought out and planned an elaborate celebration but we did think to do something special after all and I bet all of us men on our commute home thought about what a great woman we were fortunate enough to have. I know I was, thinking that a couple dozen roses were only one small expression of a much deeper feeling, the love, the friendship, the intimacy.

Is it Memorial Day yet?

Blog post number one (1)

A night of Knights near Columbus

It is time for a new post about bars. Since the last one I have been to a few, but nothing really blog-worthy came up. Sometimes the experience is only more of the same in a bar. Occasionally, there just isn't anything interesting going on. This past Friday night, Daisy and I went bowling with a group of co-workers from her office. They are a good bunch of folks and fun to have drinks with. I bowled poorly, in fact I bowled about as shitty as is possible, but what fun in any case. The bowling alley had been remodeled in recent years and looked modern and clean. This is a shame, because bowling alleys were the among the last bastions of mid century cheesiness. Bowling alleys that had survived from the 50's and 60's retained a soiled schmaltz that fairly screamed years gone by. A bowling alley should smell like old beer, cigarettes, and fried mushrooms. The lounge should have a theme of some sort, like a Tiki bar or have a row of stools along a bar with a formica top, so the effect is a bit like a diner only a lot darker. This particular bowling establishment is actually called the "Tiki Lanes" and I can only imagine what it once looked like. Now however, it is completely re-done and retains little of the classic decor.

The lounge area was clean and modern with ambient lighting and decorative art on the walls. It looked like the cafeteria in a large corporation. I expected to see men in suits and ties, chatting intensely about some deal while wolfing down what nourishment could be obtained by the fare offered. The bartenders were two women, who were pleasant and while a bit slow, efficient enough, but when it came to personality, these two may as well been robots. They didn't laugh or flirt and even though I was tipping well for the first few rounds, they refused to hook me up.

The formula is to go into a new bar, politely chat up the barmaid / bartender maybe introduce yourself, and leave a nice tip. Nothing too extravagant, but make sure to point out they can have a tip if the service is good. These girls kept going to the till to get my change, as if it were some sacred duty to make sure I got all of my change. After the second round, crack a joke or two and smile big, maybe ask the bartender a question about work, like, is this place usually busy on weekends? Then put yourself on their side by commenting on how their job is important, and how you couldnt do it on a busy night. If all goes well you can order your third drink and say "Sell me a rum and coke, mostly rum." or my favorite, "Ill have a seven and seven, mostly seven and you know which one". If you did your job, you are now getting hooked up on the drink. In some cases I have had the bartender trying to kill me with the liquor to mixer ratio.
These girls were measuring the liquor and when I used my "mostly rum" line, I was asked if I wanted a double. No, no thanks, I am trying to get you to hook me up damnit!

The drinks were cheap enough in any case and I started to feel good. After two games it was time to bail and move on. Several of the participants wanted to continue and go to a club to drink some more. I was all for this but deferred to Daisy as she was driving and I was ultimately there to be with her, not carousing in a bar all night. I wouldn't have been as much fun without her anyway. But she was game and when it came time to decide where to go, one suggestion was to drive to the Knights of Columbus lodge. One of our friends had a father that was working the bar at the local K of C that night. She assured us he would "hook us up" and the liquor was cheap in any case.

I learned that the K of C is a fraternal organization for Catholic men. While women were there, they were part of the "ladies auxiliary" (I wonder if they have a band?) but apparently not full on members. This drives Daisy nuts and rightly so, but I get the male fraternal organization thing, it is a hold over from a different time. The K of C was an older building but well maintained and had an aire of recent use. We were shepherded into the bar area, but on the way I could see hallways and passages to other parts of the building, maybe to secret rooms where mysterious rites were performed, perhaps high religious and holy mysticism, maybe artifacts, like famous swords and scepters. But I digress, I did see an open door to a large reception hall with a stage in the front. Acceptable for large Catholic wedding receptions.

