Poignant Video--Rocky Mountain News

I just watched a rather long and quite poignant video about the closure of the Rocky Mountain News. It's on the RMN website, at least it is today...the video is on the home page and all you have to do is click to start it. You'll need a high speed Internet connection to view and hear it; it's well worth watching.

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/

Deliriously Happy

I am as happy as a pig in shit.

Some of my favorite pieces of music are: Sisters of Mercy; Bird on a Wire; Democracy; A Thousand Kisses Deep; Here it Is; Suzanne; Tacoma Trailer; Dance Me to the End of Love; Who by Fire; Everybody Knows; Ain't No Cure for Love...I could go on. Imagine, then, that I will be able to hear at least some of those performed live in a concert venue in which I am just a few rows away from the stage.

This morning, I was able to secure two very expensive tickets to see Leonard Cohen in concert on April 3 at the Nokia Theater in Grand Prairie. That's a suburb of Dallas. I cannot believe it. Leonard Cohen is going to perform in Texas. Apparently, there are others like me out in the world. They've just been hiding.

For a person like me who finds celebrity worshop a disgusting practice engaged in only by very stupid people with very tiny minds, it's hard to understand the way I practically worship Leonard Cohen. I consider him one of the best poets/songwriters of all time. His songs, as hard to follow and as difficult to comprehend as they sometimes are, are works of art. Virtally every one of them is an astonishing accomplishment. His facility with words leaves me in awe.

And I've wanted to see him in person since first started listening to his music and reading his poetry. That was a long, long time ago. I don't know exactly when it was, but I know it was just around the time I went away to college, maybe just before. I started college in the summer of 1972. So it's been well over 30 years. And L.C. has not made a U.S. concert tour in about 15 years. And to my knowlege, he has never played in Texas. But this time, he'll play in Dallas and in Austin.

The world has changed. Leonard Cohen has enough fans in Dallas to warrant a concert?! How could I not have known? Who are these people? The only person I know in the D/FW area who appreciates Leonard Cohen's music is a guy who's involved in one of my client organizations. Most people I know either don't know who he is or have only a vague sense of who he is and his music.

I don't even like concerts. Never have. But this will be an amazing exception. This concert will add to my rare concert experiences that left me very, very happy. I remember seeing Gordon Lightfoot, Mason Williams, and Leo Kottke in concert at various times and being very glad I had the experience. I am sure this experience will be right up there.

L.C. is 72 or 74 years old. An acquaintance of mine said today, when I mentioned that I am going to the concert, "Isn't he a bit long in the tooth?" That comment reminded me that age is immaterial. Genius is genius at any age.

Something We Forgot

Oh. My. God. I was looking at my to-do list today, making sure everything was under control And then it hit me. It wasn't the bad day at the offce that got me upset today. Oh no. It was the simple fact that, despite conversations to the contrary over the years:

We forgot to have children!

Ah, such is life. We'll figure some other way to retire and have younger people pay for it.

My Story, In Part

I'm back in Dallas, after a brief jaunt to Houston for a client board meeting on Friday and Saturday.

I'd planned on driving part-way on Thursday afternoon so I could spend an evening with a brother 3/4 of the way down, then finish the trip on Friday morning for a 1:30 pm meeting start. But, my workload was sufficiently overwhelming on Thursday that I didn't leave my office until after 6:00 pm and was unwilling to cope with driving south in or about the commute rush...in the dark. So, I headed out around 6:00 am on Friday and went straight to the meeting.

The two half-day meetings were routine and basically uneventful. That's a good thing.

After the Saturday meeting, I allowed myself to be put in the position of driving some meeting participants to Houston Hobby airport, which was far out of my way. That little jaunt reacquainted me with the horror that is Houston traffic. A 15-minute drive took closer to 45 minutes, then the drive into town to visit my sister briefly was another 30 minutes or so. Houston needs to clear out 60 percent of its population and leave the roads alone; they would then suffice.

After a brief visit with my sister, I headed north to Falba, where my brother and his friend gave me a brief tour of an under-construction 5000 square foot metal building which houses a 2500 square foot house on one side and a 2500 square foot workshop on the other. Above the house is 2500 square feet of attic storage space. Aside from a stone facade and wood doors on one end of the building, the big metal structure doesn't look like much, but the house is going to be a very, very nice home with the benefit of being adjacent to a structure where the owners (other soon-to-be neighbors) can keep their vehicles, tractors, tools, workshop equipment, etc., etc., etc. I like it. I want it.

My brother made spaghetti for dinner after our home tour...lots of sauce, combined with ground beef and a large package of Jimmy Dean bulk hot sausage. I gorged myself. It was fantastic.

He had just bought a 4-drawer file cabinet that was stuffed with Pendaflex folders and he offered to let me have as many as I might want, which was plenty. However, I left this morning (about 6:00 am) without remembering to take a bunch of them...and without remembering to take a CD some friends had given him. The idea was that I would copy the CD and return it to him; the CD is music by a friend of his who's been involved in an 11-year world tour on a green and blue double-decker London bus.

My trip home was uneventful and free of pesky things like speeding tickets which could have reasonably been given to me were there law officers on the prowl for speeders along the route. I needed to get home to be able to meet the DirecTV installer, who's supposed to come today to properly hook up the satellite dish so that our DirecTV receivers, as well as our DVD players, work. The first try, over a week ago, resulted in good satellite reception but I discovered, only after the guy left, that the DVD players were not installed. And when I tried to figure out how to repair the incorrect installation, I realized I was not meant to be an installer. So I called.

