Workman Chronicles

Being Abnormal

2007-06-14T21:23:00.000-07:00

I overheard a young woman talking with her friend recently, consoling him over the fact that he had apparently scored a 70% on some test he had taken.

Depending on where and when you went to school, some places consider 70% to be a “C” or “Average” grade.

Once upon a time, grades went like this:

A = Excellent
B = Good
C = Average
D = Poor
F = Failing

I was struck by the young woman’s explanation that the 70% “C” fell into a category I didn’t recall from school.

Apparently, here in the 21st century, the category is called “Normal” instead of average.

She didn’t elaborate on how the rest of the categories played out, but I found the notion to be fascinating, if not somewhat disturbing.

It occurred to me that “Normal” and “Average” are sometimes interchangeable terms.

However, in school parlance, I wondered what it meant if you earned a “B”, or God forbid, an “A”.

If a “C” is “Normal,” based on fundamental vocabulary principles, a “B” or “A” would have to be considered “Abnormal.”

I guess the new grading system would look like this:

A = Very Abnormal
B = Abnormal
C = Normal
D = Not Quite Normal
F = Fast Food Service Bound

I used to get a lot of A’s and B’s on my report card, so this revelation explains a lot.

“Normal” has never been a term used very often in my direction, so this system actually fits.

While I’m not altogether comfortable with the new description of higher-than-average grades as “Abnormal,” I still prefer it to the grading system that seems to be in use these days by some of the more liberal school systems which insist that no child’s fragile psyche should be damaged by something as stress-inducing or judgemental as tiered grades.

For example, I’ve heard that a number of California schools have implemented the following grading system:

A = Wonderful
B = Wonderful
C = Wonderful
D = Wonderful
F = Wonderful

I’ve often wondered how a valedictorian would be chosen at schools using such confidence-building grading systems, and whether the process involves names being drawn from a hat.

But even this scale is better than some progressive schools which have completely done away with grades altogether, as well as tests and homework.

We used to have an institution like this where I grew up.

It was called the penitentiary.

The difference is that, instead of receiving a cap and gown and a diploma, the alumni who graduated from that particular institution received $50 and a bus ticket.

Which is still way less stressful than failing Ms. Stoeri’s 11th grade Chemistry class.

Poor Britney

2006-02-14T07:35:00.000-08:00

I never thought I would find myself saying something so ludicrous, but here it is:

I feel sorry for Britney Spears.

One minute she’s making a kajillion dollars shaking her bottom on MTV clad in a schoolgirl skirt that wouldn’t pass muster in any classroom in America, dating a Back Street Boy (or was it an N’Syncer…I always get those two boy bands confused, but it’s okay because they’re nearly interchangeable) and lip-synching her way up and down the pop charts.

She was the envy of every female between the ages of Barney and Stridex, and the erotic dream of every male between the ages of Barney and Metamucil.

Now she’s just a tired-looking makeup-challenged SUV-driving new mother.

Recently caught on film behind the wheel of a mom-mobile with her unstrapped new baby in her lap, Spears has become the whipping post for the tongue-clucking set.

Even U.S. Transportation Secretary Norm Mineta has joined in the Britney bashing, calling her “irresponsible.”

Old Norm and the rest of the political correctness patrol need to get over themselves, and get their noses out of Britney’s business.

To be honest, I’ve never much cared for the pop princess, or the poor sartorial and moral example she’s set for our teens.

But she’s getting a bad deal in this instance.

First, let’s give some credit.

At least she was actually with her child, instead of phoning in her motherhood from a tour bus or movie set like so many of today’s Hollywood moms who choose to procreate because they aren’t responsible enough to qualify for a pet adoption at the local pound.

In the video of her alleged misdeed, Britney looks unkempt, frazzled, desperate, and panicked.

Trust me, it has nothing to do with paparazzi.

All new mothers look like this.

It’s an impossible job, with long hours, lousy pay, a thankless employer, and a demanding boss (the baby) who doesn’t believe in coffee breaks, showers, or uninterrupted sleep, much like working for Donald Trump.

The unions should quit trying to organize casino workers and kindergarten teachers and instead focus on getting better working conditions and pay for new moms.

But more importantly, Britney hasn’t done anything heinous or extraordinarily dangerous.

Have a talk with your own parents, the ones who grew up in lead-painted cribs and eating mud pies, and ask them about their first driving experience.

Most of them won’t discuss their awkward attempts trying to parallel-park the family Vista Cruiser.

They will light up with the memory of sitting on their dad’s lap and hanging onto the steering wheel with both hands during a family trip.

Helping dad “drive” the car is one of the most precious bonding moments in a kid’s memory.

Today’s children have been cheated out of this treasure by air bags and a politically-correct society that would rather have kids strapped in like cargo because they MIGHT, theoretically, perhaps, in one out of a million instances, possibly suffer a potential injury in the unlikely event of a rare 20 mph fender bender.

This is the same group of zealots who also think Ritalin is a better child-rearing tool than dad’s firm hand.

Personally, I would rather endure 100 crash-induced head injuries than be politically stripped of that magical moment when dad let this four-year-old sit in his lap and take the wheel.

Britney’s baby is probably too young to be able to remember this moment in years to come.

Fortunately, thanks to home movies courtesy of CNN and Fox News, the kid will be able to relive this bonding moment before he’s old enough to get his first nose piercing.

Breaking Up Is Hard To Do

2006-02-10T23:39:00.000-08:00

It’s official.

Today is my last day as the sports editor for the Desert Valley Times.

After two years with the newspaper, I have decided that it’s time to move on.

While there are different kinds of love…love for your spouse, love for your children, love for your 1974 Camaro, love for your dog, love for your job…there is one universal truth about all forms of that particular emotion.

It hurts when you and your beloved part ways.

While I’m stoked and enthused about my new projects, which I’ll mention in a moment, this is a sad day for me.

I love writing. I have loved being a public figure. I have loved being “in the know,” helping people, telling the truth.

But like a love affair gone bad, a lot of the fun has gone out of being a part of the DVT.

It started back in October, when one of my Workman Chronicles columns was killed by the editorial staff because it was going to bring more heat on a family member.

There was nothing wrong with the article itself…not particularly inflammatory or controversial, it was just addressing a topic (Homeowners Associations) that was causing problems for someone in the business.

In protest, I decided to pull the Workman Chronicles, Hard At Play, the Phantom of the Cineplex, and all the hard-news reporting I had done up until that point.

All of these “extras” were above and beyond my job description. I just did them because I love to write, and wanted to make this the best small newspaper in the state of Nevada.

While dozens of readers expressed their disappointment, particularly in the absence of the Workman Chronicles, the editorial staff was unmoved.

But even more important than the censoring of my own article was the ongoing suppression of real news in the community.

Things have happened in this town that are intentionally not reported, or are muted to keep a positive face.

There have been shootings that weren’t investigated or properly reported by the newspaper, not to mention dozens of other activities that have gone unpublished.

And the continuing, unwavering support for the construction company and botched road project currently underway on Mesquite Blvd., in spite of the almost-universal anger from the citizenry, is beyond comprehension,

For the first year of my involvement with the DVT, I refused to believe that was happening. In fact, I had publicly and repeatedly insisted that it just wasn’t so.

But for the last year, I’ve seen it happen too often to ignore.

The DVT will put a “ground-breaking” for a new business on the front page with a 500-word story (often one not even written by newspaper staff), but will bury the 150-word story of an attempted murder on page six.

Things got worse.

In December, I was asked to do online radio broadcasts for RadioMesquite of the VVHS basketball games.

Since I was a sports broadcaster about a hundred years ago, I agreed to do it.

But first, I asked for and received permission from my supervisor at the newspaper.

A month ago, I got an e-mail saying that I had to quit broadcasting because RadioMesquite had been deemed a “competitor” to the newspaper.

This was the last straw for me.

I decided that I could no longer continue to have my name associated with an organization that had failed at its job so miserably, and had such little integrity.

Which brings me to now.

On Monday, in addition to running Computer Help, a company dedicated to computer tutoring, training, troubleshooting, and repair for individuals, retirees, and small business, I will be joining the staff of Mesquite Local and Radio Mesquite.

This company is in the process of developing an online daily newspaper.

They insist that they are dedicated to telling the truth, no matter how ugly or painful.

I don’t like harping on the negative. By nature, I’m a pretty optimistic, positive person.

But more than anything, I believe in the truth. I insist on it. I don’t like spin, and I hate obfuscation, especially when things are hidden “for our own good.”

I have been assured that MesquiteLocal will print the truth.

I’ll also be more involved with RadioMesquite, helping to develop new talk shows and other radio programming to go along with our continuing broadcasts of VVHS basketball and baseball.

So I’ll still be around, although preaching to much smaller congregations.

Fortunately, all signs are that the congregation is growing.

But most importantly, I will be able to contribute, uncensored, to an organization that values respect and honor.

So buckle your seatbelts, because we’re on our way!

School District Split

2006-01-31T07:48:00.000-08:00

There is a move afoot to split up the Las Vegas School District.

(Yes, I know they are technically the “Clark County School District,” but trust me, the LVSD title is more accurate.)

There are certain bureaucrats who believe the bureaucrats at the school district have become unresponsive to the needs of the students and communities.

This is known as “pots calling the kettle black,” or whatever cute euphemism you were raised with.

The LVSD is the fifth-largest school district in the country, although Las Vegas is only the 29th largest city.

They get their extra muscle because they also own Mesquite, Boulder City, Henderson, and a few other outlying areas.

The word “own” is used advisedly, because that is how the district treats these municipalities.

It’s not surprising that someone has pointed to this governmental wooly mammoth and said that maybe it should be changed.

“Broken up” is the term they’ve used.

What IS surprising is the silence coming from Mesquite.

Once upon a time, there was a group of people who decided they were tired of being picked on, ignored, lied to, bullied, and insulted by their ruling authority.

They weren’t treated as badly as Mesquite is treated by the school district, but they decided not to just sit back and take it.

It was called the Civil War.

After the way this burgeoning desert community has been disregarded and disrespected by the school board, you would think the residents would be ready to light the torches and sharpen their pitchforks for the coming debate.

But then, there were probably fence sitters in 1863 who really “didn’t want to get involved.”

Overall, residents of Mesquite have been conspicuously silent on the issue, although they would benefit the most from such a divestiture.

As one of the fastest-growing cities in the U.S., awaiting the addition of 10,000 new taxpayers in the Pulte development, not to mention the enormous construction project pending just across the Lincoln County line that will bring hundreds of new students, this is a community that needs its own school district.

And if the state gives the Mesquite School District a proportional share of the tax and gaming revenues currently wasted on the gluttonous Las Vegas version, school money would not be an issue.

Best of all, the people of Mesquite would finally have a say over how their schools are run and their children taught instead of lumping them in with an urban protocol that is becoming less and less attractive with each passing year.

And yet, the silence continues.

It’s hard to believe that an oppressed populace that has to beg for every scrap and morsel of school district largesse would be so neutral.

Maybe I’m overreacting.

It’s not like they’re talking about changing the slot machine comp points at the Oasis or something equally earth-shaking.

So the status quo will continue in Mesquite.

We’ll have to take what they give us, and go to the city council for anything we really need for our kids, like sports field lights or tennis courts.

And I’m sure we’ll get used to dealing with children who become more and more worldly and politically correct with the curriculum and standards mandated by a city where prostitution is trumpeted on lighted roaming billboards.

So let’s move on to something more important.

Have you heard they’re raising the price at the buffet?

Real Parents Are Waiting

2006-01-29T21:05:00.000-08:00

To the parents of the youngsters wandering around the Virgin Valley High School gymnasium during every basketball game, I’d like you to write down this website address:

www.adoption.org.

If you’re not going to be a parent, then dammit, do the decent and honorable thing and give your kids to someone who will!

Once again, as has been the case all season, youngsters as young as two are permitted to race up and down the bleachers, crawl under the bleachers, throw things, climb over seats and other spectators, and occasionally toddle onto the playing court during the game.

And the murmur that ripples through the crowd at various times is always the same: Where the heck are their parents?

Here’s the answer:

These kids don’t have parents.

Oh, there’s someone in the stands who gave birth or donated a seed, somebody who pays for their food and clothes, and someone who was proud enough to paste their name on the kid’s birth certificate, but that’s about the end of their involvement in actually raising a child.

Aside from the fact that these obnoxious little tykes are interfering with other spectators, are making the most noise possible to distract from the game, and are in general practicing for an adulthood of rude behavior, their parentally challenged guardians are living in a time vacuum, dating back to the 50s when it was actually safe to let your kids roam in a confined building.
This is a new century, filled with pedophiles, child-snatchers, and other kids who get joy out of tormenting smaller, more helpless human beings.

Why would you put your child in harm’s way and allow them to play in places you can’t monitor?

Even worse than those who allow their offspring free rein to annoy and tempt fate are the useless adults who dump their eight-year-olds at the door then go on with whatever it is that they deem to be more important than taking care of their sons and daughters.

Like feral dogs in the wilderness, these mongrels prowl the gym in packs, not showing the least bit of interest in the game while they search desperately for some way to slake their boredom.

I recognize that our little town is woefully deficient in offering day care facilities, but here’s a news flash:A high school basketball game isn’t a day care facility either.

Don’t foist your poorly-trained problems off on the rest of us to raise while you go pull that slot machine handle or hang out with other poor excuses for parenthood.

If your youngster isn’t a student at the high school, he or she should not be “dropped off” at a basketball game, or any other sporting event at the school.

The administrators have enough on their plates just keeping their hormonally-virulent charges in line and out of the dark corners of the campus during a game.

They shouldn’t be expected to do your job, too.

I know you want to get the screeching little monsters out of your hair for a couple of hours (look at how it’s being raised, and it might offer the solution to WHY you are so eager to dump them), but it’s not fair for you to get them out of your hair by tossing them into ours.

And to those “parents” (and I’m using the term loosely here) who think it’s cute to let their little ones race up and down the bleachers and onto the courts, give the website a try.

I promise that there are couples anxiously awaiting a chance to do what you appear to be incapable or unwilling to do:

Be a parent.

Turnout Turnabout Is Fair Play

2006-01-22T07:24:00.000-08:00

There is a California loon (which is a lunatic from the Golden State, not a warbling lakeside bird, although they both tend to squawk, flap their wings, and make a lot of noise without any meaningful result) who has started a campaign to get U.S. Supreme Court Justice David Souter kicked out.

Not kicked out of the Supreme Court:

Kicked out of his home.

He is angered by Souter’s vote which has enabled municipalities to force people out of their homes under the eminent domain rule to make room for “better-use” construction that will increase tax revenues for cities.

For example, an old man can be forced to leave his ramshackle home of 40 years if a new developer wants to build a shopping mall that will benefit the city with higher taxes.

No, I’m not making this up.

It is now the law of the land thanks to Kelo vs. City of New London, Conn.

But not satisfied to carp and whine like a certain online journalist who shall remain nameless (but his initials are Morris Workman), Logan Darrow Clements has managed to get enough signatures in Souter’s hometown of Weare, New Hampshire to have an item placed on the ballot where voters will decide whether to give Souter the boot under eminent domain to make room for a theoretical Inn.

(Like New England needs another bed and breakfast.)

I think the Red Sox have a better chance of winning the pen-

(I guess I’m going to have to come up with a new “Hell Freezes Over” metaphor now that the Sox, both White and Red, have actually tucked a World Series under their belts).

Anyway, there is obviously no chance that a Supreme Court Justice will lose his home in an eminent domain case.

First, he knows too many lawyers, who could effectively bottle up such a case until one of the Olsen twins is old enough to become a Federal judge.

Second, while it would be poetic justice for a Justice to receive such justice based on the injustice of one of his rulings, the truth is that there really hasn’t been much true justice in the world since Charles Bronson hung up his shootin’ iron.

The guy who shot President Reagan is walking the streets these days.

(He’s not technically free, still getting to spend most of his nights in the comfy psychiatric abode provided by taxpayers, but his doctors have ruled that Hinckley poses no threat to society now that Reagan is dead and Jodie Foster hasn’t had a hit movie in a while, so he’s allowed to leave the facility for a few days each month.)

The animal who brutally beat a Navy Seal to death then dumped his body on the tarmac during a hijacking back in 1985 is now a free man.

He wasn’t technically released by the U.S., but by our “good friends” the Germans.

Even the doof who shot the Pope back in 1981 has been released from a Turkish prison.

Shot the Pope! And he’s a free man!

(Although I wouldn’t want to be in his shoes when it comes time for him to make his case to St. Peter at the Pearly Gates. How do you explain shooting a Pope to a saint?)

Personally, I think the Supreme Court ruling which allows cities to evict people to make room for another J.C. Penney is one of the most shameful laws on the books.

And while I think I have a better chance of winning the World Series than Clements has of displacing Souter, I applaud his Don Quixote imitation.

Most will call him a fool. Or a loon.

I just wish our country had more fools like him.

Curse Works

2006-01-18T08:15:00.000-08:00

It doesn’t happen often, but every decade or two I get it right.
This weekend was one of those rare occurrences.
Upon the conclusion of the NFL regular season, I espoused a curse on all of the lazy, dishonorable football teams who chose to lay down in their last game of the season because they had already clinched their playoff berths.
I specifically cited the Patriots, my favorite team up until then, for resting their starters in a season-ending game against the Dolphins, a game the Pats ended up giving away through their sloth.
But I reserved my greatest vitriol for the Indianapolis Chokes.
This is the team that collapsed under the pressure of the “perfect season,” going belly up against a San Diego team that didn’t even make it to the playoffs.
Then they took the next two weeks off, leaving their starters on the bench for a loss against Seattle and a four-point victory against the Arizona Cardinals, a woeful semi-pro team that couldn’t beat most high school squads.
The result is a Colts team that didn’t show up for four weeks, including their coveted “bye” week earned by coasting to the end of the season after winning 13 straight.
The death of head coach Tony Dungy’s son was tragic, but it’s an insult to his death and the NFL to point to that as the reason the team didn’t bother to show up for the last two games.
It turns out that there’s more to my curse and prediction that neither team would make it to the Super Bowl than just fan frustration.
Anyone who saw the Colts lose to the Steelers on Sunday watched an inept Indy team that was enormously out of sync, even noticeably rusty in the first half.
It was vindication for my statement that an NFL team should never lay down, not even with the playoffs in the bag.
The chemistry was shredded, the momentum was gone, and the Colts looked like they were playing their first game of the year after an extended pre-season.
There are so many intangibles that go into the making of a champion.
It’s not just about X’s and O’s, or the front line’s combined body mass.
It’s involves pride, ego, momentum, confidence, rhythm, habit, routine, luck, and even a little bit of kharma.
The Colts, and to a lesser degree the Patriots, squandered all of those things by taking it easy as the regular season wound down.
Meanwhile, Denver, the other AFC bye team that actually started their stars in the season finale, won handily over an uncharacteristically slothful New England team.
And the Steelers, the team that dismantled the Colts in the division playoffs, were another team which played their starters in week 17, in spite of the fact that their big-name heroes were dinged up and injured.
The management of this weekend’s two losers defended their actions by claiming they didn’t want to risk injury to their star players.
Well they are to be congratulated.
They are now the healthiest two NFL teams to be sitting at home during the conference championship.

Publikin Backlash

2006-01-07T16:03:00.000-08:00

A wise man once said that the easiest way to get through life without an argument is to never discuss politics or religion.

I swear to God the guy was probably right.

I’m about to open up an ugly, smelly can of worms that will polarize readers, offend members of both parties, and in some bizarre way contribute to global warming.

(I’ve often thought that if the environmentalists would just shut up about it, the reduction in hot air from their silence would eliminate the Earth’s rising temperature.)

For my Republican friends, I think that snapping sound you just heard was the crack of a camel’s back being broken by the last straw.

The straw’s name is Abramoff.

Back when Brother Clinton was in office, the ‘Publikins couldn’t stop wringing their hands and salivating at the prospect of the 2000 elections.

After eight years of White Water, Gennifer Flowers, Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, Not Inhaling, and finally Monica-gate, the elephant party was practically wetting their pants in anticipation of capitalizing on all of Big Bill’s improprieties.

(They could have cashed in on Clinton’s follies sooner, but the likable lug kept bailing himself out with such annoyingly unimportant political tactics as maintaining a vibrant economy, balancing the budget, reducing the deficit, and not invading any Middle Eastern countries whose names start with vowels.)

The payoff was enormous.

A country which had tired of the obviously deficient collective morals of the donkey party (I didn’t make that up…the logo for the Democrats is an ass, and was the logo LONG before Clinton got into office) decided that conservatism had to be better.

So we elected a Republican president.

Sort of.

There are zealots in the Democratic party who are still secretly counting ballots in Palm Beach in hopes of finding spelling errors.

We’ve been unable to confirm the rumor that they have engaged psychic John Edward in hopes of proving that, while someone may have punched a hole in the card for Bush, a quick mindreading session indicates that the person really meant to vote for…whoever that Democratic candidate was in 2000.

(It’s been a while, and I can’t remember his name. Which just confirms the old saw that history never remembers the losers.)

The backlash continued, as Americans also voted in a ‘Publikin majority in the house, the Senate, and the first season of American Idol.

(We’re not sure Kelly Clarkson is a ‘Publikin, but that frizzy-haired goofy guy named Justin just HAD to be a Dumocrat.)

So the U.S. got their conservative majority across the board in hopes of improving the honor and integrity of our government.

Then questions began to arise about whether the new top dog actually showed up for his National Guard duty in the 70s.

To show that his military record was above reproach, Mr. President went right out and bombed Afghanistan.

(Sort of like a guy that has his sexuality challenged then goes out and shoots small furry animals with a high-powered rifle as proof of his machismo.)

Most Americans applauded the attack on Afghanistan.

After some turban-turd knocked down our twin towers, we needed to kick SOMEBODY’s ass, and they looked like a good candidate.

During the fracas, Top Dog promised to find Osama Bin Laden, the head baddie.

Apparently, Bush hired the same detective agency that O.J. Simpson used to find Nicole’s “real killers,” because nobody has seen hide nor hair of either offender.

A few years later, Bush apparently received some intel from that same detective agency about some weapons of mass destruction.

With his popularity numbers fading and another election just around the corner, Mr. National Guard decided to drop bombs on somebody else.

Once again, like Bin Laden, we didn’t find the WMD’s.

I’m not saying Bush is a bad president.

I’m just saying that he sucks at “hide and seek.”

Americans have been growing tired of repeated incidents where our elected leader said we were going to do something, then we didn’t.

“We’re going to find Osama Bin Laden and bring him to justice…”

“We’re going to find those weapons of mass destruction and bring somebody to justice…”

“I did not have sex with that woman…”

(Whoops, wrong president.)

Now in the old days, to say we were going to do something and then not do it would be called a “lie,” but political correctness precludes the use of such terms in the 21st century.

(GORE! That’s the guy’s name! The one who Bush beat in 2000. I knew it would come to me!)

Anyway, it isn’t just the President who is having problems with honesty.

That ‘Publikin congressional majority has turned out to be a pretty bad idea as well.

First, Speaker of the House Gingrich got caught with his Newt in a place it didn’t belong.

Then Tom DeLay, the House Majority Leader, was indicted for playing patty-cake with his PAC funds.

In September, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist was accused of pulling a Martha Stewart, selling stocks based on insider information.

Now, it turns out that a lobbyist named Jack Abramoff has been playing a real-life version of the board game “Monopoly,” but instead of buying properties, he’s been buying up Congressmen and Senators.

(I’m not sure how you put a red hotel on a Senator, but Backslap Jack could figure a way.)

Apparently, Mr. Abramoff had a particular fondness for ‘Publikin officials.

Current House Speaker Dennis Hastert has admitted to accepting green (as opposed to the orange, yellow, and blue money used in the board game version), although he won’t admit he did anything to earn the grease.

Tom DeLay was apparently so deep in Abramoff’s pocket that he could scratch Jack’s knee on command.

With Abramoff pleading guilty to charges earlier this week, then agreeing to blow the whistle on everybody he ever bribed, er, made contributions to, ‘Publikins are scrambling like high-heeled waiters on the iced and canted deck of the Titanic after the iceberg.

Over the next few months, you’re going to see more high-speed foot action in the nation’s capitol than ABC’s “Dancing with the Stars” as lawmakers try to tango around the truth and save their jobs.

But I suspect the American people have had enough.

I’m not much of a betting man (I actually started the season believing the Cowboys would make it to the Super Bowl), but I’d be willing to lay a sizeable wager that America won’t be featuring a one-party system in the House and Senate after the next election.

I’m also convinced that we’ve seen our last elephantine president for a decade or two, unless the ‘Publikins are smart enough to finally let John McCain, Congress’s last honorable man, stand on the ticket.

Or the donkey’s are dumb and stubborn enough that they insist on nominating a more testicled Clinton in ’08.

Those caveats aside, the GOP should brace for the deserved House cleaning that is on the way.

And learn how to spell “minority” in their next mythical “Ethics” class.

No Finish League

2006-01-04T07:00:00.000-08:00

If a baseball team decided to run up the white flag on 1/16th of their season, they would give away 10 games.
If a drywall hanger decided to call in sick for 1/16th of his year, he would miss 16 days of work.
If a NASCAR driver chose to coast for 1/16th of the race, he would consistently finish in next-to-last place, right behind Dale Earnhardt, Jr.
But nobody seems to mind that the NFL’s elite teams regularly take a dive for at least one of their measly 16 regular-season games.
This weekend was an abomination and a slap in the face to football fans, as team after team showed up with only half their starting lineups on the field.
The most egregious offender was the Indianapolis Colts, who phoned it in for two and a half games after their “perfect season” was ruined by the San Diego Chargers.
While Tony Dungy is usually a class act, it was a classless display by a team that was destined for greatness and is now destined for infamy as they will soon become another example of teams who chose to write off the end of their season to keep their athletes healthy, then bungle their shot in the playoffs.
On Sunday, my own beloved Patriots followed the example, pulling Tom Brady after the first half and handing the game over to the Miami Dope Dealers.
Had Brady remained in the game, New England could have finished a mediocre season (for them) with a big win.
The NFC West saw a similarly pitiful display by a professional team when the Seahawks rolled over for the hapless Green Bay Packers.
The Chicago Bears, the crappy, lucky, untalented and embarrassing kings of the NFL’s most inept division, the NFC North, followed suit by giving their starters a breather, giving up an easy win to the Vikings.
In fact, the only class act of the weekend came from Denver, who showed up to play in their 23-7 whipping of the Chargers, in spite of the fact that the Broncos had long since clinched the AFC West title.
Jake Plummer played the entire first half, in spite of being roughed up early.
John Lynch, the outstanding safety for Denver, espoused the spirit that more NFL owners and coaches should embrace.
"In my mind, every time you get an opportunity to play in the NFL, you owe it to yourself, to your team and to the people who pay to watch the game, to play hard," said Lynch, whose high school coach was in the stands.
Unfortunately, too many of the “winners” in the NFL want to act like losers, phoning it in during the last weekend of the season.
So this season, for the first time in years, I won’t be rooting for the Patriots.
And while I buried the hatchet on my hatred of the Indianapolis Colts this season while they were pursuing the “perfect season,” the hatred is back.
They were a cowardly organization when they snuck out of Baltimore back in 1984, and they’re a cowardly organization now.
The Panic Ponies choked against a mundane Chargers team three weeks ago, and they’ll cave in the playoffs again this year, just like they did last year.
And while they don’t have the talent of some of this year’s other contenders, I will cheer for the Broncos every step of the way simply because they are the only team in the 2006 post season, along with the Pittsburgh Steelers, with the heart, honor, and respect for their fans to play every game of the 2005 schedule.
Go Broncos!

Clean Slate Day

2006-01-01T12:29:00.000-08:00

Today is my favorite holiday.

I’ll admit, Christmas is nice.

It would be better if you could eliminate the obligatory waste of life-minutes in your nearest wallet-emptying facility (also known as Wal Mart, or Target, or any other store where money disappears faster than elephants in a David Copperfield concert).

I’m fond of Thanksgiving as well.

What could be better than a day dedicated to football and overeating?

(Heck, who am I kidding, I get that every Sunday from September through February).

Easter isn’t a big day at my house, mostly because it doesn’t usually translate into a day off from work.

(How sly was it for somebody to schedule a holiday on a Sunday, when everybody’s off already? Where was the union when the powers-that-be were concocting this idea?)

It’s also one of the more confusing holidays, since it tends to hop around the spring-time calendar each year, and continues to use bunny rabbits laying multi-colored chocolate Easter eggs in an inexplicable tribute to the resurrection.

But my favorite is New Year’s Day.

While most of the American holidays celebrate something from the past, New Year’s Day celebrates the future.

It is the one day devoted to my most cherished ideal:

Hope.

Every time December 31 rolls around, people stop and make resolutions, a burning flare of hope in a darkened sky of despair.

“This is the year I lose 20 pounds,” they exclaim while finishing off the last drumstick from the Christmas feast.

Then they light up a post-meal cigarette and proclaim “this is the year I give up smoking.”

New Year’s Day is also the moment when we collectively take life’s proverbial Etch-A-Sketch, hold it upside down over our heads, and shake away the mistakes and regrets of the previous year.

In my vernacular, January 1 is “Clean Slate Day.”

No matter how badly you’ve botched the previous 365 days, “Clean Slate Day” marks the chance to start over with an empty score book.

It’s fitting that the turning of the page on New Year’s Eve is denoted by the dropping of a ball in Times Square.

Regardless of how many times you “dropped the ball” in the year past, now is your chance to start anew.

I’m excited about 2006.

It’s an unexplored adventure waiting for me to get in the boat.

It will be filled with changes and new opportunities and fun and heartbreak and all of the things that make life worth living.

And I’m going to do it in a body that’s 30 pounds lighter.

As soon as I’m done with the last of the New Year’s Eve cheese sticks and chicken wings.

Happy New Year, everyone!

Wal Mart Woes

2005-12-20T22:09:00.000-08:00

The problems keep piling up for America’s largest retailer.

These days, Wal Mart must feel like they’ve got a target on their back (no pun intended), as they continue to get hammered in the courts.

It started earlier in the year when several Wal Mart stores got jammed by immigration police for using illegal aliens on contracted cleaning crews.

Apparently, the feds believe it’s okay to sell lettuce picked by illegal aliens under a blistering sun, but border jumpers cannot be permitted to do a clean up in aisle nine.

They’re also being sued for various wage law violations.

It seems that it’s against the law to pay minimum wage to people who ARE from this country.

Of course, the folks doing the suing weren’t unhappy with the paychecks when they agreed to take the job, but somehow they realized a few years into their blue-vested career that it’s Wal Mart’s fault they can’t land a better-paying job.

Now, it’s the EPA’s turn.

It seems that Wal Mart has been using their own trucks to ferry hair spray and bleach and charcoal from their distribution centers to their various stores.

Nobody, not even the feds, seems to have a problem with that.

The rub comes when they put the same items into the same trucks to take them back to the same distribution center when the items don’t sell.

When the items don’t sell, they are no longer products.

They are called “hazardous waste.”

According to the federal investigation, these items must be loaded onto special trucks (translation: exorbitantly and unnecessarily expensive trucks) to be returned to the distribution centers.

Wal Mart has always used the haz-mat trucks to take hazardous returned goods to a special disposal facility.

But our wonderful government (too bad you can’t display disgusted facial expressions in a written document) has decided that the haz-mat trucks must back up to every Wal Mart loading dock to transport that incredibly dangerous White Rain.

Once the feds finish beating up our country’s biggest purveyor of discount goods, and succeeds in adding a few more cents to the cost of nearly everything in the store, they’ll be on the lookout for the next big Wal Mart violation.

Don’t be surprised next year when the big W gets jacked up for unlicensed laser beams in the check-out lanes or stock-boys filling racks with Star Wars toys without wearing a Darth Vader mask.

Every day, people gripe about businesses and jobs going overseas.

Meanwhile, the one company which continues to hire Americans (at least for positions that don’t require toilet scubbing), fights inflation with low prices, remains headquartered in this country, and tries to keep this sluggish economy going, must continuously battle the very government they prop up with their enormous corporate taxes.

Doesn’t it make you proud to be an American?

NFL-Free Network Lunacy

2005-12-19T08:22:00.000-08:00

It’s hard to believe that I’m old enough to remember the “Heidi Game.”

For those too young to remember Joe Namath back when women were debasing themselves trying to get a kiss from him, instead of the other way around, the “Heidi Game” was the 1968 football game between the New York Jets and the Oakland Raiders.

The Jets were leading 32-29 with 1:05 remaining on this November day.

Following a timeout, one of the eggheads at NBC thought it would be a good idea to switch the broadcast over to the movie “Heidi” instead of back to the end of the game.

