congratulations to the 2010 texas rangers!

now - go kick some yankee's @$$

viva texas rangers

i’m a forty year old baseball fan who grew up in dallas pulling for the rangers in the old minor league stadium. growing up, some highlights for me as a fan include getting to see guys like the following play and manage at the ball park (these appear in no particular order as they pop into my mind): billy martin, toby harrah, gaylord perry, bobby valentine, charlie hough, pete incaviglia, jose canseco, will clark, rusty greer, mitch williams, julio franko, jim sundberg, rubin sierra, juan gonzalez, harold baines, kenny rogers, buck showalter, kevin brown, and, of course, o captain, my captain, the nolan ryan.



and a big thank you to ryan, not only for the memories as a hall of fame pitcher, but also for creating new memories from the front office. thank you for putting together a fun product on the field. ron and the boys are so much fun to watch. it’s a treat to see a texas rangers team playing ball the right way and winning. the last couple of seasons have been a blast!

and yesterday was yet another great day in what has been a joyous season (other fans can complain about losing all they want; but when you’re only a 50-year-old club and have never won a playoff series, that trumps curses and droughts in my book). wow. game one down (thanks, cliff lee . . . you ‘da man!)



keep the claws and antlers flying high!!!!!

“As memory may be a paradise from which we cannot be driven, it may also be a hell from which we cannot escape.”


John Lancaster Spalding

baby needs new shoes

one of my favorite times of year is the fall. especially, back to school. new beginnings, possibilities, everything is shiny and new. i’m convinced that the act of renewal is woven into the very fabric of why i love to teach.

one of my favorite activities of childhood that has always been a great memory for me was the buying of new shoes. my earliest memories of buying “school shoes” was getting to go pick out new Zips from the Stride Rite store. i remember having a red pair one year, a navy or black pair a different year, and i vaguely remember having a green pair on one occasion that almost, but not quite matched my green toughskin jeans (yes, those beloved reinforced deniums from Sears and Roebuck).

no matter what the color, each pair always came out of the box with that new sneaker smell, revealing the double “Z” emblazoned down the entire length of the shoe. i remember seeing those two Z’s on each shoe, gazing almost trance-like at those impossibly white twin bolts of lightning thinking, “i can’t wait to strap these babies on; they will make me run like the wind! AND, i’ll be able to jump higher too! i just know it!” it was a glorious fantasy for a boy who didn’t know he would grow up to resemble a fire-plug, usually finish most foot races in the middle or rear of the pack, and have a vertical leap only an anvil could envy.

i don’t consciously remember ever seeing a commercial for Zips. i don’t really know why my parents bought sneakers at Stride Rite (although we did buy dress shoes there at Easter because they carried extra wide church shoes). and although i can’t really find an advertisement or commercial from the 1970’s, i did find this sweet 1980’s commercial that may go to the archetypal nature of sneaker advertisements. behold: Zips (which in the 1980’s are apparently way cooler than their 1970’s predecessors – zippers and pockets? Are you kidding me?)


flash forward to 2010. this year’s back-to-school sneaker buying experience was especially poignant for me. my very soon to be pre-K daughter’s school’s uniform code dictates snappy, but not very sneaker-like blue-and-white saddle oxfords. so as not to deprive her from having a “back-to-school sneaker experience,” and since she has outgrown her current tennis shoes anyway, i thought i’d go get her a pair of shoes she casually mentioned a few saturday mornings ago.

it happened during our ritual bi-monthly trip to shipley’s donuts. as we were sitting and eating our sugary goodness, Special K leaned over the table and said, “Hey, Papa. You see that girl over there,” pointing to a two or three year old girl about thirty feet away. “Yes,” i said, peeking over the box scores of the first place texas rangers. “She’s got on a pair of Skechers,” my four-year-old said knowingly. “She does?” i counter. “Yep,” Special K says confidently. “What do you know about Skechers?” i query. “Well,” she begins, sitting up straighter, “They’re sparkly,” she begins. she waits; i wait. “Some of them light up,” she says as her face sorta lights up in anticipation. she waits; i wait. “And,” she continues, “Aislan, at church has a pair too.” “Hmmm. I see,” i say, noting the shoes and wondering if there will be more from my fashion conscious daughter. there isn’t.