Aside from everything else that has happened in my life since I last reported in here, this is my story in part.

Immaturity at an Advanced Age

I told a client today, in anger, that I'm tired of micromanagement and fed up with dealing with people who don't have their own jobs to do and so they try to do mine. I had intentionally not responded to an email yesterday because I knew I would lose my temper if I did. So I waited until the morning when I thought I could be more calm and less stressed out. It didn't work.

I wish it had, but it didn't.

So, maybe I screwed up big time. I sometimes think I'm trying to sabotage myself. It's the coward's way out of an unpleasant situation. I should grow up and resign the fucking account and deal with the consequences or, if that's too ugly, just deal with it.

February 14--In Love with Good Food.

We had a late burger snack about mid-afternoon today, after having burgers for a very early lunch. When we drove past Del's Charcoal Burgers (Polk at McKinney in Richardson) and saw that it was open, we just had to. You can't tell from the photo, but Del's is essentially all by itself in an isolated little pocket of Richardson. And we've never seen it open! So, to see it open just after 3:00 pm today was a shock. Despite the fact that we'd eaten at (I shudder to admit) Fuddrucker's for an 11:00 am lunch, we decided to pop in to Del's. We got one burger and one home-made root beer, cut the burger in half, and enjoyed ourselves immensely. The burger was very good (not the best I've ever had, but quite good) and the root beer was extraordinary...served in an exceptionally frosty mug that instantly froze root beer and foam to the glass.

Then, tonight, my wife made her out-of-this-world lassagna and giant bread sticks. Food of the gods. No question!

Happy V-Day

Happy Valentine's Day. That's all I have to say at the moment.

The Spirituality in Me Takes Over

I took this off the CNN website this morning:

The most recent Gallup poll on the issue, conducted in May, found that only 14 percent of Americans believe that humans developed over millions of years from less advanced forms of life. Forty-four percent believe that God created human beings almost overnight within the past 10,000 years, and another 36 percent believe that God guided humans' evolution from animals over a much longer period of time.

There is no hope for mankind. A plurality of the population believe humans were created overnight within the past 10,000 years? Forget being embarrassed to share a state with our ex-President; I'm embarrasse to share a species with 44 percent of the population.

Conversationalists

There's nothing of consequence to report. I want to converse, but the conversationalists are elsewhere. Or maybe they have things to say and they don't have an interest in the things I want them to hear.

My Gloriously Creative Day

It was only 6-1/2 hours ago that I went to bed. I've been awake for well over an hour and have done my Sunday morning routine:

• shower,
• shave,
• brush teeth,
• get dressed,
  empty dishwasher and dish drainer,
• load dishwasher with last night's dishes,
• clean pots on stove,
• make coffee,
• check to make sure Matilda (the duck carved from the roots of a tropical tree) is still on guard in the back yard,
• verify that Raul (the rabbit made from clay) is still vigilant,
• and accomplish other miscellaneous Sunday morning tasks.

Then, after my wife arose, we had a breakfast of toasted bread (or, her case, toasted hoagie buns) coated with her special guacamole (crushed avocadoes mixed with salt and crushed jalapeños) and then topped with turkey bacon. Food of the gods.

As I contemplate these Herculean feats, it occurs to me that we (my wife and I) have a tendency to attach names to inanimate "pretend" animals. Maybe that's because we have no real pets. Despite my desire to have a pocket-sized dog.

I said just yesterday (or was it the day before) that I would blog only when I have something of import to say. My Sunday morning routine and our practice of assigning names to wood and fired clay does not qualify as having "import." So, to make up for this momentary lapse, I will examine, briefly, the state of animals in the U.S. today.

Too many people do not take seriously their responsibilities toward pets. Many people seem to obtain pets on a whim and quickly tire of them and then they either abandon them or take them to shelters. Most shelters have limited space and resources and cannot cope with the volume of animals that find their way to the protection of the shelter. And, so, the animals are euthanized. That is barbaric. Of course I understand many shelters have no choice. It's the people who abandon their pets who are barbaric. If someone truly cannot care for, or can no longer afford, a pet, that person should make it his or her mission in life to find a good home for the animal. It's too easy to dump the "problem" on someone else.

People who simply abandon their pets are far worse, though. Those people are heartless bastards who deserve to be staked naked to a steel pole in a hyaena habitat, after having been "softened up" with a broken whiskey bottle wielded by an angry drunk.

OK, now that's out of my system, at least temporarily, here's my plan for the day:

• Take this miserable excuse for a notebook computer (Sony Vaio) to Micro Center to see if they can find out why it drops my Internet connection after a minute or an hour or two and then cannot reestablish it without me rebooting the computer;
• Look at mini-notebook computers for my office...computers we could use on-site for client event, board meetings, and the like;
• Stock up on fresh vegetables from Fiesta, where such things are 1/4 the price at Tom Thumb or Kroger;
• Plan lunches for the upcoming week and, if I'm energetic, make them so I can be lazy in the mornings;
• Consider buying several trees to plant in my front and back yards within the next couple of weeks;
• Send a homeowner database for my homeowners association to the association president so SHE can deal with creating a new directory; and
• Chill.