In that 1:05, the Raiders scored two touchdowns and won 43-32.

The outcry from enraged football fans reverberated through the halls of the Peacock channel for years to come.

But it seems the doofus brigade at NBC spent too much time in front of the boob tube and not enough time in the classroom, because they never learned what my seventh-grade civics teacher used to pound into our heads daily:

Those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it.

(Back then, I thought it was a more-than-subtle warning that if you couldn’t remember when the War of 1812 was fought, chances were good you would be taking his history class again next year.)

NBC has apparently forgotten the wrath and punishment meted out for incompetent networks who think they can pull the plug on the gridiron altar.

A few years back when the Fox network got into the game of bidding for NFL broadcast rights, pushing the cost nearly to Ralph Kramden’s figurative moon, CBS decided they could do without John Madden et al.

Within three years, CBS was at the bottom of the ratings cesspool while Fox found legitimacy on the broadcast landscape.

Three years ago, NBC made the same boneheaded decision, believing the Olympic snooze-fest would be enough to keep them sailing along in first place on the winds of Seinfeld and Friends.

Now, Seinfeld is gone.

Friends is gone.

NFL is gone.

And NBC is in the toilet ratings-wise, their best show barely beating the 3 a.m. kitchen knife sale on the Home Shopping Network.

It’s no accident.

Without football, particularly in the critical November sweeps, a network cannot stay afloat.

CBS, which is now in first place and boasts six of the top 10 shows on television, has learned their lesson.

NBC would be without a single top 10 show if not for “Law and Order: Ad Nauseum.”

So now ABC wants a reminder of life without the NFL.

Like Fox, ABC was the ugly stepsister of the network triumvirate for years until they scored a major coup with Monday Night Football in 1970.

Before long, the American Broadcasting Company was finally acknowledged as a real network.

Next year, the dorks at ABC are going to try the NBC dance, giving up their rights to a 35-year football institution.

Yeah, that “Desperate Housewives” thing is going to fill the gap nicely.

Not.

Mark your calendar, and tell everyone you heard it here first.

In 2010, NBC is going to bid about 80 kajillion dollars to get the NFL back on their network, and will throw in Al Roker and a small country to be named later in order to seal the deal.

ABC will try to mortgage Euro-Disney and put Minnie Mouse on a Las Vegas street corner wearing Daisy Dukes and a see-through Simpsons T-shirt, but it won’t be enough to lure the NFL back to their lame excuse for a network.

Meanwhile, Fox will continue to pay Terry, Howie, Jimmy, and JB obscene amounts of money to keep the NFL’s best pre-game show alive, and will finance their salaries by continuing to show night after night of insipid prime-time cartoons so they don’t have to pay real actors.

They may be stupid at Fox, and believe their audience is as well, but they’re not insane.

Too Damn Cold

2005-12-11T12:38:00.000-08:00

Okay, whoever failed to pay Mesquite’s heating bill is instructed to immediately make amends with the appropriate utility company and return our desert oasis back to it’s intended condition of searingly hot.

For those who haven’t ventured outside the warm confines of their personal abode in the last week or two, let me give you a weather report:

It’s cold.

No, wait, that’s not accurate.

It’s way cold.

Hmmm…not forceful enough.

It’s damn cold.

Getting there, but not quite right.

It’s “I’m not a frickin’ Eskimo, I hate ice on my lawn, and I’m going to strangle the next idiot who asks ‘is it cold enough for you?’” cold.

There, that about sums it up.

The current cold snap is endangering Mayor Bill Nichole’s popular claim that “we play golf 12 months a year.”

That may be technically true, since there are some golf lunatics who will actually swing a nine-iron while wearing a winter parka.

But if you are a golf purist who accepts the standard definition of “golfer” as “someone clad in loud polyester pants and mismatched polo shirt swinging a lightning-conducting rod at an elusive white ball,” then what those guys in the carts are doing can’t be construed as “golfing.”

“Freezing their Titlists off” would be the correct term.

Aside from the personal inconvenience of bundling up against 35-degree temperatures in what is supposed to be the burning desert, this stretch of North Pole artistry has deprived local residents of their favorite pastime:

Calling their friends up north and bragging about the nice Mesquite weather.

The conversation loses some bragability when your friend in Brainfreeze, Minnesota replies “35 degrees? It was up to 38 here. Of course, you wouldn’t know it while lounging in front of this nice fireplace. By the way, is your air conditioner still making that awful noise when you try to pry the thermostat up to the ‘Almost Livable’ setting?”

It’s a cruel irony that, all summer long, Mesquetians hunkered down in their homes and cars, afraid to stand outside more than 10 seconds for fear of spontaneous combustion.

Now, it’s a fear of having body parts flash freeze and snap off on the way to El Rancho.

Face it, we’re not equipped emotionally or sartorially to withstand this climate.

Most residents gleefully sold their winter clothes and fur-lined underwear when they abandoned their previous warmth-challenged address to make room for all the new shorts and t-shirts that our Easy-Bake Oven existence demands 10 months out of the year.

Now, no matter how many “Wolf Creek” polo shirts you put on, hypothermia is going to win.

And regardless of what the song says, Jack Frost is not “nipping at your nose.”

He’s kicking our butts.

Being A Touron

2005-11-30T09:07:00.000-08:00

No matter where you live, there is something nearby that warrants your visit.

It could be the world’s biggest snot collection, or something similarly disturbing, but every area has something that they hold out as a “tourist attraction.”

I live near an entire city that is one big tourist attraction, and could qualify as the world’s biggest snot collection.

It’s called Las Vegas.

If you visit or live in such a locale, you have obviously encountered one of the “lost souls” who obtain four-wheel bumper cars (also known as Hertz-mobiles) then proceed to run into other bumper cars, public fixtures, and pedestrians while gazing at the fake ship in front of the Treasure Island casino and uttering the words, “ooh, a boat!”

These visitors are known as “tourons.”

It’s a contraction of two different words that I am sure you can figure out.

I’m not insulting these visitors, because their visits and their money are critical to the survival of Vegas and my own beloved town, and because every human being in the U.S. of A. has been one at some point.

Recently I put on my “touron” hat and visited Nevada’s “Valley of Fire,” a beautiful desert landscape of red-tinted hills and canyons outside Logandale/Overton.

(The residents of this burg insist that Logandale and Overton are two different towns, but I would challenge anyone outside of their zip code to identify which is which.)

The first thing I would like to point out is that there is something inherently wrong with a government collecting money for God’s handiwork.

The state of Nevada hammers visitors $6 a carload to view this particular collection of rocks.

I’m sure their argument would be that they have money invested in the road and the 4,281 signs pointing the way to pristine “natural” locations.

(Like most states, Nevada doesn’t catch the irony in putting up manmade signs to identify natural phenomena).

As a taxpayer and nature liker (I’m not a nature “lover” because I still prefer humans to trees and believe that the Sierra club has elevated whining to an art form), I would be just as happy to see the roads allowed to return to dirt trails and the signs turned into campfire kindling.

Of course, if the state did that, how would our friends from the “Land of the Rising Sun” get their tour buses out to the “beehive” in time to snap three or four hundred pictures before returning to the black jack tables?

For the record, the red vistas are gorgeous and fascinating, well worth the cost of a couple of rolls of film.

But not worth the $6 shakedown by the state.

To add insult to injury, you are expected to “self-pay,” which means you fill out an envelope, put in your money, keep the stub, and insert the envelope into the slot of a locked metal pipe.

No humans are involved in collecting your money.

Instead, they post people on each end of the park to check for your stub (“Your paperz, pleeze!”) in hopes of catching violators and collecting the big jackpot, which is a hefty fine for stealing glimpses of stuff you already own as a taxpayer.

(Only a government could come up with a system like this.)

If you are planning a visit to the greater Las Vegas area (or even the not-so-great Las Vegas area, also known as Pahrump), I highly recommend a visit to this natural wonder.

And feel free to fill out the envelope, keep the stub, and “forget” to include your cash.

I won’t tell.

Thanksgiving Day Parade

2005-11-24T10:30:00.000-08:00

“Welcome to DBC’s coverage of the annual Spacy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.
“First, we’d like to take a moment to offer our thanks for the many blessings we have received, namely the opportunity to show three hours of non-stop commercials under the guise of a parade.
“Now, before we actually get to the parade, we’re going to cut to our on-the-street hosts who are going to banter and pretend they like each other, which is probably the best performance you’re going to see today.”
“Thanks, Hal. I’m Brat Lower and I’m here with Fady Borinc to bring you an event that epitomizes the American spirit, namely lots of commercials.
“If you look over our shoulder, you’ll see a big yellow float.
“Ignore it. We’re going to.
“Instead, we’d like to interview Razz Matazz, who is starring in the upcoming movie ‘Gone With The Wind 2: Rhett Gives A Damn.’
“Razz, it’s great to see you here.”
“Thanks, Brat. Come see my movie. I’d like to say more, but I can’t really carry on a conversation without a teleprompter, so…come see my movie.”
“There you have it folks. Now, we’re going to take you to a pre-recorded song and a stilted dance number by frozen performers to promote a tedious Broadway show nobody in the rest of the country is ever going to see, but it will entice locals to flock to the theatre, so here is the cast of ‘Everyone Should Be Les Miserable.’”
Following a tiresome presentation where the “singer” offers the worst lip-synch job since Ashlee Simpson’s visit to Saturday Night Live, Brat and Fady throw it to an anorexic weatherman, ignoring the irony of a guy with an eating disorder celebrating a holiday built around feasting.
“Thanks, Hal. By the way, you’re really looking good since that surgery to remove your large and small intestines, stomach, spleen, liver, and a kidney. Happy Thanksgiving, my friend.
“Okay, we’re going to take a 15-minute break to show you a real parade, which is the endless cavalcade of commercials lined up to empty your pockets and fill ours. We’ll be back when we run out of sponsors.”
Following 20 minutes of commercials for such holiday products as Depends and Crapital Won, encouraging you to overspend again this holiday season, Brat and Fady return.
“Behind us, you can see a gang of people with instruments from some school, but we have more important stuff to show you, beginning with an excerpt from this Tuesday’s new comedy ‘Bite Me In A Bikini’ right here on DBC.”
After a three minute clip of a girl in a swimsuit explaining all the ways her CEO dad is a moron, Brat and Fady return to the screen.
“Looks like a winner, wouldn’t you say, Brat?”
“It sure does, Fady. Speaking of winners, I love the snow and skiing that comes with every winner season, which leads us to talk about the Winner Olympics, coming up somewhere in Europe.
“Fortunately, you can catch every uninspiring, boring moment of the Ukranian curling team and plenty of folks who aren’t Americans winning the gold right here on DBC.”
“Okay, Brat, we were going to send it back down to Hal, who’s standing by with the stage manager for the Rolling Stones, who we couldn’t get on our show because our producers have a rule against inviting anyone who actually has talent.
“However, Hal’s currently being blocked by some fat guy in a red suit riding a fake sleigh, so we’ll wait until he moves along before sending it back to the street.”
“Right you are, Fady. So, while we have this extra time to fill, let’s continue to ignore the big balloon Underdog floating by and talk about your kids. How’s that rehab coming along?”
The next 10 minutes are filled with inane stories about past holidays that you know are made up by writers from dysfunctional families, which are basically vignettes ripped off from “Miracle on 34th Street” and Ralphie’s “A Christmas Story.”
We hope you enjoyed this year’s broadcast.
Our accountants sure did!
Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

War Is Bad

2005-11-17T23:30:00.000-08:00

Here’s the latest news flash:
People sometimes get injured and, gasp, even killed during war.
I know, a startling revelation that has some do-gooders absolutely apoplectic.
The word comes from a report on last year’s battle in Falluja, that nice Iraqi resort where things were oh-so-rosy before those nasty Americans with their white phosphorus weapons showed up.
The report accuses Americans of having the temerity to actually kill people who were shooting at them with rocket-propelled grenades.
According to the report, which was prepared by someone in the U.S. Army, soldiers used white phosphorus incendiary devices during last year’s battle to close the terrorist convention center that the city had become.
But a number of international groups are claiming foul, insisting that it was somehow improper for Americans to use the devices to clear out spidey-holes and tunnels.
Apparently, the politically-correct method of clearing such places is to march a parade of soldiers into the cave until those hiding inside run out of bullets, or the cave entrance becomes so clogged with dead American bodies that the insurgents become trapped in the cave.
In a touch of irony, those yapping the loudest claim that it violates international law to use such weapons in civilian areas, although there doesn’t seem to be any rule against combatants dressing like civilians, hiding in civilian homes, using civilian vehicles to blow up targets, and using civilian neighborhoods as their base of operations.
So again, the Americans are wrong, and the kindly folks who blow up buses and restaurants filled with women and children are the good guys.
Even though, as one American general pointed out (he’s an American, so how can he be trusted?), white phosphorus weapons have been used in battle by legitimate armies for nearly 100 years.
Part of the outrage comes as the devices are being erroneously touted as “chemical weapons” because phosphorus is a chemical.
If we’re going to use that benchmark for hanging the dreaded “chemical weapons” tag on a munition, then I guess all items of war must be classified as such.
Bullets are propelled by gunpowder, which is a chemical.
Rocket-propelled grenades are powered by chemicals, and use chemicals in the explosion process.
For that matter, it means that the chemical H2O and sodium chloride must be also be banned (water and table salt).
Nobody disputes that getting burned by white phosphorus is not a pleasant experience.
But exactly what part of war can be deemed palatable?
American body parts strewn all over the boulevard after a car packed with cheap explosives goes off in a downtown area?
Bullet holes in boys from Birmingham?
Civilians getting dragged from their vehicles, beaten, shot, burned, and hung from a bridge?
(If I remember correctly, the bodies hanging from the bridge is what spurred the American assault on Falluja).
Personally, I wasn’t in favor of invading Iraq.
But while we’re there, I don’t recommend conducting a “war by the numbers,” particularly using the playbook from countries which regularly wind up on the losing side of such conflicts.
War sucks, from top to bottom.
And as soon as the bastards with the RPGs and roadside bombs stop waging it, we should give it up, too.

Pregnant Men

2005-11-15T08:00:00.000-08:00

Scientists in California have discovered some fish off the coast of SoCal.
Not a big deal unless you’re a fisherman with a seaworthy boat.
But these fish are unique.
They are male fish that can produce eggs.
They have labeled the creatures as “intersex” fish.
Of course, like most eco-whackos, they couldn’t resist blaming it on pollution or treated sewage water.
I’m certain that, before the week is out, they’ll find a way to blame it on global warming.
But the guys in white coats are missing the point.
Males that can produce eggs.
If Darwin was right, and you extrapolate the theory that all life began in the sea, that means we will eventually have land mammals capable of carrying a fetus.
That’s right, pregnant men.
(Okay, we’ll wait while you women finish applauding, whooping, and cheering.)
This has been a dream of women for years who have tired of hearing husbands invoke the politically correct and mentally deficient remark “we’re pregnant!” at parties when telling friends of an impending birth of a future middle linebacker.
While “we’re” pregnant, only the woman is saddled with an extra 40 pounds, daily nausea, cravings for food groups that were never meant to be combined, and of course the “joy” of childbirth that basically involves passing a watermelon through a garden hose.
Don’t get me wrong, men go through three out of four of those things, but it’s usually referred to as “being single.”
Pregnant men would be Mother Nature’s little payback for centuries of female suffering.
Imagine bloated and lactating CEOs in maternity business suits trying to conduct a board meeting.
Or the guy in the hardhat pouring cement and trying to hold down this morning’s oatmeal.
Then there are the social considerations.
If men were able to conceive, which is a feminine trait, would they face discrimination?
Would a whole new line of bigotry arise, with derisive slurs like “Look at that preg over there!”?
Would pregnant men get paid less than non-pregnant men?
And of course the most important question, would football uniforms have to be redesigned?
Obviously, it will take a few eons for these questions to become valid.
But just the notion of millions of men insisting on “safe sex” to avoid a pregnancy that would interfere with his bowling commitments is worth a few laughs.
Like a female comedian once said, if men got pregnant, not only would the “morning after” pill be legal, it would be free!

Gender Equity Still MIA

2005-11-13T06:30:00.000-08:00

Back in the seventies (back when you could advertise cigarettes on television, a time fondly referred to as “the good old days” by tobacco companies), there was a brand of smokes aimed at female smokers.
The jingle’s tagline was “You’ve got your own cigarette now, baby, you’ve come a long, long way.”
First, for our younger readers, a jingle was a catchy song that extolled the virtues of a particular product, like “I’d Like to Buy the World a Coke.”
Advertisers don’t use jingles anymore, instead opting for old Led Zeppelin tunes behind ads for Cadillacs.
Obviously, we weren’t particularly hip or sophisticated back in those dark ages, since most of us didn’t get the irony of a line that heralded the arrival of the fairer sex as a legitimate part of the political landscape, while still referring to women as “baby.”
Anyway, the point is that, in spite of this cancer-causing proclamation, women really haven’t come that far in the world of sports.
This is evidenced by the continuing examples of bad behavior by athletes of both sexes, but the vast disparity in the way they are treated.
For men, you can be involved in the murder of two human beings and still find a place in the Baltimore Ravens defense.
For that matter, coke dealers are welcome on the other side of the ball in Baltimore.
And don’t get me started on the Terrell Owens saga.
Baseball players can take illegal steroids like kids eat Fruity Pebbles and still be voted the league batting champion.
In fact, you can tell Congress that you’ve NEVER used steroids, then just grin and wink when you get a quickie ten-day suspension for having steroids in your system.
You can beat your wife, get caught driving drunk, assault fans, slap around camera guys, and smoke every flavor and variety of marijuana known to man and still get nothing more than a temporary forced vacation.
But let a cheerleader have just one alleged sexual encounter with another cheerleader in a bathroom stall, and they’re off the team for good.
This doesn’t sound fair.
Don’t get me wrong, I think that the cheerleaders in question should lose their job for embarrassing the team (even though they were off-duty at the time).
But I think the same standard should apply for every other member of the team.
If you get popped for a drunken orgy on a Minnesota lake, you should be on the unemployment line before that boat reaches the dock.
If you choke a basketball coach, the only court you should ever see again is the kind featuring a guy in robes.
To be fair, the Carolina Panthers organization is a little better than many of their NFL brethren, since their most famous transgressor no longer plays for the team.
However, Rae Carruth’s absence from the Panther lineup has more to do with the North Carolina penal system than the team’s standards.
The true test will come when Carruth comes up for parole.
If the team is waiting outside the prison walls with a contract laden with incentives for the number of non-pregnant guys with helmets he can take out the next time the Panthers play the Giants, you’ll know that the double standard lives even in a place named Charlotte.

Singing Mice

2005-11-11T07:45:00.000-08:00

I recently read an article where researchers claim certain breeds of male mice can sing.
This immediately led my fractured brain to two questions.
First, which government agency paid for such a study?
And second, what kind of music do they sing?
I suspect it will take more of the first to answer the second.
If I had to lay five dollars at the parlay window, I’d bet they sing heavy metal.
Initially, I considered the idea that rap music would be their favored genre, but equating rap with vermin is just musical prejudice on my part.
Besides, the researchers actually used the word “sing,” which means it couldn’t have been rap.
Country music would be appropriate, but then I realized that the researchers indicated it was the male mouse that did the singing, and everyone knows that country music has become the province of female singers like Shania and Faith and that little girl who plays Dorothy in her Wizard of Oz video.
The idea that the little cheese-snatchers were into show tunes crossed my mind, but researchers put the kibosh on that notion.
The guys in the white coats claim the mice sing to woo female mice.
If testing showed that the male mice were singing to woo other male mice, it would be show tunes.
(To my gay friends, take your politically-correct outrage bonnet off your head and sit back down. This topic was addressed on “Will and Grace,” which is my arbiter of all things that are permissible to be stereotyped as gay. After all, “Just Jack!” wasn’t a blues review.)
An argument could be made that they sing pop music, but researchers didn’t mention anything about the mice lip-syncing, and not one of them danced a jig off the stage after being caught with “backing tracks.”
Some of the darker, more alienated mice might turn to singing alternative and grunge music, a fact which will be confirmed as soon as tests come back indicating the presence of heroin, or when one of the mice manages to shoot itself in the head with a shotgun.
My apologies to any of you Kurt Cobain fans who take exception to this image.
I guess a case could be made for opera, but none of the mice they studied wore tuxedos or Viking armor.
No, I suspect the little varmints sing heavy metal.
The scientists mentioned that the sounds are rhythmic and vary in pitch, but aren’t intelligible.
That kind of defines heavy metal music.
(Ever listen to old Ozzy Osbourne records? I enjoy the Prince of Darkness’s music, but after 30 years, I still don’t have a clue what he’s saying. Of course, I’ve watched nearly two dozen episodes of the TV show “The Osbournes,” and I still have the same problem.)
And for all their noisy bluster, heavy metal artists always manage to land the gorgeous babes.
I mean, Tommy Lee is one ugly head banger, and he took Pamela Anderson on a honeymoon boat ride.
It has to be the music.
My theory will be confirmed once the scientists discover tiny little mouse tattoos on their subjects that say things like “Born to tease cats” and “Mouse Traps Suck!”

Two-Part Disappointment

2005-11-07T07:00:00.000-08:00

I have an important message I want to impart.
I believe it to be timely, topical, cogent, and worthwhile.
It will probably be funny, highly entertaining, socially meaningful and politically incorrect.
And I’m going to share this message with you.
Next week.
Frustrated?
This is the way I always feel after investing my valuable couch-potato time on some piece of network television tripe, only to discover just before the plane crashes or the killer is unmasked that the show is the front end of a two-parter.
I hate these “To Be Continued” offerings.
I’m particularly outraged when the networks hide the fact that the show will be a two-parter the way an Amway fanatic hides the fact that the “get together” he or she wants you to attend will actually be a recruiting pitch.
(To my Amway friends out there, I’m sorry to insult you by comparing you to a lowly network television executive. You have my apologies, and I need two gallons of that special biodegradable toenail soap on page 482 of your monthly catalog.)
On Sunday, I got sucker-punched on two different networks.
I was actually torn between two shows that were scheduled for 9 p.m.
The first was “The Crusades” on The History Channel.
I had been looking forward to that show for nearly a week, hoping that by watching, I might finally understand why the Muslims hate me and my country so badly.
It turns out that 20 minutes into the show, (which, to be honest, was even more dull and boring than my ninth grade history class, where I should have paid attention when my teacher was going over this topic nearly 30 years ago), the History Channel made the mistake of running a promo for part two.
I immediately switched over to the other 9 p.m. offering that had caught my interest, a CBS catastrophe-of-the-week made-for-television movie called “Category 7: The End of the World.”
I waited through two hours of REALLY bad acting, terrible casting (Randy Quaid and Shannon Doherty hooking up? I haven’t seen chemistry that bad since I dropped my Mr. Professor Chemistry Set on a concrete floor when I was 12), insipid story lines where people were more broken up about old flames and jealousy over past relationships than they were about the tornadoes that had killed thousands and threatened to wipe out D.C., and INCREDIBLY bad writing.
At the end, with the hurricane heading for our nation’s capital, where terrorists had just kidnapped the first born children of wealthy socialites fleeing the hurricane’s path while the torch from the Statue of Liberty was about to crush Randy Quaid while hugging Shannon Doherty (see what I mean about the writing?), the piece of crap ends with “To Be Continued.”
I feel so betrayed.
It’s particularly frustrating when you realize that the director could have eliminated the inane threads about old relationships, worn out pilots flying worn out airplanes, gorgeous eye-candy Gina Gershon as the head of FEMA and her bizarre relationship with her teenage “son” who looks old enough to be her uncle (right…all of those federal bureaucrats are gorgeous, like Janet Reno), and a televangelist played badly by James Brolin, and reduced the two-parter to a digestible two-hour flick.
In fact, he could have taken out most of the cheesy special effects about tornadoes hitting the great pyramids, and the devastation in the city of Buffalo (that’s right, the storms hit all of Earth’s important population centers…Cairo, Hong Kong, Detroit, Chicago, New York, Miami…and Buffalo) and whittled it down to about a half hour, which would still be too much for such a lousy movie, but at least the audience wouldn’t want to commit hari-kari because they had wasted two hours of their lives on this drivel.
I hate two-part movies.
All of them.
I’m not fond of sequels either.
But to foist this bad TV fare on a nation for two consecutive weekends is a sure sign of the Apocalypse.
And I hope there’s a special chamber of Hell for the TV executives who have lured innocent people into their lair without warning of an impending two-parter.
I have a lot more acid and hate for CBS and their ilk, but I’ll save it for the second half of this diatribe, to be continued next week.

Hell In A Handbasket

2005-11-03T06:30:00.000-08:00

Originally published in The Spectrum in November, 2002

A news flash for you: The World Is Going To Hell In A Handbasket.
I remember my first encounter with that statement.
At 8 years old, I overheard my paternal grandfather punctuating a long-winded diatribe with “the world is going to Hell in a handbasket”.
I don’t remember the topic which inspired the statement, but I do recall the imagery.
In 1969, I had grown up with supermarkets, which involved wheeled shopping carts.
I didn’t understand what a “handbasket” was, but since it was apparently the vehicle in which we were traveling to Hell, I figured it couldn’t be a good thing.
My grandfather got out of the “Hell In A Handbasket” industry when they planted him in 1972.
He won 2nd place in game that was popular back then, called “I’ll Bet I Can Smoke 3 Packs Of Cigarettes A Day Without Dying of Cancer”.
(Unfortunately, the only people I ever met who won that game were those who got hit by buses.)
My dad inherited the “Hell In A Handbasket” franchise, and business was booming.
According to him, the Democrats and the Commies (which is redundant, because he believed the terms to be synonymous) were responsible for Nixon’s implosion.
We had lost the war in Vietnam.
And Hippies were ruining everything.
Being children of the 1960’s and 70’s, most of my friends disagreed with my dad’s philosophy.
They thought he was just too old fashioned, and that the world was really a wonderful place full of new ideas and opportunities.
We alI tried to maintain that optimism through the 1980’s, when “greed was good”.Now I’m in my 40’s.
Most of the things I read in the news confirm that my grandfather and father were right.
I’ve adopted their philosophy, although I’ve updated the vernacular.
“Hell In A Handbasket” has been replaced with “That Sucks!”, but the sentiment remains unchanged.Kids today have taken my former place in the heirarchy, convinced that I’m just old fashioned and out of touch.
They see nothing wrong with the fact that “Ozzie and Harriet” have been supplanted with Ozzie and the Osbournes.
(It’s ironic. Back then, I insisted to a parent that Ozzie qualified as “music”. Today, kids insist Ozzie qualifies as a parent.)
Schools without armed policemen have become as foreign to them as the old one room schoolhouses were to me.
And Constitutional Rights are as relevant today as the Magna Carta was in the days of disco.
Every generation has “H.I.A.H.B.” as a rite of passage.
It is usually bestowed with the confluence of the first gray hair and puberty-bound offspring.
Of course, in my humble opinion, I believe the handbasket now has shuttle rockets attached.
Everything in society is moving at warp speed, including our impending demise as a species. I am not crotchety, nor a fuddy-duddy.
In today’s words, I am simply “politically incorrect”.
Typical.
Even my status as a *@&!%$# has become a kinder and gentler insult.

Early Christmas Beef

2005-11-01T06:00:00.000-08:00

It seems that every entity with a cash register and a tax ID number is currently offering their Christmas wares.
For those of you who are calendar challenged, let me give you a hint: It’s barely November.
Every year, it seems that stores trot out their Christmas merchandise earlier and earlier.
Next year, I’m expecting to see dancing Santa Claus figures next to the fireworks display at Wal Mart.
I understand that stores want to hurry their biggest selling season, but I’m tired of wading through shelf after shelf of Christmas wrapping paper and fuzzy red stockings while looking for the suntan lotion.
By the time of Santa’s annual arrival, I am nearly sick of the entire holiday.
Christmas carols over shopping mall sound systems have become equivalent to nails raked across a holly-tree-green chalk board.
The guy with the fake beard and jolly belly has become like a member of the family, since I’ve seen him more often than my Uncle Harvey.
For Christmas, I may buy my kids an electric stomach pump to save them from that overdose of red and white striped candy that they’ve been munching for the last 75 days.
And I’m going to apply for a hunting license so that I can legally shoot Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer every time that annoying Rankin Bass special comes on my TV.
(I don’t know what the bag limit is for Rudolph, but I figure I can easily use up a carton of 25 shotgun shells in one Christmas season.)
Since there are no signs that the retailing industry can rein themselves in, and our legislators are once again asleep at the switch and completely useless, I guess we’ll have to rely on that favored American pastime to get some control over this insanity.
Somebody is going to have to sue somebody.
I suspect the turkey people may be first in line at their favorite neighborhood bar (and I don’t mean the place where you can get rum-laced eggnog).
It’s reaching the point where people don’t have any money for their Thanksgiving Day bill of fare, since they already blew it on Playstation 16 and Ashlee Simpson’s latest sing-along production.
Or maybe the ACLU can file discrimination papers, since the Christian holiday of Christmas is obviously infringing on the rights of ghosts, goblins, and Freddy Kruger wannabes.
Personally, my money is on the Sierra Club lunatics.
Once they find out how many artificial trees have been cut down from the artificial rain forest, leading to artificial erosion and loss of artificial habitat for stuffed rabbits and teddy bears, it’s likely that an injunction will hit the Christmas industry so fast that it will make their ornaments spin.
Really, I’m not a Scrooge, and “Bah Humbug” is not part of my daily vernacular.
However, I’m getting tired of being forced to pass out frankincense and myrhh to trick or treaters because the Halloween candy, which was put on shelves in August, was pulled out of the store in mid October to make room for that adorable little zucchini nativity scene.
A movement has started aimed at putting “Christ” back into “Christmas.”
I’d be happy if they could just get Christmas back into December where it belongs.

Price Gouging

2005-10-30T01:30:00.000-08:00

Every time the wind blows hard, some politician stands up and makes menacing remarks about the legal woes that will befall anyone who dares to gouge victims for things like ice, water, plywood, generators, and bourbon.
(For any of you who have actually gone through a category three hurricane, you know that liquor is an important survival commodity).
I’ve never actually heard of someone doing time for charging $6 a gallon for drinking water after a catastrophe, so I guess our “justice expectation meter” shouldn’t be too surprised that gouging on a mammoth scale will never be a crime.
I’m referring to the recent admission by Exxon/Mobil that they set a new record for third-quarter profits, earning $9.9 billion from July through September.
Remember September?
When leaves were falling?
Along with trees, buildings, and Volvos?
If I remember correctly (and I should, since I haven’t endured any hurricanes since moving to Nevada, so my bourbon supply is nearly untouched), the oil companies claimed that they were nearly wiped out by Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Rita, which damaged oil refineries, oil platforms, and just about everything except stock options.
And yet, with less product available (according to them), they managed to set a new record.
Does anything sound odd to you?
Of course, the oil companies insist that they didn’t gouge.
I’m sure they set a new cha-ching record thanks to a sudden rash of drive-thru oil changes.
Or that there was a nationwide rush on silencing rusty door hinges.
It couldn’t possibly be that they were charging $3.30 a gallon for gasoline that they bought, shipped, refined, and stored at 90 cents a gallon, then took advantage of a panicked country that bought the petroleum line of impending gas rationing and potential legions of gas pumps wearing “out of gas” signs.
Fortunately, our sitting president is a former Texas oil man, so he knew exactly what to do.
He did what he does best.
Nothing.
(Before my Republican friends start calling for my head and other critical body parts, let me remind you of Mr. Bush’s “actions” and how they turned out. To be honest, I prefer his inactivity.)
So now, mysteriously, the price of gas has gone down.
Some.
Trust me, we’ll never see gasoline under $2.50 a gallon again in my lifetime, but we’re to the point where we’re referring to $2.75 as “reasonable.”
But I suspect that will only last until the next natural disaster.
And it doesn’t have to involve hurricanes.
I’m sure that Exxon and Texaco and the rest of the oil bandits already have their marketing departments working on ways to capitalize on other temper tantrums by Mother Nature.
For example, don’t be surprised if the next California earthquake is accompanied by oil companies lamenting the rupture of some mythical pipeline that will disrupt petroleum distribution for months.
A series of twisters through America’s heartland will be responsible for ripping up oil derricks all through the Midwest, devastating our oil supply.
And the first serious Alaskan snowfall will be the causative factor in shortages all over the country, as critical pipelines will freeze and oil tankers will be harbor-bound by ice floes.
They’ve found a new way to suck deeper into our wallets.
And if the oil companies are noted for anything, they’re known for how much they suck.