so, as school approaches, i think to myself that i’ll just trot on down to the store and pick up a pair of the aforementioned too cool for school light up Skechers that have captured the imagination of my child. little did i know what i was in for. not only were there several dizzying styles of sparkly, light up and non light up versions of the shoe, but they were adorned with all sorts of graffiti from skulls to peace signs, neither of which i’m a big fan of, nor wanted to encourage in the clothing choices of my four-year-old. in addition, the price range varied with the amount of bling associated with each style, some ranging upwards of sixty buck. “holy $&!#,” i think to myself, “i don’t even spend that sorta cash on my own shoes. and i’m certainly not going to pay that sort of coin for pacifist or gang related imagery.” luckily, i did find a pretty snazzy pair of Skechers on sale that looked at first glance as pretty innocuous.

feeling pretty proud of myself, i brought ‘em home to my girl who was every bit as pleased as i hoped she would be. as she opened the shoe box,she squealed, “Skechers! Skechers! Just like on the commercial, ‘Go, Skechers, Go!’” and then it happened; the jungian connection between 40-year-old dad and 4-year- old kid. as she finished putting them on, she jumped up and headed for the door exclaiming, “Come on, Papa! Watch me run around the house! These Skechers will make me run faster! Watch me run!” and away she flew. i must admit that i was feeling pretty puffed up.

and then my wife brought it to my attention that the graphics on the shoes were modeled after old school tattoo art.

"winning, you know . . . it's like better than losing."

i’ve always been a big fan of kevin costner through thick (dances with wolves and seven academy awards; small indie films like a perfect world; quotable masterpieces such as bull durham; classics like field of dreams; and thrillers like mr. brooks) and thin (robin hood, prince of thieves; alright, even i couldn’t quite stomach water world; but i staunchly maintain that the postman is one of the most underrated films of all time – if you’re brave enough – try it again).

but regardless of his films' successes or failures, i’ve typically been pretty impressed with the guy. his work ethic always seems commendable and his passion always seems infectious and genuine. he's not afraid to fail, and, consequently, this leads to some huge successes.

it seems costner may be close to another success. since the exxon valdez spill in 1989, costner was convinced that there had to be a better way to address oil spills. so, over the last 15 years and $20 million of his own money later, costner's ocean therapy solutions has developed a working centrifuge machine that can separate oil from water at the rate of 2,000 barrels a day. it is going to take this sort of of innovation, determination, and self reliance to clean up the gulf coast.

it can be done. and we can do it.

in the words of president obama, “What the public wants to see is us solving this problem. And that may not make for good TV.”

he's right.

mr. president, there are lots of folks like costner with lots of workable ideas who would love to be put in the game.

so - put us in coach.

we're ready to play.

today.





Perdido Pass, Orange Beach, AL

trends

over the last several years, may tends to be a down month for writing blogs, what with summer festivities going on all. but, looking over last year's may blog, i got warm fuzzies noting that one entry dealt with the fact that the texas rangers were in first place. a rarity in my 40 years as a fan.

but, as i write this on this beautiful may afternoon, i can say for the second season in a row, the rangers are in first place. again, it may be but for a temporal moment, but i'll take it.

i love what nolan ryan is doing for the philosophy of how baseball should be played in texas. pitching, defense. the little things. even we lose, it seems prettier that when were were living for the long ball to miraculously bail us out in the 80's and 90's.

so - go get 'em boys! thanks for two great summers in a row!

Happy Tax Freedom Day April 9, 2010

Whooohoooo! Happy Tax Freedom Day to you and yours. If you live and work in the US, prior to today, the money you made this year went to the federal government. After today, you get to keep what you earn! What a concept. Keeping what you earn.

Jonah Goldberg has a great op ed piece in USA Today on April 6, 2010. In the article, Goldberg asks us to "(i)magine for a moment that Tax Freedom Day was Dec. 31. In other words, picture working 365 days a year for the government. Now, the government would 'give' you a place to sleep, food to eat and clothes to wear, but all your income would really be Washington's income to allocate as it saw fit. Some romantics might call this sort of arrangement 'socialism' or 'communism.' But another perfectly good word for it is 'slavery' or, if you prefer, involuntary servitude."


We could do worse than remember the wisdom of Aesop. "Better to starve free than be a fat slave."

"Sometimes the first duty of intelligent men is the restatement of the obvious." George Orwell

"The essence of Government is power; and power, lodged as it must be in human hands, will ever be liable to abuse."