So, there you have it. Don't you?

Hope? Change?

Last July, on another blog that I used to write but have ignored for quite some time, I wrote a scathing diatribe against Barack Obama, who I called a bastard for ignoring his promise to withhold support of the horrific abuses of the FISA law in which the Bush administration engaged. I got over it and I voted for him. But he ignored yet another promise and is behaving as if he is preparing to abandon his principles across the board.

His latest broken promise was the one in which he promised not to sign any law, except in emergencies, before giving the public five days to comment. Well, he signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act (which I heartily endorse, by the way) with virtually no notice at all. He seems to think that he need not worry about giving the public time to comment if he feels his "base" will support the law. That's stupid, bad politics, and a broken promise.

Another Obama characteristic with which I have enormous problems is his irrational love affair with unions and his abandonment of good sense when addressing policies when those policies involve unions. Again, I'm in favor of unions in general, especially when the employers with whom they bargain on behalf of workers have behaved badly and cannot be trusted. But Obama is abandoning all sense of reason by engaging in a love-fest with unions that is economically dangerous and utterly anti-business. The so-called Employee Free Choice Act, which would strip employees of the right to secret ballots in deciding whether to have a union represent them, is one such dangerous move. Why, I wonder, do unions need to strip employees of their right to decide, in private, whether to be represented by unions? Could it be that they need to protect their intimidation tactics from the light of day? Why, when unions come out ahead in more than 60 percent of employee votes, do they need more help by requiring employers to recognize unions if only 51% of employees sign a "check card" in support of a union? Historically, many employees who originally supported a union in their workplace changed their minds when they voted in secret...that is a very telling fact.

Something else that bothers me today about Obama is the fact that he's utterly ignoring the public outcry for transparency in the "deals" that are being worked out with respect to his proposed bailout. This is the man who espoused integrity and openness as characteristics of a good leader and said he had those characteristics and would live by them in his administration.

When either party is in a lopsided power position, it cannot be trusted, nor can its leaders. I've spoken before of a revolution in this country to remove the career criminals and "favor-mongers" from the seats of power. I think that call was more appropriate than even I might have thought at the time. I so hoped for "change."

Well, I guess we got it. But it's not what I had in mind. I had hoped we wouldn't simply be trading in Republican corruption for Democratic corruption. Hope. Hah!

The Economy: I'll be Watching

I've been ignoring this blog this week, thanks to the distractions of Facebook and my own slothful frame of mind. That will stop. Despite the odd appeal of Facebook, it is fundamentally a distraction to me and a mindless one at that.

For the immediate future, I'm going to try to discipline myself to write in this blog on a more regular basis. Oh, I know, I shouldn't let the blog become my master! Not bloody likely. But I WANT to put my thoughts down so I can come back later and marvel at my self-importance and exceptional shallowness.

Like most people today, I suspect, the economy is on my mind. Questions about the need for a bailout, the proper structure of a bailout if indeed it is necessary, and the consequences of failing to either do anything or to do the wrong thing weigh on my mind.

I think the unthinkable. I ask the questions: what if the economy utterly and completely tanks? What if the economy goes into such a tailspin that the entities and organizations that provide basic services like electricity, potable water, etc. grind to a halt? I know the common response is that "they" or "we" or "the government" would never let that happen. I don't believe "they" or "we" or "the government" would know what to do to prevent it. Even if there are people who truly do understand the full framework of the economy and know just the right buttons to push to get it back on track, I believe those "buttons" would have to be punched in a slow and agonizing sequence and that, in the interim, most of us who are not at the head of the priority list would have to do without.

I'm not a doomsday sayer nor do I predict the imminent collapse of the economy, but I am not a pollyanna; I know the world's economy is too complex to be easily controllable. I think it's reasonable for reasonable people to consider whether they can and should act now to prepare for the potential of a cataclymic economic collapse.

If the electric power grid went down today, what would I do? How would my business operate? How quickly would grocery stores, which depend on power not only for their freezers and coolers but also to allow them to process credit cards, close their doors or run out of food? Do you have plenty of food to keep you alive until you can plant a garden and start to survive off of what you gro?

No stop lights in a city like Dallas could quickly lead to gridlock...but maybe the lack of power would keep people off the streets so that would not be an issue. But no power also means the pumping stations that deliver water to our homes and offices would stop working. How many of us have a long-term supply of potable water at our immediate disposal? And, of course, no power means no quick way to get gasoline out of the underground storage tanks at gas stations.

Let's assume, though, that an economic Armageddon does not hit us through the power grid. Let's assume it simply grinds most business to a halt. Then, we'd have to rely on our savings to get by...assuming we could get at our savings and that our savings have value in the midst of an economic calamity. And how many of us would have enough, even if the value of the dollar were to maintain some semblance of its current value, to continue to pay our mortgages, put food on the table, and cover other necessary expenses? If the economy went utterly haywire, how many more of us would lose our homes? And where would we go?

I would go on and on with horrific scenarios that paint a bleak picture of our lives if the economy were to completely collapse. We've grown so dependent on a fast-moving, consumer-focused, high-living economy that we don't know anything else. What would we do? How would we get by?

If I knew the answers, I'd be far more comfortable than I am and I would be sought after by the politicians who admit they don't have the answer. I'm just asking the questions and wondering if I should become a survivalist, starting today. Should I go to the store and stock up on cannned food? Fill up my bathtub with water? Buy a shotgun just in case things get ugly?