Spammers Win This Round

2005-10-28T13:00:00.000-07:00

Okay, Gang, I'm sorry to succumb to the evil bastards who have no soul but plenty of bandwidth, but the spamming has become intolerable.

Therefore, I've been forced to invoke the "word verification" feature on this blog, which will require that you type in a word to post a comment.

I apologize for the inconvenience, but I figure it's the lesser of two evils: impose word verification, or continue to serve as the repository for every scumbag spam on the planet.

Hopefully, this will be a temporary situation, until the spammers get tired of hitting the roadblock, or some genius figures a way to filter out the crap.

Again, I'm sorry to add this pain-in-the-behind extra step, but those of you simlarly afflicted will certainly understand.

Thanks for your patience and loyalty.

Stocks Don't Cheat People...

2005-10-23T16:30:00.000-07:00

It’s time for us to ban all investments.

We need to shutter the New York Stock Exchange, layoff everyone from the American Stock Exchange, and retrain stock brokers and analysts for exciting new careers in the food service industry.

I say that because there is simply too much cheating in our financial industry.

Such rule-bending has received celebrity endorsement over the last few years from such high-profile offenders as Martha Stewart.

In Martha’s case, I still don’t understand how it’s a crime to sell your stock in a company when your friend, who happens to run the company, tells you things aren’t going well.

For example, if my friend at the Wal Mart knew that the price of a cordless drill was going to be reduced by 75 cents next week, and he kept his mouth shut when I told him of my plans to buy a drill this afternoon, well, he wouldn’t be getting any more Christmas cards from me.

But maybe I just don’t get the whole idea of stock market investing.

After all, I still own 200 shares of Enron that I purchased a couple of years ago using my “bounce” theory of economics.

My theory was that a company as huge and integral as Enron would eventually rebound.

So I bought a couple hundred shares at $9 each.

(This was long before I became a newspaper writer, back when I used to actually have money.)

Last week, Enron was trading at 20 cents a share.

It bounced like fresh Play-Doh.

Enough said about my investing prowess.

Now, it seems that United States Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist is on the griddle over a Martha-esque escapade.

According to reports, Dr. Frist (yes, he’s a surgeon, which means he honed his budget-cutting techniques on appendix patients years ago) sold stock in his family’s hospital company, HCA Inc., just before the stocks tanked.

Martha got a heads-up from a friend, and she went to jail.

Dr. Frist probably got the inside scoop over apple pie at mom’s house one Sunday.

So you have two pretty smart people, well known in the U.S., who have allegedly been caught with their hands on the “sell” button.

(Although, in another indictment of the American society, some of you are scratching your heads saying “Bill who?” regarding the fourth most powerful man in the world’s most powerful country, while everyone knows the name and story of a lady whose most notable accomplishment is a perfect pineapple upside down cake.)

I’ve decided that maybe the gun control nuts are right.

They have insisted for decades that handgun murders shouldn’t be blamed on the person actually pulling the trigger.

It’s the gun manufacturers and sporting goods stores that should be hanged.

Using their logic (an oxymoron if ever there was one), Frist and Martha shouldn’t be the scapegoats.

It’s those nasty old stock manufacturers and traders.

Let’s go after them.

Oh sure, you’ll have lobbyists and stock lovers like the soon-to-be-formed National Stocks Association claiming “stocks don’t cheat people, people cheat people,” but such rhetoric doesn’t seem to be doing the NRA any good, either.

I say that if we eliminate stocks and the stock market, there won’t be anymore stock cheating.

(I just re-read that sentence, and it actually sounded logical, which scares me.)

Until the federal legislature tires of pointing fingers at each other over who is to blame for a category four hurricane and enacts valuable legislation outlawing the trading of stocks, we’ll have to look out for each other.

I don’t care what the Stock Exchange Commission says.

Friends don’t let friends buy United Air Lines.

But if you insist on playing the stock market, then I have 900 leftover Bethlehem Steel shares I’d like to offer you.

And don’t listen to those financial idiots who might tell you that Bethlehem Steel went out of business two years ago.

I still think it’s going to bounce.

Blog Spam

2005-10-22T09:45:00.000-07:00

I guess the blog spammers have found me.
I know I should be honored, that it's a sign of "making it" in the blogosphere.
I should be jumping up and down like Navin Johnson in the movie "The Jerk" yelling "The new phone books are here! The new phone books are here!"
But it's really just a pain in the behind.
I'm constantly amazed at the lengths marketers will go to in order to hawk their sites and products.
It's bad enough that my e-mail "In Box" stays crammed with junk mail, offering me over 400 sources for that ever-important Viagra or Cialis.
Eventually I'll be old enough to need such medications, but I'm sure I'll have a brain hemorrage before I'm able to reach a decision about which of the 400 sources to use.
And to all of you poor rich folks in Nigeria who want me to help you smuggle your $14 million out of the country, I'm the wrong guy to ask.
In fact, I think they should start a club over there for all those unfortunate families.
If they were to pool all of their $14 million dollar inheritances, they'd have enough to buy themselves a decent country.
I think Guam is for sale.
In fact, after hurricane Wilma, I'm sure they could get a discount on the nation of Mexico.
After the e-mail blitz, I get to wade through the electronic War of 1812.
That's the conflict which spawned our "Star Spangled Banner."
These days, every time I fire up my browser, I'm bombarded with "Pop ups bursting on screen."
I use a Popup Stopper, but I have to leave the darn thing off in order to see certain sites that feature legitimate pop-ups (like my Fantasy Football site).
And of course, every site I visit has some form of advertising.
I'm guilty of this myself, since my site is now graced with its first advertiser.
Of course, that advertiser is me, with an ad for my new part-time computer business, so I'm not sure that counts.
And now the sales vermin have infiltrated the blogosphere, pretending to offer patronizing accolades about your blog before offering people a place to find the latest info on a 2006 Buick Lucerne, or intriguing merchandise pertaining to ceramic cactuses. (Or is it ceramic cacti?)
I'm glad they're finding my site.
It means that I exist on some search engine somewhere.
But even if I'm lost in the Sahara desert, I don't relish the vision of being found by the Cialis guy.

*Morris Workman

Shower Warning Device

2005-10-18T09:00:00.000-07:00

Once again, I’m lost in a luxurious shower of steaming hot water and silky suds letting my muse whisper in my ear while preparing for another day of journalistic battle.
Suddenly, a stinging barrage of cold water hits my skin like the attack of the ice mites.
Yes, someone in the other bathroom (presumably my teenage daughter with the shower addiction) has started their own shower, robbing me of the precious contents of the water heater.
Without warning.
It made me realize that someone needs to invent a Shower Warning Device.
I’m envisioning a large flashing red sign similar to the “On The Air” light found at TV and radio studios.
You would hit a button before entering the shower, which would light the sign in the other bathroom as a warning to anyone contemplating a shower or flush.
The deluxe model would be automatic, with the sign lighting up whenever someone turns on the shower faucet.
The super-deluxe model would automatically turn off the water to any liquid-control device in the house (other shower, sinks, toilet, washing machines, dishwashers, and refrigerator ice makers) until the main shower was completed.
Following this episode, I was pining for the good old days, acknowledging that the development of the multi-bathroom abode wasn’t such a great advancement after all.
As a kid, our house had one bathroom.
I know the concept is as antiquated as the telephone party line, but it was far more practical.
Like a “poop party line,” only one person could use the bathroom at a time.
It also made it pretty easy for everyone else in the house to realize that a shower was taking place.
If the bathroom door had a decent lock, it also cut off access to the most dangerous burn-inflicting device in the house.
No, not the stove.
With a stove, you knew it was hot.
If you got burned, it was usually your own stupidity or a plastic-army-man experiment gone awry.
The burn inflicting device to which I am referring is a flushed toilet.
(Which could take your showering experience from comfortable to scalding in 2.3 seconds.)
The lock was sufficient notice to the other occupants of the residence that the water facilities were in use, ensuring a safe and enjoyable showering experience.
Unless of course you had a mischievous sibling with malicious flushing on their mind.
Today, with multiple bathrooms, every shower is like a reconnaissance mission in the jungle.
You never know when a surprise scalding or fast freezing is imminent.
It comes without warning, and usually without remorse.
So to any inventors out there who might be tuning in, here is an idea for you to make your first million dollars.
Once you design it and market it, just send me 25 bucks and we’ll call it square.
And if that works, send me an e-mail and I’ll provide you with a few of my $100 ideas, brilliant flashes of inspiration that usually involve advanced plastics and frickin’ lasers.

Baseball Playoffs Around Here Somewhere

2005-10-15T08:15:00.000-07:00

I am proud to announce that I finally caught some Major League Baseball.

Not a whole game, mind you.

In fact, not much more than an inning.

And I ended up tuning in not because I was interested in watching a collection of steroid abusers and bawl babies attempting to earn their multi-million-dollar paychecks.

I actually checked it out to see what a record-setting 18-inning playoff game looked like.

I’m glad I did, because there was actually some drama and heroism to be found.

It was the final National League Divisional Series game between the Houston Astros and the Atlanta Braves.

Back when I used to enjoy Major League Baseball, before cheaters like Bonds and Giambi and Palmeiro ruined it, the Braves were one of the teams I liked to follow.

But I also liked to watch Roger Clemens in his prime (which, judging from Sunday’s performance, was about 10 minutes ago).

So the 6-6 battle into the 17th inning was rather intriguing.

Clemens came on in relief for only the second time in his career, pitching three brilliant scoreless innings after the Astros emptied their bullpen.

But in the bottom of the 18th inning, the equivalent of two full games, Chris Burke came to the plate.

Burke, a 25-year-old player for the Astros who had just five home runs during the season, appeared to pose no threat to the logjam.

But a stroke later, the ball was beyond the left-field wall and the Astros were on their way to the National League Championship.

That was pretty heroic.

But the true heroism came after the game.

With Burke and Clemens leaping around the field in celebration, a TV sports reporter began chasing Clemens for an interview.

It was obvious she wanted face time with the big-name star instead of the unknown player who had just hit the game-winning homer.

When she finally caught up with Clemens, Burke started to walk away.

However, the seasoned veteran reached out and pulled Burke back into the camera frame.

A few seconds after the reporter’s first question, Clemens pulled Burke into the interview and turned it over to him, ensuring that the kid would get his deserved 15 seconds of fame.

It was a classy gesture from a guy who has been there so many times before, a guy who took a pay cut to be with a team he believed in and wanted to help.

And while Clemens has the reputation of being a bully and a bad sport, those charges always seem to emanate from his adversaries and not his teammates.

Tomorrow, baseball news will again be filled with cheaters and cheating suspects, superstars who are all about the gain instead of the game, and criminals posing as baseball players.

But for this one beautiful moment, it was about the honor and beauty of America’s misplaced pastime.

New Home

2005-10-12T10:45:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the new home for the Workman Chronicles.
Okay, it’s the same old home.
But it’s now the sole repository for these rambling diatribes, since the Workman Chronicles is no longer being published in the Desert Valley Times.
I would like to explain the falling out between myself and my employer, but that would be bad form.
It also might get me fired.
Suffice it to say that my editor and I had a difference of opinion.
I wrote an article uncovering a heinous activity by H-
Whoops, almost spilled the beans.
Anyway, my boss pulled the plug on the article.
So I pulled the plug on the Workman Chronicles.
I like to think of it as a noble gesture, since I felt that to continue putting my best efforts into a publication that lacked-
Darn, almost did it again.
Of course, I guess the other perspective is that I’m being a big baby, and that I gathered up my marbles and went crying home to mommy.
Since I know what really happened, I’m okay wearing that tag.
Besides, my mommy said it wasn’t true.
This entire situation makes me sad.
The Workman Chronicles was my favorite part of the job.
It also evoked the greatest number of responses from the community, both good and bad.
But the reason it got such attention is because it unabashedly faced the truth and told it in a, hopefully, humorous way, even if it cost me popularity points in the community.
(I still have red marks from where the Yearbook kids and their moms whaled on me.)
Unfortunately, that zeal for the telling the truth isn’t shared by-
See, I have to watch that.
Not only is the St. George-owned newspaper my employer, but my boss has access to “paper by the ton and ink by the barrel,” which means he could respond with his own scathing perspective that would reach 7,800 people (according to our latest circulation numbers) while only the 20 or 30 of you who visit this site would get the tr- um, my perspective.
So, until I come up with a new job, or a new distributor for the Workman Chronicles, this will be the only place to find it.
In the meantime, I’ll continue to attend most of the VVHS games and local sporting events, writing about our teams, and giving you the latest scores.
In other words, I’m going to do what one local H** president suggested in a Letter to the Editor, which is stick to writing about sports.
I figure since my editor seems to agree with this guy on most other important issues, he probably feels the same way on this one as well.
So at least somebody will be happy.
(By the way, to Mr. B and the rest of the evil overlords engaged in turning this beautiful city into the unfriendliest place on Earth, congratulations. You win.)
As for me, life will go on.
I’ll eventually find a newspaper or magazine interested in what I have to offer, although it will probably require me to leave the town I have come to love.
If not, I can always go back to earning an above-average living in the insurance or computer industries.
Yes, giving up the poverty and 55-hour work weeks would be a hard call, but it may be a sacrifice I’m forced to make.
Until then, enjoy the Workman Chronicles here on Mesquedia, where $3.95 a month to my internet webspace provider can still buy freedom and truth.

Bigotry For Fun And Property Value

2005-10-07T09:00:00.000-07:00

NOTE-This article was rejected by the Editor of the Desert Valley Times

I’ve been thinking about joining the board of an HOA recently.
It’s not that I have some overwhelming desire to bully innocent lawn ornaments or join the garden-hose patrol, but I can see the advantage to being one of those carrying the whip.
It’s also one of the last places in America where bigotry can be practiced without some group with lots of A’s, U’s, and other vowels in their name threatening to hold their breath and throw lawsuits like so many rocks.
Before you get the wrong idea, the bigotry has nothing to do with skin color.
It’s not about anyone’s cultural heritage.
It’s not even a prejudice against a particular religion.
If you listen to the charlatans beating the association board drum, it is a bias against one of the lowest life forms in the human genome, a group of beings so lowly and despicable that they shouldn’t even be allowed to breathe, much less inhabit a building within the gun-turreted walls of a particular PUD.
According to the “prophets,” these two-legged vermin are responsible for declining property values, dead grass, toy proliferation, noise complaints, diphtheria, and global warming.
Unfortunately, the movement is gaining traction as innocent homeowners are taking the bait, convinced that their lives and neighborhoods would be better off without “their kind.”
That’s right, I’m talking about…renters.
To their credit, none of these anti-renter zealots are suggesting that renters be crucified, hung, or put in stocks, but I think it has more to do with the fact that such structures would violate architectural review committee rules.
The bigotry is manifesting itself in “rental restrictions” popping up in the CCR’s of homeowner associations all over the city.
Rental restrictions dictate that homeowners cannot rent out their homes to other people unless they are already doing so.
It also says that new buyers, particularly investors, cannot rent out their home.
In my not-so-humble opinion, I think it’s one of the most un-American rules I’ve heard of since Jim Crow died.
Although you think you own and control your home and property, a board can make a rule that tells you what you can and can’t do with it, and restricts who you can sell it to.
According to the myth which has been proffered in the propaganda pushing for the eradication of renters in our lifetime, the elimination of non-owners will increase your property value.
Apparently, renters are the bane of the residential world, leeches and parasites that drain a community of its escalating resale values and destroy its quality of life.
Of course, the “increasing property value” is the same excuse they use for punishing wayward residents who fail to get their garbage cans in on time, or who don’t get permission before planting rose bushes.
I suspect we’ll eventually see “increasing property value” as the reason why residents aren’t permitted outside their homes between 7 p.m. and dawn, why families will be limited to no more than 2.3 children, and why Subarus and cars built before 2003 will be banned from driving on local HOA streets.
According to several realtors, the rental restrictions are having the opposite effect, chilling property values because up to 40% (depending on which realtor you talk to) of the new home buyers are investors, or folks who intend to rent the property for two or three years until they are ready to retire.
I’m not the smartest person (I’m a renter, so how smart could I be?), but according to the most basic economic principle of supply and demand, if you have six potential buyers instead of 10, meaning less demand, your price must go down.
But I’m more disturbed by the discrimination against the mortgage-challenged.
Before long, I expect to see signs cropping up in stores saying “Non-Renters Only” and little posters above drinking fountains with “Renters” and “Non-Renters” separating the bad people from the good people.
I’m even more disturbed because some of the people voting for this evil codicil were once renters themselves.
They’re the ones who say “I don’t have anything against renters, I just wouldn’t want my daughter to marry one.”
To the homeowners in associations which haven’t yet adopted these measures, I implore you to have a heart, be an American, use some common sense, protect your property values, and vote against these idiotic anti-renter rules.
And to the association board members promoting rental restrictions, I would beg that you stop hating the poor, downtrodden renters, and go back to hating people who paint their fences tan instead of taupe.

Reporter Decked During Game

2005-10-05T08:30:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
September 29, 2005

During Friday’s JV football game between Virgin Valley and Faith Lutheran, a member of the local media patrolling the sideline was upended in an unfortunate out-of-bounds incident.

The sports reporter, who shall remain nameless due to concerns about dignity, the potential for embarrassment to his family, and Federal HIPAA regulations, was wiped out during the fourth quarter of the game.

He was toppled when VVHS quarterback Doug Hafen was hammered out of bounds by a Faith Lutheran defender.

The two JV players hit the intrepid newspaper writer full force, knocking him flat on his prodigious behind.

A flag was thrown on the play.

Contrary to initial reports, the penalty was for a late out-of-bounds hit on Hafen, and not a “Roughing The Photographer” foul.

According to sources, it was the first time the former varsity offensive lineman had been pancaked since 1977, when he was flattened by an all-county linebacker in the annual Havre de Grace-Aberdeen High School football grudge match between the two northeast Maryland institutions.

Following the collision, a quick inspection of the adjacent running track was conducted.

Since there were no cracks or dents in the track surface, it was ascertained that the reporter’s head never came in contact with the asphalt.

While there were no injuries reported, or at least none that the writer would admit to, one page of the Reporter’s Notebook sustained a fatal tear, and an emergency mud extraction was required for a camera lens.

Adding insult to injury, the downed photographer didn’t get the shot on film.

Immediately following the collision, the writer jumped up laughing.

Trainers were initially concerned about a possible head injury, but were unable to determine how much brain damage existed prior to the incident.

The writer remained on the sideline throughout the rest of the JV contest, and continued to prowl the Virgin Valley side of the field through the varsity game, although he was occasionally heard muttering about a truck and stars.

In a statement released by the pummeled pundit, the collision will be remembered as one of the highlights of his Mesquite career.

“I’m embarrassed to have been knocked down by a couple of JV players. I mean, I know the ‘Dawgs hit hard, but, I’m a big guy. I’d have thought it would have taken at least a couple of varsity beefeaters to bring me down.

“However, I’m honored to have been hammered by Doug Hafen. A few years from now, I expect to be watching college football on TV, and I’ll be proud to brag to everyone else in the nursing home day room that I was once plowed by USC’s starting quarterback.”

In lieu of flowers, well-wishers and fans are encouraged to forward their donations to the “Let’s Install Air Bags In The Fat Guy’s Suspenders” fund.

The reporter is expected to return to the sidelines in time for the Oct. 7 VVHS home game against Boulder City.

According to sources, he will be the only member of the local media clad in shoulder pads and a DVT helmet.

Necktie Blues

2005-10-03T06:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
September 27, 2005

I miss neckties.

For our younger readers who have probably never seen one, a necktie was a piece of cloth men used to wrap around their throats and drape across the front of their long-sleeve button-down shirts.

In a future column, I’ll probably explain that long-sleeve button-down shirts used to come in lots of colors that weren’t plaid.

Believe it or not, neckties were an accoutrement of fashion, and used to change shape and width more often than Oprah.

They were usually worn by people attending functions that involved a church such as weddings, funerals, bar mitzvahs, and high-stakes Bingo.

Ties were also worn regularly by doctors, lawyers, teachers, and other professionals as a statement of social and intellectual superiority which said “I’m smarter than you because I know how to make a Windsor knot.”

It made life a little easier, because you could tell the difference between the guy who was going to remove your pancreas and the guy who was going to offer you fries with that burger.

Today, the caste system reinforced by the necktie has been eliminated by the emergence of the polo shirt.

Everyone wears polo shirts in this era, including accountants, police officers, surgeons, insurance agents, and sanitation engineers.

Unfortunately, the polo shirt has also doomed the hippie movement, because it’s tough to figure out exactly who is “The Man” when corporate executives are adorned in the same collared t-shirt as the guy carrying the “Make cookies, not war” protest sign.

(Again, for our younger readers, “The Man” was a sixties euphemism for the Establishment, or those in authority. “The Man” is not to be confused with “Da Man,” who is usually a superior golfer or athlete, as in “You da man!”)

I must admit that I miss wearing ties.

When I was in the business world a few years ago, I proudly wore multi-hued ties as part of my corporate battle armor.

Again, it was easier to discern a company’s pecking order based on the ties worn.

The lower-level flunkies usually wore red and blue diagonally striped ties.

As I ascended the corporate ladder, stripes gave way to more intriguing patterns.

When I reached upper-level management, my ties often involved cartoon characters like Bugs and Tweety.

(Only the boss could get away with such frivolity. Yes, they were wild and swinging times.)

Ties were also handy at lunch time.

Depending on your skill in making lunch selections based on the color and pattern of your tie, you could spill almost anything on it and still make that afternoon presentation with confidence.

Obviously, this is why I preferred the period when wide ties were in fashion.

The only down side to wearing ties came if you were a) color blind or b) your wife didn’t dress you every morning.

You could tell the guys in either category because their orange ties with large green polka dots would clash with their blue and purple striped shirts.

I also miss the 80’s, when “power ties” were in fashion.

Of course, it took me a few months to figure out that a “power tie” was one that featured a single bold color like canary yellow, and not an adornment that required several AAA batteries to power the flashing lights and the electronic “Jingle Bells” tune.

Eventually, like all fashion trends, ties will make a comeback.

I’m hoping that we’ll one day return to a world where NASA scientists wear ties and crew cuts while launching space vehicles that don’t shed parts like a 1978 Chevy Chevette, and business leaders wear three-piece suits to places other than their sentencing.

When they do, me and my Taz tie will be ready.

We're Back!

2005-10-01T21:30:00.000-07:00

After a vacation and extended absence, we're back online.

It all started with the simple idea of bringing my mom from Lincoln, Delaware to a new home in Mesquite, Nevada.

After the proverbial and actual "Six Days On The Road," we arrived with the Penske rental truck (I'm giving them a plug because the diesel International 26' truck was a dream to drive, reasonably priced, and gave us not the slightest bit of trouble, although it didn't seem to enjoy the long pulls up the mountains around Denver, Vail, and Frisco).

No, not San Francisco. Frisco is a little ski town near Vail, Colorado. It is a beautiful place, picturesque, nestled in the Rocky Mountains, clean, architecturally unique, and way too expensive for any real human being to live in.

Eventually, we arrived in Mesquite.

Then came the unloading.

Now, for the last two weeks, it's been the unpacking, rewiring, furniture arrangement, unpacking, furniture rearrangement, wonderful dinners with my mom, furniture disassembly, more unpacking, furniture assembly, cleaning, furniture re-rearrangement, more unpacking, and furniture re-re-rearrangement.

I've also managed to squeeze in 14 football games, 12 boxing bouts, two soccer matches, and a musical performance as part of my day job at the newspaper.

The good news is that we now have family here in the Wild West for the first time since moving here in 2001, with my 97-year-old grandmother slated to fly out next week.

The bad news is...heck, there IS no bad news.

In addition to the moving-in process, we've also been busy showing off our town, taking mom to the theatre (yes, we have some culture here in the Wild West), out to dinner, to football games, Bingo (see, I TOLD you we have culture), shopping, and even a boxing match (more of that culture I was telling you about).

Mom is 65, and I can tell you after all of that activity over the last two weeks...that I'm getting old. It is tough to keep up with that lady!

She's also been busy becoming official...Nevada drivers license, new phone, new cell phone, new car insurance, and of course the first official screwing by a government organization.

Nevadans are rather cocky about the fact that we don't pay state income tax.

But like any and every government entity, Nevada makes that money back in other ways.

One of the ways is the righteous rip-off for sales tax on vehicles.

Mom's 2005 Honda, which she bought in Delaware, cost her over $1,300 in Nevada sales tax before she could get her car tags.

Welcome to the Silver State.

Anyway, my wonderful mother is here now, and I'm the luckiest guy on the planet because she and my wonderful wife get along. (I'm fortunate to be surrounded by wonderful women...just ask me about my wonderful daughter some time, who is in the band, in chorus, in softball, and in just about everything else except trouble.)

My mom and my wife are becoming best pals, particularly when shopping together and plotting how to make me a better human being. All I can say is...the shopping thing is working out.

So, to those of you who have loyally and faithfully checked the 'blog over the last three weeks, I appreciate your patience.

When you get a chance, I also recommend that you visit our website at www.mesquedia.com, where we are offering a new $25 Bingo game, as well as some new features.

Again, thanks for your wait. I hope you feel it's been worth it!

A Job Well Done

2005-09-06T09:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
September 6, 2005

I believe that Benjamin Franklin once wrote “A job well done never need be done again.”
Even if he didn’t write it, he’s a dead public figure, so I’m going to blame him.
Franklin is without a doubt my favorite American, and not just because I’ve heard a rumor that he happens to be on the one-hundred dollar bill.
(I work for the DVT, so I’ve never actually seen a hundred dollar bill.)
While nearly everything Franklin uttered or scrawled was a genuine pearl, I’m afraid old Ben missed the mark by a Philadelphia mile on this one.
There are a lot of tasks that, regardless of how well you do them, you’re going to have to do them again.
Below, I’ve included a list of some of those endless activities.
- Mowing The Lawn. Even if you’re the Michaelangelo of the Briggs and Stratton, the lawn you mowed yesterday will need to be mowed tomorrow. I’m not sure they even had “lawns” back in Franklin’s day, much less lawnmowers. I believe yards back then were called “pastures,” and their lawnmower usually made that “baaaaa” noise and gave wool once a year.
- Taking A Shower. This is something I know about. If there was an Olympic Showering event, my family would be gold medallists. Personally, because I live with three females, I am the amateur sprint showering champion. My wife excels at “power showering,” completing more tasks in one watering than any three carpenters. And one of my daughters would be the all time professional shower marathoner, with showers that seem to last longer than the terms of some presidents. No matter how good those showers may be, another one is always needed tomorrow.
- Cooking. I don’t care if you’re talking about the illegitimate love child of chef Wolfgang Puck and home-making impresario Martha Stewart, that luscious lunch is only going to satisfy for about eight hours. Five in my house. Three when I’m off my diet.
- Cleaning Up After Children Or Husbands. The only way Ben’s statement can be true here is if you simply accept the fact, as many valiant home makers do, that it’s not a series of jobs but one long unending job that lasts until your kids graduate and move out, and your husband takes up golf.
- Doing The Dishes. I almost have this one figured out with the cunning use of paper plates and plastic forks. It’s that “disposable Tupperware on the stove” thing that keeps blowing the deal.
- Laundry. The only way you don’t have to repeat a load of laundry is if you throw the clothes away after you wear them. But that would require a job well paid rather than a job well done.
- Going To The Bathroom. Again, I’m the Charlie Daniels of the toilet seat, but even my best efforts have to be repeated three to four times a day. Ten to twelve times after a visit to Taco Bell.
- Sex. Like the old joke says, “Once a king, always a king, but once a knight is not enough.”

Again, Benjamin Franklin is the epicenter of such philosophical bon mots as “Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.”
Unfortunately, when it comes to this particular idiom, Mr. Franklin needs to try again.

School Names

2005-09-05T02:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
September 2, 2005

Sometimes I wonder how schools arrive at their official “school names.”
I have a suspicion that it often involves a thesaurus and a set of darts.
For example, how did a school smack dab in the middle of a desert, a thousand miles from the nearest ocean, come up with the name “Pirates?”
I’m not slamming Moapa Valley, the reigning 3A Southern Conference football champions, just asking a question.
Similarly, what does the unique community of Pahrump Valley have to do with Troy?
I’m not sure how Trojans relate.
Faith Lutheran is pretty bold in their team name, “Crusaders.”
Obviously, they don’t have a lot of Muslim students, since the Crusades are kind of a prickly issue with folks of that religion, but as a private school they are less susceptible to the ever-changing winds of political correctness.
I like that.
Boulder City has a pretty innocuous name.
It’s doubtful that any Sierra Club members are ready to take on the Clark County School District over the name “Eagles,” although it might make their agenda once they finish making SUVs illegal and complete the task of banning all human beings from any national park.
Some folks might question the source of our own beloved educational institute.
I’ll bet there’s a good story behind how the Bulldog became our mascot and namesake, even though I don’t often see that particular breed of dog watering the landscapes of the various HOAs.
I don’t think there’s anything in the CC&Rs prohibiting a specific breed, although dogs in general might be precluded from residing in some of our more upscale or anal PUDs.
I know that children and renters are outlawed in some of them, so I guess anything is possible.
Regardless of the origin, our name is actually rather fitting, particularly when referencing our football team.
The VVHS varsity, JV, and freshman squads are ferocious and tenacious, and their bite is infinitely worse than their bark.
Unless you’re from Dixie, you don’t want to mess with an angry bulldog.
Some schools are currently in danger of losing their long held and deeply cherished monikers.
The NCAA has taken on the nut-job task of outlawing all college mascots and team names that refer to any form of Native American.
This means the probable end to such proud names as the Seminoles, Fighting Illini, Chiefs, Braves, Redskins, and Indians.
Like most politically-correct undertakings, I’m certain this will escalate and spin out of control.
Eventually, some group of outraged retired swashbucklers will petition the No Common-sense Anal-retentive Association to ban Pirates, Buccaneers, and Raiders from the helmets of innocent schools everywhere.
Then will come the vitriol from the descendants of Troy who will apply similar pressure to stop Pahrump Valley and the University of Southern California from using their heritage for a mascot.
See how ridiculous this can get?
Fortunately, since Virgin Valley doesn’t use a human mascot, our logo should remain intact.
That is, of course, until those lunatics at PETA find out.
As soon as they finish running rodeos out of existence and outlawing the use of silk for clothing (after all, those poor innocent silkworms are being exploited for the benefit of nasty old humans), I suspect we’ll be seeing Pamela Anderson picketing in front of VVHS, complete with her silicone “assets,” which she can proudly boast are 100% devoid of any living material.
Until then, we can continue to show up for Friday night football games and cheer for our boys.
Go Bulldogs!

Going To Heaven

2005-08-30T08:30:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
August 30, 2005

This week’s Chronicles is for a friend of mine who unexpectedly lost her brother last week.
Hopefully she can find a smile in here somewhere.
I hate it when someone close to me loses someone.
I feel so inept.
I’m a professional writer, a wordsmith, someone who uses vocabulary every day like a cement worker uses a trowel.
Yet my shortcomings are never as clearly evident as when I look for words of comfort to offer, and those words are never adequate.
First, let me offer some quick background.
I’m not a religious person.
I belonged to a church only once in my life, but to paraphrase Groucho Marx, I should have never joined any church that would have me as a member.
I’m not sure where this leaves my soul, but I doubt that the dusty old thing is worth God and the devil getting into a poker match over.
I’m not a particularly good person, and not a particularly bad person (although there are HOA board members all over this city who would argue the latter).
I just go through life trying to do the best I can, praying that God grades on a curve and throws in extra credit for effort.
For the record, I believe in God.
I’m a bit fuzzier on the “Heaven” thing.
Before I start, please understand that I’m not bashing or disrespecting anyone’s religion, I’m just offering a few observations.
After all, you must admit that the various versions of Heaven can be pretty amusing when you look at it objectively.
If you have enough bourbon in you, the ideas can be downright funny.
First, the standard King James version of Heaven.
Angels with harps.
I don’t know about you, but harp music has never turned me on.
Also, while movies and cartoons show angels as fully clothed while bearing wings, I suspect Heaven is a clothing-optional beach.
Now for the Kodak moment:
If I happen to slide through the Pearly Gates on a technicality, do you really want to see my big naked behind sitting on a cloud strumming an electric four-string harp and singing Garth Brooks tunes?
I know, sounds more like Hell, huh.
For my LDS brethren, Heaven becomes a Monty Hall game show.
If you’ve been so-so, you get what’s behind door number three.
Better behavior gets a shot at door number two.
And for those who tithed, avoided tea, and followed their patriarchal blessing, a trip to the Kingdom behind door number one is your reward.
I like that version, because I have a one-in-three chance of winding up somewhere wonderful.
It’s better odds than I get from the nickel slots.
(Boy, I hope God was kidding about that gambling thing.)
But the best vision has to be the Muslim Heaven.
For those with the best track record on Earth, 72 virgins are waiting.
I don’t understand how this is a big attractor for women believers, but I’m sure there’s some major reward for them as well.
But for guys, it’s the 72 virgins.
Of course, they don’t talk about the downside, which is 72 angry mothers-in-law.
I imagine that would be their version of Hell.
It would certainly be mine.
I’m not sure where atheists believe they’ll go when they die.
Maybe to the mall.
Maybe Taco Bell (which would mean Mesquite is one restaurant short of truly being Heaven).
The idea of being nothing more than worm food or a dust mote in someone’s eye upon death is too depressing to consider.
I’m not sure what Hell is supposed to look like.
I’ve endured southern Nevada in July, so I’m not intimidated.
But to concur with country philosopher Hank Williams Jr., if it’s much like New York City, I’d rather not go.
In fact, I’d prefer to just postpone the trip altogether.
However, I suspect God is like the ultimate newspaper editor.
When your deadline arrives and your story is due, time is up.
And God never stops the presses.