James Madison, speech in the Virginia constitutional convention, Dec 2, 1829

spring break 2010 wrap up

 

spring break was awesome. we covered about 1,000 miles from the ‘burg, MS to sewanee, Tn; over to chattanooga, TN; and then down to fairhope, AL. in the car; with a four-year-old; without a DVD player; without a cell phone; without incident.

i won’t get on a soap box here, but folks often think we’re crazy for the way we raise special K. however, after seeing her on her first real hikes of any elevation at oak mountain’s peavine falls and sewanee’s morgan’s steep to cross trail, i'm pretty sure we're on the right track with her.

with the determination and agility of a regular billy goat, special K moved her low center of gravity up and down the trails with grit, identifying flora and fauna on the fly, undauntedly facing challenging climbs, and quickly overcoming bumps and scrapes that come with hiking. in short – she was a champ. she left me filled with joy (and not just a little bit of pride) at what a courageous and tough girl we’ve got on our hands! i could go on and on.

from the mountains to the aquarium to the gulf mexico, special K reflected the psalmist’s wonder and excitement of god’s creation.

"Praise the Lord, O my soul. O Lord my God, you are very great; you are clothed with splendor and majesty. He wraps himself in light as with a garment; he stretches out the heavens like a tent and lays the beams of his upper chambers on their waters. He makes the clouds his chariot and rides on the wings of the wind. He makes winds his messengers, flames of fire his servants. He set the earth on its foundations; it can never be moved. You covered it with the deep as with a garment; the waters stood above the mountains. But at your rebuke the waters fled, at the sound of your thunder they took to flight; they flowed over the mountains, they went down into the valleys, to the place you assigned for them. You set a boundary they cannot cross; never again will they cover the earth. He makes springs pour water into the ravines; it flows between the mountains. They give water to all the beasts of the field; the wild donkeys quench their thirst. The birds of the air nest by the waters; they sing among the branches. He waters the mountains from his upper chambers; the earth is satisfied by the fruit of his work. He makes grass grow for the cattle, and plants for man to cultivate-- bringing forth food from the earth: wine that gladdens the heart of man, oil to make his face shine, and bread that sustains his heart. The trees of the Lord are well watered, the cedars of Lebanon that he planted. There the birds make their nests; the stork has its home in the pine trees. The high mountains belong to the wild goats; the crags are a refuge for the coneys. The moon marks off the seasons, and the sun knows when to go down. You bring darkness, it becomes night, and all the beasts of the forest prowl. The lions roar for their prey and seek their food from God. The sun rises, and they steal away; they return and lie down in their dens. Then man goes out to his work, to his labor until evening. How many are your works, O Lord! In wisdom you made them all; the earth is full of your creatures. There is the sea, vast and spacious, teeming with creatures beyond number-- living things both large and small. There the ships go to and fro, and the leviathan, which you formed to frolic there. These all look to you to give them their food at the proper time. When you give it to them, they gather it up; when you open your hand, they are satisfied with good things. When you hide your face, they are terrified; when you take away their breath, they die and return to the dust. When you send your Spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the earth. May the glory of the Lord endure forever; may the Lord rejoice in his works--he who looks at the earth, and it trembles, who touches the mountains, and they smoke. I will sing to the Lord all my life; I will sing praise to my God as long as I live. May my meditation be pleasing to him, as I rejoice in the Lord. But may sinners vanish from the earth and the wicked be no more. Praise the Lord, O my soul. Praise the Lord." psalm 104

 

(if you want to read some excellent literature on kids and the woods, check out Richard Louv, author of Last Child in the Woods; he is right on the money.

make my day . . .

so - remember the lines from the 1971 classic, Dirty Harry?

“I know what you’re thinkin. ‘Did he fire six shots or only five?’ Well, to tell you the truth, in all this excitement I kinda lost track myself. But being as this is a .44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world, and would blow your head clean off, you’ve go to ask yourself one question: ‘Do I feel lucky?’ Well, do ya, punk?”

well, this past week i felt kinda lucky myself. maybe it was st. patrick’s day in the air; maybe it was the fact that i ran into my cousin who has been away in wyoming and who i have not seen in over ten years; maybe it was the fact that we rode a kawasaki mule from my uncle’s upscale hoover, alabama home down to the muddy banks of the cahaba river to have some cigars, adult liquid refreshment, and visit between shooting off live rounds within the city limits; maybe it was knowing that no one in their right minds would be able to find us.