No, not yet. I'm going to acknowledge that I've long since put my life in the hands of people I consider to be self-serving idiots. But I'll be watching, and watching closely.

Good Night, OK?

Last night, I went to bed at about 11:30. By 3:30, I knew it would be one of those nights. I drifted off a few times, but as a rule, I was awake all night until about 4:30. Then I fell asleep. And I had a hell of a time getting up at 6:30. When I was jarred awake at 6:10 by my alarm, then at 6:15 by my wife's alarm, then at 6:30 by the show door slamming shut, I knew it would be Monday. In slow motion.

It's 10:20 now. I'm going to try to do tonight what I was unable to do last night.

The Excitement....the Drama!

This, in case it's not obvious, is a bacon, jalapeño, and tomato (BJT) sandwich. I'm not supposed to each lettuce (though often I ignore that prohibition against raw roughage), so I make it a practice to eliminate the lettuce from BLTs. For anyone who knows my personal preferences in food, it will be obvious that I did not make this BJT. The bread, for one, is toasted white bread. White bread is not my thing.

I prefer dark wheat bread or rye bread or, if I'm living it up, pumpernickel or, in the right circumstances, sour dough (in which case I would also add lots of fresh basil...for some reason, basil on a BJT does not do much unless the bread is sour dough). For another thing, I would not have made French fries to accompany my BJT...especially not these fries, which appeared to have been fried in some sort of very light batter. Instead of the fries, I would have preferred salt & vinegar kettle-fried potato chips (though I rarely have them with BJTs...just to mention, in the interest of full disclosure). Finally, the jalapeños would have been visible with every bite, because I really like jalapeños. They are not so hot that they cause pain, but they add a sensory element to food that I cannot describe; I can only say that they make food worth eating, whether it's worth eating or not.

So where did this BJT come from? It came from J's, a breakfast and lunch diner not far from my office. And despite my suggestion that it did not live up to my expectations, I enjoyed it. It just wasn't as good as I would have made.

Now, why, you might ask, would I choose to post something about a sandwich that wasn't extraordinary? Isn't it obvious? It's the most exciting thing that has happened to me today, so far.

Stupid Trips

If the ice doesn't get in the way, I'm off to Austin on Wednesday, where I'll attend a professional conference that will earn me points toward keeping an arcane certification. And I may buy dinner for a nephew...he's agreed, as long as his molars have not just been yanked. This involves missing out on having someone else buy me dinner at a swanky, expensive place, and ply me with liquor. Goddamn, I'm a magnificent uncle if I say so myself!

The idea of driving 200+ miles in icy weather has no appeal, but I have commitments, by god, and I'm stupid!

OK, I won't go unless the ice has melted...or is melting...or promises to melt.

Ice on My Mind

The weather reporters on television are warning that an ice storm unlike any we've seen in many years is heading our way. Just in time to interrupt some very important business I have to get done, come hell or high water. The ice should be problematic tomorrow morning, they say, growing progressively worse as the day wears on. Then, late tomorrow and Wednesday morning, a thick coating of ice will be made worse by freezing rain.

I have appointments tomorrow. I have to spend time giving my staff some updates. I have things to do and people to be. This is not allowed to happen.

I cannot possibly trust the weather people. They just can't be right. I won't allow it!

Me...Tonight

Here is the real me...as of tonight. I change the way a chameleon changes color, though.

My Political Views
I am a left moderate social libertarian
Left: 4.13, Libertarian: 1.79

Political Spectrum Quiz


My Foreign Policy Views
Score: -6.14

Political Spectrum Quiz


My Culture War Stance
Score: -8.04

Political Spectrum Quiz

Stunned Silence

The weekend whirled away. There's very little left of it yet to enjoy, which is disappointing. I was hoping the weekend would drag on and on and on. I didn't expect it, but I had hoped for it. Alas, no dragging. Instead, the clocks apparently ingested little red pills that accelerated everything. So, Sunday afternoon arrived only a few hours after Friday night ended.

We went to a small party on Friday evening, where we met, among others, a former Olympic athlete from New Zealand, Peter Snell. He was a Gold medal winner in Rome in 1960 and in Tokyo in 1964. He's now Associate Professor, Department of Internal Medicine and also Director of the Human Performance Center at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas. He was one of a few New Zealand athletes featured on some New Zealand postage stamps in 2004. There is a statue of him in his hometown in New Zealand. I got only a small fraction of this information from Peter directly; most came from a search of the web. What I did get from him is that he rides his bike to work every day; this 70-year-old guy wants to stay in shape. I bow my head in deep shame and humiliation in recognition of my slothful lifestyle.

There were others at the party, but Peter's story was the most intriguing. Certainly more intriguing than mine.

Yesterday, my wife and I decided to pretend it was the weekend (we have to pretend, even when it is, or she will end up at the office). We took a drive to Fort Worth, where we wandered aimlessly around the western part of town and had lunch at a Mexican restaurant that does not warrant mention here. Then, we drove toward Granbury but turned around before we got there and continued to wander the seedier areas of the city. I'm always drawn to the seedy areas of town; I think I inherited a seedy-side gene.