Betting Big

2005-08-25T00:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
August 23, 2005

I’m not much of a gambler.
It’s not a religious matter, or an ethical issue.
I simply suck at it.
I feel pretty sure that, if I were to bet $5 that the sun was going to rise tomorrow morning, it would be the day of a solar eclipse.
When I make a rare visit to one of the local casinos for a few hands of blackjack, I never expect to walk out with any money in my pockets.
That’s one of the few gaming speculations where I’m consistently correct.
And I don’t consider it gambling when I drop a few dollars into the slot machines while waiting in line for the buffet.
I consider it a donation to help send poor, underprivileged casino owners to summer camp in the Bahamas.
Unfortunately, the IRS doesn’t see it that way, so I don’t even get the deduction.
When it comes to sports wagers, I’m particularly inept.
At the greyhound track, I could bet on the rabbit every race and still manage to go broke.
The only way I could make any money betting on football would be to charge $5 to every New England fan I know if I just promised never to bet on the Patriots.
You’ve heard of the Midas touch?
I have the antidote.
It’s called the “Morris touch.”
If I were to bet ten bucks on the Philadelphia Eagles beating Mesquite’s fourth-grade youth football team, I feel pretty confident the Baby Bulldogs would wind up on the heavy end of a 34-20 score.
(It’s not as unbalanced a contest as you might think. Our team would have a starting lineup of nine-year-olds, while the Eagles would have Terrell Owens.)
And don’t talk to me about “the spread.”
The only time I get “the spread” right is when it involves cream cheese and a bagel.
I’m pretty knowledgeable about football (although a certain Iggles fan who wrote in last year might dispute that), but when it comes time to put my small money where my big mouth is, I can never seem to get it right.
Hence, the Morris touch.
Fortunately, I work for the newspaper, so I don’t have much money available for gambling.
Or eating, for that matter.
Since I haven’t found a bookie willing to accept El Rancho coupons on the Packers-Bears game, I’ll have to be satisfied with knowing how much money I save each week by being too broke to go broke.
So I’ll continue my life’s history of being out of sync with my environment.
I grew up in Maryland, the seafood capital of the world and the home of Maryland blue crabs, but didn’t like seafood.
I spent 16 years on the west coast of Florida, living six minutes away from the Gulf of Mexico, and never went to the beach.
And now I live in Nevada, where gambling is a way of life, unable to make the right call in a game between Cleveland and the Steelers.
For those who want to use the “Morris touch” to their advantage, the Browns play in Pittsburgh on Nov. 13.
I’m setting aside 10% of my salary for the next 11 weeks so I can bet $5 on the Steelers.
Browns fans should wager accordingly.
I would recommend that you get your bets in early, before the local sports books find out which way I’m leaning and Cleveland becomes the odds-on favorite.

HOA Kindness Goes MIA

2005-08-23T08:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
August 23, 2005

You know it’s a bad day when I start quoting Rodney King.
But if I had my way, the CC&Rs for every homeowners association in Mesquite would begin with the line, “Can’t we all just get along?”
Unfortunately, the answer too often is “No!”
(Notice the exclamation point? Not just a “No.” but a “No!”)
The latest example comes from a little development out past Primex that I’ll refer to as “Encampment.”
Apparently, the homeowners from this particular fiefdom are tired of Joe Citizen using their private lanes as thoroughfares to Turtleback.
This is a reasonable expectation, since it is a private road which they paid for and maintain with their dues.
Unfortunately, their discontent has expanded.
So far, they have hammered the mayor.
They have complained to the city council.
They have threatened to write ugly letters to offending businesses.
Any day now, neighbors are expecting the association to institute a draft in order to raise an army.
Patriot missiles and nuclear weapons are sure to follow.
Okay, maybe the Patriot missiles are an exaggeration.
After all, the association can’t seem to come up with enough money to install a coded gate, which would appear to be the most rational solution.
If they can’t afford an automatic gate, advanced anti-ballistic weaponry might be a stretch unless somebody has an uncle at Raytheon.
But it’s no exaggeration that the problem has the potential to disrupt the harmony of a community that prides itself on the kindness of its citizenry.
While armored tanks and M-16s haven’t come into play yet, several of the residents of “Encampment” have armed themselves with video cameras to record the offending vehicles that dare to drive through their neighborhood without permission, while others jot down license plate numbers of unfamiliar cars wandering through their parking lots.
This is a dangerous precedent.
What if every neighborhood adopted this tactic?
I can envision gun turrets atop sand-bagged privacy walls and higher association fees to fund sophisticated radar networks.
Various developments would fire off missives to the heads of other associations, threatening them with attack if they don’t keep their homeowners out of those PUDs.
“Welcome to Mesquite” signs would be ripped down and replaced with border markers bearing slogans like “Keep Out! Trespassers will be filmed, documented, and generally made to feel like interloping Muslims at a Bar Mitzvah!”
Board meetings would become treaty negotiations.
It’s the bane of all small countries headed by power-hungry despots with too much time on their hands.
(The whole Iraq thing could have been avoided if Saddam had just taken up a hobby.)
This community has worked too hard to earn the reputation of being a friendly place to let a few zealots ruin it.
To the HOA presidents and board members who insist on patrolling their communities each morning with clipboards in search of unrolled garden hoses and visitors “vizout zere paperz!” I would offer this simple advice:
Get a life.
For those communities headed by their own little Idiot Amins who are too clueless to figure out how to do that, I would recommend a nice quiet coup d’etat at your next board meeting.
When it comes to HOA tyrants, “Just Say No.”
Let’s go back to being a nice town where people are allowed to borrow each other’s roads without fear of reprisals.
Let’s get that Magic back.

Fun Is Not Recreation

2005-08-20T09:30:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
August 19, 2005

Once upon a time, the term “recreation” was nearly synonymous with “fun.”
Unfortunately, thanks to the stuffed shirts who sit in various state and federal legislative bodies, one no longer has anything to do with the other.
There was a time when people could jump on their ATVs, head into the endless wasteland known as desert, and enjoy a ride across wide open desolate spaces.
Then some legislative loser found out about it, heard that someone dared to use a natural resource for something as frivolous as “fun,” and rammed through law after law to curtail the enjoyment of four-wheeling.
Today, inmates sweeping up the jail have more freedom than an ATV enthusiast intent on riding through any land owned by the federal government (which, in Nevada, is nearly all of it).
Riders hear “No!” more often than a four-year-old in the candy aisle at Smith’s.
Now, it appears that someone spilled the beans about the fun that you used to be able to have in a boat.
I owned and operated my first boat when I was 13 years old.
Today, I would be an outlaw, since you must be 14 to operate a motorized watercraft.
You must also take a boating course, and keep proof of that course with you at all times on the water.
(“Your paperz, pleeze! Ve must zee your paperz!”)
It’s a good thing Christopher Columbus never tried to navigate Lake Mead.
And Heaven forbid you get caught without wearing a lifevest, a cumbersome device that sort of defeats the purpose of enjoying a day in the sun working on your tan.
Last Saturday, the DUI Gestapo set up a “safety checkpoint” at Cottonwood Cove on Lake Mohave.
They’re proud of the fact that they stopped 153 boaters that day.
I guess the freedom to travel without government interference and warrantless stops ends at the water’s edge.
Of course, it’s all in the name of “safety,” which makes anything short of a strip search and a cavity probe an acceptable government activity.
This time, they were in search of the “demon rum.”
It’s funny how the effects of Prohibition linger even 70 years later.
A Nevada game warden mentioned that an officer was “amazed by the amount of beer, wine coolers, and other alcohol that was being placed into boats” while manning a boating information booth at a launch ramp.
Wow.
Drinking beer while fishing.
Who’d a thunk it?
Hopefully, nobody mentions to lawmakers that people actually drink beer in the parking lot before football games, or the Oakland Raiders will be out of business.
And before I get a stack of hate mails from “BADD” or the Carrie Nation club telling me that X number of people lose their lives to drunk boaters, save your AOL time.
I get it.
I agree that anyone who kills someone while operating their boat while under the influence should be locked up.
But I also believe that anyone who kills someone while operating their boat while NOT under the influence should be locked up as well.
At what point do we consider prophylactic justice as going too far?
(“Prophylactic justice” is the practice of arresting people because they MIGHT break a law, like locking up a guy in a canoe because the three beers he drank MIGHT lead him to run over a pontoon boat full of nuns.)
And I’m saying this as a guy who doesn’t drink beer.
But the point is that legislators have run out of annoying ways to manipulate, stifle, and control our lives in business, commerce, travel, education, marriage, child-rearing, and even in our homes, and are now extending their treacherous tentacles into our recreation.
Men and women have managed to navigate entire oceans for thousands of years with nothing but a compass and an incomplete map bearing warnings of sea serpents, but the state of Nevada feels we need a whole new layer of rules and regulations to survive the treacherous waters of Lake Mohave.
I guess the next round of watercraft legislation will involve size requirements and an operators license for rubber duckies, and a whole section of state regulations so people don’t become victims of drive-by splashings in their own bathtubs.
It’s a shame we can’t invoke “logic checkpoints,” where we line up all of our government officials and test them for common sense.
Like innocent boaters who are forced to take breathalyzers, any official who tests positive for stupidity or registers less than an I.Q. of 45 would be forced out of the legislature.
Of course, that would leave a state law-making body composed of around nine members and a janitor.
Then again, maybe that wouldn’t be such a bad thing.
To those nine, I would ask simply and humbly:
Please stop trying to regulate and eliminate fun.
It’s supposed to be one of the fringe benefits of freedom.
Even the Declaration of Independence specifies our right to “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
Your illegal and immoral DUI checkpoints are violating the second and third in the dubious attempt at protecting the first.
Go back to making inane laws about things like the proper size of road gravel and leave our recreation alone.

Hospital Firsts

2005-08-16T07:30:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
August 16, 2005

There are many advantages to having a new hospital in our community.
The obvious ones have a lot to do with proximity to major supplies of bandages after a close encounter with such things as a cranky lawnmower.
But a new hospital offers another benefit.
It’s the fact that almost every malady qualifies as either “the worst,” “the first,” or “the biggest.”
When a medical center has been around for a long time, like Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles, there’s not much that can even raise a physician’s eyebrow.
“Gall stone the size of a corn dog? Saw it in ’92.”
“Left leg attached to a Buick? Nearly a weekly ritual.”
“Broken arm after getting run over by a juggling bear on a unicycle? 1973, 1986, and twice in 2000 (the Democratic National Convention happened to be in town, remember?)”
Here in our little slice of microwaved Heaven, almost anything you can drag into the pristine Mesa View Regional Hospital Emergency Room will qualify as “one for the books.”
I don’t have access to the MVRH records (the bureaucrats who crafted the HIPAA legislation have no sense of humor when it comes to columnists and medical catastrophes).
However, it’s a pretty safe bet that the title is still available for “biggest hernia,” “first rectal extraction of a gardening implement,” and “largest olive passed through the left nostril while laughing at a CasaBlanca comedian.”
Recently I had a chance to take the crown following a visit to my local doctor.
After looking at a recent battery of blood tests for my diabetes, he informed me that my glycohemoglobin number (whatever that is) was over 14.
He explained that “normal” was around six.
He said it was the highest number he’d ever seen.
I assumed the properly concerned facial countenance expected of someone who had just received bad news.
However, a small voice inside pumped its little fist and exclaimed “Yes! I am number one!”
While I’m now dieting, exercising, and taking a host of funny-shaped pills, I’m still contemplating having the number “14” tattooed on my chest.
Let’s face it, there’s never been a “good” reason to check into a hospital.
Nobody makes an appointment to see the doctor just to announce your daughter is getting married, and guys aren’t lining up to put their insurance to the test because they just shot a 74 at Wolf Creek.
If you’re visiting a health care professional, it’s usually because some part of your body is staging a physiological rebellion (except for childbirth, which is a rebellion that is delayed for about 15 years).
But if you’re going to be sick anyway, you might as well be the best at it.
Don’t settle for that wimpy 102 temperature.
Give the docs something to talk about.
Aim for 106.1.
Be the first patient MVRH has ever treated for scurvy.
And don’t settle for one of those microscopic kidney stones.
Try passing something you can use in your next game of marbles with your grandkids.
No matter what the injury or illness, be sure you can punctuate the tale of your most recent visit with the words “and it was the biggest they’d ever seen!”
Fortunately, with a hospital this new, you can be assured of a “worst,” “first,” or “biggest” title without forcing your doctor too deep into his Physician’s Desk Reference.
And while we’re on the subject, did I tell you about my daughter’s tonsils?...

Helpful Hints At The DMV

2005-08-09T07:30:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
August 9, 2005

Her last words as I left her desk are still ringing in my ears.
“I don’t want to see anything about the DMV in your paper next week.”
I get a lot of that these days.
In fact, if I heeded those words every time I heard them, this space in your newspaper would be filled regularly with badly-drawn pictures of flowers done in crayon.
Or another ad.
Fortunately, I’m hard headed.
I made my annual pilgrimage to the local DMV office last week.
It’s a trip that rivals trips to the dentist and regular proctology exams as less-favored destinations.
But bashing the Department of Motor Vehicles is almost cliché, like shooting over a baited field.
Instead, I’m going to offer a few tips for your next trip to this hallowed state agency as a public service.
Before I begin, I just wanted to acknowledge that the lady who helped me last week is terrific.
In fact, the entire staff at our local office seems to be among the most competent and friendly in the entire organization.
And I’m not saying that just because I don’t want my driver’s license number to end up on some website with a flashing banner that says “Steal this guy’s identity for fun and profit.”
They really are helpful and capable.
Unfortunately, even really good sailors occasionally find themselves on Russian mini-subs at the bottom of the ocean.
Now for the helpful hints.
First, bring a book.
I would recommend “War and Peace,” or a similarly lengthy tome.
If you can’t read, bring lots of picture books.
(Although, the inability to read might pose a problem when you try to take that ever-important license exam.)
If someone in a hat and trench coat comes up to you in the DMV parking lot and whispers “I’ve got number 23,” pay whatever he asks.
Scalped numbers may be the only way you can get in and out of the place before your toddlers graduate from college.
Speaking of toddlers, please leave your small, crying, running, screaming children at home.
If, as I suspect, you can’t beg or con anyone into watching your little demons at home, try bringing along some items to keep them occupied and quiet.
Narcotics and a gag are perfectly acceptable.
If you have more than one, I would recommend seating them in different areas.
Maybe Logandale and Scenic.
Next, and I say this as respectfully and lovingly as I can, please shower or bathe before showing up.
Ever taken a whiff of three dozen sardines jammed into a can after being left open in the desert for a few days?
I know the French consider it de rigeur, but in a confined space like the DMV waiting area, yesterday’s manure-moving project isn’t going to make you popular.
Another suggestion is to make sure you bring plenty of money.
As a rule of thumb, bring as much as you think you’re going to need, then bring more.
You have a better chance of escaping the dollar slots section of the Eureka with your wallet intact than the DMV tag renewal process.
For those who don’t know, there is no grace period when your tags expire.
I thought the state would be understanding, since I’ve been busy covering flag football games, attending water board meetings, and being broke.
The punishment for being five days late on my tags cost more than some peoples’ divorces.
If you happen to see me at the I-15 exit with a cup and a sign that says “Will write for tag money,” please be kind.
And finally, be nice to the good folks working behind the DMV counter.
It wasn’t their idea to fine you $250 because the dog ate your insurance card.
Your anger should be directed at the yahoos in Carson City who passed such idiotic laws.
And if you can manage to get your car registered, get your tags renewed, take your driving exam, pass your road test, get your photo taken, and get your driver’s license issued, all in this lifetime, I would recommend you drive straight to Carson City and tell them about your anger.
Just be sure to bring along a valid I.D.

Steroids In Supplements

2005-08-05T07:30:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
August 5, 2005

Baltimore Oriole baseball star Rafael Palmeiro recently tested positive for steroids, and was given the standard 10-day vacation by major league baseball.
Back in March, Palmeiro told a congressional committee that he had never, ever used steroids.
This week, he had to amend that statement, invoking the new word "intentionally."
As cop-outs go, I kind of like that one.
It's like the 21st century version of Flip Wilson's catch phrase "the devil made me do it."
It lets you off the hook by suggesting it's not your fault, no matter the crime.
By using the word "intentionally," Palmeiro is intimating that there must have been some steroids in something he ingested.
He doesn't come out and say what that might have been, but believe me, I can empathize.
I mean, how many times have we all gathered around the dinner table and "unintentionally" wolfed down a half-dozen ears of corn, only to find out later that we have tested positive for steroids?
I'm sure it happens all the time.
Poor Palmy could have picked up that dose of steroids in anything.
Maybe he was drinking from a water fountain after somebody else who had steroids in their system.
Or it could have been one of those non-kosher hot dogs.
They put just about anything in frankfurters these days, so it's not beyond possibility that Palmy was contaminated by a couple of dogs at the ball park.
Perhaps the Orioles star picked up a "contact" positive by being in the room where someone else was doing steroids.
And of course you can't rule out fast food.
Maybe steroids is part of that "secret sauce" we keep hearing so much about.
Unlike some of the brainless rookies coming out of the high school ranks, who frequently claim they didn't know they were injecting steroids into their thighs in spite of the fact that "STEROIDS" was marked in large letters on the bottle, a long-time pro like Palmy would know better.
That's why it has to be something he inadvertently took that caused the positive test.
Major League Baseball needs to do more research.
I would recommend they start by running some of those sunflower seeds through the gas-chromatograph spectrometer.
Connect the dots.
Lots of baseball players eat sunflower seeds.
Lots of positive steroids tests come from baseball players.
Are you seeing a pattern here?
Or maybe there's more in that bottle of Gatorade then we realized.
Some have wrongfully suggested there might be a trace of steroids in some of the muscle density drinks and supplement shakes athletes often use.
Just because some people might believe that ingesting artificial substances for the purpose of causing unnatural muscle growth could be considered cheating doesn't mean that steroids are involved.
There are lots of things other than steroids that cause such rapid and explosive muscle enhancement.
There'summmthere's
Spinach!
That's it!
Check Palmy's recent diet.
I'm sure he wasn't taking those over-the-counter cheating products.
It has to be spinach.
Take a look at an old Popeye cartoon, those bulging forearms, then get a glance of Palmy's hammers.
Do you see a resemblance?
Unfortunately, the similarity ends there.
While Palmeiro continues to insist that, no, nope, huh-uh, he's not a cheater, never has been, is just a victim of circumstances, at least you could count on Popeye to be honest in his post-game interviews.
Palmy should give it a try the next time he appears before congress to be asked if he's a juicer:
"I yam what I yam."

Shuttle Advice

2005-08-02T10:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
August 2, 2005

The space shuttle Discovery finally launched last week after being in the garage for the last two years.

Apparently, the mechanics over at NASA aren’t that hot, since they weren’t able to definitively solve the issue of a balky number-three fuel sensor, and they have discovered since lift-off that a few parts fell off the vehicle during launch.

I once had a 1974 Ford Pinto, so I can relate.

Like Discovery, my Pinto had a bad fuel gauge.

I’m sure the eggheads at NASA tried the "tap on it with a pair of pliers" trick, which usually did it for my car.

And like the shuttle, I occasionally had parts falling off my Pinto, usually pretty innocuous things like mufflers and drive shafts.

But it’s what you expect from a vehicle that’s over 20 years old.

I don’t know why NASA has that surprised look on their face when they light the candle on a bird that was built in 1983, and stuff starts going wrong.

Think about it…any of you still driving a car that old which DOESN’T have malfunctions and missing pieces?

And we’re talking about a shuttle design that was developed in the 1970s, back when advanced propulsion systems consisted of an Acme rocket strapped to a coyote.

I used to drive an older car that had over 100,000 miles on it.

Occasionally, there would be something leaking out of it that might have been oil, or could have been liquid hydrogen.

So it shouldn’t come as any great shock to NASA that their vehicle, which has a couple of million miles on its odometer, might have a few rattles under its hood and a few rips in its upholstery.

As a devoted American and Patriot, I’m now going to offer a few suggestions to the boys and girls in Cape Canaveral about proper repair and maintenance techniques for 20-year-old vehicles, free of charge.

(Are you getting the irony here? A forty-something humor writer is going to give tips to rocket scientists? My mother would be so proud!)

First, let me say two words:

Duct tape (also known as "duck tape").

You have insulation coming off your exterior tank?

Duck it!

The duct tape would also work great for those pesky heat tiles that keep falling off.

And if you can’t find the electrical short in the fuel sensor, there’s always electrical tape.

Let me give you step-by-step instructions on how to fix it.

1. Cut about an inch and a half of the black electrical tape off the roll.

2. Carefully take the strip of tape into the command module

3. Place the tape over the red "Fuel Level Low" light so you can’t see it flashing anymore.

Wasn’t that easy?

I also have additional repair techniques available that involve baling wire and old coffee cans, but I’m running out of space here.

The best advice I can give is the one I employed when my Pinto got old.

Here it is:

Visit your nearest used space shuttle dealer.

Discovery is past its prime.

It’s time to trade her in.

Take the fuzzy dice off the rear view mirror and peel that "Aerosmith" sticker off the left wing.

We’re talking about the safety of seven brave souls and the pride of a nation here.

We can do better than the space-bound equivalent of a 1974 Ford Pinto.

(Although I must admit, I still miss those mag wheels.)

If you can’t find a used shuttle dealer, simply drag Discovery over here and leave it parked on the street overnight in one of the seedier neighborhoods of Las Vegas.

I’m sure Uncle Sam has insurance.

Let the "Good Hands" people buy you a new one.

The bottom line is that it’s time to pull Discovery out of rotation.

And for the next shuttle, could we see something in a metal-flake blue with spinners?

Beautiful Music

2005-08-01T06:00:00.000-07:00

We’ve been condemned to mediocrity by our zeal for perfection.
That’s my official ruling on music, particularly country music.
First the disclaimer.
Once upon a time, I was a small-time country singer working the club circuit, first in northeastern Maryland then in southwestern Florida.
I was a decent singer, but my Achilles heel was actually a size-48 waistline.
If you closed your eyes and listened, I could be your dream guy.
Open your eyes, and even through the Budweiser-filtered smoke-filled haze, I would be your nightmare.
But once upon a time, the way you looked didn’t matter.
Go back and revisit some of the biggest country and even rock stars of the sixties and seventies.
Ever see a picture of Janis Joplin?
Sorry, that was one ugly female.
But man, she could sing!
Merle Haggard, one of the biggest names in country music, was never a very pretty man.
Rumor has it that NASA refused to use his face in ads for the Apollo program because it had more craters than the moon.
(Okay, I just made that rumor up, but you have to admit it’s funny, and pretty close to true.)
And Loretta Lynn, who I still love from afar to this day, could have been billed as one of the "Lee" sisters with Patsy Cline..."Ug" and "Home."
But all of these stars rose above their appearances because while they weren’t beautiful physically, they were beautiful vocally.
Fast forward to the 21st century, a musical landscape where evil record companies look at the face first, and the music second.
If you are a size two with perfect skin and noticeable boobs, you have a place in Nashville society.
It doesn’t matter if you can sing, that’s what studio engineers are for (who are usually the ugly ducklings who had the talent but not the looks to be on the other side of the studio glass).
The same applies to male stars.
Think about it.
The last ugly singer to make it big was Garth Brooks, and I’ve been told by some women that even he has some puppy-dog cuteness that gets him by.
Today’s country music lineup is filled by women like Shania Twain and Faith Hill (who, while actually being a truly talented singer, still owes a sizeable portion of her fame to her sizeably portioned “hills”).
The only “fly” in the ointment of my position is a real former barfly, Gretchen Wilson.
She’s like the antidote to an overdose of Erika Jo and Deanna Carter.
But the fact remains, lesser talent is making it onto the music scene simply because pretty faces equate to more airtime on CMT.
The trend isn’t quite as prevalent in pop and hip-hop music, where a cool name like Linkin Park or Eminem or Hoobastank is more important than talent, but it’s still tough to find an ugly single artist.
“Li’l Kim” is the poster child for this hypothesis, since she has absolutely zero musical talent, but consistently makes the top ten because she has nice boobs and isn’t afraid to show ‘em.
To anyone.
To everyone.
At any time.
Today’s truth is that singers who would score no better than a seven at a local talent show are signing million dollar contracts because they score a perfect ten on the beauty-meter.
When it comes to Miss America pageants, I’m okay with that.
But when it comes to the sounds coming out of my radio speaker, I’d rather hear an ugly woman like Patsy Cline crooning about a life of struggle than a synthesized beauty like Miranda Lambert singing about heartache she’s never known.

Reality TV Fare

2005-07-30T10:00:00.000-07:00

As television viewers, we’ll watch anything.

For years, people have been carping about the downward spiral in TV fare.

While I don’t think we’ve hit rock bottom yet, I believe we’re close enough to see the pits and blemishes in the approaching stone.

Three years ago, it was an explosion of “reality TV” featuring concocted scenarios with allegedly real human beings (although the DNA tests still aren’t back on “Survivor” winner Richard Hatch) put into unrealistic situations.

The result?

“Survivor,” “Big Brother,” “Fear Factor,” et al.

Ummm, yeah, that’s realistic.

You’re trapped on a deserted island with a collection of people with camera-ready faces and bikini-friendly bodies, and you’re going to spend your endless free time jumping through hoops and conniving against your other island mates?

Yeah, right.

If they wanted to make it a REAL reality show about beautiful people marooned on a deserted island, they would feature an hour each week of video shots of grass huts emitting grunting noises from within.

The following year, television offered a series of competitions that got our blood pumping, including “American Idol” and a few other talent show clones that didn’t make it.

Personally, I thought this was a genre that had run its course after “Ted Mack’s Amateur Hour” in the fifties, but some bad ideas never go away, as proven by resurrections like “The Gong Show” and “Star Search.”

Last year, it was a foray into the board room, with Donald Trump’s famous catch-phrase “You’re fired!” on “The Apprentice.”

First, I find it ironic that a show featuring such a phrase could be popular in a social climate where “You’re fired!” is as much an anachronism as “Groovy, man!”

In this era of affirmative action, sex discrimination, civil rights, gay rights, equal opportunity employers, unions, and a nationwide infestation of personal injury lawyers, also known as scum-sucking bottom-dwelling vermin, you can’t actually fire anyone anymore.

“The Apprentice” will soon be joined by a spin-off featuring Martha Stewart.

Unlike some, I believe Stewart was wrongfully imprisoned for the made-up crimes they tried to hang on her.

She went to jail because her friend told her to sell her stock in his company?

I wouldn’t expect anything LESS from a friend!

If that’s a crime, then every woman in America should be doing time for telling her girlfriend “You should throw out that dress, honey, it makes you look fat.”

Or “I’m telling you, gurrul, you need to dump that man of yours. He no good!”

Also, for idiots like me who watched every episode of “The Apprentice” last year, do you realize that you raced home from your office job to catch 13 weeks of other people at their office job?

Vying for a bigger office job?

We actually take time out from griping about our jerk of a boss to watch a TV show featuring a jerk of a boss.

Personally, I think it’s time for us to give up these reality TV shows.

Or, if you can’t imagine getting through the day without them, try this.

Pretend that everything going on around you is part of a reality TV show.

And the best part is, pretend YOU are the star!

It’s just the latest offering from “Survivor” producer Mark Burnett.

It’s called “Getting A Life.”

Lance Armstrong, American Hero

2005-07-27T07:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
July 26, 2005

This weekend, bicyclist extraordinaire Lance Armstrong ended his career by winning an unprecedented seventh Tour de France.
He did it without an end zone dance, without pointing at other bicyclists and calling their mamas ugly names, and without pointing to the sky and thanking God/Allah/Buddah/Vishnu/L. Ron Hubbard for the victory.
Lance did it without getting busted for possession of crack (at least, since the bicyclists gave up their biking shorts for the new full-body racing suits), without beating up his wife, and without stabbing anyone outside an Atlanta bar.
There have been rumors about steroid use, but that’s just nonsense.
First, the folks who run the Tour are extremely vigilant, with constant drug testing and monitoring of their athletes.
This year, one biker was disqualified because his girlfriend got caught with steroids in her car.
Unlike the wastrels in Major League Baseball, these people are serious about keeping their athletes clean.
Second, it’s Lance Armstrong.
This is the guy who kicked cancer’s butt in 1995.
I suspect he’s extremely fussy about what he puts into his body these days.
Of course, Lance isn’t perfect.
Like most humans, he has his flaws, like trading up to singer Sheryl Crow after ditching his original wife.
But, come on, it’s Sheryl Crow!
I think that even I could be tempted to make such a move, if it weren’t for three things.
First, judging by her current selection, Sheryl likes hardbodied skinny guys who work out three times a day.
Personally, my body is more like the “before” picture in a Trim Spa or Weight Watchers ad.
Second, I dearly love my wonderful wife.
Third, my wonderful wife knows where the cutlery is stored while I sleep.
But even with his flaws, Armstrong is a hero, a superior athlete that kids can actually look up to.
His “Live Strong” foundation helps cancer survivors across the country.
He works hard at his craft, and never takes the shortcut or the easy way when training or competing.
He conducts himself with honor and class, which are forgotten attributes in today’s world of sports.
And he avoids places that have the potential to get him in trouble, like bars, hip hop radio stations, and Michael Jackson’s house.
To be honest, as a sport, bicycling is tough to get excited about.
They occasionally have some pretty good wrecks in the turns, but nothing as spectacular as a NASCAR warm-up lap crash.
You can time the difference between first and second place with a calendar instead of a stopwatch.
They don’t have a single “Billy Bob” on their entire roster.
And it’s tough to pledge allegiance and buy racing merchandise for the guy on the 4291 bike.
It just doesn’t roll off the tongue like “that number 8 Budweiser car is running really fast for a guy in 38th place.”
(My apologies to Dale Jr. fans.)
But for the last seven consecutive years, the guy standing on the podium in Paris has been a Texan.
It’s tough to find a sport, any sport, that has featured the same champion seven times in a row.
And at a time when Americans are pretty unpopular around the world, Armstrong has risen above the politics to show that we still have world-class athletes with world-class class.
The fact that he’s able to tweak the French on their noses in their own country is just gravy on the biscuits.
(Sorry, I just couldn’t resist.)
The only cloud on this incredible victory is the fact that it will be his last.
Armstrong announced before the race that he was retiring from the sport.
And unlike other big-name athletes with big-time egos who couldn’t stay retired, I suspect this one will stick.
After all, he’s got a lot of touring with Sheryl left to do.