I really liked the place, it looked just like any other small bar, neon signs and a big screen TV. There were notices on the walls about activities and fund raisers, all good community minded stuff. There were two trophy cases and inside were mementos of gratitude for some odd community or church achievement. There was also gambling. Yes, gambling. One of our party made no secret about the gambling part and she couldnt wait to participate. Sitting on the back bar were two large fishbowl shaped containers filled with odd little booklets, long and skinny but like a tiny matchbooks with pages. They were "Tear offs" or, more aptly named "Rip Offs". For a buck, you get one of these weird little books to rip off at the perforation to reveal if you are a winner. To be a winner you need a "dog bone" which was just that, an image of a dog bone. It was worth $25.00. One of our party friends won 175.00 just like that and it was on, he kept buying drinks and "rip offs" and winning and I only paid for one drink. That one drink was a mere $1.60, a generous tumbler full of Vodka and mixer, a good drink. For a buck sixty, I could have stayed there all night.

I have several impressions of the Knights of Columbus Lodge. The folks were great, friendly and fun, lots of laughing and smiling. The other patrons were mixed ages but older than us. One couple looked to be well advanced in years. I hope I can still rage when I am 80. It is the sense of community that was evident while I was in there. I was welcome, but an outsider, I wasn't Catholic and I wasn't a Knight. I found myself yearning for some of that community, and the cheap liquor of course. Our bartender was amiable and fun, he was obviously amused at this group of heathens in his bar, and expressed it with his generous drink making. No person, not connected with the K of C was going to come through that door. We were with the daughter of the bartender, and we had a key card, the modern equivalent of a secret password. For regulars, that means everyone is a friend or an acquaintance that might be swilling beer next to you.

I will never be a Knight of Columbus (named for Christopher Columbus by the way, not Columbus, Ohio.). I am not Catholic, and never will be, not that I have anything against Catholics, it is just hard to re-think what you grew up with when it comes to religion. I am a Baptist. We do not have clubs where we can fellowship with other Christians while simultaneously gambling and drinking to our hearts content. Baptists would condemn this behavior as sinful, worldly and enough to keep you out of heaven. This place had a photo of the Parish priest and the top Knight, some Bishop hanging in the entry way! Religion and vice, way to go! God probably doesn't care that much if we have a drink or two. That wasn't grape juice at the famed "water into wine" incident in the New Testament, it was wine and I bet it was good wine too. Nothing short of a divine beer run.

Maybe I can become a Moose or an Elk, perhaps and Eagle. All of which have famously cheap drinks in secret bar rooms with key holes for that all important password. Perhaps I could be an Odd Fellow, and go to that building that has the I.O.O.F emblazoned across the eaves.

I just can't help but admire the K of C and the good solid folks that do good things for the community in the name of Christ, but also allow the worldly part of our human experience to exist, if not outright encouraged, in all of us.

Wor, what is it good for?

I live in a small town in south central Ohio. We do not have a bad crime problem here, although there is some minor drug trafficking, and some rednecks fighting in bars, for the most part life in my small town is pretty safe and quiet. We do not have street gangs, well, that is what I thought anyway. Several months ago, graffiti started showing up on buildings around town. All of it appeared overnight, indicating that some kids with a can of spray paint were out on a spree. Over a period of a few days, I noticed the letter "W" in red paint, scrawled on dumpsters, sides of buildings, even my own garage got defaced with a scarlet "W". Of course I had no idea what the "W" may have stood for at the time. Maybe "Warlocks" or "Wizards" maybe "William". The graffiti looked similar to gang tags. I once lived in a neighborhood in East San Diego, where Hispanic gangs would "tag" their territory with brightly painted and stylelized logos and iconography. While most was incomprehensible, there were occasional works of art on some overpass that a gringo could understand. The markings eventually would get covered over with some rival gangs signature indicating a turf war, or maybe just competition for the available wall space.


I had never seen gang tags in Circleville, Ohio. That is until the mysterious "W" made it's appearance. One day after the graffiti showed up, I was driving past the abandoned feed mill across from my home. There, emblazoned across a large street facing wall was the now familiar "W" followed by a bold paint scrawl that read "Worriers" I did a double take to make sure I read correctly. It said in plain English, albeit less than straight, "Worriers". I started laughing, I mean this was just rich. Our local gang was the "Worriers". Later that evening I drove my girlfriend past the defaced building and she laughed too. We didn't get a photo that day, and I really wish I had because the next morning, workers that had been converting part of the feed mill into a recycling center painted over the offending tag.