Speaking of seedy, after our time in Fort Worth, we went to view a double-wide trailer at the local Palm Harbor Homes dealership. I had once stopped in there to look at their inventory, as I was thinking of buying a manufactured home for our land in Falba. I left my name back then and I got a call a few days ago from the dealer, informing me that someone had traded in their 1998 Clayton home and asking, "would you be interested?" They said they were completely re-doing the Clayton and would sell if for $39,000. At any rate, we took a look. If my land were just a few miles up the road, I might have bought it (despite the fact that it is not the cheeriest living quarters I've ever seen). But, no, this one was not for us.

Before we left home for our little jaunt, I did all the prep-work for a crock-pot beef stew. Just before we left the house, I turned the crock-pot on to 'low' and let it cook away. By the time we returned home, the stew was almost done. And when we ate it last night, I had to congratulate myself for dinner.

That little success made me work on tonight's dinner this morning. Not planned as a crock-pot dish, tonight's dinner could be. I sliced some habanjero/green chile sausages into 1/2 inch disks, then added 2 cans of diced tomatoes, some frozen okra, some frozen corn, salt, pepper, chile powder, garlic power, a touch of file powder and put all of the ingredients in a pot that will be cooked on medium high this evening. It better be good.

Tomorrow, I am having a lunch meeting with an attorney I know who retired to San Miguel de Allende several years ago. He's actually semi-retired...does lots of consulting, public speaking, and some litigation. I called him not long ago to ask if he'd be willing to let me market one of his presentations that I think would be of significant interest to employers (it has to do with pending "card check" legislation regarding formation of unions). He was interested and said he'd like to talk next time he was in town...which is now. So, I'll bounce some ideas off of him to see whether it's worth my while to organize a public training program.

So, my fingers are worn and my mind is empty. One day, I'll have creative thoughts to share and readers will be stunned into silence.

A Facebook Pileup

Under the guise of another persona, I am in the midst of discovering that there is a reason I am something of a loner who is not blessed with dozens or even hundreds of close friends.

I have decided that, if I really wanted many other people (including casual acquaintances who decided to befriend me) to know exactly what I was doing at any given moment, I would prefer telling them individually instead of publishing my every movement and every thought to the Internet.

Facebook and Twitter are unquestionably useful tools (or toys) for many purposes, but they are not appropriate add-ons to my semi-reclusive lifestyle. Once one "tweets" with Twitter and accepts exposure on Facebook, though, it's a little tough to withdraw. It's especially tough when one's clients have begun to notice the Facebook persona.

I'm now trying to figure out whether it's possible for a Facebook persona to be badly injured in an Internet accident, thus providing an out for me. I've considered posting this news flash on my Facebook site:

The lifeless virtual body of [Facebook persona] was extricated from a multi-personality pile-up on Facebook today, after an heroic effort by Facebook first-responders to get through the tangle of awkward posts and ignored friend requests. According to Facebook Fire and Rescue, "There was nothing we could do. By the time we made our way over the cluttered Newsfeed, shattered Status Updates, Pokes, Super Pokes,and People You May Know, there was virtually nothing left. Even the Tom Waits Magical Trunk was hidden under a pile of Shared Links. It was ugly." [Facebook persona] is survived by 'Innocent When You Dream,' 'The Dress She Never Wore,' and 'A Tattooed Tear.'

The problem, of course, is that such an ending would not only get rid of the posts from unwelcome clients and extremely casual acquaintances, it would eliminate the posts and Pokes from my blogger friends. So, I'm still deciding what to do. Maybe a new persona is in the offing.

January 20, 2009

History was made today. Truly.

Now, it's up to the rest of us to make damn sure the promise is kept.

Please, Let Me Be an Optimist

I don't know about you, but I'm extremely interested in watching the inauguration on television this Tuesday. Here's the schedule...all times are Eastern. My concern is whether the cheesy, antenna-less TV/DVD player in my office can pick up any stations; I've never used it to watch TV, only to view DVDs because it won't pick up any stations. I'm going to buy an antenna this afternoon. If it works, I'll allow staff to ignore work for a few hours to witness history. If it doesn't work, I'll allow staff to leave work for a few hours if they promise they'll go watch the inauguration.


The closer it gets, the more excited I become. I know the world won't change on Tuesday, but I think the axis on which it spins may get adjusted just a touch. If Barack disappoints me, this will have been the last election I've let myself get excited. To use a Bushism: "Fool me once, shame on, uhh....me. Fool me, twice, uhh,... Won't get fooled again."


I want so desperately to be an optimist. I've been a pragmatic pessimist for far too long.

Opening Old Wounds

Last night, I watched Body of War, a documentary produced by Phil Donahue and Ellen Spiro.

It tells the story of Tomas Young, a guy who in the patriotic fervor following 9/11 joined the military on September 13, 2001. He anticipated going to Afghanistan, but shortly after enlisting it became apparent that was not the real target. He was sent to Iraq.

Just five days into Iraq, he was hit by a sniper's bullets and was paralyzed from the chest down. After he returned and received what was clearly inadequate care and painful and painfully inadequate rehabilitation, his brother was sent to Iraq. While Tomas' perspectives on the war evolved into an extremely critical perspective that strongly opposed the war we were waging against people who never attacked us until we invaded their country, his brother had a different attitude about the war and about his service to his country.