Snooze Button

2005-07-26T07:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
July 26, 2005

Has there ever been an invention as wondrous as the snooze button?
You know, the little device on most modern alarm clocks that you can hit which shuts off that beep/buzz/wah/annoying FM DJ which is intended to wake you up in the morning, and gives you an extra 10 minutes of sleep.
There you are, in the arms of Farrah Fawcett (the 1976 “Charlies Angels” version, not the 2005 “my plastic surgeon is an incompetent quack” version), when your alarm clock reminds you it’s time to get up and prepare for your day of counting rectal thermometers at the Quickie Mart.
You roll over, hit the snooze button, and then try to return to where you left off in the dream.
Of course, by the time you get back to slumber land, you’re in the arms of “Survivor” winner Richard Hatch.
This time, you’re grateful for that blaring alarm clock.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if inventors could come up with a way to use the snooze button in other parts of your life?
Like most technological innovations, kids would be the first to make it wildly popular.
Homework not done?
Hit the snooze button and buy yourself another day.
Unprepared for tomorrow’s big test on the Pythagorean Theorem?
Whack that old snooze button and put it off for a week.
And, like the alarm clock device, you could hit the button eight or nine times, ensuring that you graduate before that test actually gets taken.
For adults, the benefits would be endless.
Big report due in the morning?
A snooze button would come in handy.
Bar getting ready to close while you still have a quarter-ounce of sobriety left?
Press that snooze button.
(Although you may be seeing three or four of them by this time…just aim for the one in the middle.)
Housewives facing the daunting prospect of cleaning the oven after last night’s cheese and spaghetti sauce souffle’ disaster could press a button and put it off for another meal or two.
(Of course, with as many tasks as amazing housewives have each day compared to normal humans, their collection of snooze buttons would resemble the console of a NASA space mission at Houston control.)
Construction project not finished that you promised a month ago?
Snooze button to the rescue!
(Actually, I believe that contractors have already invented a snooze button. They call it “two more weeks.”)
And as yours truly could attest, they would be invaluable to sports writers and journalists in general.
Facing a deadline on the varsity marble championships?
Hit that button and go back to watching John Wayne in “Hellfighters.”
(Some people might argue that the VCR has a “pause” button, but they don’t understand that a man must have his priorities in order.)
I’m sure that some enterprising young Bill Gates in the future will come up with a real-life snooze button.
Until then, man will simply have to make do with the tools currently used to keep deadlines at bay:
Excuses and alibis.
Now, if you’ll pardon me, Chance is getting ready to blow out that poison oil well fire in Malaya.
And somewhere, Farrah is still waiting.

Restaurant Riposte

2005-07-19T10:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
July 19, 2005

One of the topics featured at last week’s City Council meeting was a hearing on a proposed new restaurant.

Well, actually, a new restaurant and bar.

Okay, according to the license sought by the property owner, a new bar and restaurant.

(There’s some contention between the owner and the city over the issue of 51%, but it’s all too technical and financial for my feeble brain.)

Several council members expressed a longing for more eating establishments that are willing to count on their bill of fare for a profit instead of bourbon-driven happy hours and one-armed bandits.

That’s not a slap in the face to the existing restaurants in town, just some out-loud wishful thinking.

Personally, I’m a big fan of most of the local food purveyors.

Just look at my waist line and suspenders.

I’m a BIG fan.

Admittedly, I haven’t had an opportunity to visit all of them yet.

There are a couple of upscale casino restaurants that I haven’t tried.

As a writer, I’m hoping to eventually land a million-dollar book deal for one of my novels.

Once I do, I’m going to give those places a try.

If I get two million dollars, I’ll take my family as well.

I like most of the casino restaurants I can currently afford.

In fact, I haven’t met Victoria, the namesake of Victoria ’s Buffet, but I’ve eaten there so often I’m sure I’ll be mentioned in her will.

I don’t personally know Chuck either, but I suspect he’s Victoria ’s husband, because his Chuck Wagon restaurant is housed in the same building.

I don’t know who the Purple Fez is named after.

I’m not even precisely sure of what a Purple Fez is, or why it’s purple, or what it has to do with good food, but I know I can attribute at least one of the holes in my belt to their menu.

And for those who don’t know, Tumbleweeds Café is not a salad bar, as any restaurant with the term “weeds” in their name might indicate.

Now the proper thing to do is go on and name all of the other casino restaurants in town, since I’m a devotee of most of those places as well, but I’m out of cute ways to weave their names into this column.

Another thing I don’t understand is the culinary conspiracy that exists here.

What is it with this desert city and clam chowder?

Almost every restaurant in town except the two Chinese food joints serves clam chowder every Friday.

Panda Garden and Canton Chinese probably serve clam chowder as well, but hide it under some name I don’t recognize like Moo Goo Gai Foo Shum Pan Suey.

And those Mexican restaurants that currently refrain from serving this item on Fridays will probably join the conspiracy as soon as they figure out how to fit clam chowder into a folded tortilla shell.

The conspiracy aside, I like most of the eateries here, although I take exception to the term “fast” being used in reference to some of the “fast food” places.

They could more accurately be referred to as “medium speed food,” or on Tuesdays and Fridays as “slow food” places.

But once the burgers and fries or chicken and fries or roast beef and fries or Pannidos and fries arrives, it’s usually pretty darn tasty.

(I’m not sure what a “Pannido” is, but it looks like a food cigar).

While I like and frequent most of the restaurants currently here, it doesn’t stop me from wishing for new additions.

My favorite is Outback Steakhouse, which I hope is on somebody’s drawing board for Mesquite .

I particularly like their restaurant since they’ve changed their seating policy, which was basically “let ‘em stand in line for a couple of hours so they’ll REALLY be hungry once we get around to finding them a table.”

And while I like to drink on occasion, I wouldn’t mind seeing a few more family restaurants make the scene without a list of beers that is longer than the list of appetizers.

(Politically-correct disclaimer: don’t drink and drive, no one under 21 should drink, drink in moderation, don’t drink if you’re pregnant or planning to operate heavy machinery, or if you’re pregnant AND planning to operate heavy machinery.)

Here’s your news-flash for the day: Mesquite is growing.

As it grows, more restaurants will spring up.

This doesn’t take away from the terrific restaurants we already have, it just expands the options.

And, at least in my case, expands the waist line.

Bon Apetit, y’all!

Radio Daze

2005-07-15T07:00:00.000-07:00

First, I want to thank Scott Garner, the star of the hit show “Highly Sophisticated Rednecks,” who inspired this thread.
He got me to thinking about my brief career as a radio sports announcer.
I was 17, and a friend who worked in the office at WASA-AM WHDG-FM in Havre de Grace, Maryland suggested I apply for the job as the color announcer for the station, which covered the Friday night football games at our high school.
Since I was a former varsity football player who was also the morning D.J. at our in-school high school radio station (“Morris in the Morning”…original, right?), it seemed a natural fit.
Don’t underestimate the talent it takes to spin records (yes, we actually used round vinyl discs to broadcast recorded music back then) at an in-school station.
It takes a lot of skill to develop a hip song rotation and interesting patter in between announcements about today’s lunch (usually something involving a fish by-product or the nebulous term “a la king”).
The music itself was secondary.
Unlike the underground college stations Scott mentioned, our catalog was often determined by the size of our individual weekly allowances.
That’s why my listeners were treated to plenty of “Frampton Comes Alive” and Stevie Wonder’s “Songs In The Key Of Life,” because my meager allowance dictated that my personal album collection involved lots of “Greatest Hits” double-album sets.
I always thought it was more economically sensible to buy records filled with proven older hits than to gamble on a hot new six-dollar album that might or might not have more than two tolerable tracks.
Anyway, the in-house experience led to my first real broadcasting job, as the color commentator on WASA-WHDG.
My contract was extended after the football season to continue with broadcasts of the local high school basketball games.
The “contract” consisted of the station manager saying, “Hey, you want to stick around and do the basketball games? I’ll bump you from $10 to $15 a game.”
Unfortunately, my celebrity run ended with the last basketball game of the season, since the station didn’t broadcast high school baseball.
Nearing graduation, I sat down with the station manager to discuss the possibility of joining the station full time.
You need to understand that the radio station was owned by a widow, and she had put her only son in charge of the station simply because she had run out of family-owned places to put him.
(She and the family lived in Washington, D.C. The son and the radio station were located in northeastern Maryland, in a community of 9,000 people. It wasn’t the end of the world, but you could SEE the end of the world from our town.)
So this ill-at-ease seventeen-year-old sat in front of the station manager and asked for a full-time slot.
His answer, and I’m not exaggerating an inch, was “not unless you have a sex-change operation.”
It seems that he was cooking up a whole new format, where the broadcasting staff was going to be all female.
(Did I mention he was an only child?)
Obviously, this was the late 70s, before such things as “sexual harassment” had become popular as a courtroom distraction.
My broadcasting career had come to an end, and I went on to a job building floor buffers in a chemical factory a few months later.
(Oh, how far the mighty had fallen.)
More “Tales From The Airwaves” to follow over the next few weeks.

Bloody Tale

2005-07-12T07:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
July 12, 2005

In the course of daily events, we often take for granted the mundane chores done on our behalf by store clerks, receptionists, tellers, and technicians.
Unless we happen to stumble across the occasional Simon Cowell of customer service, which happens less often than you might think, our day-to-day lives run along smoothly thanks to competent people doing their jobs.
Unfortunately, they are often ignored, and rarely thanked for their contribution to our smooth lifestyle.
But once in a while, someone comes along who does their job so well, you can’t ignore it.
I experienced this last week during a visit to my doctor.
First, let me explain that I am nearly 44 years old, a big hefty guy with a beard who frightens forest animals and some small children.
But when it comes to needles, I am a big sissy.
Wait, that’s a politically incorrect term.
Let me try again.
I am a big chicken.
No, not nearly forceful enough.
Excuse me for a minute while I consult my thesaurus.
Coward…phobic…faint…lily livered…weak-kneed…
Here it is.
“Wet my pants and scream like a little girl.”
That’s it.
That is me when it comes to needles.
So here I am, sitting in the phlebotomist’s chair (“phlebotomist” is a fancy medical term for the person who sucks your blood out with a hollow spike attached to a Hoover industrial vacuum cleaner).
While the person wearing this intimidating title is actually someone I know outside of the sanitized walls of my doctor’s office, I won’t embarrass her by mentioning her name.
After all, at some point in the future, she will probably be stabbing me with a sharp metal object again.
In any case, she began poking around with her fingers in search of a vein (a process that, in all my experience watching Dracula movies, has never been used by a thirsty vampire, and yet they never seem to miss the mark).
Then, she employed the “good cop, bad cop” routine often used in bad TV shows, allowing another staff member (another wonderful person I know outside of the doctor’s office) to distract me with conversation while she prepared to, to, in-, insert, um, the uh...
(Please excuse me while I go change my pants.)
Anyway, while talking with the other staff member for a few moments, I dared to look over at the phlebotomist’s ministrations.
To my shock, surprise, and relief, she was gathering her goodies and preparing to send me on my way.
This Michaelangelo of the hypodermic needle had managed to extract a few tubes of my sugar-tainted, cholesterol-clogged, red American coward’s blood without a single scream of searing pain, or even an “ouchie.”
In all my years of being used as a diabetic pin cushion, I’ve never had blood taken that didn’t involve terror and suffering.
This angelic health care specialist with a devilish sense of humor probably does a hundred blood raids every week, to the point where it is an automatic endeavor like dragging a potato chip bag across the scanner at a grocery store.
But to me, her skill was special.
I didn’t want a week to go by without letting her know that her work is appreciated.
And the next time I come in for blood work, I’ll leave my Depends at home.

Honor Doomed By Courts

2005-07-10T11:00:00.000-07:00

I’ve been jumping up and down like Daffy Duck on crack about the lack of honor and character in our country, particularly in sports.
Lately, the NCAA and the college campuses have been my whipping boy, where nearly every collegiate football and basketball team seems to be stocked with thugs, criminals, and deviants who aren’t worthy to even be in college, much less on the hallowed fields of athletic excellence.
But I must now admit that I have been wrong.
It’s not the colleges that are screwed up, absent any sense of dignity or character.
It’s us.
It is this society.
Specifically, it is the “us” represented by a broken judicial system that allows child molesters to go free on bail while first-time offender Martha Stewart goes to federal prison for taking a friend’s advice on a stock option.
It’s a court system that is flawed, dysfunctional, and almost completely useless, from the District Court that refuses to sentence drug dealers to any significant time, up to a Supreme Court that says it’s okay for cities to steal a citizen’s home if a developer thinks he can increase the property value.
It includes an arrogant, despotic judge in New York who thinks it serves the nation’s interest to jail a reporter who refuses to rat out a confidential White House informant.
Now, the American Injustice System is going to be used to rough up a university that has at least tried to show some semblance of integrity.
In 2000, Sione Havili was tried and convicted of throwing a milk jug filled with gasoline through the window of a Salt Lake City home, allegedly in retaliation for a gang-related drive-by shooting.
After this walking piece of pond scum finished serving just seven months of his pitifully insignificant one year sentence, he attempted to join the University of Utah football team.
In a rare display of honor, the university politely declined to welcome a gang-banging arsonist to its athletic program.
So scumbag Havili is suing the school’s athletic director and former president, claiming they violated his civil rights.
If it really is a “civil right” for felons to be allowed to besmirch a college’s sports program, to force their criminal element on innocent students and athletes, then this country truly is without honor or hope.
While the populace rails for honesty and integrity in sports, from the eradication of the steroids disease to the elimination of criminals from our pro and collegiate sports ranks, the lower life forms continue to force their cries of “it’s my right!” on a land already overburdened by the weight of dope dealers, cheats, spouse abusers, thieves, and murderers.
So now we get to see how badly Utah’s Third District Court is broken.
Sadly, in a country where it’s legal to burn the flag but illegal to pray in school, there’s little room for optimism.

Southern Hospitality

2005-07-08T21:00:00.000-07:00

NOTE: While I don't usually burn a blog post with a joke, I just couldn't resist. I particularly hope my buds in Statesboro appreciate this one.

A very gentle Southern lady was driving across the Savannah River Bridge in Georgia one day.

As she neared the top of the bridge, she noticed a young man fixing (ready) to jump.

She stopped her car, rolled down the window and said, "Please don't jump, think of your dear mother and father."

He replied, "Mom and Dad are both dead; I'm going to jump."

She said, "Well, think of your wife and children."

He replied, "I'm not married and I don't have any kids."

She said, "Well, think of Robert E. Lee."

He replied, ''Who's Robert E. Lee?''

She replied, ''Well bless your heart, just go ahead and jump, you dumb ass Yankee!”

French Fried

2005-07-07T21:00:00.000-07:00

I’m not much of an overseas traveler.
In fact, the only time I’ve left American borders was a trip to the International House of Pancakes.
Okay, I did visit San Luis, Mexico back in April, but since the seedy border town scared my wife back into the U.S. within 30 minutes, I don’t think it counts.
However, everything I’ve read and heard indicates that visiting France is like spending $5,000 for a ten-day visit with your in-laws.
Insults, snubs, snide remarks, and being ignored are just some of the features of a trip to Escargot land.
That’s why I’m glad that Paris got the el snub-o for the 2012 Summer Olympics earlier this week.
Word has it that the French, who were front-runners for the gig, are pretty steamed about losing the Olympics to London.
Some say the defeat was due to President Chirac’s cruel remarks about mad cow disease in England and the terrible food found in Finland.
Obviously, Chirac is a devotee of that stalwart self-improvement tome “How To Alienate Countries and Piss Off Allies Without Really Trying.”
Others believe the defeat might have something to do with a certain country’s stance regarding a particular mideast war that is being waged by a couple of Olympic bid hopefuls.
Personally, I think the Paris bid fell to defeat because…that’s simply what Paris does best.
If there was an Olympic Surrendering event, the French would take the gold every four years.
(Okay, it’s a cheap shot to keep running into the ground the fact that the French collapsed to a Nazi marble team back in World War II, an event that occurred long before I was born, but it’s an easy target.)
But I’m still glad that the 2012 Olympics will not be held in France.
One observer sort of summed up my opinion of the country:
“As I have always said, it is too bad that France has to be wasted on the French.”
In light of their regard for Americans, I’m still amazed that France actually gave us the Statue of Liberty back in 1886.
As Dennis Miller once said, “they must have been throwing it out anyway.”
So to any French nationals reading this, all I can say is “Ce qui circule vient autour.”
Or, as we used to say down south, “What goes around comes around.”

Good Old Days

2005-07-05T08:30:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
July 5, 2005

It’s easy to find faults and flaws in today’s society, providing enough literary inspiration to keep a whiny old columnist like myself in material for centuries.
Every once in a while, I find myself wishing for the “good old days,” which basically encompasses any time period that isn’t now.
Sometimes I think about what a great life it must have been back in the Wild West days, riding the prairie and shooting bad guys.
At least, that’s the way John Wayne liked to tell it.
Other times I ponder what I missed back in the innocent and wonderful fifties, with exceedingly cool cars and care-free times where the worst venereal disease to afflict most teenagers was a bad hickey.
Even the rollicking twenties holds an allure, with images of flappers and speakeasies that promised excitement and adventure.
Admittedly, I’ve never waxed longingly for the time of the Great Depression, although I am quick to admit that it was the tempering forge which produced some of the most honorable, ambitious, and patriotic men and women in the history of the country.
However, when I find myself getting too nostalgic, I try to remember the facets of those eras which were less than appealing.
For example, the one reality of the Wild West that is never portrayed in the movies is the, um, most natural.
I’m sorry, call me spoiled, but that whole “making doody outside” thing isn’t what I would consider a Kodak moment, particularly when you consider that farmers and cattlemen never grew an annual crop of Charmin.
I shudder to think of all the things they used in its stead.
While we usually think of the pioneers as hardy and tough, the truth is that the list of simple things that could result in death is a long one.
Some contemporaries point to the 1800s as being nutritionally superior since cancer wasn’t as prevalent as it is today.
However, the truth is that most people died of something far less harrowing long before cancer got a crack at them.
Remember, this is a time when people died of that nebulous disease “old age” long before their 55th birthday.
And it takes a lot of fun out of the idea of running down to the store to pick up a few items when you consider that the trip to Ye Olde 7-Eleven was measured in days instead of minutes.
Moving on, there were plenty of hot times back in the twenties, particularly in the cities.
This is attributable not to the pearl-draped women doing the Charleston, but because air conditioning was not yet a part of the building code.
Today, Americans occasionally whine because high-speed internet hasn’t quite reached their zip code.
Back then, the big wait was on that mystical innovation known as “electricity.” Again, call me pampered, but I’ve grown attached to the alternating current teat.
Which brings me to the fifties.
Yes, it was a boom time.
Unfortunately, the biggest boom was the one we feared from the Russians, who we finally learned to refer to as the Soviets just in time for the USSR to be dismantled back into being Russia.
These days, we pay lip service to the security concerns about terrorists.
However, schools aren’t running “terrorist” drills where kids are taught to hide under their desks in the event someone named Hassan drops in.
Back in the fifties, children were instructed to hide under their desks in an orderly manner in the event of a nuclear attack from the Commies.
I’ve often wondered what miraculous stuff those desks were made of, a material that could ostensibly withstand the thousand-degree heat of an atomic explosion.
Personally, I’d like to build my next house out of that stuff and tell the insurance company to take a hike.
The truth is, each generation has its challenges.
We have ours, including a hundred-year addiction to the economic heroin known as fossil fuels, ways to extend average life-spans beyond the century mark, and a dangerous, conniving, insidious band of counter-revolutionary terrorists known as the U.S. Supreme Court.
The best part is that, fifty years from now, an overweight, middle-aged guy with a beard is going to sit down in front of whatever passes for a keyboard, and begin a story about our era.
It, too, will be entitled “The Good Old Days.”

Car Name Games

2005-07-02T06:00:00.000-07:00

I have a pet peeve, an ongoing bone to pick with American car manufacturers.
It’s similar to my take on the downward spiraling movie makers in Hollywood, but I’ll save that for another time (or you can see this week’s movie review at Mesquedia.com).
I hate industrial laziness.
For hundreds of years, Americans have been at the forefront of industry and invention and innovation and a lot of other “ins.”
But lately, the American car manufacturers have become exceedingly lazy in developing new cars.
Mostly, it’s the marketing department, which is so bankrupt of new ideas that they are simply rolling out proud names of past muscle cars and slapping them on poor excuses for automobiles.
Chevy is the leader in this practice.
In the last few years, they have introduced a new Impala, Caprice, Monte Carlo, and Malibu.
None of them even slightly resemble their namesakes from the 1970s.
Even the Corvette now looks more like a poor man’s Ferrari than the proud sports car of the 60s and 70s.
Not to be outdone, Ford is so lazy that they didn’t even bother to come up with the idea of using old names for new cars, they stole that laziness from Chevrolet.
Their latest entry is the Ford 500, which looks like a Taurus on steroids.
Henry Ford’s company is already way behind the pack in developing new cars, a race currently led by Chrysler.
This new entry is, well, it’s an ugly car.
Not as ugly as a Ford Tempo or a terminally woeful Ford Escort, but eminently uglier than the Crown Victoria.
However, to their credit, Ford has actually rolled out new versions of their two best cars, and managed to make them look like their namesakes.
The Thunderbird finally looks like a Thunderbird again, the sexy 1950s version.
It’s a work of automotive art on wheels.
But the coolest, sexiest, unequivocally the best vehicle in their lineup is the 2005 Ford Mustang.
They finally got it right (except for the price tag) after three really bad imitations, circa 1978, 1980, and 1995.
The car looks just like the 1960s version, although that model rolled out at a pretty fair price in 1965, while today’s version begins at a pricey $19,770.
While the ‘Stang is a masterpiece, it’s also an indictment of the Ford designers who haven’t come up with an attractive new auto since Lee Iacocca left them in 1978.
Ford’s Mercury division has also jumped on the bandwagon, using the proud Montego and Monterey names.
The Monterey isn’t even a car!
They’ve slapped the name on a minivan!
The Montego is…well, it’s just another ugly little car.
Come on, Ford, step up!
Get original!
If you can’t come up with a decent design on your own, steal a couple of designers from Chrysler.
I hate that this is now a German-owned car company, but you can’t argue with the fact that Chrysler has designed THE best looking vehicles in America over the last 10 years.
And, until recently, they even managed to come up with fresh names.
There is no cooler car on the planet than the Prowler, followed closely by the Viper.
While Chrysler priced the Prowler out of existence, there’s no denying that their designers are the best.
Another great looking car is the PT Cruiser.
Okay, “PT” isn’t the most impressive effort at naming a car, but at least it’s original.
In fact, the only two re-treads in Chrysler’s inventory is the Chrysler 300, a breathtakingly gorgeous car that deserved its own name, and the new Dodge Charger.
The Charger front end looks like the Dodge Magnum, the coolest station wagon to hit the highway since Chevy’s Nomad in the 1950s.
But for all its racy appearance, it looks nothing like the original Charger, a long, low, mean-looking race machine with a spoiler and a throaty engine.
Chrysler gets a pass because they at least have designed a unique-looking line of cars, but the hard work of their designers should have been rewarded with catchy new names.
In my opinion, President Bush should quit mucking around with Social Security and playing patty cake with North Korea.
There are more important laws that need to be written, like a Federal statute that would make it a capital offense to use a proud old name on crappy new cars, an offense that should be punishable by death.
Or at least a harsh sentence of 20 years behind the wheel of a Ford Escort.

Classy Lane

2005-07-01T20:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
June 28, 2005

To be honest, I’m not much of a Major League Baseball fan any more.
When I was younger, and the game was more pure, I was a huge fan.
I grew up watching the best pitching rotation in the history of the game, with Jim Palmer, Dave McNally, Mike Cuellar, and Pat Dobson each booking 20 wins in the 1971 World Series season of the Baltimore Orioles.
I remember sitting in a fifth-grade classroom watching the O’s and the Pittsburgh Pirates battling it out for the pennant, with the Pirates winning in a heart-breaking seventh game.
A teacher would get fired for allowing students to watch a baseball game in class today, although I claim it should be a legitimate part of the curriculum, since it’s such an important part of American history.
Of course, it’s a moot point, since World Series games are no longer played in the daytime.
But you have to go over 30 years down memory lane to find that bright spot, as the lane has now become obscured and shadowed by overgrown egos and steroid-juiced animals in the underbrush.
Last Tuesday night, a brief glimpse of honor and sportsmanship was exposed in a ghastly mental error that made me pine for the long-forgotten days of athletic heroes.
In the sixth inning of the National League game between the Houston Astros and the Colorado Rockies, a Colorado player hit a deep fly to Astros right fielder Jason Lane.
With runners on second and third, Lane made the catch, then turned and tossed the ball to fans in the stands.
By itself, that’s a classy move.
The problem is, the catch was only the second out.
A runner scored on his gaffe, and also paved the way for the tying run to knot the game.
With seemingly the whole world watching, and serenaded by a lusty chorus of boos, Lane realized his mistake.
Fortunately, the Astros went on to win the game, but it didn’t stop Lane from beating himself up.
This is what has elevated him to hero status in my book.
Instead of trying desperately to find someone, anyone, to blame, which is the new MLB way, or taking it out on inquisitive sports reporters who would dare to question the play in post-game interviews, Lane stood up and took it like a man.
"I just missed an out somewhere," Lane said. "There's not a lot you can say. You just certainly can't make mental errors like that."
According to the Associated Press writer, Lane went on to offer an apology to Astros fans instead of ripping them for their boos.
"The fans paid good money to see major league players," he said. "Stuff like this shouldn't happen."
Wow.
A ball player who actually cares about the fans.
This is only his second year in the bigs, and his first year as a starter, but I want to nominate him right now for the Baseball Hall of Fame.
In this age of cheaters and whiners and blame-dodgers, here is a player who actually owns up to his shortcomings.
Like guys who can hit 60 homers a year or book 300 career wins from the mound, Jason Lane is extremely rare.
And when you find someone this rare, he deserves the recognition, if only to balance the attention received by so many other players for their visits to the police station or the grand jury.
So while most don’t even know his name, you might want to write down Jason “Memory” Lane in your heart.
He is a reminder of when baseball truly was America’s game.

Fire On The Mountain

2005-06-28T08:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
June 28, 2005

“Fire on the mountain, run boys run.”
Boy, that Charlie Daniels guy sure knows how to give a weather report.
Last year around this time, I remember that being a popular catch-phrase out West, since a lot of the landscape was in flames.
I particularly recall that the heavy fire season was due to a lack of rainfall.
This year, the hills are alive once more with the sounds of burning timber.
The heavy fire season is due to…
Too much rainfall.
That’s the story being advanced by Smokey Da Bear’s keepers.
(When I was growing up, he was known as “Smokey THE Bear,” but rumor has it he changed his middle name following the 1985 Chicago football season.)
According to Da Bear’s people (not to be confused with the DeBeers people), the fires this year are attributable to the rainy January, which caused the grass to grow extra high.
The grass has now died and become more combustible than a Tom Cruise-Matt Lauer conversation about psychiatrists on Prozac.
So we have fires if we don’t get enough rain, and we have fires if we get too much rain.
Personally, I think Mother Nature is just a pyromaniac with a really big book of matches.
Word is that lightning is the most likely cause of this year’s fire crop, a fact that will really tick off the environmentalists.
They’re never happy unless they have some careless humans to kick around, and Mama Na’Ture is just a little out of their political sphere of influence.
It’s kind of tough to rally a bunch of tree huggers to carry picket signs (ironically made out of wood and poster board) and march around Washington D.C. chanting “Down with Nature” and “Nature is environmentally insensitive” and “Two, Four, Six, Eight, Who do we really hate? Na-Ture! Na-Ture!”
I also find it ironic that this is again occurring near the Fourth of July, a day noted for its man-made pyrotechnics.
First, there aren’t many bottle rockets that can compete visually with a mountain on fire at night.
Second, it’s funny to see what Mama Na’Ture can do with a little dry grass and some lightning, while dads in backyards across the country can’t get a fire going with twelve pounds of charcoal swimming in two gallons of gasoline.
And third, it makes you wonder what Mama Na’Ture has against fireworks vendors.
Once again, the flash-bang merchants will have trouble emptying their shelves in towns where fireworks have been banned due to the fire risk, except of course for the folks hired by said towns to light up the skies with high explosives and incendiary devices.
I think it may be time for us to consider moving the Fourth of July to another month, like March.
We can still call it the Fourth of July, although I like the impressive sound of “March Fourth,” which sounds like a command from George Washington to his troops.
This isn’t as far-fetched as it sounds, since our federal government is good at juggling national holidays.
(Since the implementation of “Presidents Day,” I’ll bet you can’t find ten kids who know when Washington was born, other than it was on a Monday.)
So as a reminder, please be careful this year with your sparklers, your campfires, and your back yard grilles.
Maybe have dad use only one gallon of gas this year.
After all, Mother Nature hates the competition.

21st Century Philosophers

2005-06-25T08:00:00.000-07:00

Back when civilization was fresh out of the oven and still cooling on history’s window sill, the human condition was examined by such great men as Aristotle, Plato, and Socrates.
People would gather from miles around to hear the orations from these deep thinkers, who would expound about man’s destiny, the sciences, and how to pick up babes around the Parthenon.
One of my favorites is “the unexamined life isn’t worth living.”
This was one of the gems attributed to Socrates.
It’s odd that the “Big Three,” as they were called back in those swinging BC days (“Before Cable”), all hailed from Greece.
Socrates was the first, and was the teacher of Plato, who went on to open a vo-tech school for philosophers that was attended by Aristotle.
It reminds me of the chain between three of today’s great philosophers.
It all started with Richard Pryor, who was the teacher of Eddie Murphy, who went on to school Chris Rock.
Here in the 21st century, we don’t really have philosophers.
At least, none that get quoted like the “Big Three.”
I suspect it’s because the philosopher gig doesn’t pay very well.
Instead, we have comedians dispensing the little nuggets of wisdom that explain human behavior.
The high priests of humorous wisdom today include such philosophers as Dennis Miller, Bill Maher, Robin Williams, and Eddie Izzard.
Today’s lectern is the cathode-ray altar, and the current greats sometimes opt for Hawaiian shirts and sneakers instead of robes and sandals (although Izzard often espouses his soliloquies while wearing a skirt and open-toed high heels).
Socrates was run out of town and eventually died because of his opinions.
Maher was run off the air, and his show “Politically Incorrect” was killed because of his opinions.
Fortunately, it’s just a sign that we are more civilized today, since we tend to reward our philosophers with big contracts funded by advertising dollars.
(I’m sure there’s an irony buried in there somewhere.)
Socrates died broke, mostly because he was never able to land that big chariot-wheel sponsorship.
And while today’s philosophers can choose to hawk Coke, Pepsi, Sprite, or “The Dew,” Socrates was pretty much limited to that one-time endorsement of Hemlock cola.
(I can see the TV tagline…”New and improved Hemlock cola. It’s a killer!”)
Admittedly, the words of Miller and Pryor and Williams probably won’t last through the centuries (although Pryor’s encouragement to speak up for your rights, “Act a fool, you’ll get your seat!” will probably show up in philosophy text books somewhere along the line).
But then, Aristotle never got a guest shot on the Leno show, so it all balances out.

Hell In A Handbasket

2005-06-24T01:00:00.000-07:00

A news flash for you: The World Is Going To Hell In A Handbasket.
I remember my first encounter with that statement.
At 8 years old, I overheard my paternal grandfather punctuating a long-winded diatribe with “the world is going to Hell in a handbasket”. I don’t remember the topic which inspired the statement, but I do recall the imagery.
In 1969, I had grown up with supermarkets, which involved wheeled shopping carts.
I didn’t understand what a “handbasket” was, but since it was apparently the vehicle in which we were traveling to Hell, I figured it couldn’t be a good thing.
My grandfather got out of the “Hell In A Handbasket” industry when they planted him in 1972.
He won 2nd place in game that was popular back then, called “I’ll Bet I Can Smoke 3 Packs Of Cigarettes A Day Without Dying of Cancer”. (Unfortunately, the only people I ever met who won that game were those who got hit by buses.)
My dad inherited the “Hell In A Handbasket” franchise, and business was booming.
According to him, the Democrats and the Commies (which is redundant, because he believed the terms to be synonymous) were responsible for Nixon’s implosion.
We had lost the war in Vietnam.
And Hippies were ruining everything.
Being children of the 1960’s and 70’s, most of my friends disagreed with my dad’s philosophy.
They thought he was just too old fashioned, and that the world was really a wonderful place full of new ideas and opportunities.
We alI tried to maintain that optimism through the 1980’s, when “greed was good”.
Now I’m in my 40’s.
Most of the things I read in the news confirm that my grandfather and father were right.
I’ve adopted their philosophy, although I’ve updated the vernacular.
“Hell In A Handbasket” has been replaced with “That Sucks!”, but the sentiment remains unchanged.
Kids today have taken my former place in the heirarchy, convinced that I’m just old fashioned and out of touch.
They see nothing wrong with the fact that “Ozzie and Harriet” have been supplanted with Ozzie and the Osbournes. (It’s ironic. Back then, I insisted to a parent that Ozzie qualified as “music”. Today, kids insist Ozzie qualifies as a parent.)
Schools without armed policemen have become as foreign to them as the old 1 room schoolhouses were to me.
And Constitutional Rights are as relevant today as the Magna Carta was in the days of disco.
Every generation has “H.I.A.H.B.” as a rite of passage.
It is usually bestowed with the confluence of the first gray hair and puberty-bound offspring.
Of course, in my humble opinion, I believe the handbasket now has shuttle rockets attached.
Everything in society is moving at warp speed, including our impending demise as a species.
I am not crotchety, nor a fuddy-duddy.
In today’s words, I am simply “politically incorrect”.
Typical.
Even my status as a *@&!%$# has become a kinder and gentler insult.