weapons of choice: dominican, cold, 12 gauge stoeger coachman and (drumroll please) ruger super redhawk 454 casull.















wow. you know the one dirty harry used - the one that WAS the most powerful handgun in the world? my cousin says the 454 is eleven times more powerful than that. i don’t know if this is the case, but this is what i do know: it was a rush to shoot the double action ruger; the first shot literally caused me to take a step backwards; and after six shots, i had a blister between my thumb and index finger of my shooting hand from the recoil. and the sound . . . what’s that? come again? i can’t quite make out what you’re saying. oh, yeah. it was freakin’ LOUD!

word on the street was that the local pd was looking for us, but no one really wanted to get stuck in the mud.

my three favorite clean jokes of all time . . .

1) a duck walked into a pharmacy and asked the pharmacist for some chapstick. the pharmacist asked, “how are you going to pay for it?”
the duck said, "just put it on my bill."

2) what did the green grape say to the purple grape?
“breathe.”

3) what did the snail say when he rode on the back of the turtle? “WHEEEEEEEEE!!!!!”


thank you, thank you very much. . . i'll be here all week . . .

with friends like these . . .

"What are conscience? I'll tell ya! A conscience is that still small voice that people won't listen to. That's just the trouble with the world today."
Jiminy Cricket

"One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. The bamboozle has captured us. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back."
Carl Sagan

smile, don't you know god loves you?

i relish the occasions when god peeks out from the abstract and his nature is revealed in the everyday. i’m convinced that he does this often; i am just not attuned to him enough to pick up on it most of the time. but when i do see it, i’m always amazed. in the following clip, i felt like god sorta winked at me while nudging me in the ribs as if to say, “if you want to have a bit of fun, watch this.” and there he was, revealing himself to me through three things i love the most – music, humor, and the shear creativity of the average human being. and why should this be a surprise? we are, after all, made in his image.

let it snow

as a humanities instructor who has been fighting the good fight for about 18 years, sounding the alarm that man-made global warming (MMGW) is a myth designed to infuse socialism into our midst, it’s been a lonely road at times. some colleagues in the science department have laughed and pitied me; sincere students have looked down their collective noses at the moron who should stick to talking about his own field of study; others have sworn that i hate the earth, the environment, al gore, life itself.

so, i must admit that when snow appeared in 49 states this week and one of the main voices in the MMGW movement made the concession “that the world was warmer in medieval times than now – suggesting global warming may not be a man-made phenomenon,” the cockles of my heart were quite warm, errr, i mean, ahem - cozy.

i do love the earth, the environment, life, clean water and air. maybe not al gore - though i don’t wish him ill, just that he be exposed for a greedy fraud. the acknowledgement that there have “been two periods which experienced similar warming, from 1910 to 1940 and from 1975 to 1998” and that these periods of warming “could be explained by natural phenomena” should put a dent in the marketing of those environmental indulgences better known as carbon off-sets. as i have discussed elsewhere on this blog, if you follow the money trail, it is easy to see that the MMGW Hoax is a way to redistribute wealth.

luckily, the hucksters are being revealed for what they are.

watch out for those who say the cold is made by MMGW and for those chicken littles who will, inevitably, claim that we’re about to face a new Man Made Ice Age.

but, in the mean time – bundle up, hunker down, stoke the fire. enjoy the next decade. make some snowmen, a snow angel or two, maybe make some snow-icecream. stick out your tongue – the snow tastes fine – even in february in the deep south.

music just doesn’t get any sweeter

savana lee and anthony crawford in foreground, Sugarcane Jane
craig riches and david trice on drums and bass, Leavin' Brothers Band


if you ever happen to find yourself on Fish River in Daphne, Alabama on a sleepy weekend afternoon, try to find your way to the picnic tables at Big Daddy’s. you’ll always find great food and a good time, but – if you’re lucky, you might just get to listen to one of the south’s best kept musical secrets–
Sugarcane Jane .

whether singing their original works (like Louisiana, Butterfly, and Sugar) or putting their down home sound on familiar classics (ranging from an incredibly playful and fun Hot Rod Lincoln to a spontaneous rendition of Roger Miller’s Dang Me or a dreamily mellow and psychedelic Midnight Rider), Sugarcane Jane’s appeal cuts across generations and appeals to a wide audience.