I have the "W" on my garage still, and I get a chuckle each time I see it. I am sure the spelling was supposed to be "Warriors" but these kids were obviously hooked on something other than phonics. The "Warriors" might have instilled some fear and respect into rival gang members entering their turf, however I find it difficult to believe anyone would give a thought to invading the "Worriers" territory.

I can hear it now:
"..Come on Jim, lets go do crimes.."
"..Ok! Wait, Billy, what if we get caught, what if my mom finds out.."
"..Oh you are right Jim, lets stay home and play Uno instead.."
Or from the Circleville chapter of the "blood red crippled gangtas".
"Lets go to the south side and bust some heads"
"Isn't that the'Worriers' turf?"
"Yeah but they are worried about something and unlikely to give us any trouble."

Poor, poor white kids from rural central Ohio, trying to find their identity, and gain acceptance in society by forming a street gang in the only city they know. Outcast from their nice soft beds, in nice suburban homes. Alienated from society for all the usual reasons, like access to good schools, parents who supply three square meals a day and an allowance for spray paint. You know the usual reasons to turn to gang life.

Then there is the spelling issue, perhaps a rival gang could be called the "Websters" or the "Oxford Unabridged" and go about correcting the misspelled gang tags. A big red check mark with the correct spelling next to it.

Apparently I live deep in the heart of "Worriers" territory. Somehow, I am not all that worried.

Chains to nowhere

Clear back in the early spring, one of the first really warm days actually, Daisy and I were hanging out in her as yet unfinished guest room, I was sipping a beer and she was painting trim around the walls. I was catching a decent buzz and she was happy and just finishing up her painting when the phone rings. Daisy talks to the person on the other line, hangs up and suddenly exclaims that we have a visitor arriving at 6:00 PM. I was a little confused and since it was nearly that time already I raised an eyebrow and waited for the explanation. I sort of had to fish it out of her, while she cleaned up and hurried about in anticipation of the mystery visitors arrival.
It turns out that sometime back she was pressured into accepting a sales call from some company that sells air purifiers. In return for her time, she gets to choose the fabulous vacation of her choice for FREE! Apparently there was no purchase required. The phone call was from the sales dude, having got faulty instructions and needed to confirm the address. While he was on his way back across town, Daisy informed me that I get to deal with him. Oh yay I though, can I be rude? May I mock him? No, no be nice and then get rid of him.
The door bell rings and I answer the door, expecting a man in a suit and tie but am instead greeted by a tall, lanky individual with bright red hair and a flaming red goatee. The gentleman was dressed in a shirt that had what looked like burn holes in it and a pair of jeans and cowboy boots. The over all image was of some redneck nerd gone hormonal.
I invite him in, with some trepidation mind you, as he smiles (I dont think all the teeth were there) and shakes my hand. Daisy comes out of the living room and we gather in the kitchen. I am bemused at his appearance and notice the guy is wearing one of those wallet chains. You know, that emblem of shitkickers everywhere, the obligatory biker / redneck / piercing crowd fashion accessory that doubles as pick pocket prevention.
He starts in with the small talk and tosses a beat up brochure on the counter, the one with a stunning array of spectacular and exotic vacation destinations. He proudly says we are entitled to a vacation and we should choose one right now before we go any further. Daisy, chooses one, just randomly after we make a few jokes about it. With that out of the way our redneck salesman must be feeling encouraged because he becomes animated and starts winding up for the pitch. No sooner had the hot air started blowing and he had barely opened his case, Daisy asks him how long this was going to take. He derailed pretty quick and started to deflect the question but Daisy wouldn't let him. He states that the presentation will take about 2 hours.
As if that weren't enough, Daisy starts asking what the product is and how much. Oh our wallet chain wearing salesman didnt like that at all and Daisy was wielding Occam's Razor with the skill of a butcher.
Finally he breaks down, spills the price, gets told no, and is being massaged out the door. He didnt even get his case open. The conversation briefly turns into a question and answer session about him. I ask if he makes any money selling these things door to door, and how I cannot believe people still make a living at this sort of selling. They dont apparently, or else he would have had on better clothing. However there is that chain guarding his wallet, it could be it is stufffed with cash from all the $3000.00 air purifiers he has sold, right before dinner time, in someones living room.
Or it could be that he just didnt want to leave the house without his favorite fashion accessory, proudly (and loudly) proclaiming the quality of his character, convincing us right away that he and his company can be trusted and we should get out the check book right then and there. If the check made it past the closest state lottery outlet, it sure enough would have been safe in that wallet.