Fun With Pedestrians

2005-06-21T07:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
June 21, 2005

Here’s a tip for any budding humor columnists out there.
When that inevitable writer’s block rears its ugly head, simply turn on your TV.
It’s like the toy box for playful minds.
Don’t bother with watching sit-coms or mindless reality shows.
Use your TIVO to skip through to the commercials.
They represent the cerebral gold mine for humorists.
While enjoying the fruits of my Father’s Day labor, which involved exploring the multitude of comfortable positions in my La-Z-Boy chair and surfing channels like Laird Hamilton on a weekend bender, I came across an ad for Honda.
It was ironic that the ad should appear on the same day that I had caught a piece of a Dateline report which intimated that car manufacturers had gone about as far as they can go in passenger safety.
The Honda ad exalted the newest safety feature of their cars:
Pedestrian safety.
Apparently, Honda engineers have developed a way that you can hit people with your car while causing a minimum of injuries.
It involves a lot of technical yadda yadda about hood angles and front frame construction, but most of it was lost on me.
I was too busy imagining the benefits of this latest feature.
First, you really have to hand it to the Honda engineers for recognizing one of the most desperate needs of American drivers, which is a way to run over people without excessive lawsuit exposure.
My mind immediately drifted to a vision of sitting behind the wheel at a crosswalk in Las Vegas, where drunken gamblers paraded in front of my Honda wearing bulls-eyes and silly grins.
If the car lived up to the hype, you might be able to hit three or four inebriated pedestrians at a throw without invoking serious injury.
I also considered the benefits of this technology when pulling into your mother-in-law’s driveway.
The sports writer in me also reared its ugly head, with visions of new vehicular sports that don’t involve racing around an oval track.
“Pedestrian Bowling” was one of the first ideas that came to mind, followed closely by “Bumper Tag.”
I suspect this new feature will make Honda the number-one seller in California, where steering wheel-challenged drivers in a hurry to get everywhere have turned hitting pedestrians into an art form.
I also pondered what the Honda engineers might be able to come up with next.
Cars with a safety feature that keeps drivers from running over family pets would be a nice option.
Making automobiles bicycle-proof would be another, since bike riders are even more susceptible to broken body parts than pedestrians.
As part of the technology, Honda developed a new pedestrian crash-test dummy which is designed to measure the damage when a jogger has an unfortunate encounter with a Prelude.
If they can come up with a way to mass-produce the dummies at a reasonable price, I’m sure a contingent of American drivers will line up to buy them for target practice.
After all, if you’re going to hit someone with your car, you want to be good at it.
In fact, I can see a new Olympic event on the horizon.
Since we can’t seem to beat anybody in Olympic basketball or archery, this might give us a chance to up our medal count.
I would write more about this, but the commercial with the wedding party falling into the lake is on again, and I just can’t wait to find out what Enzyte Bob is “up” to next.

21st Century Pioneers

2005-06-18T10:30:00.000-07:00

Traveling from Florida to Utah gave me new respect for the Pioneers who settled this land.
After selling our house in 2001, my wife and I filled our Conestoga wagon (a Budget rental van) with everything we couldn’t unload at our last yard sale. Then we loaded my car onto a trailer behind the truck. Finally, we packed my wife’s car with suitcases, 2 daughters, a dog, a rabbit, a guinea pig, and a cockatiel.
For those of you shaking your heads and holding your noses, remember that the original wagon trains included smelly livestock. Fortunately, my wife has bad sinuses, so the aroma wasn’t much of a burden.
Our first catastrophe came when the kids snapped the antenna off of their battery-operated TV/VCR during a game of “Gimme That! It’s Mine!”. This may not seem equivalent to a broken wagon axle, but then the pioneers never suffered 2 kids going through cartoon withdrawals. We were rescued when we found a trading post (pronounced “Wal-Mart”) where we stocked up on videos.
We passed through Mobile, Alabama. My olfactorily-challenged wife called on the radio from her small SUV packed with the dog, rabbit, guinea pig, cockatiel, and 2 daughters and asked me what that smell was. Enough said about Mobile.
Like all pioneers, we marveled at the mighty Mississippi. We asked an American Mart convenience store clerk about the river, but like the Paiutes in 1847, he didn’t speak English.
We continued on through Mississippi, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas, Texas, Texas… (it’s a big state).
Eventually, we hit Utah. The map showed we could take Route 9, drive through Zion National Park, and on into St. George. Unfortunately, the map didn’t mention anything about a cover charge.
We pulled up to the tollbooth at Zion. (The Park Service calls them “Ranger Stations”. That’s a lie.). I rolled down the window of the van and informed the nice man that the blue SUV was with me. He looked at the van, looked at the car on the trailer, and looked at my wife’s car.
“Van and a car, $20 each, $10 for the trailer,” he calculated, “That’ll be $50” .
I was stunned. “You don’t understand. We’re not visiting the park. We’re just driving through on our way to St. George.”
“Doesn’t matter,” he replied.
I fumed. This was a National Park, which meant my tax dollars had already paid for it once. Route 9 was a state road, which meant the nice people of Utah had paid for it again. And people with tents were paying Ramada Inn prices for patches of dirt. I realized that National Parks are not about preservation or wilderness, they are about money.
“How about this,” I ventured. “What if we promise not to look while we’re driving through?”
The park ranger was not amused. We paid.
Finally, our caravan arrived in St. George. Like the pioneers before us, we were thankful to have survived the long journey, and to have only been scalped once.

Fax Terrorists

2005-06-16T08:00:00.000-07:00

“This message is intended only for the use of the individual or entity to which it is addressed and may contain information that is privileged, confidential, and exempt from disclosure under applicable law. If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient or agent responsible for delivering the message to the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this electronic transmission in error, please delete it from your system without copying it, and notify the sender by reply e-mail or by calling (999) 555-5959, so that our address record can be corrected.”

This is the footnote that is popping up on business faxes all over the country.
Once upon a time in a soul-less city not so far away, some bright but bored attorney sat down at another in a long line of meaningless meetings.
Instead of doodling images of Tweety and Bugs, he starts drafting this disclaimer while the speaker drones on about something like the dangerous food-poisoning liability exposure of Homeowner Association presidents who eat their boogers.
After the meeting, the practical-joke-loving barrister decides it would be a hoot to see how many clients he can rook into believing that this disclaimer is absolutely critical to the protection of the American free enterprise system.
So now we see this stupid clause at the bottom of nearly every business fax transmission in the country, which is often longer than the actual message being sent.
Eventually, one of these lands on my desk.
Is it just me, or is there something odd about somebody sending an unwanted fax to someone by mistake, using up my paper, toner, and phone time (when I’m expecting a truly IMPORTANT fax from the pizza place down the street to let me know what toppings are available), then threatening ME over THEIR mistake?
In a tremendous irony, the fax is to announce another meaningless meeting of some cataclysmically dull group.
Let’s be honest, this unwanted fax would ordinarily find a home among its junk-mail brethren in the bottom of my circular file without a second glance.
Unless of course it included some sort of juicy gossip about a political leader or co-worker, which would immediately find its way onto a website or news wire within the hour.
(Face it, if I inadvertently catch an errant doctor’s note explaining why Paris Hilton’s gonorrhea isn’t responding to treatment, I’m not going to sit on that. Pulitzer Prizes have been awarded for less, I don’t care WHAT the little disclaimer says.)
(Disclaimer: to the best of my knowledge, Paris Hilton does not and has not ever had gonorrhea…see, I have lawyers too.)

Scientology

2005-06-15T01:00:00.000-07:00

I try to keep an open mind about religion, although I am wary of nearly every organized religious body.
The recent stir about Tom Cruise and his belief in Scientology made me curious.
So I went online to try and research the core tenets of this burgeoning new belief system.
Here is what I learned:
First, L. Ron Hubbard is their Buddha.
Hubbard, the best-selling author of “Dianetics,” seems to be the lynchpin of the movement.
I’m always fascinated by obscenely wealthy men espousing their religious beliefs.
It actually makes more sense than our current system of worship, which is often led by guys who can’t even afford a decent haircut or a leisure suit that doesn’t make that “whick whick” noise when they walk.
I’m not saying that following rich guys on their lunatic crusades is a good idea either, as evidenced by those who really believed that six million dollars was going to buy Oral Roberts a “get out of heaven free” card, that Jimmy Swaggert didn’t have sexual relations with that woman, and that Jim Bakker could offer them a comfy place in the hereafter if they would just fund an adequate air-conditioning system for his pet’s dog house.
But maybe ol’ L-Ron is onto something, so I kept reading.
I now know that “the aims of Scientology are a world without insanity, without criminals, without war, where the able can prosper and where Man is free to rise to greater heights.”
I know this because they have it posted on nearly every page of their website.
Of course, nowhere on that website does it explain exactly how that’s to be done.
The answer is in one of the dozens of L. Ron Hubbard books that are offered for sale on the site.
Which is a hint that Scientology is a real profit-based religion.
Unlike the Mormons who will gladly have a pair of persuasive, clean-cut missionaries hand-deliver a free copy of the Bible and the Book of Mormon, or the Gideons who save souls every day with their free bedside Bibles in nearly every hotel in the country, it takes a major credit card to find salvation at the church of Scientology.
After an hour on the site, I still don’t know whether Scientologists believe in God, because they play their principles pretty close to the vest.
In fact, I haven’t seen this much institutional secrecy since the last three or four times people have tried to suck me into becoming an Amway distributor.
But I suspect the answer would be a big “no” on the Creator, since it appears ol’ L-Ron hasn’t figured a way to copyright his image or trademark.
It also appears that the church is just jammed full of former political speech writers and Madison Avenue execs whose previous God, swathed in green, let them down.
I say this because I haven’t seen so much intellectual misdirection, obfuscation, side-stepping, and double-speak since the Republican National Convention.
(Or maybe it was the Democratic National Convention. All those guys look alike to me.)
The Scientology website never does explain what they believe in, why they believe in it, or why we should believe, too.
Except of course for the fact that Tom Cruise believes in it.
Which, when you think about it, is really reason enough to sign up.
After all, can your prayers, rituals, or flagellations at whatever religious franchise you currently call home, help you land a date with Katie Holmes?
I rest my case.

Thick Skin

2005-06-14T02:00:00.000-07:00

Workman Chronicles
Published in the Desert Valley Times
June 14, 2005

I came across a message website recently that claimed I was a complete idiot.
They didn’t elaborate as to what I did to earn such a moniker, but it was in print, so it has to be true.
I’m thinking of taking all the labels that have been hung on me since coming out of the literary closet (admitting that I am a Dave Barry wannabe, taking the major pay cut, becoming a professional writer, attacking innocent yearbook kids, and using the ugly slur “adequate” in reference to the local library), and including them on my business card.
You know, like haughty professionals who punctuate their name with PhD, MBA, CPA, etc.
I would be “Morris Workman, Complete Idiot, Arrogant Jerk, Untalented Hack, Dufus, Donkey.”
(I haven’t really been called a Donkey, but this is a family newspaper and I can’t use the “A-word” that my detractor actually used.)
Since it won’t all fit on one card, I may have to abbreviate it as “Morris Workman, CI, AJ, UH, D&D,”
The bad part is that people may not know what all of the initials mean until after I open my mouth.
I’ll admit that it stings to be called such things, but it also allows me a wonderful latitude in behavior.
I can act a fool, then simply point to my title as a Complete Idiot, shrug my shoulders, and say in a perfect Tony Soprano voice, “hey, whattaya gonna do?”
Like most people, I want to be loved by everyone, respected by the powerful, admired by the meek, desired by the voluptuous, and tolerated by my wife.
However, until I finish making payments on my home-study course in hypnosis, I suspect this will have to be an unfulfilled wish.
Like it or not, this is the cost of being a semi-public figure willing to share his musings.
Even such luminaries as Bill Clinton and Pee Wee Herman discovered that, if you put it out there, people will talk bad about you.
Fortunately, I have a good support system of friends, family, and fans that simultaneously keep me grounded and above ground.
I also have a tolerant editor whose litmus test for publication basically consists of “will it get us sued, shot, or shut down?”
He has also counseled me repeatedly not to take it personally when people want to figuratively club me over the head for telling a truth they would rather not know.
I’m sure that even the kid who blabbed about the Emperor not wearing any clothes received hate mail.
So the more I write, the more I need to toughen up.
I want you to keep that in mind the next time you see me in public.
I’m not fat.
It’s just thick skin.

Unveiling

2005-06-13T20:00:00.000-07:00

Well, folks, I would like to once again thank Alison, Brad, Ken, Luke, Michelle, Scott, and Ted for their guidance regarding the Sports Blog.
I spent the weekend re-vamping the Workman Chronicles website (not the blog…as my dad would say, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it).
As part of the facelift, the address has changed (www.mesquedia.com, although www.morrisworkman.com will still work).
I have also done away with the Phantom of the Cineplex blog, and will de-activate the DVT Sports Blog by June 30.
Again, I want to thank those who took the time and cared enough to comment.
Now, on with the show!

Little Help

2005-06-09T00:30:00.000-07:00

I need a favor.
I need you to take a look at the other blog I operate, "DVT Sports Blog."
I'm doing some journalistic housekeeping, and I'm contemplating shutting it down because it doesn't get much action or visitation.
This isn't a shameless ploy to lure you to another ego-stroking blog.
I want your feedback here as to whether I should keep it or dump it.
Scott, ol' buddy, I'd really appreciate your appraisal.
I also would value the input from those of you who have continued to visit the Workman Chronicles, who already know my style and haven't run screaming into the woods yet.
Don't hold back, let me know what you think. (As Hemingway said, "we have to kill our darlings." It may be time for some delete-key euthanasia.)
I appreciate it.

Stephen King Fan-atic

2005-06-08T23:30:00.000-07:00

In looking over the last two columns, I noticed consecutive references to Stephen King.
I guess that’s to be expected occasionally, because King is my literary idol, my Buddha, my Vishnu, my Bo Bice and Kerry Underwood all rolled into one.
I want to be Stephen King when I grow up.
While other more sophisticated writers might cite Thoreau or Emerson or even Steinbeck as their most significant influences, my benchmark begins and ends with the Dark One.
It’s funny, because I’m not even a particular fan of the horror genre.
When evaluating novels and other written material, I basically cull them into three categories: 1 – “I can write better than that;” 2 – “That’s like something I would write;” 3 – “I wish I had written that.”
(That’s not arrogance…the amount of stuff out there which exists in category three is sufficient explanation for why I write for a twice-a-week newspaper in the middle of the desert.)
Stephen King lives in category three.
Always.
I believe that his signature on a dinner check is more “category-three” than anything Tolstoy or Faulkner ever penned.
While most people think of him as the Master of Horror, I see him as the Master of Character Development.
Any writer can tell a story.
Truly great writers can breathe life into their protagonists, and make you actually care about them when they get eaten by the giant bat monster.
(Let’s see Tolstoy come up with a story about a werewolf-fighting kid in a wheelchair. Classic!)
There has never been a major character that I didn’t wonder about after finishing a King tome, craving more.
Hopefully, this sheds some light on why his name may occasionally pop up in a posting.
I’m a supporter. I’m a wannabe. I’m a fan.

Book Money

2005-06-07T07:30:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
June 7, 2005

Like most writers, I have fantasized regularly about publishing that “Great American Novel” and being swept away on the tides of outrageous fortunes.
Lowering my sights a little, lately I’ve been toying with the idea of putting together a compendium of old articles into a bound form and selling them at gas stations and restaurants.
Now, with school drawing to a close, my eyes have been opened.
Heck with traditional publishing.
It’s too much like work, and the payoff is hardly worth the effort.
I’m going into the yearbook business.
All you have to do is take a bunch of pictures, spend 15 minutes on witty captions, slap it together with some paste and a pretty cover, and you’re on your way to Bill Gates land.
I say that because our local high school is charging students $120 for this year’s edition of the yearbook.
Stephen King’s latest book, “The Dark Tower,” is selling for $35.
That’s $85 less than the VVHS yearbook.
To be honest, I’ve never seen the yearbook on the New York Times Best Seller List.
(Personally, I think that’s a significant slight, considering the tome is filled with such brilliant literary bon mots as “Sally and Tammy fooling around in the cafeteria.”)
And yet we’re expecting kids (which, like most things, really means “parents”) to pony up $120 for this collection of high school hijinks.
Some folks think this is less about selling books and more about holding high school memories hostage.
Even worse than the fact that it’s three times more expensive than one of the most pricey productions ever produced by an internationally best-selling author, you can’t get the discounted model of the yearbook at Amazon.com or Books-A-Million.
To be fair, kids could have gotten the book for $60 if they had been willing to pre-order back in the fall, much like the $17.99 price you can secure now if you pre-order Harry Potter’s latest adventure at Amazon, which will be $29.99 if you wait until it’s actually been finished, published, and printed.
Can you imagine buying a house using this method?
Where someone requires you to pay $300,000 for a house that’s not even built yet?
(Wait, this is Mesquite…that actually happens here. Sorry, my bad.)
But even at $60, that’s a pretty big number for such a slim book, still nearly twice as expensive as the 672-page Potter tale.
And J.K. Rowling’s sixth book doesn’t contain a single advertisement for such local establishments as Wally Burgers or Fred and Barney’s Real Estate which fills the back pages of our yearbook.
I’m sure it’s not really the school’s fault, since they are most likely the victims of confiscatory pricing by the manufacturer.
(Although it’s ironic that the school apparently has to pay more for a collection of cheesy photos than they pay for 12th grade Calculus text books).
And I’m sure the finished product has to price out at double the original cost to make up for any leftover books that don’t sell.
After all, it’s not like there’ll be a booming E-bay market for 2005 VVHS yearbooks.
But it just seems an unfair burden on either end of the school year, whether folks have to find another $60 in September after selling their blood in order to afford the back-to-school clothes, back-to-school supplies, and that ever-important back-to-school IPod, or they need to come up with an extra $120 after funding their kid’s high school ring, graduation garb, graduation announcements, senior trip expenses, SAT tests, and party supplies for the end-of-school bash in third period geometry class.
I don’t even want to imagine the horror for some of our local families with three or four kids in high school.
What do they do, buy one yearbook, then parcel out the pages?
“Tommy, you can have it on Monday, and your friends can sign pages 18-23. Janie, Tuesday is your day, pages 24-29…”
So next spring, look for my new book, “The 2006 VVHS Budget Discount Yearbook.”
And I’ll only charge $34.
After all, who do I think I am, Stephen King?

Book Desecration

2005-06-04T13:30:00.000-07:00

Okay, I’ve tried to resist, but I can no longer remain silent.
I am a book desecrater.
I’m guilty.
Call up the Muslim Chamber of Commerce and the Library Police.
I have actually stepped on a book.
In fact, I once kicked a book across my bedroom floor after it viciously reached out and attacked my big toe on my way to the bathroom one night.
I once used a Bible as a coaster for my bedside soda in a hotel that was too cheap to provide a decent nightstand.
I have used books to level wobbly tables, hold up temporary shelves, and as weights to help expedite the glue-bonding process.
In fact, looking around my desk, I currently have about a half dozen of them laying on the floor in spectacularly un-sacred fashion.
(Two of them happen to be Readers Digest, which probably don’t count as books.)
To be honest, none of those books were the holy Quran, but that’s just because I don’t happen to have a copy of that highly-popular text stashed on my bookcase.
If I had a copy, it would get just as badly abused as my Bible, my Book of Mormon, and my paperback copy of Stephen King’s “The Stand.”
(To be honest, “The Stand” is the only one of the three that I’ve actually read cover to cover.)
I love books.
As a writer, I hold them more sacred than the average page-turner.
But I’m nowhere in the same zip code as those who think book abuse should be punished by blowing up real human beings.
The big story these days, at least until the Michael Jackson jury comes in, is the desecration of Qurans at the Guantanamo Bay prisoner of war camp.
Apparently, a sizeable portion of Middle Easterners have taken the kicking and maybe even flushing of these books as the okay to suit up in their favorite explosive vest (the ultimate in instant weight-loss couture) and head out in search of innocent women and children to blow up.
Oddly, they seem to make a habit of blowing up other members of their own religion instead of actually springing for low-fare tickets to Cuba on Assassin Airlines to try and take it out on those actually using their holy book as soccer placebos.
It might have something to do with the fact that those doing the kicking are armed, and will actually shoot back, unlike the easier victims like the nine-year-old in Baghdad who can now spend eternity in her casket without arms and legs.
But that’s to be expected from a collection of lowly cowards who make a weekly picnic out of burning American flags because Americans kicked Islamic text books.
(Is “irony” a foreign concept in the Muslim religion?)
This is not a free-pass for American soldiers to begin using the Quran as their Charmin substitute.
I think everybody gets it.
Desecrating somebody’s holy book is wrong.
I understand how dedicated fighting men could lose sight of this, as they are so desperate they are willing to use any psychological squeeze if it gets someone to give information that saves one life.
But, in another ironic twist, book bashing is bad press.
So we as Americans need to stop this particular insult and go back to making remarks about the captives’ mothers and camel sex.
(Come on, Larry the Cable Guy gets raunchier than that in the first six minutes of his act, and he’s rated PG-13.)
And Muslims need to get over themselves.
They need to understand that no collection of paper and ink, no matter how sacred or revered, not even an autographed first edition of Stephen King’s “Carrie,” is worth one drop of human blood.

Dueling Lawsuits

2005-06-02T23:00:00.000-07:00

Back in the good old days, when America got into a snit with another country, bombs usually ensued.
Now, the “New America” has taken the path of wimps and scam artists everywhere.
Instead of relying on good old fashioned bomb payloads, the U.S. is going…
…to court.
The U.S. and the new European Union are going toe to toe in the World Trade Organization court, with claims and counterclaims flying all over the place.
Ironically, the flying claims revolve around airplane manufacturers.
It seems that America’s big airplane maker, Boeing, is unhappy because the French had the nerve to actually design and build a plane that is bigger and better than anything we have to offer.
Once upon a time, the American spirit would have dictated that we simply pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps and build a new and better mousetrap to regain superiority.
Today, we instead choose to whine and do what most weaklings do at the first sign of an imagined slight, which is to sue somebody.
The lawsuit claims that the European airplane manufacturer Airbus, which has been steadily eating Boeing’s lunch for the last decade, was able to gain a financial edge because of contributions from several European governments, leading to their production of the biggest and most fuel-efficient airplane in the world.
The response by the French was, well, typically French.
They’re suing us back.
The French claim that the U.S. has been subsidizing Boeing for decades.
To be honest, I’m not sure that the U.S. government’s involvement with Boeing could be construed as a benefit to the airplane maker.
After all, NASA is almost completely funded and run by the U.S. government, and only three of the five space shuttles operated by that partnership have managed to stay in one piece.
In other words, 40% of the flying machines built by the U.S. agency have suffered horrendous crashes, which isn’t a very reassuring flight safety record.
The truth is that the red, white, and blue emporer isn’t wearing any clothes.
Our government shouldn’t be in the airplane business.
If Boeing can’t do a better job of staying ahead of the competition on their own, (remember, the competition is French, for crying out loud!), they deserve to join their counterparts Studebaker, DeLorean, and American Motors on the bankrupt corporation trash heap.
If our airplane companies aren’t good enough, then maybe we no longer deserve the title as the best country in the world.
And our world image isn’t improved by whining to an international court.

The War On Voter Apathy

2005-05-31T08:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
May 31, 2005

It is an unfortunate fact that, unless we’re electing a President or the newest American Idol, too many citizens in this country could care less about voting.
The further down the political totem poll you go, from Federal down to county and city elections, the thinner the voter turnout.
Now we could sit and whine about this, but whining never accomplishes anything unless you’re Jessica Simpson.
What makes this country great is that, instead of doing nothing when faced with a problem like voter apathy, we often rise up, put on our thinking caps, brainstorm, found think tanks, compile lists of suggestions, debate various options, develop focus groups, designate committees, threaten detractors, and THEN do nothing.
In that spirit, I have some suggestions on how to solve this growing dilemma.
First, I have to give credit/blame to Mrs. Susan Bennett, the incredible journalism teacher at our local high school, for suggesting this topic.
I know that there is hope for the future of education in America based on her first suggestion on how to end election apathy:
Threaten to shoot voters.
This isn’t as Lee-Harvey-Oswald as it sounds.
Mrs. Bennett pointed out that this method worked well in Afghanistan and Iraq, where citizens poured into polling stations even after being threatened with death by the various bad guys in those countries.
Voters there braved bullets and car bombs to make their mark.
In our country, we won’t brave a light rain or rush hour traffic to make our voices heard.
She also suggested a new rule where you can’t speak at a City Council meeting, or complain out loud at the coffee shop, unless you can show your “I Voted” sticker.
In addition to encouraging people to vote, it would also cut down those marathon City Council meetings where everyone wants their 15 minutes of fame on cable access channel 46 (which has now been moved to channel nine).
A third concept involves a unique “poll tax,” which would be assessed against anyone who doesn’t show up to vote.
I like this, because the quickest way to influence the behavior of a populace is to threaten their Bingo money.
It also inspired me to come up with some ideas of my own.
Right away, I thought a solution might be to actually pay people to vote.
Unfortunately, I’m afraid we would get sued for patent infringement by the city of Chicago, who founded that concept back in the 30’s.
(For the record, they also hold patents on “Dead People Voting” and the copyrighted election-day phrase “Vote Early, And Vote Often.”)
Of course, when reality isn’t working, turn to reality-TV.
Instead of campaign signs and public debates, we could have the candidates take turns doing silly and death-defying stunts, then instead of voting FOR them, we would vote them off one by one a la Survivor.
Or make the candidates sing, then citizens could phone in on a series of 800 numbers to choose which ones become the next “Mesquite Idol.”
Another idea would be to disguise the voting booths as slot machines, allow folks to make their selection, drop in a quarter, then pull the lever.
(Unfortunately, according to some people in town, no matter which candidate you select, the reels would just come up “Joker, Joker, Joker.”)
If that didn’t work, we could just do away with voting booths altogether.
We would line up the five candidates inside five different dunking tanks such as those you find at the carnival, then hand out baseballs to a line of voters.
The last candidate to stay dry wins.
Frivolity aside, voting is serious business.
We have kids in the Middle East eating sand sandwiches every day while wearing “Shoot Me” signs on their backs, all for the sake of a human’s right to determine his own political destiny.
We owe it to them to show respect for their sacrifices, and those of soldiers who have died before them.
Besides, government studies have shown that failing to vote increases the occurrences of warts, Herpes, sexual dysfunction, memory loss, psoriasis, halitosis, marital infidelity, poor gas mileage, and bling anemia.
So do yourself a favor, one which benefits your friends, neighbors, and insurance agents:
Please vote on June 7.

Memorial Day

2005-05-30T12:30:00.000-07:00

Today marks a unique American tradition known as “Memorial Day.”
As bizarre as the custom of celebrating the death of Jesus by flaunting bunnies delivering eggs and marshmallow-filled baby chicks, it is a holiday where citizens raise a flag and burn hamburgers on the grill in celebration of those who gave their lives in time of war.
I’m not sure of the connection, but there it is.
It has also melted into a generalized acknowledgement of all persons deceased, not just those who died in the service.
My daughter recently asked about the difference between Memorial Day and Veterans Day.
I told her that Veterans Day is basically for those soldiers who actually made it through the war.
That is in no way disrespectful to those courageous souls who made the ultimate sacrifice on behalf of their nation, but a short-hand response small enough to satisfy the curiosity of an MTV-generation teenager.
While we all cherish the extra day off from work, most of us have lost the spirit of the day.
This is evidenced by the wane of Memorial Day parades in most small towns like mine, where a good haircut used to be sufficient cause to roll out the fire trucks and plant the mayor on the back seat of an antique car.
But we’ve lost our bearings on most of our American holidays.
For example, Arbor Day.
Other than some nebulous reference to trees, what is its purpose? How are we supposed to celebrate?
Columbus Day is another big one that has lost its significance in the face of political correctness, where the hero has been knocked from his perch as the valiant discoverer of the western continents down to a land-grubbing, Native American bashing expansionist who exploited a new discovery for its resources.
(Columbus sounds like a good Republican to me, so I don’t understand the conundrum.)
Independence Day has managed to maintain its patriotic symbolism, where we basically paint anything that will sit still long enough with red, white, and blue, then blow stuff up with colorful explosives at the end of the day.
Even a major holiday like Christmas has evolved from a celebration of the birth of the Savior into a day featuring a jolly guy in a red suit and a Welfare state of mind, handing out toys to kids.
It has become so absurd with protests by every nut-job anti-religion and alter-religion group that it won’t be long before the word “Christmas” will join Carlin’s list of the seven words you can’t say on TV.
And Labor Day?
Even I can’t figure that one out. My best guess is that it must have been some bargaining chip forced by the UAW somewhere along the way, back when unions actually had a place at the social and political table.
If truth-in-advertising laws really worked, we would just be honest and rename Memorial Day and Labor Day as Start Day and Finish Day, because their best use is as the demarcation points of the beginning and ending of public schools’ summer vacation.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have charcoal to nurture.

Diabetic Dreaming

2005-05-28T17:30:00.000-07:00

I am a diabetic.
(Sounds like the intro at some twelve-step meeting, huh?)
I don’t usually mention this to people, because I never want to be one of those annoying people who bore people to tears with their litany of maladies.
It’s a genetic gift from my father, who died from diabetes-related complications, which is a kind way of saying they ran out of things to amputate.
But one thing he told me about this illness is true:
If you have to have a dread disease like diabetes, this is the moment in history to have it.
One of the biggest benefits is the scientific advances in the area of artificial sweeteners.
Thanks to Sweet ‘N Low, saccharine, aspartame, Equal, and Splenda, I can eat almost anything that normal people eat.
(Obviously, I also don’t have any politically correctness when it comes to the disease. Nobody needs to handle me like a Faberge’ egg, no need for people to speak in whispers around me, I’m not pitching for a telethon or insisting on some idiotic title like “sugar-challenged.”)
Food manufacturers have also smoothed the road for diabetics with sugar-free sodas, sugar-free ice cream, sugar-free candy, etc.
Any day now, I’m waiting for someone to introduce sugar-free cotton candy and sugar-free Twinkies.
In fact, Splenda is almost the ninth wonder of the world, since it’s basically sugar-free sugar.
These are blessed innovations, particularly since I don’t think they will find a cure for diabetes in my lifetime.
I say this for two reasons.
First, as Chris Rock so eloquently pointed out, doctors aren’t going to do anything that stupid. Doctors, like dope dealers, have learned that the money is in the come-back.
Rock said in one of his videos, “What was the last thing they actually cured? Polio?”
I have to agree with this. In my case, I have had the disease for about 6 years. I know what I need, know what to watch for, know the warning signs and the pre-warning signals.
But my last three doctors have all insisted that I can’t have that three-month prescription (which, until last month, hadn’t changed in over three years), unless I make the quarterly pilgrimage to their office.
They will not find a cure for diabetes because it cuts off a pretty significant revenue stream.
The second reason I know there is no cure on the horizon is President Bush.
Most of the positive reports on diabetic advances point to stem cell research.
Unfortunately, our Prez has a real problem with any medical breakthroughs that involve the use of discarded fetal residue.
Or, as the extreme right wing considers them, the murdered pre-Jesus (since every aborted zygote has the potential to be the next Messiah, in their opinion.)
So while my life will most likely be shortened by the disease, I am grateful for the quality of life that has been made possible by our sugar substitute sorcerers.
To paraphrase the late James Dean, I’ll live fast, die young, and eat plenty of sugar-free Reeses Peanut Butter Cups before I go.