Alabama’s own Anthony Crawford and Savana Lee continue to work their musical alchemy creating sweet sounds that are assessable and easy, while at the same time intuitive and distinctly their own. if it’s your first time to hear Sugarcane Jane, you’ll find yourself saying, “wow. now, who are these guys? they’re good.” if your familiar with their work, you’ll overhear such comments and smile knowingly as you remember the exact time and place you first stumbled onto the band.

either way – when Sugarcane Jane plays, heads bob, feet tap, smiles spread, and hearts beat just a little faster. you’ll either fall in love with the band, or fall in love with the band again. it just can’t be helped.

so - if you’ve got a sweet tooth for great music and are ever in South Alabama around Fairhope, Daphne, or Gulf Shores, don’t hesitate to give Sugarcane Jane a listen. if you wait too long, the secret will have passed you by.

fruit of the (parcells) vine . . .

wow. what a football year. i must say, that as a dallas cowboy fan, i was disappointed they were not in the super bowl. but, as an nfc fan and a transplant to south mississippi, i could not have been more excited for the saints and the city of new orleans.

however, my greatest delight of the evening stemmed from the fact that i am a monster fan of bill parcells. as a teacher and motivator, parcells, in my book, is about as good as it gets. i was elated when dallas hired him and sad when he left.

just imagining the big tuna watching the game, masterfully coached by his protégé, sean payton. i can just almost see parcells' smile spreading across his face as the second half progressed. peyton did his mentor proud. i bet parcells was thinking to himself something along the lines of, “that’s my boy.”

as i thought about peyton and parcells and the link between the two, i kept hearing the words of Christ rattle around my brain. in john 5 he says, "I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. 6If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. 7If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. 8This is to my Father's glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.”

would that i might do The Mentor proud.

remnants

“Whenever the people are well informed, they can be trusted with their own government; that whenever things get so far wrong as to attract their notice, they may be relied on to set them to rights.”
Thomas Jefferson

friends in low places

one of my heroes is a high school buddy of mine, will white. he was a year ahead of me, but took me under his wing as a freshman. we both played trumpet in the band; he took me on trips with his church youth group where i was introduced to rappelling, horse back riding, and camping out under the milky way in capitan gap, new mexico; we played pranks on folks and each other all the time. will was always one of the good guys.

one thing i always admired about will was his singular focus to become a pilot and fly planes for a mission organization. and that’s exactly what will did when he grew up. will and his family have been working in haiti for years, flying for mission aviation fellowship.


will’s duties include, providing transportation, supplies, housing, encouragement, and support for missionaries and national church workers in haiti. will is also the haiti program flight scheduler; in this role he takes requests by email and phone from local missionaries, teams coming from the US, and haitian pastors and christian worker, and coordinates them with the 3 aircraft and 7 pilots, as well as managing the ongoing maintenance schedule of the airplanes.

i was relieved last night when an email from will appeared in my inbox. he and his family are safe. his wife and kids are already back in the states, while will stayed behind, already involved in helping supplies get to the front lines.

if you get a second, while you’re praying for Haiti, include will and his family. they’re good folks doing good work.

Do you swear to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God?

Howard Dean, current leader of the Democrat Party


All truths are easy to understand once they are discovered; the point is to discover them. GALILEO GALILEI

veterans’ day, 2009

my grandfather, johnny thomas poole, was an accountant; he was married to my grandmother for over fifty years; he had three daughters; and he was a veteran. he served in the united states army during world war ii. he was stationed france. until his death in 2004, this was about all we knew of his service.

he was the kind of guy who did not really talk much about it. he had a couple of stock stories that he would tell when pressed, but even these were not elaborate or detailed. they were sorta little vignettes really.

one was about staying in a private house where the women who cooked for them did not speak english. apparently when the soldiers requested pancakes and sausage for breakfast, they ended up with what sounds like some version of pigs-in-a-blanket (for a man who would not eat lasagna – “cain’t stand that EYE- talian food”, but would scarf it down if it were served as “hamburger pie,” this is no small detail).

another story johnny would refer to took place around the railroad yard where he was in charge of the organization of military equipment as it came off the boats and was being loaded on railroad cars to be dispersed to units around europe. one day the yard was being bombed, and johnny dove under a railroad car for cover and dislocated his shoulder of his tennis arm. until the end of his tennis playing years (which was in his seventies), whenever he would lose a tennis game (which was not often), he would blame it on his bum shoulder. the part of the story he always highlighted was the fact that he did not realize until the bombing was over that the car he dove under was an oil tanker that would have exploded and killed him had it been hit.