Body of War is a brutal, jarring, utterly honest portrayal of what life is like for a badly injured soldier who questions why he was ever sent to Iraq. His mother is at his side and supports him in his efforts to protest the Bush Administration's actions in and about Iraq. His father is a dyed-in-the-wool Republican who supports the war, the President, and the idea of the war. A good deal of the documentary focuses on his mother's emotional and intellectual reaction to the war.

The documentary does an extremely good job of showing how the anti-war activists are huge supporters of the men and women of the military who risk their lives to undertake the missions given to them by their Commander-in-Chief. The film clearly shows that the protests are NOT against the people who were sent to fight, they are opposed to the leaders who sent our soldiers off to war.

The documentary is fascinating and riveting, but it really brought to the surface my personal loathing for Bush and for all the people who voted to allow him to take this country into an illegal and immoral war that bankrupted this nation. There were 23 Senators in 2002 who voted against authorizing Bush to take us to war. The authorizing resolution passed the House 296 to 133.

By January 2007, when ABC News asked the 77 Senators who voted in favor of authorizing the war if they would do it again, knowing what they knew versus what they knew in 2002, thirty-four of them said they would not; so, it would have been a vote of 43in favor and 57 opposed. It tears me up to know that, had more people in the Senate been as thoughtful and as intelligent in their assessment of the rush to war as Senator Robert Byrd, we would not have lost thousands of our military men and women, billions upon billions in treasure, and the respect of the majority of the countries in the world.

I remember screaming at my television, urging members of the Senate and House not to authorize the resolution. I believe I sent messages to my Senators and to my House representative at the time, but I can't be sure. Whatever I did, it had no effect. In hindsight, I wish I'd asked others to join me in protesting to their elected officials.

Today, I am stunned to continue to hear people who say they support the war in Iraq. They point to the good that is being done by soliders and they point to the instances in which the tide has turned and the improved Iraqi public opinions. I don't doubt those things have occurred. But the issue isn't whether we are doing good; the issue is whether we should have been there, period.

To my way of thinking, it's as if the supporters were saying, in a similar set of circumstances: "It's OK if the President misleads us into a war, because once we're in it, we can do some good for the people we are fighting." And I get extremely upset when I hear people say those who oppose the war want us to leave without completing our mission. Just what the fuck is our mission? I thought it was to protect us from weapons of mass destruction. Mission accomplished. And war-mongers tend to say we can't leave now because to leave would be equivalent to declaring defeat "after we've made so much progress." Progress toward what?! I would be far more proud of this country to say "We made a mistake and we're going to leave and make it right" than for us to continue to cling to our ultra-nationalism and say "We're the most moral country in the world and if we went it, it was for a good reason and we won't leave until we have things our way."

I don't care how many times Bush points to how fucking hard he had it as President and how he always believed he did the right thing. Lately, he's even begun to try to admit he made some mistakes, though he's careful not to go all the way and really admit anything...he always points back to wanting in his heart to do the right thing. The man is a liar and a fraud and deserves to be imprisoned.

At the absolute BEST he was criminally incompetent and a blatant liar and he should be treated accordingly. I'm equally disgusted with every Senator and every Congressman who voted his way...perhaps even more so now after watching Body of War. Hillary Clinton and Kerry voted to support the war; I don't trust them. And while we're talking about records, something needs to be clarified just for the record. A lot of people say Barack Obama voted against the war; he spoke against it, but he was not a Senator then...so he could not vote against it.

If you haven't seen Body of War, I strongly recommend it. But be forewarned, it will be deeply moving and will almost certainly open some wounds that you may want to remain beneath a protective scab.

I Fought the Law and the Law Won

My welcome home from my business trip included a traffic ticket waiting in the mail. It was for running a red light in Baytown, TX on January 1. There were photos of my car approaching the intersection (i.e., just a couple of feet before the white line on the pavement), my car going through the intersection where the light was clearly red, and a close-up of the tags on the rear of my car. According to the ticket, I was going 12 miles per hour as I ripped through the light.

While I'm not fond of Big Brother watching me, I can't help but admit I did run the light. I remember it vividly. I was annoyed by something and had roared up to the light after I roared out of the motel parking lot. The light turned to yellow as I was approaching, too fast to stop before it turned red. So, I said something to the effect that "I know I'm breaking the laws of man and nature, but I'm going to run it anyway." There were no other cars nearby, no one waiting to drive through, so no danger. Except the danger of getting caught. And I did. It is so rare that I run red lights that I distinctly remember this last time I did...and I got a ticket for it. My first ticket in about 8-10 years (the last one was for murder with a motor vehicle...just kidding!).

So, I'll be forwarding a $75 payment for running a red light.

Trauma

My client board meeting got dramatic this morning when the president called me in my hotel room to report she had been quite ill all night and needed to get to a doctor or the ER. Fortunately, a local board member came to the rescue, taking the president to her doctor who quickly admitted her to the hospital. Shortly thereafter, she was in surgery for a suspected appendicitis. Sure enough, it had ruptured. Latest news is that she's going to be fine. Her husband was flying in to be with her later today.

Otherwise, the meeting went well. Better than I expected.

But I'm glad to be home. And I'm especially glad I didn't have to experience an on-water evacuation of the plane, as many did yesterday in New York. My preference for the person to pilot any plane I fly on has become Sully Sullenberger.

But I Don't Like Sweetened Tea

I'm going to Atlanta on Wednesday; back Friday night. Probably no time to blog...but maybe.