Watching TV

2005-05-26T19:30:00.000-07:00

A few quick observations about the cathode-ray teat…
…First, NBC announced they won’t be renewing “Revelations.”
I really wanted to like this show, and thought the premise had promise.
But leave it to last-place NBC to make the end of the world into a boring, plodding, tiresome series…
…Word has it that Fear Factor may also be on the chopping block. Maybe there IS a God…
Back in the seventies, I was a slave to Saturday Night Live. My parents weren’t particularly impressed. Now, my teenage daughter is addicted to Mad TV, and I just can’t stand the show. I’m sure my dad is in heaven, pointing his finger and laughing…
…Bashing NBC one more time, why can’t they leave things alone in the scheduling? I finally found an enjoyable drama that didn’t revolve around cops or doctors. I actually penciled the show “Medium” into my day planner. Now, in its first season, you have to be a mind-reader to know when the damn thing will be on, since NBC has pre-empted the show three different times this year for such inspiring TV fare as “Hercules.” I’ve decided to hell with it. I’ve completely given up on the show and the folks at the No Brains Company network…
…We need a new American catch phrase. There hasn’t been a good one since Budweiser’s “Whazzzzzup.” I miss “Where’s the Beef?” and “I can’t believe I ate the whole thing,” and even the Quizno’s Spongemonkeys singing “We love the subs.” Can you think of a current TV ad catch phrase, other than Paris Hilton’s trite and irritating “That’s hot!”?...
…Sitcoms continue to circle the bowl after the reality-TV inspired flush. “Everybody Loves Raymond” is the latest to go down the pipes. Meanwhile, like the stubborn nuggets of feces that just won’t go down, “That 70’s Show,” “Two And A Half Men,” “Still Standing,” and “King of Queens” remain above the whirlpool. I never thought I would hear myself say I miss “Friends.”…
…And I guess I’m just getting too darn fussy. I never thought Bruce Springsteen’s song “57 Channels And Nothing On” would actually be a daily mantra, but I am finding it harder and harder to find anything fit to watch. Thank God for a huge library of old movies. I would rather watch “Backdraft” for the 83rd time than try to stomach a single episode of “Stacked.”…

Playing With Money

2005-05-24T01:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
May 24, 2005

After a relatively long period of monetary stability, it appears that America’s financial underpinnings are in flux.
It’s not the stock market, or the value of the dollar against the yen.
It’s money itself.
For years, American money was boring yet consistent.
Your five-dollar bill in 1973 looked just like your 1994 model.
And the biggest change in change (yes, it’s a pun, and yes, it’s a lousy one) came when pennies quit carrying wheat and began carrying advertisements for one of D.C.’s favorite tourist attractions.
(For those of you playing along at home, it’s the Lincoln Memorial building.)
Now, you can plunge your hand into a plastic casino cup full of metal money and come up with three dozen different varieties of coinage.
The fronts still look the same (kind of), but the backs are as varied as, well, as the states.
If you don’t see Washington’s mug on the front, you might be holding a quarter with a minted story about Alabama or Maryland, or you could be holding a bus token from Saskatchewan.
Like most folks, I thought the idea of each state getting their own quarter was cute in the beginning.
Now that the variety has become so diverse, you need a degree in numismatics to figure out if you’ve got enough change for that Snickers bar.
And if it’s confusing for me, what kind of torture do you think it poses for tourists visiting from other countries?
They might wonder how much a quarter is worth.
But then the subtle nuances kick in.
Is a Georgia quarter worth as much as an Ohio quarter?
If you try to use a Virginia quarter to buy North Carolina cigarettes in South Dakota, do the money police show up to take you away?
Not satisfied to keep people off-balance about their quarters, the U.S. Mint is now employing the same shell game with our nickels.
It’s still Tommy Jefferson on the front, but the back is festooned with various state mottoes and maybe even an ad for the last Star Wars episode.
But the fun doesn’t end with jingling money.
Have you seen the latest $20 bill?
No you haven’t, because they changed it again five minutes ago.
I used to suffer from a national inferiority complex, because our money was pretty boring with its shades of green, while other countries used blues and reds and purples.
Now, our newest folding money changes colors right before your eyes, with secret images and magic threads and a seeing eye over the pyramid that captures electronic images of the inside of your wallet and transfers the photos to a huge database in Washington D.C. where bureaucrats collate the information to determine whether your taxes need to be increased.
(Basically, if there is a single dollar bill remaining in your wallet, your taxes are too low and need a bump.)
I always feel guilty when I spend one of those colorful new bills, because anything that artistic deserves to be hanging on my refrigerator with a gold star and smiley face.
And have you seen the new $100 bill?
Okay, I work for the DVT, so I haven’t seen one either.
But I hear they’re tinkering with the color schemes and inserting GPS homing beacons so Uncle Sam can gather them up more easily every April 15.
I know the current currency designs (yes, another pun, but this one is marginally better) are intended to discourage lazy counterfeiters from lining up at Kinko’s, but I’ll be happy when the U.S. Treasury finally finds a version they like and declares a winner that they’re going to stick with.
Otherwise, playing Monopoly at my house is just going to get more confusing.

Miller’s Rants Canned

2005-05-21T01:00:00.000-07:00

CNBC pulled the plug on comedian Dennis Miller’s talk show last week.
Personally, I never understood the logic in putting that show on CNBC in the first place.
The cable network is supposed to be the purview of the financial arts, a haven for stock brokers and accountants.
Ever met an accountant with a sense of humor?
Every night, Miller must have stepped onto the set saying to himself “Tough network, tough network.”
I’m glad his show is over.
To me, Dennis Miller isn’t just a comedian.
He’s a 21st century philosopher.
He was also the victim of an uninspired writing team that could have served as poster children for the Peter Principle.
Hopefully, if he doesn’t just kick back on his jillions in the bank and hang around the house annoying his wife, this will free Miller to return in a format more suitable to his style, one which will allow him to go back to the winning formula of writing his own material.
His HBO show was fantastic in the early years because it was only once a week, allowing Miller to write most of his own jokes and rants.
Unfortunately, I don’t think he’ll ever get the hang of interviewing guests, because so few of them match his intellect.
“So, Jessica, you have a take on this whole Iraqi torture tale?”
“Well, Dennis, you know I believe in equality, and if the guy wants to be a welder, who are we to say no? Just because he’s from South America doesn’t mean he shouldn’t be allowed to use a torch! By the way, did you see the cute Jimmy Choo shoes on the cover of my new CD?”
Also, even if you’re Dennis Miller, making commentary on bad skits featuring untalented members of your incompetent studio crew and staff isn’t comedy.
In redneck parlance, it’s shooting over a baited field.
I don’t always agree with his stances, particularly on handguns and the Constitution, but I will quickly submit that he is one of the smartest guys ever to grace the small screen.
I’m glad that he is free at last.

Generation Gap Of Sound

2005-05-17T08:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
May 17, 2005

Back in the day, a young man measured his worth using the currency of horsepower.
Your level of “cool” was directly proportional to how fast your car ran.
I would like to say that I was among the elite in this measurement back in the 70s, but there is only so much “cool” to be derived from driving a Pinto station wagon.
(Admittedly, my “cool” quotient rose a few clicks after the news broke about that unique Ford factory accessory known as “the exploding gas tank,” but my potential would always be limited by my four-cylinder engine.)
Guys would get together and compare engine displacements and transmission ratios, convinced that bigger was better for attracting girls.
Little did we know that we were conceptually correct, only mistaken about where size counted.
Most of us were into our late teens before we realized that size indeed mattered, but that the important measurement involved the bulge in our pants.
Specifically, in the right hip pocket, where the size of a guy’s wallet meant a lot more than the size of his hemi.
But that didn’t stop us from doling out machismo in the form of mag wheels and oversized carbs (which had nothing to do with food ingestion and everything to do with fuel injection.)
Today, that foolish notion about “bigger is better” continues with the teen set.
And the standard still revolves around a guy’s car.
However, in this age of nearly three dollars a gallon for high-test gasoline, it’s not about how big your engine might be or how fast you can turn the quarter mile.
It’s a question of decibels.
“Coolness” is now determined by the size of your sub-woofer.
Like kids in the seventies who plowed hard-earned dollars into Hurst shifters and traction bars, today’s macho teen is working like a union apprentice to get the money necessary to pump up the volume in his ride.
They spend hundreds of dollars on amplifiers and bass bins in the quest for testosterone supremacy, which is determined by who has the loudest stereo system.
One of the by-products is today’s kid is every bit as obnoxious in his automotive pursuits as we were in my day.
When you spend that much money on your car, you can’t just quietly ride around the community in silent superiority.
With a tricked-out 300 horsepower Camaro, the only way to get your deserved attention was to gun the engine loudly and squeal wheels at every intersection.
In fact, we used to joke about stop signs as being a permission-giving acronym for “Spin Tires On Pavement.”
Here in the 21st century, the financial investment made by some of these adolescent car enthusiasts absolutely demands that it’s knobs-right on the volume and bass controls as they cruise around town, a musical “look at me.”
I can tell I’m getting old, because I can look back fondly on the traffic-law misadventures of my high school brethren, racing their cars at 60 mph in front of the school (where “school zone” held a different meaning than that intended by our local gendarmes), while staying in a constant state of irritation by the “boom, boom-boom” of today’s sound-barrier-breaking scofflaws.
I’m sure a part of my irritation is a result of the musical generation gap which has probably existed for centuries.
(I figure parents in the 1800’s probably chided their teenagers often with such statements as “Turn down that Chopin crap right now! Beethoven and Mozart, now THAT was music!”)
It seems that booming rap music is the preferred song selection for those with the heavy duty sound gear, even if the driver happens to be a geeky little white kid with taped-up glasses and a pocket protector.
Apparently, the Dixie Chicks and Merle Haggard just don’t make the fillings in your teeth rattle sufficiently when played through these monster systems.
So while these young purveyors of sound pollution continue to do what teens have done for centuries, which is to annoy adults, those of us who grew up in the Mustang and Firebird eras will just have to remember that we were young once, and simply look back fondly on the days when aggravating adults was our own mission in life.

Methane Gas Gambit

2005-05-14T18:00:00.000-07:00

The Discovery Channel recently broadcast a documentary about the Bermuda Triangle.
While this is a well-plowed field of superstition, supernatural, and psychobabble about alien landing zones and time travel portals, Discovery’s show actually came up with a scientific answer:
Methane gas.
Also known as “swamp gas,” methane has been heralded as the explanation for UFO sightings, as well as the answer to all of the world’s energy problems.
For those who never heard of methane, it’s the gaseous by-product of the decay process.
In swamps, it’s usually the decomposition of dead fish and grasses.
In humans, it’s the decomposition of Big Macs and any product listed on the menu at Taco Bell.
I’m not a particular fan of sophomoric “fart” jokes, because they show a certain lack of intellectual evolution.
But here is a respected television channel telling us that, basically, the loss of hundreds of ships and planes in the Bermuda Triangle comes down to ocean farts.
By extension, it means that unexplained flashing lights seen in rural areas are actually alien farts.
According to Discovery, there are methane beds beneath the bottom of the ocean in the Atlantic Ocean that are constantly releasing little bubbles of methane.
Once in a while, an underwater landslide occurs, releasing an enormous bubble of the stuff, which is violent enough to break up and sink 500-foot cargo ships.
Further, the large bubble continues to rise into the atmosphere, where it stalls the engines of prop-driven planes and makes the altimeter do funny things.
Personally, I like the idea of a mutant octopus or ocean-borne rips in the space-time continuum way more than methane gas eruptions as a reason for the disappearance of so many ships and planes. I also think they are about as credible.
But it certainly opens the door to the “methane” defense in everyday life.
Why didn’t the electric bill get paid before the lights were shut off?
Methane gas.
Why didn’t you call your wife to tell her that you weren’t going to get home before a quarter-past Tuesday?
Methane gas.
Why is your homework late?
Methane gas.
If this excuse is good enough for a bunch of pointy-heads with big budgets (which they used, among other things, to sink a nice ski-boat with artificial fart bubbles), it should be good enough for your boss.
And you’ll know that the “methane defense” has become a legitimate excuse for every malady in America when Michael Jackson uses it next week to escape molestation charges.
“No, your honor, that wasn’t my hand. Methane gas. Thank you.”

Church Of The HOA

2005-05-10T07:30:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
May 10, 2005

Which homeowners association do you belong to?
It has become almost as important a question in Mesquite as which church you attend.
And like the church, you have a certain contingent of “non-believers” who reside outside the boundaries of any HOA, replete with the snubs and marginalization of second-class citizens.
There are almost as many HOA’s in town as there are churches from which to choose, each with their own dogma and belief structure.
You have the long list of associations north of the Interstate which are offshoots of the Mesquite Vistas project, similar to the litany of divisions under the Protestant umbrella.
Each association has its own way of doing things.
Some believe in a strong authoritarian position, including board presidents who sometimes see themselves as the Pope of their particular PUD.
Others subscribe to more board-ly ways, with every decision balanced by a host of association apostles.
Some even believe in the “live and let live” theology, although those associations are few and far between.
The scariest part of HOA living is similar to believing in certain aggressive religions where zealots rule the day.
At church, zealots will pick up snakes, chastise those who fall short of the Biblical bar, and rail of fire and brimstone for those who don’t believe in the same set of guidelines that he or she holds sacred.
The HOA zealots arm themselves with cameras and violation forms in search of infidels who commit the mortal sins of leaving their trash cans out too long or failing to roll up their garden hoses before nightfall.
Their CC&Rs are their Koran, their Architectural Standards serving as their Bible.
Now, all this vitriol aside, HOA’s, like churches, serve an important function in a civilization.
Without churches, the world would be a sin-filled landscape of unfettered fornication (and even some fettered fornication) and immoral endeavors.
Kinda like Vegas.
Without HOA’s, neighborhoods would be filled with circus-colored houses and wheel-less cars up on blocks.
Admittedly, in wealthy ‘burbs like Calais, the wheel-less cars up on blocks might be Hummers and Cadillac Escalades, but even an $80,000 eyesore is still an eyesore.
And like the religious tribunals of old, every once in a while the associations have to hold hearings for the transgressions of their flock.
There have been no documented reports of stoning, although there have been more than a few witch-hunts rumored over the last few years.
All of this boils down to an essential question:
Are HOA’s un-American?
For over 200 years, men and women have fought and died for your right to paint your house orange.
They call it freedom.
In order to own a home in an association, you have to surrender a certain amount of your freedom.
The trade-off is that your neighborhood will most likely be a clean, beautiful, and safe place to live, filled with friendly and polite neighbors (although, if some of the associations get their way, none of those neighbors will be renters or humans under the age of 55).
As Benjamin Franklin once said, “Those who sacrifice essential liberty for temporary safety are not deserving of either liberty or safety.”
Of course, Ben never lived in a nice three-bedroom two-story villa in Mesquite where the lawn was mowed each week by someone other than the family goat.
He might have objected to that “No kite flying” rule in the CC&R, but I think he would have liked limping along nicely manicured yards under tasteful streetlamps made possible by one of his discoveries.
To be fair, no one holds a gun to the head of prospective home buyers to force them into neighborhoods featuring severe deed restrictions.
And the lower property values of homes outside of HOA neighborhoods is a financial testament to the success of associations where you can paint your house whatever color you want, as long as it’s tan.
So while Mr. Franklin and his cohorts may have won the Revolution back in the 1700’s, the battle over fence height restrictions and lawn ornaments rages on in Mesquite.
Just know that, while you can be leisurely about choosing your religion since you can usually change it with the turn of a steering wheel and an extra gallon of gas, make sure you do your homework before deciding which HOA you will be pledging your allegiance to, since the new flag will likely bear the slogan “Live Free or Pay Your Dues.”

Sleeping With The Judge

2005-05-07T01:00:00.000-07:00

What is this world coming to?
For decades, the running joke about such TV fare as “The Miss America Pageant” has revolved around female contestants sleeping with male judges to win the big prize.
And of course, as is the case with most jokes and salacious innuendo, there is no truth to it.
Well, there was that whole Miss Black America thing where one of the contestants decided to visit Mike Tyson’s hotel room in the middle of the night, but Tyson wasn’t technically a judge, so that doesn’t count.
Now, we have a new charge of a contestant claiming to have slept with a judge.
The twist?
The contestant was a guy. The judge, a woman.
Former American Idol contestant Corey Clark is making a big deal about the fact that he had a sexual relationship with AI judge Paula Abdul while competing on the show.
Wow.
What’s next, female bosses chasing male secretaries around the big desk? Female construction workers whistling at male bicycle messengers? Famous female company executives going to jail for insider trading?
On the face of it, this sounds absolutely absurd.
Paula Abdul is a forty-something bona-fide rich hottie.
The guy in question is a smarmy, scummy, street-wise twenty-something singer with a girl’s voice and bad hair.
Oh, and he is also perpetually broke, a convicted sister-beater (no, not a hip black female, his actual sister), and a confessed liar.
And did I mention his bad hair?
Leading up to his appearance on an ABC crap-u-mentary, it appeared pretty obvious why he would make such outlandish claims.
He is selling a “tell-all” book about his experience on American Idol, and it didn’t look like it was going to sell many copies with the only “tell-all” story involving the fact he got kicked off the show for lying about going to jail for beating up his sister.
He is also working on a new album, and as Madonna has taught us, whatever is lacking in talent can be compensated for with controversy.
Then there is the appearance money from talk shows and interviews, and the opportunity to score on a whole new parade of rich network hotties.
But then the dirtball came up with a paper trail.
Phone bills, medicine bottles and receipts for clothes that, if legitimate, give credence to his claims.
Ms. Abdul isn’t helping herself, hiding behind the “I’m not going to dignify such outlandish lies by answering questions about them” gambit. (You saw how well it worked for Bill Clinton and Michael Jackson).
If the claims turn out to be true, it could be the end of her tenure as an AI judge.
But in the end, she didn’t really do anything heinous (other than display incredibly bad taste in sex partners, which is a Hollywood trademark).
She didn’t pass him the answers to upcoming quiz show questions, she didn’t seal a pact to vote for him, (at that point in the competition, all of the judging was done by brain-dead Americans with good speed-dialing equipment, who managed to eventually select “Reuben Sandwich” Studdard over popular androgynous crooner Clay Aiken), and she didn’t tinker with the voting.
According to the scumbag in question, she did help him with advice, but telling him to get a haircut and pull up his pants can hardly be considered insider trading.
I’m hoping the charges are not true.
Not because I give a whit about the “integrity” of such seminal television fare as “American Idol,” but because I sense that Ms. Abdul is a genuinely nice person who got caught up in trying to help out an obvious loser.
(It’s a pattern…she was once married to Emilio Estevez).
As for the Clark-meister, he will go on to make millions, then will probably squander it on coke-parties and bling because that’s what scum bags do.
The sad part is that he’ll do it on the American dime, because that’s what we do; buy trashy, salacious books from pusbags like Jose Canseco, and plunk down buckage for CD’s by untalented hacks who have managed to punch the clock on their fifteen minutes of fame.

Slot Machines

2005-05-03T06:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
May 3, 2005

First the disclaimer:
To my friends back at Gamblers Anonymous and my boss’s bosses back in Utah, who have a lot in common, I’m not much of a gambler.
First because I’m a newspaper writer, which means my paycheck barely covers such luxuries as food and gas.
Second because I really suck at it.
But I have been known to drop a few quarters into the occasional slot machine.
Not any more.
Tri-Properties, the company which owns CasaBlanca, the Oasis, and the Virgin River casinos, has put a ton of money into sprucing up all three properties.
In particular, they’ve upgraded most of the slot machines, particularly at the ‘Riv.
The new machines and the atmosphere are beautiful.
(That sound you may hear in the background is me, kissing up to the biggest advertiser in our paper.)
But to be honest, I’m not a big fan of the new one-armed bandits.
They are now coin-less.
They will only take dollar bills.
This doesn’t work for me, because I’m a cheapskate.
I may be willing to put four quarters into a machine, but I’m not going to put in a whole dollar!
Also, again because I’m a cheapskate, the machines always reject the foul, crumpled one-dollar bills I’ve been hoarding and squeezing since Reagan’s first term.
So I no longer have a place to get rid of my itinerant loose change.
Another thing I don’t like is that you put money in, but they never give money out.
And I’m not talking about my usual prowess, which resembles the same likelihood of hitting the jackpot by sticking quarters into a parking meter.
When you win, you don’t get money anymore.
You get a slip of paper with foreign symbols on it.
Then, unless you’ve accidentally mistaken it for your dry cleaning slip and retrieved your best suit with it, you are supposed to stick the slip into another slot machine, or a change machine.
I miss the clanging cascade of quarters ringing against the metal drop trays, although some of the computerized machines have been programmed to play a recording of that sound.
Also, when I win, I want everyone to know it.
Instead of using one of the cute little plastic buckets, I like to fill both pockets with change then go jingling-jangling-jingling around the casino like a dusty-spurred gunslinger at high noon.
My favorite part was trying to pay for my meal at the buffet with fistfuls of quarters.
It’s all different now, because you can’t use the little slips to buy anything.
It also adds another sobering trip to the change machine.
I’m going to miss the change girls who used to pop up for the bigger payoffs (so I’ve heard, since I’ve never hit a jackpot big enough to require human intervention).
At first I was worried about their careers, envisioning lines of out-of-work change girls holding plastic buckets labeled with signs like “Will convert quarters to nickels for food.”
However, they will have a chance to move on and up in the gaming world.
(Excuse me, someone’s at my front door. Pretend you’re listening to “On hold” Muzak until I return.)
(I’m back. It was a nice lady in a red long-sleeved shirt asking for someone named “Keno…Keno…”)
I know I’ll eventually get used to the new technology.
And I do see the advantages of eliminating all the finger-blackening coinage from the equation.
Besides, considering my meager pay, the casinos are an integral part of my retirement program.
I figure that, in the next 25 years, I should be able to rack up enough points on my Virgin River “frequent flusher” card to get comped meals delivered to my future address at machine 4293 in the nickel slot section for the rest of my days.

Alabama Fried Chicken

2005-04-29T23:00:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure if this commercial is playing all over the country, but I've noticed a new string of TV ads for Kentucky Fried Chicken.
Under the commercial, the song "Sweet Home Alabama" is playing.
Maybe I'm missing something here, but what does "Sweet Home Alabama" have to do with Kentucky Fried Chicken?
Is it possible that a Madison Avenue exec who failed seventh-grade geography was put in charge of this account?
Maybe the ad executives got together and said, "Alabama...Kentucky...all those Confederate states look alike to us."
Next thing you know, Cadillac will start putting Led Zeppelin music under their ads...

Talking To Myself

2005-04-27T09:30:00.000-07:00

I’ve been tracking hits to the Workman Chronicles ‘Blog lately.
Let’s just say that, if I was a sitcom on the WB, I would have been cancelled already.
It made me wonder…if a writer writes in the forest, and nobody reads it, is he still a writer?
Or could the idle rantings posted thereon be considered an electronic version of talking to myself?
And if it can be construed as talking to myself, is there a 12-step program that could help?
Are there webmasters in white coats who will soon arrive at my portal to escort me to a padded chatroom?
It’s such a double-edged sword.
I simultaneously wonder if I were to write more, to post something new every single day, maybe that would inspire more visitors, while also wondering why I bother to put on a writing party at all if nobody is going to show up.
(Yes, it’s very “oh woe is me” in here today.)
I recognize that part of the problem is marketing.
Outside of the few nice folks who stumble in from my day job at the newspaper and the morbidly curious but kind who track me down from my inane rantings on other ‘blogs, nobody knows about this place.
I could try to buy ads on the internet, but that’s too much like being a prostitute’s John, where I have to pay for love.
I’m one of those hopeless romantics who believes there’s an audience out there for everyone.
Also, I’m a newspaper writer, which by definition means I don’t have any money for such luxuries as food and clothes, so I certainly can’t afford to gorge Yahoo and Google’s pockets any further.
A quick perusal of “Blog Explosion” or any of the other ‘blog catalogs out there explains that it’s tough to rise above the din of hundreds of similar sites claiming to be humorous. (On Blog Explosion alone, there are nearly 700 sites listed in the “Humor” category, way more than any other category in the catalog.)
My only hope is that I’ll become a posthumous success like Van Gogh or Jim Croce.
Long after I’ve died from an overdose of french fries and McNuggets, perhaps someone will discover this treasure trove of wit and exploit it into celebrity.
Or maybe a single stroke of the delete key will perform a bandwidth angioplasty, “killing my darlings” as Hemingway said.
In any case, I’m still here, howling at a digital moon and talking to the firewalls.
A caricature of the age-old stereotype of literary artists tinged with insanity.

Apocalyptic TV

2005-04-26T06:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
April 26, 2005

I’m always on the lookout for signs of the impending Apocalypse, or the fiery end of time.
Usually, my window of impending doom sits no further away than the entertainment center in my living room, home of the 21st Century golden idol, also known as the television.
Some of the “signs” are easy to find.
War, famine, drought, pestilence, and even locusts can be found 24 hours a day on CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News, along with the regular menu of catastrophe and calamity on the three network news broadcasts, sandwiched between ads for Enzyte male enhancement supplements and Old Navy come-ons for tunic tops.
But to find the deeper portents of impending Armageddon, you have to spin the channel a little further.
Many of the warning signs can be seen in prime time, where man’s inhumanity to man has become prime time viewing.
They call it “reality TV.”
With shows like “Survivor,” “The Amazing Race,” and a slew of other programs which pit humans against other humans in death-defying scenarios, you know it’s just a matter of time before one of the shows cash in on the big money jackpot of videotaping someone getting killed.
We’ve degenerated into a parody of the Roman Empire, where it was considered sport and entertainment to throw Christians to the Lions.
(Here’s a sports recap for you…Christians 1, Lions 8,492).
But we’ve gone a step beyond.
The Romans would just throw you to the Lions.
On “Fear Factor,” they’ll throw you to the worms.
And the fish guts, and the pig’s blood.
I’m sure that championship nose-picking is just around the corner.
(We interrupt this diatribe for a word from our sponsor. This is Bob. Bob has a big smile because he takes a pill that enhances his sexual equipment and endurance. Be like Bob. Buy pills.)
Then I caught a show I hadn’t seen before.
It’s known as “CJ,” or by the official title “Celebrity Justice.”
Yes folks, it’s evidence that we’ve reached the bottom of the barrel.
This is a TV magazine show dedicated to celebrities in trouble with the law.
It includes news and footage of divorce filings, contract disputes, lawsuits, paternity issues, minor traffic violations, and of course, celebrities under arrest and in court.
The current poster child, pardon the pun, is Michael Jackson, who could have an entire 24-hour cable channel dedicated to his odd behavior and courtroom career.
But CJ manages to fill up an entire show with such stories as which famous rapper has been busted for, basically, being stupid in public, and which silicon-injected bimbos are dumping their Botox-addicted hubbies.
While once upon a time we discarded law-breaking famous folk on the trash heap of obscurity, we’ve now reached a place in civilization where we celebrate their scofflaw antics and wallow in their abuses of jurisprudence.
(Another word from our sponsor. You too can own a $19.99 tunic top containing 83 cents worth of fabric. Just look at our dancing girls. Since this newspaper is not equipped with audio, simply hum the song “Bust A Move” to yourself until you can’t resist.)
I just hope they get the Space Shuttle airborne so I can start saving for my one way ticket to Mars before next season’s new shows hit the airwaves, including “Who Wants To Pull The Switch On The Electric Chair” and the hot new game show, “You’ll Put Your Eye Out With That!”
The world is coming to an end.
And it will be broadcast live on “The Simple Surreal Afterlife.”
(Another word from our sponsor. This is Bob. He has overdosed on the little pill and is now chasing the Tunic Top girls like Groucho Marx on a three-day bender…)

Homesick

2005-04-22T01:00:00.000-07:00

Congress should propose and pass a law immediately that would require every citizen to spend at least three days living somewhere other than their current hometown.
I don’t say this lightly.
The first benefit of such a statute would be a cross-pollination that would occur when people from one town are exposed to the culture and customs of another town.
For example, a Los Angeles resident could learn that recklessly zig-zagging from lane to lane at 90 miles per hour near an interstate exit is not the norm everywhere.
Small town citizens would learn that their Town Council’s vitriolic battle over whether the town park’s flowers should be yellow or red is not such a big deal.
But mostly, it would reinforce the special characteristics that made you choose your hometown in the first place.
During my own recent four-day vacation, I visited Arizona, California, and Mexico.
About as disparate a geographical triumvirate as you could find.
Here’s what I learned:
Dorothy was right.
There’s no place like home.
Sometimes I get caught up in the politics and minutiae that is inherent in suburban living.
A quick trip to California is the cure for whatever ails you, whether it be an exposure to maniacal highway driving or the ecological phenomenon of smog.
While the visit to the Pacific Ocean was awe-inspiring, the barefoot guy standing knee-deep in a tide pool playing a guitar with seaweed sprigs for a pick and singing songs aimed at the shores of Japan made me long for the more mundane insanity of our own town bum who keeps everyone guessing as to what color parka he will wear today.
(Just a reminder…I live in the Nevada desert.)
I became homesick for the 30-second delay at Interstate exit 122 that causes so much rage in our town after sitting at a dead stop for 20 minutes on a 12-lane California highway.
And a trip across the border into Mexico is the antidote for whatever complaint you could possibly have about the place you call home, because I promise that your town is Oz compared to the desperate, dispirited towns that dot the south side of the Mexican-American line.
It should be mandatory that every citizen must spend time away from home.
The experience will fill you with love for every wart and blemish that distinguishes your zip code from every other dark circle on Rand McNally’s best seller.

Road Rage

2005-04-19T08:00:00.000-07:00

I never understood the concept of road rage.
Oh sure, I get the idea of anger at bad drivers, and even the “flight of the bird” after exhibitions of inferior driving skills.
But the California version of road rage was difficult to grasp, replete with roadside fist fights and occasional gunplay.
Why would anyone shoot another person over something as innocuous as cutting someone off while entering the freeway?
Then I visited California for the first time last week.
Now I get it.
I’m in San Diego for 15 minutes, and I’M looking for a gun shop!
No disrespect to the state of California and all 20 jillion residents, but unless you have a dying patient in your back seat, is it really necessary to weave in and out of traffic at 85 mph like a crazed Martha Stewart on speed trying to finish an afghan?
I’ve been on bumper car attractions at the fair that featured better driving.
It’s even more amazing when you consider that the attitude is completely different just a few miles South.
While visiting Mexico the day before, I was treated to a phenomenon that I thought only afflicted three-year-olds and escapees from the “I Am Bulletproof” Institute.
People on one side of the street who wanted to be on the other side of the street just stepped out in front of the oncoming traffic and headed to their destination.
It poked enormous holes in the old joke “Why did the chicken cross the road?”
The real question should be “HOW did the chicken cross the road?”
After a while I realized that this wasn’t an aberration, but a custom.
Nobody got mad at anybody, there was no cacophony of offended car horns, no flight of “birds” at the pedestrian, just a laid-back acceptance of this tradition that would have filled hospitals back home.
I must admit that I was a little hesitant at first, but before long I was calmly stepping out in front of speeding taxis like a San Luis native.
I suspect the tradition was born of a place that wasn’t big on traffic lights or stop signs.
In fact, the area I visited wasn’t really big on streets, curbs, or sidewalks, and showed a complete absence of such things as traffic cops or crossing guards.
Admittedly there is a lot less to see in this part of Mexico than in Southern California, which might explain the lack of haste south of the border.
If you’ve seen one three-legged dog eating out of a garbage bag on a downtown corner, you’ve seen them all.
That’s not to say that things are safer in Mexico, but they are definitely slower.
If only we could instill a touch of this ‘tude in the driving populace of Cali, we might cure road rage in our lifetime.

Tax Time

2005-04-15T06:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
April 15, 2005

A news flash from our “Duh”-partment Of Obvious Facts (DOOF), today is tax day.
It’s that glorious moment when all of the Last Minute Larrys trundle down to the post office to mail off their 1040s, W-2s, and big portions of their kid’s college fund to Uncle Sam.
We always hear about the idiotic endeavors our tax dollars fund, like $20,000 hammers and $30,000 toilet seats, and it’s never a good idea to visualize your hard-earned check going into the pocket of the smiling dunderhead on C-SPAN railing to an empty Senate chamber about the dangers of imported dental floss, or an impassioned plea to save the endangered Sierra Mountain Spotted Rock Fly,
However, those aren’t the only things your tax dollars support.
You want to feel better about sending the IRS the money you were going to use as a down payment on the shiny red ATV?
Think about the other places your money may go.
Three months from now, a soldier in Iraq may be alive because it was your money that bought the Kevlar jacket that saved his life.
You may have stopped a terrorist attack when your check was used toward the purchase the bomb-sniffing equipment at a major airport.
And while the Welfare system gets plenty of knocks, your dollars just might be the ones used to feed a hungry child next week.
The fact that nobody likes to pay taxes is also a unifying bond of all Americans.
It doesn’t matter if you’re white, black, brown, red, yellow, or purple, whether you’re from a red state or blue one, we are all brothers and sisters united in a disdain for sending our green to the gub’ment.
Happy Tax Day!