that was pretty much it as far as johnny’s firsthand narrative of his time in the service. occasionally, a new time life type book on wwii would appear on the book shelf. and occasionally, i’d find a picture in said book with a building circled and some marginalia scrawled in granddad’s hand – typically a date and a brief note like: “we stayed in this building for a week” or “this hotel had clean sheets.” stuff like that.

imagine the family’s surprise upon his death in 2004 when we were going through his paperwork and found his discharge papers. my granddad - the mild mannered accountant, father or three, grandfather of seven, sunday school teacher - the one who never talked about the war, was the recipient of not one, but two bronze stars. no one in the family had ever even heard about the medals let alone ever seen them. despite a little bit of digging, we have not been able to find out much about why johnny was twice awarded the bronze star. we have been able to find out that johnny was involved in the battle of the bulge, the single largest and bloodiest battle american troops experienced in this war .

it’s been five veterans’ days since i’ve been able to call johnny up and thank him for his service.

so – to all the johnnies out there – those who came before my grandfather and those who served after – thank you for what you do for us. and thank you for how you do it.

we sleep safe in our own beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm.
george orwell

apple bobbin’ 09

fall is a great time of year. i love the change in weather, the passion of the football season, and the onset of the holiday season. one of my favorite holidays is halloween. it might be the nostalgia of the 1970’s when kids in my dallas suburb roamed the streets trick-or-treating without fear of the literal signs of the boogie men (bright orange jack-o-lantern graphic with the “no candy at this residence” notice ); maybe it was the strange way that my grandmother used to recite a cryptic poem about when little orphan annie came to her house to play around this time of year; it could be the fun of embracing an alter ego via costume if only for an evening; the cooler, crisper, chillier air; the traditions; the mystery; the surprise. it’s almost too much to try and bottle up.

so – let me just say that this year, my joy for halloween revolved around the big fun special k had at our annual halloween party. her wish for the party was that we have bobbing for apples. we had the dry version last year, but she insisted on “havin’ a bucket, with water.” so in the grand tradition of snap apple night (new foundland’s version of halloween) we had opportunities for folks to go “dooking” (scotch for “ducking”) for apples. as she was curious in the ways three year olds are want to be, we did a little research on apple bobbin’ and found out some pretty cool stuff. like - why apples as the fruit of choice? well – for one – they float . two – apples were used in the earliest bobbing games during the celtic harvest festival samhain (summer’s end) and are linked to love and fertility. an interesting aside, apparently, Agatha Christie has a book called, the hallowe’en party which revolves around the murder of a girl drowned in an apple bobbing tub.

special k was beside herself with glee at the chance for everyone to bob for apples. while she was unsuccessful, she was pretty tenacious and did try enough times to become thoroughly soaked.

happy halloween to you and yours. hope you don't get a rock.

an exercise in juxtaposition

"Let us consider the nature of true greatness in men. The people who can catch hold of men’s minds and feelings and inspire them to do things bigger than themselves are the people who are remembered in history. . . . those who stir feelings and imagination and make men struggle toward perfection."
-Henry Eyring






"Striving for success without hard work is like trying to harvest where you haven't planted."
-David Bly

the sugar does indeed taste so fine . . .

last weekend, my father-in-law and i went to the local american legion in search of adult beverages and the possibility of live music. and i must say, we hit the jackpot on both counts.

there just so happened to be a song-writers’ sing around in progress, and on stage we were privileged to hear a regional group called sugarcane jane . in short, they were fantastic.

the group is made up of anthony crawford and savana lee. crawford is one of the best guitarists i have ever witnessed in person. he has toured with neil young, played with roy acuff, and his songs have been sung by kenny rogers, lorrie morgan, and the nitty gritty dirt band. his voice is like the love child resulting from a tender affair between the intonations of neil young and the haunting tenors of del mccoury. savana, a loxley, alabama girl, was great as well. her voice and harmonies ranged from gentle and krauss-like to passionate shades of loretta lynn. the chemistry between lee and crawford was a thing of beauty to witness. after the show, i bought four of the cd’s they had available and immediately went to their web site to find future locations/dates where these two will be playing.

