Mmm clotted cream!

For those of you that know me personally you know that I don't get fired up about much of anything. So I want to be clear, "I don't hate the royals any more than I hate a multitude of other privilaged bastards that started life 2 yards from the finish line. Doesn't matter what your politics are, you just don't impress me if you work as a hobby instead of as a survival skill. It's not just the royals. Donald Trump, starting with a mere $40,000,000 of real estate left to him by his father ( That "Death Tax" sure does harm peoples lives), mangaged through shear will to become the mogul you see today. Ted Kennedy, when Hiliary Clinton left the senate, thought it would be a peachy idea to appoint his niece Caroline to the position. Camelot and all that what. The appointment would have just streamlined things anyway, both the Kennedy's and the Bushes have access to family political machines that can pretty much gaurentee a victory if they match the kid to the right district. They all lose touch with what it is like for me, you, your families, and your friends to get through a week. To have to earn things.

I'm not a hater. I can do a good imitation of one in print but hate is a waste of time. What I was going for with my last post was we can't waste our time on bad thinking.  In the sixties they used to say "What if they gave a war and nobody came?"

If nobody came it's all good, but what if one side didn't get the flash mob untext?

I'm no peacenik either. Wars happen, but what if the people resist the idea of war? What if we don't march in lock step behind our soverign lords when they decide killing people is a good way to blow off steam? "Obama shot a man in Libya just to watch him die", That was a lyric to an old Johnny Cash song wasn't it? Take it one step further. What if you gave a royal wedding and nobody watched? What if  privlige is something you earn instead of inherit. What if we just stop buying into corrupt outmoded concepts.

I don't remember the source, but Gabrielle Giffords traveled to see her husband do a shuttle launch this week. Who do you want your daughter to be? Who do you want to be? If you are asking "Who is Gabrielle Giffords?" please don't because you'll make me cry. Just put on your slave coller and bow down to your king and queen.

My Italian grandfather wasn't always a good man, but then neither am I. He might have been all about the wild demons that haunted him, and it might seem like I would have a hard time getting excited if I was with the Swedish bikini team during Mardi Gras. He only went to 3rd grade, I graduated collage.  We both agreed on one thing though, America might not always do the right thing, but the concept of "America" is what will save this world. Best a King could ever do, hopefully a benevolent one,  is make the world good for his lifetime.

That was great grandpa's favorite song. It isn't spiritual but it is perfect for Sunday morning all the same.

Fortunate Son

My grandfather on my fathers side was a nasty little Italian immigrant. He would get drunk and beat my father with a garden hose. He would beat him with a golf club. He wasn't a nice man. He had come to America at the age of 3 as an orphan. I don't know the story behind that. Did the shipping lines use orphans for ballast? Despite being a mean prick he started his own business, raised a mess of kids, owned his own home, and thrived in a place where everyone was supposed to have an equal chance. The kind of chance he would have never had if he had stayed in Italy. He used to say to my father "If your hair's combed and your shoes are shined your as good as anyone."

You have to love that attitude. We're all Bozos on this bus. Up yours Hitler.

Now in 2 days the British are going to have a big wing ding about the right to be born better than someone else. Mmmm better! Kings and Queens are just so...so... shouldn't we be dragging those bastards to a guillotine ? The British can go screw, but it is their country and their prerogative so I hope they enjoy the damn wedding. That doesn't mean you should give one breathless second of your precious time to watching that crap on television.

Why it's just like a fairy tale... and they lived happily ever...oops!

There is of coarse a ruling class in this country too. Kennedy's, Bushes, Gores, Rockerfellas are our own version of royalty. They win election after election because they are Kennedy's, Bushes, Gores, Rockerfellas. Why do we allow it? Aren't your shoes shined? Isn't your hair combed? Why don't we believe our own mythos? It's been a long hard slog for "every man", with hard earned rights evaporating around us even as I type these words. Meanwhile our own royals and their acolytes are howling for even bigger cuts or conceding our future to those that do. Are you really going to watch the royal wedding?