Blue bombs: death by frozen fecal material (an unlikely odessy) .

Today was a work day in hell, and not just your garden variety hell fire and brimstone mind you, but a day in the seventh level of Dante's inferno. As some of you know, I am a web site developer and Internet consultant. Basically I build websites for companies. I am good at it and I make a good chunk of change hosting websites as well. However, I do not own my own server. Heaven forbid it, I wouldn't want to. I lease servers in their individual climate controlled, security monitored, and hyper connected buildings in places far away for a few hundo a month. So one of my big servers is located outside Philadelphia Pennsylvania. I have a nice deal with an honest hosting company, a good man owns it and he is far from "rinky dink" with `10,000 servers under his control, overall a good deal on fairly high end service. I pay a monthly lease payment and then resell the space and bandwidth to my clients.
The last two weeks I have busted my butt to build, produce and deliver a high profile set of three websites for a national brand of insurance. I was contracted through a marketing firm that has in turn contracted with the big brand. They are fairly clueless, regarding the process of building a website and I was more than happy to host the site for them. Hosting, you see, is easy money most of the time and easy to sell as an addition to the website construction. The machines keep the websites visible to the public and I sit around and collect fees for watching paint dry. Once in awhile the paint doesn't dry correctly and all hell breaks loose. This is what happened overnight and today (Tues Jan 30).
Last night I was peacefully dozing in my bed, almost asleep as I worked till midnight and had only recently gave up for the day. The phone started ringing, at first I didn't want to acknowledge the fact someone was trying to reach me, and I let it ring. Then in rang again, this incessant noise was demanding my attention. I got up and groggily stumbled to the phone in the dark, and missed the call actually. Upon reviewing the call history, I saw that it was one of my programmers and business partners. I immediately called back and asked what was so important she had to call at 12:20 AM.
I learn at this point that the server had to be moved and I had to make a decision on how to handle the situation right that moment. Folks, I was sleepy, grumpy and in no way qualified to make any big decisions at that moment. My first reaction was "fuck that" lets deal with it in the morning after a good nights sleep and some coffee. As she droned on about the problem it became apparent that something had to be done immediately, as the large project I had bled for the last two weeks was due to be proof edited by the large insurance company at 9am that morning. It was indeed crunch time. Within a few moments I got a call from the owner of the server farm and was informed of the situation. The situation was beyond crazy, it was ludicrous in the extreme, my poor brain could hardly wrap itself around it. What happened, to make my life a living hell for the next 20 hours was this. A large chunk of ice fell from a passing aircraft. It fell to earth with enough velocity to hit one of the air handling units on the roof of my data center. The unit promptly crashed through the ceiling upon impact an was hanging on the rafters. Now keep in mind this is a serious building, one cannot get into the server room without thumb print recognition and all the appropriate credentials. Very secure.
The owner calls the local building inspector and the insurance adjuster to take a look. The building inspector immediately orders an evacuation of the building as it is deemed unsafe with a two ton air conditioner hanging on by some unseen force through a hole in the buildings roof. A tarp is placed over the hole and the insurance adjuster is then charged with the investigation of what actually happened. It seems a chunk of ice, roughly three pounds after entry, had fallen from a height of 35,00o feet to demolish the roof. This ice was "blue ice" from an airline lavatory. Apparently it still had turds and toilet paper ensconced within it's frozen form. In layman's terms, a giant hunk of ass water just fell from the sky and wreaked havoc on the parade. All of several hundred servers had to be moved to the new data center about 60 miles away. The server company had been in the process of moving all the servers to the new location at the time, mine was one of the unfortunate ones left in the old building.
So to make a very long story shorter, the owner personally took my physical box to the new building, put it in a rack and plugged it in. Needless to say nothing worked at first and I have been all day making phone calls, placating clients, testing connections and otherwise being miserable. There is nothing so bad as having websites down all over the country because of a server outage.
My team and I eventually got everything going again, and it became a waiting game, waiting for all the connections to solidify and propagate throughout the world wide web. I went to my local pub and ate a late dinner and many beers. The hard part is over, and I have happy customers again, but that errant bomb of turds really fucked with my day and the day of many others. I dont know if it is legal to jettison human waste over a populated area, but this load of shit did a number on us terrestrial peons this day. Should the heavens not open up and deposit anything more than rain for the rest of my life, I will be happy.
slf 01-30-07