Today's big news: one of my newest clients is no longer a client. It only took me a month and a half to decide I don't want them if they aren't going to pay me. No backlash yet. But it' coming, I'm sure. And now I need a client to replace the client that really never was.

One day, I'll learn BEFORE I take on a client that I must NEVER believe what they TELL me their balance sheet looks like. If I can't see it, they probably don't have one. Bad sign, a business without a balance sheet.

Writing a Wrong

I'm nothing if not wishy-washy. Well, maybe it's not wishy-washy, maybe it's indecisive. But that suggests I don't make quick decisions, which I do, so perhaps it's actually that I'm WRONG SO MUCH OF THE TIME!

That's it. I make decisions and the decisions have to be revisited because they're wrong. Or I forgot I made them.

Take yesterday's post about my newsletter for clients. On reflection, I realize that most of my clients and their board members probably won't have any interest in my assessments and predictions about the outcomes of complex interactions between social and economic and technological and political events. Inasmuch as my assumption about their actual interest in and appreciation for my writing played a significant part in my decision to start a client newsletter, it's time to rethink this thing.

So, I've decided, instead to write children's stories. For fodder, I'll use all of those funny and touching experiences rearing children of my own so what I write will be realistic and...wait! Oh my god, we forgot to have children! I have no fodder! Well, I could write the unauthorized autobiography of my imaginary offspring, I guess. No! If I do that, people will come around asking to see my children and, when I can't produce them, I'll be jailed and charged with something horrendous that will make my family and friends shrink away from me and express horror at what I could have done.

See, that's how it goes. I have these grandiose ideas, things that I find appealing and worthy of my dependable two days worth of focused thought, and then BAM! they're gone. Either I run out of interest or I realize the ideas were appallingly bad to begin with. Or I simply get sidetracked and by the time I get around to them six months later someone else has taken the idea public and has become filthy rich in the process.

Well, until I come up with better ideas, I guess I'll stick with the client newsletter thing. At least I can feel good about writing a wrong.

Newsletter Emerges from the Cold

I've allowed this miserable cold to control me for the entire week. Last weekend, I was essentially confined to the house, save one trek out to buy lunch on Saturday. At least I got to watch a lot of mindless film, and some good stuff, as well. (Incidentally, I learned that State of Play, the BBC miniseries I watched last weekend, has been made into a full-length movies starring Russell Crowe, Ben Affleck, Helen Mirren, et al; will be released in March.)

I made it to work all week long, but my wife caught my crud about Wednesday and was sick at home Wednesday and Thursday. She is back among the living now, but both of us continue to have ugly coughs and we still feel like refried shit. I supposed another week or two of being "under the weather" and we'll be fit as fiddles.

During this stint of feeling lousy and having to work nonetheless, I began to think back to all those times I've felt like I've just not been in the right business (if you've read my blog for long at all, you know that's always just below, or just above, the surface). Those feelings are out there again, but I'm doing something different this time. I'm examining WHY I feel the way I do.

It all comes down to control. I am a control-freak. You'd think owning my own business should take care of that, but it doesn't. My clients wield the power and the control, I don't. I'm not "doing my thing," I'm "doing their thing." There may be little I can do about that as long as I confine myself to a field I know enough about to cause people to pay me for my time and expertise. BUT, I keep coming back to what I enjoy doing and what I enjoy most when I do like my work: writing. It's not just any writing, though, it's a special kind of writing. It's writing about my interpretations of the meaning of changes in the business, social, political, and economic environments in which we all function. More precisely, I've always enjoyed reading the work of futurists who attempt to describe the ways in which current, new, and emerging trends are likely to affect the world around us. While I've not written so much in that genre, I have enough confidence in my intellectual capacity and in my writing skills to believe I can join the pack.

So, I've decided to try to satisfy my need for control over that little part of my life by creating a newsletter for my clients, with which I will share my interpretations of how changes in the world around us all will affect their organizations and their businesses, now and in the future. I will distribute it to all current clients and may send it to key players who were involved with clients in the past...and I may go to people who have the potential to bring clients to me. It's a bit of a risk, in that my interpretations often reveal my personal political leanings, but I think I can live with that. The purpose of the newsletter will be to give readers reason to think about things in ways they may never have thought about them before; I want people to say, "wow, I never considered that before." Actually, I don't care what they say; I want them to think something like it!

My first issue will be distributed soon, possibly within the week. If this backfires on me, I may add a "contribute here" button to my blog and request alms for the poor. I hope you'll be kind.

Ending Vacation on a Low Note

I'm miserable. Sore throat, horrific cough, stopped up nose, watering eyes, fever...the whole deal. It really took hold yesterday, but it got far worse overnight and today. So, I've been taking pills and cough syrups and sleeping a lot. My voice is hoarse; I sound like I'm making croaking noises when I try to talk. This crap has to stop. I've got to go to work tomorrow...no getting around it. And it won't be pretty if I feel the same way then as I do now.

The one good thing is that I've been able to do nothing today but watch DVDs on the television...6 episodes of State of Play (a BBC miniseries), a movie (Vantage Point, action-packed but not much else), and 1 episode so far of Homicide: Life on the Street. That's more tube-watching than I've done in a month of Sundays.

I'll not be doing much blogging while this cold or whatever it is hangs on.