At 4AM on friday morning millions of our countrymen are going to waste their hard earned time for sleeping watching 2 winners of the luck sperm contest rub our noses in their privilege. Breathless style reporters, embracing their slave morality, will call it like a baseball game and sell it like the holy grail of love. A nation of fools with messy hair and scuffed up shoes will lap it up before returning to their daily lives. All wishing that it could have been them on the screen when they should be out buying a comb and some shoe polish.

Not Me.

Redemption

Easter Sunday... I'm not a religious person. I'm not, honest. Still isn't the idea of redemption, and second chances, inviting. It's a reoccurring theme for almost every religion and an especially comforting one for Americans because in Christianity you get someone else to do the torture and death part for you. Mmmm torture and death! Of coarse my cynicism is cheap, unearned and definitely offensive. If you are a believer, or even if you only believe in the possibility of there existing things bigger than yourself, the kind of sacrifice Easter represents is indeed a reason for celebration.

A little faux reggae to get the Holiday off to a thumping start. I like my religion infused music to be danceable even though the best I can do now-a-days is get my toes to tapping sans any body movement whatsoever. Take one part middle age, add a car accident, 2 dashes of butter, Mmmm butter! and a lot of bacon, Mmmm bacon! and suddenly the "Electric Slide" becomes the "Fell Over and Died". Nothing to be sad about though, given my innate dancing abilities that just means dozens of weddings have been spared horrible dance floor accidents over the last 8 years. It doesn't stop me from enjoying the world it just slows me down a little... 2nd chances, right?

The 5 blind boys are about a combined 250 years old. They are the second incarnation of the group. Spirit in the Sky was actually a minor hit for them even if it was already a bigger hit in 1969 for Norman Greenbaum. Second chances, second chances. Of coarse you can always celebrate with the original.

Well, I hope you are enjoying some garlicky lamb, maybe a twice baked potato and a little roasted asparagus. I'm actually playing it low key this weekend being an agnostic and all. I'll probably shuffle off to Linda's for some breakfast then head out to the beach for a walk. I can't think of a better church to convince me there is a god than the beach. Plus I can get Tripoli pizza instead of those body of christ crackers the Catholics are dishing out. Have a great holiday.

Downhill Part 3

I know Mondays post was a disappointment. I figured that the conservatives were so loud about who sucks that they would also know who doesn't. Boy was I wrong. By using their definition of who makes this country great we managed to cross 8 people off our list of suspects, but that leaves over 300,000,000 people who could be destroying America to sort through. Damn! We'll all be bowing to our Chinese masters by the time I sort this out. Maybe with a heroic... that's the ticket! Heros can't possibly be ruining the country. A quick nexus search for heros should clear this up.

Oops! That one is from my porn stash (what? pictures of women would be exploitive). No, I am talking about real American heros. The kind of folks that are the backbone of this great country. You know the media talks about them all the time, it's just a matter of...

Sorry, now I've got myself into Rush Limbaugh's porn stash. Darn you people and your need for colorful pictures. I thought this was going to be easier. I mean think about it, you turn on the news and all you ever hear is about American heros. Cops, firemen, teachers, union members, soldiers, pro athletes, doctors, nurses, why the list goes on and on. Just having the title is often shorthand for "hero". Now who am I to argue with the hard working members of the mainstream media. I'm sure they know a hero when they need spoonable imagery for their stories, or their news pieces. So...

Downhill Part 2

I don't want this to devolve into a lot of finger pointing. If we are going to get to the bottom of why America is declining we can't be always be playing the blame game. I am going to , by the process of elimination, whittle down the list of possible culprits by identifying the innocent until only the guilty remain. That way we can avoid...

The discussion about the  Endowment for the Arts got pretty heated.

Lets start with the conservative side. Conservatives get pretty angry that the "producers" in our society are not properly rewarded. Me to. I think that people that put in a hards day... wait... That's not who conservatives are talking about when they talk about "producers". Conservatives are talking about Ann Rand and Atlas Shrugged ( you might have bumped into her in 9th grade when some english teacher tried to slide in We the Living or Anthem. The former her own Diary of Ann Frank only with the Soviets playing the Nazis and her not dying. The later Childhoods End for dummies.) When they talk about "producers" they are talking about the rugged individuals that create businesses through hard work, self reliance, and no government hand-outs. OK, I like those people too so we'll take them off our list.