Smoking in the Free World

Well, I am finally in a position to sit and write some new blog material. It has been a busy month or so since I last posted. Not that I have a vast following of readers mind you, but still, I blog for the fun of it and if someone else enjoys my words then so much the better.

Last month, our esteemed electorate voted to ban smoking in all public indoor spaces throughout the state. The measure passed with 68% of the vote. I am appalled that almost 2/3 of my fellow citizens are willing to outlaw a legal activity and violate my rights as a smoker. To be honest, I don't really feel as though I have "rights" as a smoker but I can indeed legally buy and consume tobacco as I see fit for the most part. Tobacco is not a controlled substance after all. The real losers are the business owners, men and women that own and operate bars and restaurants specifically.

I have a friend who owns a bar, he is a good guy and has worked hard to make his pub the best in town, he tries very hard to compete and stay ahead of the game. In my small town, smoking and drinking go hand in hand, it is difficult to separate the two activities, I mean in most peoples minds the two are synonymous even if one doesn't smoke. I asked my friend how he felt it would impact his business, he said he didn't know, but wasn't too happy that the government just told him what he could do in his own damn building. That is the real injustice of the new law. If I own a building that is open to the public it is up to me to decide what happens there. If it is ladies night then women get discounted drinks, if I want to paint the walls chartreuse, or cater to gay men then that is my right and my choice. My building, my business, my decision. I fail to see how smoking (once again a legal activity) is any different than other aspects of running a private business.

See, no one is holding a gun to the consumers head and saying "you must go to this smoky bar", on the contrary, if I am that offended by smoking I can choose to drink or dine in a non smoking facility. Guess what? If enough people do go to the non - smoking bar the others will follow suit to stay competitive. Huh? Free market democracy deciding policy in privately owned business'? No way.

Smoking is not good for you, we all know that. Smoking kills, and causes difficult and painful health problems as well. There isnt a smoker alive that doesnt know these things and is keenly aware of the need to quit or get sick someday. Still, it is an addiction comparable to heroin and cocaine, the difference is I can walk to the "quick mart" and get an entire carton of my drug and get my "fix" as I walk back home. What about second hand smoke, you ask? Lets be completely honest about it, if you choose to spend time in a smoky bar, once a week lets say, you are not getting enough carcinogens to make one iota of difference to your health. There is little solid evidence that second hand smoke causes any health problems despite what is promulgated in the press. Walk down a busy city street and inhale the clouds of exhaust, work near a factory belching chemicals, drink the water coming out of the tap, all these things have harmful elements in them but no one is shutting down driving cars.

The number one issue that really chaps my ass is this. To get the ballot initiative passed, a bunch of people had to sit around and think of it. Then they had to pass around a petition to get it on the ballot, then raise money to shove it down our throats in the form of campaign commercials and other media. What the hell do these people do for a living? Don't they have better things to do than sit around worrying about where I smoke? Get a grip people, I dont sit around worrying about how much coffee you drink, or how much money you spend at the track, I dont concern myself with how flatulent you are in the morning on the bus, nor do I sit and think up legislation that would outlaw that nasty perfume you wear that makes my eyes water and my gag reflex start up while I stand beside you at the checkout counter. Lets make it illegal to scratch off lottery tickets on the premises, that is offensive to me, or better yet while I am waiting for your gambling ass to get out of the way while you lose your dollar, I should be allowed to light up to kill the time.

I am an addict, true enough, and I need to stop smoking or I will die, true enough. That is hardly the point, as even if I were not a smoker I would still feel just as strongly about this suppression of freedom at the hands of holier than thou do gooders. If you do not like smoke filled atmosphere in the bar, go to another one that doesnt allow smoking. How bloody hard can it be?