My Predictions for 2009

Everyone goes into a new year with at least a modicum of hope for better things. So do I. And while I hope for better times ahead and believe that we will see our share of improvements, I think we should go into the new year ready to confront the battles that are certain, at least in my opinion, to plague us. Here, in no particular order, are my predictions for 2009:

Financial Crisis: The symptoms of the financial crisis may ease a bit early in the year, but the underlying cause and, therefore, the most dangerous aspects of the crisis will get worse. The fact that our government is deeply in debt and getting more deeply mired in the quicksand every day makes any "solution" so much wishful thinking. I predict that at least one of the big 3 automakers will fail, moving the meter past "crisis" to "emergency" and then on to "impending disaster." If Obama is as good as we hope he is, he'll be able to shoot straight with the public and let us know that massive sacrifices by all citizens are in order. 2009 will not be a good year for the economy, despite some early signs of recovery.

Fuel Prices: I predict that fuel prices will again make a sharp turn north, possibly hitting $4-$5-$6 per gallon or more by the third quarter. While I WISH the government would impose an emergency tax hike on gasoline right now, taking prices back to at least $4 per gallon, I doubt that will happen. My reason for wanting to see that is to see the tax revenue available for some desperately important investments, like mandatory public transportation infrastructure all over the country, alternative fuel, and worklife adjustments that would require businesses to allow employees to work from home when practical. What I want and what I get are different, though. I believe today's artificially low gas prices are where they are, in part, because OPEC and domestic exploration and refining companies became terrified that high prices could permanently alter demand. So, they changed public behavior by slashing prices. They know now, though, that the public will respond and so they will jack up prices again, but they will be more careful and will watch consumer behavior more carefully. Watch; by the third quarter, we'll be paying far more per gallon than we are today. Unfortunately, that increase will not be going into government coffers to fund needed research into alternative transportation.

Political Parties: The Democratic Party will demonstrate that, when given the opportunity, it will give the Republicans all the tools they need to club Democrats to death over things like sex scandals, skimming of funds, etc., etc., etc. Like the Republicans, Democrats will squander large majorities in Congress and even control of the White House by behaving the way politicians do: like drunken thieves in an unlocked liquor store. Neither party will behave in ways that will make any of us proud. Instead, they will give us yet more reasons to want to throw the lot of them out; unfortunately, the public apparently does not have the stomach for revolutionary change. By the end of 2009, Democrats will have lost significant clout; Republicans will have gained clout, but will not have figured out that powerplays are not the stuff of public appreciation. In a nutshell, nothing of any positive consequence will get done, and the country will suffer because of it. I predict that Democratic power will wane quickly and Republican power will rebound just as quickly in 2009.

Good Things: Despite all the gloom and doom in the paragraphs above, I believe we will see a huge outpouring of support if and when there is a major catastrophe of any kind, whether domestic or international, during the year. The people most likely to give, and give big, will be people who can least afford it, though. Many people who can most afford to give will give, as usual, but their gifts will too often be the obligatory "charity" rather than the hearfelt desire to help others. As these two cultures of social responsibility clash in their approach to giving, I predict there will be a growing movement to engage all people of even modest means to become part of a "giving society." The challenge will be to adjust both conservatives' and liberals' perspectives about who qualifies as "deserving" of help. The "giving society" will emerge from a consensus about the quid pro quo required of recipients of aid. I think the attitudes of conservatives and liberals toward charity are closer, fundamentally, than it might appear on the surface. I hope so.

Six Days on the Road

The vacation is over. I'm back in my home office, wishing I'd made strong coffee when I got up this morning.

Yesterday, we went into Houston to visit with a sister, a brother, and a niece and her husband. We all met at my sister's place and had to stay there for lunch because of some medication she is taking. That was fine, though, because it gave me an opportunity to go with my niece and her husband to seek out lunch on New Year's Day. After discovering that a Mexican restaurant my niece suggested was not open, after all, we went to Connie's, a Mexican seafood place nearby. I bought lunch, which consisted of fried shrimp with tartar sauce, a salad, and miscellaneous other stuff.

While we waited, I noticed a guy sitting at the bar filling an ice-cold mug with a Corona beer...but the mug already had about an inch of red liquid in it, so the result when the beer was poured was a translucent red brew. I asked my companions what it was...they had an idea, but where not sure exactly what was it in. My niece's husband, a Paraguayan who speaks Spanish as well as Guarani, asked the Hispanic guy what it was. Micheleda, he said, and offered to let me taste it. I took him up on his offer and found it really excellent. In what I have come to believe is a common Hispanic response to expressions of appreciation for something someone else has, the guy offered to give me the rest of his drink! I thanked him, but decided to buy one for me and for my niece's husband, instead. My niece found this wonderful drink foul and appalling, giving me cause to wonder whether, in fact, we are related. At any rate, I have become a fan of Micheladas. And Connie's sells its "secret" mixture for Micheladas in bottles....I did not buy one, but should have.

Back at my sister's place, we got online with my brother's son and his son's wife. I got a picture of the whole group, including the online couple, that I hope to post here sometime soon. But, I took it with my brother's camera, so I'm not sure when I'll get a copy.

We left about 2:00 pm to head back to Dallas and made it back into town not long after dark. We stopped at Luby's cafeteria for dinner, where we could have black-eyed peas and other good things for not much money. And then, finally, we were back home, able to kick back and relax. And curse the fact that our so-called vacation lasted only six days.