Now of coarse the conservatives like to bandy that term around to include pretty much everybody filing a 1099 form at tax time. Not going to cut it my friends. Rand, and real conservatives, were talking about real producers only. No sucking off of the government tit. No mortgage tax credit. No medicare. No public parks. No public schools. No redistribution of wealth from one persons labor to you. Alright, maybe there are 8 or 9 people like that currently living in the United States, and my hats off to them. They might even all be Republicans. Still 8 or 9 people leave several hundred million still on our suspect list. Hmm? What to do? What to do?

Not a vegetable anymore.

Well, we can check with the main stream media. They must know who the good folks are. It's a shame about the conservatives. Those rascals  are so loud about who sucks I figured there would also be more about who the good folks are. Oh well, at least we eliminated 8 people from possible guilt. This new angle might take some time though, so until I can get my research done maybe it's time to knock off a side dish for Easter dinner.

Downhill Part 1

So I started writing this blog when I lost my last job. I felt like the world was closing in and at my age I was all done. Well surprise surprise, unemployment kicked in, I had money for my bills, people sent me job leads, I didn't get sick but even if I did government mandated COBRA insurance was there for me, I was still worried about the future, but hey, doesn't everybody worry about the future, then I got a new job... So where is the downhill part? That wasn't downhill. That was a rough patch. Right? But?... while doing this blog and watching the news and talking to all of you and just getting my citizen on it became pretty clear to me that everyone thought we, and by "we" I mean America, were in trouble.

Oh no! The Taliban army has taken Disneyland

It seems that everyone across the entire political spectrum seems to think so. The current budget head butting just magnified the feeling. It was time for me to spring into action. Shaking the lethargy that had fallen upon me after an over dose of spring I decided to finally root out the destroyers of America. I knew this was going to be a difficult task. I didn't want to be like the pun-dents that cast wildly aggressive and only quasi accurate accusations at each other. No red state/ blue state war for this blogger. I didn't want to be a sissy either though. After all, someone was destroying America and it has to stop. So no Sunday service and breakfast today. Last week was sentimentality, the week before was both religious manipulation and saccharin secular up lift. My new hard investigative self decided to cancel todays original clip "Wing beneath my Wings" by Bette Midler ( sorry Bette Midler fans) followed by a danceable gospel tune from the 50's ( sorry danceable gospel fans) in favor of facing Sunday with...

Writers Block

Sorry about the writers block.

It amazes me how many great people there have been on this earth. They create medicine, fight injustice, build towers to the sun. Me? Yesterday was cold and wet. I was all done. Today was a perfect spring day. I was all done. I'm so all done that I am writing this post even though I am all done. Call it writers block, but today I am all done. Did I tell you I was all done?

I mean how does any body ever get any work accomplished when there is some spring outside. I need me a full fix of spring. I need to open the windows and smell that scent of the world coming alive at last. I need to be both out doors and warm at the same time. I need the powers that be to stop screwing with me like they did yesterday. 35 degrees and pouring out, really Powers That Be? I need to get out there and do some serious frolicking. You have seen nothing in this world until you see me frolic.

So I'm supposed to work when that's outside the window?

My yearning to screw off makes me feel guilty too. Did I mention that there are people out there right now curing cancer, writing great novels, running businesses, building skyscrapers, fighting wars, putting everything on the line and all I want is...

As if!

By the way this whole post is a complete rip-off. There isn't even a recipe. Of coarse there is an Easter meal coming up, followed by Cinco de Mayo, so plenty of recipes are coming. I know, you can't wait. I'm signing off now, but take a second for the video. See what a real guy can do with his spring fever. It's why Vivaldi is still famous. Alright, alright maybe famous is the wrong word... important then. Me? I am about 20 years away from being worm food. Hey, that'll help somebody go fishing.

Classical music, keeping Bugs Bunny in soundtrack music for generations.