Gas Pains

2005-04-12T06:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
April 12, 2005

As humans, we are constantly on the lookout for scapegoats.
Oh, we don’t use that term, but it’s conceptually accurate.
You can see it in the proliferation of frivolous lawsuits.
“I’m too stupid to know how to hold and drink a cup of coffee, so I’m just going to sue somebody for my burned crotch.”
When we run out of human beings to blame, we’ll often turn to the man upstairs, as if it’s somehow His fault that we’re overdrawn at the bank.
Now, we as a nation are being caught up in a crisis that we weren’t expecting, which was already pretty stupid on our part, but now that it’s here, we want to blame EVERYBODY else.
I’m talking about the price of a gallon of gas.
Word is that the near future will include gasoline prices of over three dollars a gallon.
Locally, some folks have started using the Maverik convenience store as the community punching bag.
Here’s a news flash for you:
It ain’t their fault.
In fact, you can discard your hate mail for all of the local fuel purveyors.
According to the Associated Press, Nevada has the third-highest prices for gas in America, averaging $2.38 a gallon, just behind California and Hawaii.
But we can’t hang the governor in effigy.
Keep moving up the blame trail.
The oil companies make an easy target, mostly because of their ten-dollar-a-gallon Stetson hats.
But it’s not their fault either, because it’s costing them nearly $60 a barrel to buy the stuff from our turbaned friends in Saudi Irobiya, Jordamfools, and Kuwaitandseewhatwechargenextmonth.
But we still can’t blame them.
Even if it was their fault, our government couldn’t do much about it, since we’re currently on hiatus from our favorite national game show, “Thumping Middle Eastern Countries for Fun and Profit” while the producers are working on the sequel, “Dropping Bombs On Countries Run By Guys Named Kim.”
If you want to go eyeball to eyeball with the person responsible for this whole mess, I have an exercise for you.
First, take out your car keys, head to your car, open the door, and get in.
Start the car and tune the radio to your favorite “All babble, All the time” radio station.
Then reach up and grab the rear-view mirror and twist it to face yourself as if you were going to apply lipstick.
(For many of our female readers, this will be an almost automatic function. For guys without recent Jaegermeister or college fraternity experience, it may take a few tries.)
Now, look deeply into the eyes staring back at you from that mirror.
You’ve found your culprit.
You know why gas prices are so high?
Because you’re willing to pay them.
End of story.
I remember taking a real estate class a few decades ago, back when I was still sane and believed that making money was a good thing.
The proctor, who was a realtor, passed out an info sheet on a house.
It included square footage, location, amenities, and price comparisons from three other properties.
Then he challenged the class to determine the market value of the house.
My hand shot up, ready to dazzle him with my intellectual superiority, buttressed by my intimate familiarity with advanced calculations involving square footage, replacement cost ratios, and formulas previously used to determine payloads for Apollo moonshots.
In other words, I knew my math.
Unfortunately, he knew real life.
“Wrong!” he exclaimed gleefully (or maybe it just seemed that way to the red-faced smartmouth whose hand shot up just moments before).
“The market price of a house is…whatever someone is willing to pay for it.”
This universal economic principle is applicable to everything, including and especially gasoline.
As long as we continue to buy this stuff by the tanker truck at whatever price is tossed onto the sign, that price isn’t going anywhere but skyward.
Don’t look so shocked.
This is the fourth or fifth time gas prices have spiked like this since the great oil embargo of the mid-seventies.
And if history has taught us anything, it’s this:
We’ll pay ANY price just so we don’t have to sit by that smelly, scary guy who is the poster child for public transportation.
So until we as a combined and cohesive nation make the commitment to drive less, car pool, build and buy more economical vehicles, give hydrogen fuels a chance, break out our bicycles, and begin taking vacations to locales which share our own zip codes, just look in that rear-view mirror, open up your wallet, stick out your cash, and say “Owww.”

Musical Airlines

2005-04-10T13:00:00.000-07:00

You decided to buy a car, so you headed down to your nearby Chevy dealership.
You looked at lots of options, weighed the differences, and selected the Chevy Suburban.
You filled out the paperwork, wrote the big check, then headed outside to take your new car home.
But the vehicle waiting by the door is a Kia Sorrento.
“We didn’t really have any Suburbans on the lot, but this one will work just fine,” the salesman assures you.
Would you be happy?
Then you now know the frustration of thousands of airline passengers.
Recently I made arrangements for my mom to fly on flight 2771 to Las Vegas on a United Airlines plane from Philadelphia.
I should have smelled a rat when the airline told me they couldn’t say what seat they would assign.
(Making your own seat selection has become commonplace when buying tickets online.)
On the appointed day, my mom pulled up to the United sign at the Philadelphia airport and unloaded her bags for the skycaps.
A few minutes later, she learned that United doesn’t have a flight 2771.
Before panic could reach frenzied hysteria, the official informed her she was booked on a U.S. Airways flight.
Relieved to at least have a seat, she loaded the bags back into the car, then drove another quarter-mile to the U.S. Air terminal, unloaded her bags, and rushed to get to the gate in time for departure.
On the other end, blissfully unaware of this, I arrived at McCarran Airport and went immediately to the “Arrival” board.
No flight 2771.
I had spoken personally with a United representative the day before, so I knew the flight existed.
When I tracked down an airport employee with a walkie-talkie, I heard the blood chilling reply.
“You need to go to the United office.”
I knew from watching movies and reading books that this was the way they usually broke the news about an air crash.
So I raced down to the United kiosk located near the baggage carousels.
There, a bored clerk explained that my mom would be on U.S. Airways flight 633.
Once my heart slowed down and I could hear better, the United Airlines employee went on to explain that it was now common practice for the airlines to purchase seats on other airlines, then sell them as their own.
She also admitted that it was a despicable practice.
On this day, flight 2771 existed only on a computer screen.
I hurried to the U.S. Airways baggage carousel, found my mom, and gave her an extra-long hug.
She had paid for a flight on United Airlines, but had been baited and switched to a ripped seat on a dirty airplane filled with rude flight attendants operated by U.S. Air.
When she goes back in two weeks, it wouldn’t surprise me to learn that she’ll be returning on a Greyhound bus while her bags are sent back east on a train, thanks to this new scheme by the airlines.
I’m not arrogant enough to suggest that you should boycott United Airlines, but I can assure you it’s the last time I will book tickets with the Friendly Lies people.
Also, the Chicago-based airline has a new fan.
As their bankruptcy case (filed in December of 2002) continues to wind its way through the courts, I’ll be the guy on the sidelines, fervently waving pom poms and cheering their eventual demise out of existence.

Death of a Pope

2005-04-07T02:00:00.000-07:00

Pope John Paul II has gone on to his deserved greater glory.
Unlike most people ascending to Heaven who must wait to be judged by St. Peter and The Book before passing through those pearly gates, I suspect the Pope will be taking the express lane with valet parking directly to his room next to The Big Guy’s master suite.
Unlike the lawyer joke about naming all the passengers on the Titanic in order to gain admittance, John Paul’s only test question will be something like “did you bring your toothbrush?”
Of course, the tears haven’t dried on St. Peter’s Square yet and already the big question is which backup quarterback will be elevated to the starting Papal team.
The candidates stretch from Italy to India to Brazil.
Word has it that no Americans have made the short list, but we shouldn’t take it personally.
After all, it took nearly 2000 years to get a pope from Poland into the big chair, and they’ve been around a good bit longer than we have.
So the question of succession is at hand, along with all of the corollaries which will perplex scholars until the first puff of white smoke arises from the Vatican chimney.
Questions like:
Whose picture will Sinead O’Connor tear up every morning when she gets out of bed?
Whose face will be printed on the rifle targets at the Bulgarian Secret Service firing range?
Whose effigy will the pro-choice crowd set on fire to start their weekend rallies?
Who will the Jews, Muslims, Christians, and others with no breathing religious patriarch to petition, be jealous of now?
Who gets to ride around in the Vatican’s bulletproof vehicle for the next few weeks?
(My money is on Batman, since he already has a car that looks a lot like the Pope-mobile.)
Who gets to wear the big, funny hat in the Pope’s absence?
(I suspect the Pope and Minnie Pearl will have a lot to talk about in Heaven.)
Some folks may be offended at my levity in regard to the recently-departed papal icon, but I contend that Pope John Paul II had a sense of humor.
Besides, if he can forgive the guy who put holes in his best cassock with a pistol back in 1981, I’m sure he has some forgiveness in his heart for a wayward writer from Mesquite.
(Although Sinead O’Connor hasn’t had a hit since her Saturday Night Live debacle, so maybe there’s more to fear than I realize.)
The good news is that the Pope will be reunited with the eight feet of intestines that were removed following the 1981 attempt on his life.
The bad news is that Earth-bound humanity has lost a gentle friend.

Cell Phones

2005-04-05T07:00:00.000-07:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
April 5, 2005

I love the new generation of cellular phones.
What I find most amazing is the plethora of choices now available for ring tones.
You know, the noise a phone makes when someone wants to talk to you?
Back when I was a kid, (when phones were first invented, according to my youngest daughter), the tone was actually a bell.
I know, hard to believe.
Then, in the 80’s and 90’s, we had electronic beeps and chirps to let us know when it was time to pick up the phone and utilize that time-honored of greetings.
We used to say “Hello?” with a certain amount of anticipation or dread instead of just glancing at the caller I.D. and saying “’Sup, gurrul?”
Today, the sound has been replaced by rap music, and sounds that mimic car engines with a bad fan belt, and an electronic impersonation of Celine Dion.
(Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between the three.)
Yep, now people can be annoyed in public by a whole spectrum of new
sounds.
I’m waiting for the first time a solemn church service is interrupted by some of the, um, shall we say “colorful” language of a 50 Cent ring tone.
I’ve noticed a phenomenon that should be added as one of the corollaries to Murphy’s Law.
The more obnoxious the ring tone, the louder the volume setting.
As if the tune “Take Me Out To The Ballgame” isn’t annoying enough to get someone’s attention, the phone-owner has to have it set for “jet-engine loud” so everyone in the movie theatre can enjoy the nerve-grating serenade.
There is another facet to the ring-tone craze that once again shows that I’ve outlived my usefulness on this planet.
(Warning: Another “Back when I was a kid” moment dead ahead.)
Back when I was a kid, my friends and I collected baseball trading cards, Matchbox cars, and pennies.
Today, kids are collecting ring tones.
You can download them from this thing called the “Internet,” store them in your cellular phone, and trot them out whenever life isn’t keeping you distracted enough with TV, TIVO, CD, DVD, DSL, PS2, MP3, R2D2, C3PO, or LMNOP.
(Okay, I made up the last one, but I’m optimistic that a rapper will soon glom onto it as his stage/’hood name, leading to thousands of gangsta dollars heading my way in the form of royalties.)
While some of the sounds can be annoying, the positive is that the distinctive rings help people discern when it’s their phone ringing instead of the person next to them.
Before the unique tones, business meetings resembled a convention of gunslingers at high noon.
An electronic noise would sing out, and thirty businessmen would simultaneously slap their right sides at belt level like Clint Eastwood reaching for his gun, each checking to see if it was his phone making the sound.
Those who didn’t win the cell phone lottery would grin sheepishly like the gunslinger who accidentally shot the school marm.
“It wasn’t me,” they offer, leaving others around them to figure out whether the guy is referring to his silent phone or that taco-tainted aroma now filling the room.
The only thing that rivals the avalanche of ring tone options in oddness is the proliferation of cell phone ear attachments.
(Warning: Final “Back when I was a kid” moment fast approaching.)
Today, you can find people walking the halls of a building or strolling the aisles at a local store with a wire dangling from their ear, talking to themselves.
They’re called “savvy business people.”
Back when I was a kid, we just called them “crazy."

Armored Cheapskates

2005-04-03T13:00:00.000-07:00

I just came across a “Help Wanted” ad for a major armored car company.
(No, I’m not looking for a job…it’s like a self-affirmation I occasionally employ, looking at all the miminum-wage jobs out there that actually pay less than my weekly pittance at the newspaper, reminding me that maybe I don’t have it so bad).
The ad was looking for armed guards and drivers.
The pay?
$9 an hour.
Unbelievable.
Whenever I think about armored cars (which, admittedly, is not very often), I envision the dramatic movie and TV scenes where the bad guys are taking down the driver and guards to empty out the cash.
Now, my vision is of gun-toting guys risking their lives, tooling around town in an uncomfortable truck surrounded by stacks and stacks of hundred dollar bills, knowing that at the end of the week their paycheck will cover almost a half month worth of of rent, as long as they don’t eat or put gas in their own car.
I’m a big advocate of honesty and honor, but it just seems to me that it would require incredible self-restraint to follow the straight and narrow while embedded with the temptation of a king’s fortune on wheels.
I can imagine the driver developing a twitch in his left eye every time he approaches that last interstate exit, with visions of grandeur and opulence enticing him if he would just keep going straight to some hideout down the road where he could off-load his treasure.
(Obviously I’m killing any future I might have had in the currency transportation industry with these confessions.)
There is also a reverse perspective for the armored car companies and the banks which use them:What kind of quality employee do you think you’re going to get for nine bucks an hour?
Really, for that kind of pocket change, when the bad guys show up with automatic weapons, my bet is the driver is going to open the back door, show them where the biggest denominations are kept, and help them load it into the getaway car (which the armed guard will notice is nicer than his personal vehicle waiting at the armored car garage employee parking lot).
Polite robbers would flip the guy a tip, maybe an errant stack of fifties that would equal about three months worth of salary.
The ad goes on to mention that you must have a clean driving report, no criminal record, a favorable credit rating, and pass a drug test.
Let’s be honest, I know ex-cons and parolees who wouldn’t settle for that kind of scratch, so how do they expect to lure top-quality clean cut high school graduates with the moral compass necessary to watch over someone else’s cash?
Sorry, as long as McDonalds needs night managers, the armored car business will continue to be on the lookout for decent employees.
As long as they continue to be tight-fisted, they’ll be short-handed.

Company Lies

2005-03-30T21:00:00.000-08:00

I guess there is some truth to the myth of “Truth in Adverstising,” even for some of the big boys.
Advertising giants Blockbuster and Kentucky Fried Chicken recently felt the sting of government regulators, who were responding to claims of false advertising by duped citizens.
In this country, Blockbuster was recently lambasted for their “No Late Fees” campaign.
I remember when this one first came out.
I wondered out loud, “how are they going to stay in business without late fees?”I envisioned a run on “Spiderman 2” DVDs where people rented the flick, then lapsed into bouts of amnesia that might run three or four months, maybe years.
Since then, word is out.
If you’re more than 7 days late, Blockbuster simply bills you for the price of the tape or DVD.
Now to their credit, if you return the tape you now technically own within 30 days, they will “refund” (wipe the amount off your bill) the cost of the tape.
But they will add on a “re-stocking” fee, even though there really isn’t any activity that might resemble re-stocking, like tearing cellophane or opening a cardboard box.
The leader in home video agreed to pay a $630,000 settlement, which will probably wind up as a profitable move, since the “No Late Fees” scam lured in more new subscribers than any ad campaign in the last two years.
Meanwhile, in London, ads for KFC’s new chicken sandwich were cited and removed from the airwaves because the size of the sandwich shown in the ad was misleading.
Apparently, there have been a number of complaints from hungry Brits flocking to the Colonel’s nearest franchises only to find that the sandwich is about the size of a credit card (although a bit thicker).
Allegedly, the hands of the model used to display the munchie are on the smallish size.
KFC representatives claimed it was just a “coincidence.”
In any event, the English version of the FCC banned the ads, wagged their finger, and said “tsk tsk tsk,” which is the English version of a huge fine.
While it’s disheartening to know that “caveat emptor” must now apply to well known multi-national corporations the same as time shares or credit repair programs, it’s good to know that someone in authority is paying attention.

Sneaky Easter

2005-03-29T07:00:00.000-08:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
March 29, 2005

Did you notice that last Sunday was Easter?
I certainly didn’t.
The holiday snuck up on me like the Easter Bunny with mugging on his mind.
Where were all the ads for big Easter blowout sales that usually announce the impending arrival of this evasive holiday?
What about the sappy TV commercials with the bunny rabbit laying chocolate eggs?
How does anyone expect the populace to keep track of Easter without these not-so-subtle reminders?
Maybe the advertising industry was caught off guard as well.
It’s understandable, considering that the holiday is such a confusing moving target that bounces around more than a garden-destroying Easter bunny avoiding the business end of Farmer John’s 12-guage Remington carrot protector.
Maybe that’s how bunny rabbits became the secular symbol of such a holy holiday.
Unlike Christmas, which is always on December 25, and the Fourth of July, which is, oddly enough, celebrated every July 4 (except in Utah, where it kind of vacillates between the third and the fifth, depending on whether or not the fourth falls on a Sunday), Easter never settles down on one particular date.
Sometimes it is celebrated in April.
Sometimes in March.
I even seem to recall celebrating Easter in May once, although I might be mistaken.
(I was only four at the time and had a legitimate struggle with that whole March and May conundrum.)
Today, I’m an adult, and I still can’t figure out when Easter will appear each year without a calendar, a calculator, and a Magic 8 ball.
(“Will Easter fall on April 9?” Shake ball. “Doesn’t look good.”)
I’m pretty adept with a computer, and the formula used to determine the holiday even stymies my Dell.
Actually, I believe the correct formula is known only to the Pope and a handful of ecclesiastical scholars who use ancient artifacts to determine the date, including the Dead Sea scrolls, an abacus, an Urim and Thummin, and maybe even a Ouija board or two.
I’ve had people try to explain the method used, but it comes out sounding like a physics quiz, or stereo instructions printed in Aramaic.
I’m not sure, but I think it has something to do with Ash Wednesday, the square root of pi, and months where i comes before e, except after c, and sometimes y.
Basically, I would recommend that you just close your eyes and point to any Sunday on the calendar.
You have a one-in-52 chance of being right, which is better odds than you’ll get on the Double Diamond slot machine at your favorite casino.
Of course, figuring the correct date for Easter is still more complicated than the dice game “Craps,” which has to be the most intricate gambling game ever conceived.
(Did you know the “Don’t Pass” section of the Craps table has nothing to do with handing the dice to the next player? I do now. But I digress.)
Maybe someday a courageous American President will stand up and say “From now on, Easter will be celebrated on” and pick a date.
Hey, a President was powerful enough to change time a few years back, with Daylight Savings time, another confusing calendar hobbit, so this should be a snap.
Until then, if we have any ecclesiastical scholars out there, please send me an e-mail with an explanation of how to figure out the correct date for Easter so my daughter can get a fair shot at a chocolate bunny next year.
Try to limit the e-mail to 10,000 words or less.
And e-mails with the message “Buy a 2006 calendar, you doofus” will not be appreciated.
Morris Workman can be reached via e-mail at mworkman@dvtnv.com.

Just Call Me Mo Rass

2005-03-28T22:00:00.000-08:00

First it was The Game and 50 Cent.
Now it’s T.I. and Li’l Flip exchanging slaps for fun and profit.
I’ve decided that it’s time for me to hang up this writing gig and become a gangsta rapper.
Okay, strike one, I’m white.
Strike two, I’m old.
And strike three, I’m the epitome of uncool.
But I figure just one dustup with P. Diddy or an exchange of rude lyrics with Eminem on my upcoming CD “As Chubby As I Wanna Be” will lead to the talk show circuit, plenty of inquisitive press, and of course, astronomical record sales.
I already know that I don’t need any talent to be a rapper, as long as I’m able to “sample” from a song with a really good “hook.”
I’m thinking of busting rhymes with a track of the Beatles’ “Eleanor Rigby” behind them.
Check it:
“Ah, look at all the homely people...” (heavy synth-cello work) “Ah, look at all the phony people…”
Then I say something offensive like, “P. Diddy, you’re so ugly, I’ll bet Jennifer Lopez would never go out with you.”
(Yes, I know, cutting edge snaps, huh. I hate to be so mean to somebody who has never done anything to me, but this is the music business, baby.)
And it gets worse.
“Eminem, you’re so dumb, you have to use your initials because you can’t spell Marshall Mathers.”
(Ouch! I’m really getting the hang of this!)
All I have to do now is come up with something cutting to say about someone’s mama, and I’ll have armed record executives beating down my door.
“Yo, I know which “game” yo mama named you after…Sorry!”
Wait, maybe I should delete that line.
After all, I understand The Game uses real bullets to sell his records.
But such is the hip hop life of another Chubby-G in da hood.
Now I just have to hang in the ghettos of Mesquite looking for my crew, or my posse, or my homeys.
Or a rap interpreter to explain the deeper intricacies of “fashizzle.”
Peace out, ch’all!

My Muse

2005-03-26T07:30:00.000-08:00

I’m sometimes asked where I get my story ideas.
(Okay, what they really say is “what the heck is wrong with you?”)
The short and obvious answer is, from my head.
But that’s not tangible enough for some people, so I’ll be more specific, scientific, and geographical.
I get my best ideas in my shower.
Whenever I’m stuck for an idea and my deadline is less than two hours away, I jump into the shower for a good soak.
To be more mystical, I would say that the shower is where my muse lives.
A muse is a mythical creature responsible for creative inspiration.
If you’ve ever seen the movie “Xanadu,” Olivia Newton-John was a muse, who happened to live in an old concert hall that was transformed into a skate bar.
In the movie “Dogma,” the muse was played by Salma Hayek.
Stephen King refers to his muse in his writing memoir “On Writing,” referring to him as a “basement kind of guy,” so I’m not a complete crackpot.
(I wonder what it means when I point to horror impresario Stephen King as my example of normal…)
I haven’t actually seen my muse, but I’m pretty sure he lives behind the shower nozzle.
It took a little while to get comfortable with the idea of an unseen entity in my shower, particularly the way my body looks without clothes (no, please don’t try to imagine), but he’s the one with the great ideas, so I have to accept it.
I hope this doesn’t mean my muse is a peeping tom.
If you’re not comfortable with the idea of invisible creatures, I have another theory.
I’ve read that Lewis Carroll wrote great whacks of the book “Alice In Wonderland” while under the influence of LSD.
Perhaps my enhanced creativity in the shower is the result of a chemical reaction.
If so, I suspect it’s that explosive combination that occurs when the Zest soap interacts with the Alberto VO5 shampoo.
I’m not sure if my results would change if I were to try a different soap/shampoo combination.
Maybe Cameo and Pantene would give my writing style a more sophisticated lilt, or I could purify my content with Ivory and Johnson’s Baby Shampoo.
To get in touch with my feminine side, I could abandon soap altogether and try some of that body wash stuff and a scrubby.
And to improve my horror fiction output, I could try Lava soap and a shampoo of Easy-Off oven cleaner.
But for now, I’m sticking to my muse theory.
It’s more “out there,” which is expected of people who make their living with the written word (we’ve all been led to believe that most writers are artsy, flaky folks with weird lifestyles anyway, so I’m not going to try and swim upstream on this one).
So now, if you’ll forgive me, I’m going to finish toweling off and go dry my hair.

Rising Gas Prices

2005-03-24T20:00:00.000-08:00

We have a new addition to the fatalistic phrase “Nothing is certain except death and taxes.”
Now we can amend the idiom to read “Nothing is certain except death, taxes, and rising gas prices.”
The price of a gallon of gasoline has been steadily climbing for months, with plenty of economists (aka “price tag fortune tellers”) predicting that the prices this summer will be even higher.
This week’s explosion at a BP gasoline refinery in Texas guarantees that the price of gasoline will basically equal the amount paid for a gallon of Jim Beam at your nearest liquor store.
The good news is that this pricing parity is sure to cut down on drunk driving, as those who are forced to choose between the two liquids will certainly select the bourbon.
A gallon of gas may get you to the other side of town.
A gallon of good bourbon can get you to the other side of the cosmos.
Besides, when the gas is gone, you just have an empty gas tank.
When the bourbon is gone, you often have new stories to tell that begin with “you’re not going to believe this,” a pretty clear bottle you can fill with colored water as a dining table centerpiece (yes, I was once a bachelor living with another hetero bachelor, and this was a part of our décor), and extra pairs of underwear you can’t explain, although you now have a new indentation in your forehead that says “Hanes” when you look in the mirror.
Drivers today are like the cigarette smokers of the eighties.
These are the folks who said “when cigarettes reach $2 a pack, I’m going to quit,” then “when cigarettes reach $3 a pack, I’m going to quit,” then $4, $5, etc.
Some of the hard-core smokers whose cigarette habits have resulted in their being evicted from the office, forced out of California bars, banned from all restaurants in Utah, and even exiled from their own living rooms by reformed non-smoking spouses, are still offering up that weak promise.
“When cigarettes reach $80 a pack, I’m going to quit.”
American drivers are the same way, according to recent reports.
The surge in gas prices hasn’t dissuaded drivers from cruising their gas guzzling SUVs to the supermarket to pick up that 12-pack of Q-tips, or driving to their mailbox a half block away.
The obsession with consuming vast quantities of fossil fuels to feed our octane addiction is approaching crack head proportions.
It doesn’t get any better when you consider our main-line dope dealers are swarthy turbaned men from the Middle East who would rather see us dead, but just can’t turn down the cash and long-term entertainment of watching our country sell our collective grandmothers for just one more hit of mid-grade, or “87” as it’s known in the streets.
Just like the never-ending supply of cocaine which pours across our borders each day, no amount of government suggestion or intervention is going to stop America’s craving, for as long as there is a demand, there will be a country willing to provide it.
Our only hope is that the Columbian cartels will become so furious with their shrinking profits when customers use perfectly good drug money to buy gas for their Honda Civics that the drug lords will declare war on the Middle East.
Or that they can invent a car that runs on bourbon.

Royal Titles

2005-03-23T10:00:00.000-08:00

It seems they’re having a bit of a row across the big pond these days.
Prince Charles is getting ready to marry Camilla Parker-Bowles, the love of his life and the woman suspected as the catalyst in the famous break-up between Charles and Diana.
The problem is what to call Parker-Bowles in the event that Charles becomes king.
I find it ironic, since the people and the British press have had no problem in deciding what to call her for the last few years, usually a title featuring an upper-case “B.”
Apparently, the British subjects have collectively accepted the nuptials, but are adamant that she should not be referred to as “Princess” anybody, and most importantly, never gets to wear the title of “Queen” should Charles do the unthinkable and actually outlive the Queen Mother.
(My money is on Liz.)
Charles has had a rough time, spending his life preparing to wear a crown that his mommy absolutely will not allow him to play with.
Okay, he’s put his foot in it a time or two, an ugly divorce and the Parker-Bowles affair, but overall he’s been a pretty patient guy.
You’ve never seen a picture of the Prince in the royal limo, surrounded by royal concubines, putting royal white powder up his prodigious royal nose.
He’s probably got as many skeletons in his closet as your average B-list rock star, but he’s put up a good front.
I’m not sure why the queen won’t let him take over.
She has witnessed recent historical examples of what can happen when someone rules a country, then is forced to sit by and watch how things turn out when his son takes over.
She might have a point.
It’s tough in this country to grasp the whole issue of titles when we can’t even handle something as simple as adding a prefix of “Mr.” or “Ms.” when addressing elders, but apparently it’s important to the Brits.
It appears the ruling family has landed on the title “Princess Consort” for Camilla.
Funny, since it actually sounds like the title of a royal concubine.
So the wedding will go on, not in a big church like the first go-round, but with more of a Las Vegas flavor, with the ceremony taking place in a Town Hall.
Now, if we could just get Elvis to perform the vows, it would be perfect.
A Prince getting married by The King.

50 Cent’s Beef With The Game

2005-03-22T06:00:00.000-08:00

Published in the Desert Valley Times
March 22, 2005

A war broke out recently that, for a change, had nothing to do with Iraq, Afghanistan, or any other oil-bearing desert region.
The war was between 50 Cent and The Game.
Sounds like the tale of a kid in an arcade, doesn’t it?
No, children in an arcade have far too much intelligence for this particular brand of conflict.
You see, for those like me who are terminally unhip, “50 Cent” is the pseudonym of a rapper.
Not to be confused with a 50-cent wrapper, which is a paper tube used to gather pennies.
It’s not the name of the rapper’s group, it’s the dude’s moniker.
If you’re going to say the name in public, you need to know that it’s not pronounced “fifty cent” unless you want to get laughed out of middle school.
It’s “fitty sint.”
I’ve heard this gentleman’s music.
For my money, 50 cents would be about twice what the CD is worth.
But apparently the kiddies like his music about murder and pimping and the ‘hood, so who am I to judge.
Anyway, it turns out that there used to be a member of his “posse,” which is rapper shorthand for those who choose to share his company, named The Game.
(Doesn’t anybody name their kid “John” or “Freddy” anymore?)
The rumor is that The Game “dissed” fitty cint, expressing loyalty to a rival performer, which evoked cint’s ire.
Now let’s not get too high and mighty here.
I’ll admit I liked Elvis Presley when I was a kid.
I’ll also admit to watching more than one Elvis movie where the king opened up a can of whoop-butt on a rival fishing boat captain, a rival race car driver, a rival treasure hunter, and even a rival cliff diver.
So musicians beating each other up isn’t a novel concept.
But unlike a mere Hollywood thrashing solved by somebody getting the girl, the conflict between 50 Cent and The Game broke out in gunfire at a radio station.
Very un-Elvis-ish.
Afterwards, the two “gangstas” postured and howled at the moon about wounded pride and vengeance.
But then, somebody got in their ear and explained that maybe killing other musicians isn’t the best way to promote an album.
No, it wasn’t the police. (Does ANYBODY in the entertainment industry listen to them anymore?)
Most likely it was somebody WAY more important, like a record producer or a publicist or the guy who drives the limo.
So, fast forward a few weeks, and we see 50 Cent and The Game making nice in public.
Neither of them came right out and said who did what to whom, but it’s all better now.
In fact, they fixed it the way most celebrities and not a few liberal Democrats fix things: by throwing money at it.
Each of them pledged a few hundred thousand dollars to the other’s favorite charity, and now life in the ‘hood can go on.
Nobody’s going to jail (which is for mere mortals like taxi drivers and home improvement divas), nobody’s going to court, and everybody’s CD gets a sales boost, which is about as close to a happy ending as it gets in the hip hop world.
It sure gives a new meaning to such music industry expressions as “the song is number nine with a bullet” and “this song killed them at the radio station” and “this is his first shot at the big time.”
Which is why I’m sticking with country music, where all you have to do is avoid lights going out in Georgia and black-eyed peas consumed by guys named Earl.

Food-O-Nauts

2005-03-17T23:00:00.000-08:00

America is known for blazing new trails and riding the cutting edge of all things trendy and chic.
But while everyone knows the name of the first man to walk on the moon (Lance Armstrong, wasn’t it?), no one remembers the pioneers of the palate.
I’m talking about the brave souls who were the first to partake of certain culinary delights, with the survivors helping usher in a whole new world of tasty treats.
For example, you know that somebody had to be the first to grab the mammary glands of a large, ugly critter, squeeze it until white liquid came out, then turn it into a breakfast staple.
(I’ve often wondered what prehistoric man put on his cereal before milk was discovered.)
And how did we settle on cows as the primary source of milk?
Almost all female mammals have the ability to produce milk.
Why isn’t Haagen Dazs ice cream made of horse milk? Or platypus milk?
I think that the person who finally made cow’s milk the dairy standard should be recognized, or at least have a Ben and Jerry’s flavor named after him.
Then consider the myriad choices for meats.
Americans have expressed their preference for beef, (it’s what’s for dinner, according to the Beef Industry ads), chicken, pork, and fish.
Why don’t you see any Alabama Fried Possum fast food places, featuring a bucket of the deep-fried marsupial prepared with the Lieutenant’s secret recipe of 11 herbs and spices?
Somewhere in the history of the species, someone with a fast club decided that one of those three-pound flying-impaired feather bearers would make a good take-out product.
Why isn’t he memorialized in the annals of culinary lore?
Then there was the guy, alive before Jesus’s time, who was sitting on a fence one day watching a filthy, curly-tailed critter eat its own feces and decided that it was exactly what was missing from his lettuce and tomato sandwich on toasted bread.
For over 2000 years, we’ve been ignoring the professionals at our nearest Jewish deli and insisting on adding a dozen different thinly-sliced versions of this on rye.
And how about the very first guy who test-tasted wine?
I can just hear his buddy the monk explaining the production of this libation.
“See, what we’re gonna do is take these grapes, stomp all over them with muddy feet, (monks weren’t known for good podiatric care), put the squishy mess into these half-rotted wooden casks that we previously used for our semi-annual baths, then let it sit in the dark for a few years. Wanna try some?”
Of course, to me, the ultimate hero of nutrition has got to be the guy who discovered that eggs were good to eat.
The first Neanderthal daring to whip up an omelette after watching where that egg came from is far braver than Superman, John Wayne, and Evel Knievel all rolled into one.
And there’s not even a Las Vegas casino restaurant named after him.