my father-in-law and i have enjoyed lots of local gigs across the southeast over the past ten years. we’ve seen some good acts here and there. enough that we’ve developed a question between ourselves: how good do you have to be? implying that the music business must be tough, because while some of these talented folks aren’t hitting it big, american idol et al is cranking consumption for the masses that just ain’t all that.

something tells me sugarcane jane just might be good enough. if you’re lucky enough to catch them live, you’ll see and hear what i mean.

never forget.

one of the things i miss most about living in texas is the annual state fair. and a big part of what i miss is the food offerings at the fair (did you know that snow cones debuted at the texas state fair?) one of my heros, abel gonzales, jr. (the creator of such delectables as texas fried cookie dough, fried peanut butter, jelly and banana sandwiches, and fried coke) has done it again. this october gonzales is introducing (drum roll please) . . . . . . . . . . . . . fried butter!



can it get any closer to heaven on this side of the grave?

i hope babe’s fried chicken learns how to fix fried butter and serves it as an appetizer.

quick - name that animal . . .

welcome back, james!!!!!!!

tomorrow is a great day. one of my all-time favorite politicians will be released from the federal pen. so look out washington. if he were to run for anything, i’d vote for him. and since half the jokers in that town are crooks what ain’t been caught yet anyways, why not give old j.t. a crack at sorting out some of the mess. the people need a wordsmith of the common man to go toe to toe with THE ONE. check out these golden oldies:









now that he’s out of jail, his art work should be going on sale in legit markets. if you’re interested in that sort of thing, j. t. has got some pretty cool stuff. my personal favorite is his madonna and child painting.

things that make you go, "hmmmmmmmmm."

before viewing the following clip, ask yourself the following questions:

“am i happy with the service i get from the united states post office?”

“why does the cost of postage keep going up, but the service of the us post office remain the same or get worse?”

“when was the last time the us post office turned a fiscal profit?”

according to jo cerra's article in the new york times , the us post office lost 5 BILLION dollars in 2007, 2.4 BILLION dollars in 2008, and is on track to lose 7 BILLION dollars in 2009.

with these thoughts in mind, witness the rhetorical mastery that is THE ONE.

one of my favorite happenings is when god reveals glimpses of himself in unanticipated or unexpected places or/and events. maybe i should not be so startled or surprised, but when it happens, i feel the most like a child on christmas morning than at any other time. one such event occurred last friday night at the beau rivage hotel and casino in biloxi, mississippi.

my lovely and gracious wife and i are not big fans of the boats, but we did want to catch the los lonely boys in concert. so, we booked a room, burned through a roll of nickels at the one-armed-bandits, ate some pretty good food, and set off to hear what turned out to be a great concert.

i knew the los lonely boys were going to be good, but had no idea that they were going to be THAT good. the three brothers ( henry, jojo, and ringo garza) brought it for roughly 70 minutes, came back for a one song encore that turned into a two song encore that morphed into another twenty minutes split between stevie wonder’s superstition and jimi hendrix’s voodoo child. Wow. pretty much the whole concert was amped a bit more than their studio work; in fact, the pace and volume of the concert revealed a whole other side of the band.

but i digress - - - about twenty minutes into the show, for one brief moment, the boys slowed the pace a bit. henry dedicated a song to “all of us here tonight who might have done that one little thing in our life we might regret,” and then they played forgiven.

it’s not like i haven’t heard the song before or haven’t ever contemplated the spiritual journey of the band whose albums include titles like forgiven and scacred.

maybe it was the venue – a casino – with vice in all its forms available. maybe it was the brazen act of witness in a secular forum. whatever it was, in the roughly 3 minutes it took for the los lonely boys to perform forgiven, the arena was almost completely silent, and i was taken into the presence of god in a powerful and palpable way.

and it was pretty cool to know that the answer to the song’s question, “Can I be forgiven?” is a resounding, “YES!”



Take it away. Take it away.
Take away these feelings cuz they're bringing me down.
Cuz I can't breathe. Feels like I can't breathe.
Feels just like this whole world's coming down on me.

Oh, can I be Forgiven for all I have done?

Can you set me free? Can you set me free?
Set me free from all this pain life's done to me.

If you can hear me praying, then I'll ask one more time.

Can you take it away, Lord? Oh, can I be forgiven?
Can you take it away, Lord? Help me change my ways of living.
[ Forgiven lyrics from http://www.lyricsyoulove.com/ ]

Oh, can I be forgiven for all I have done?
Is there time for me? Is there still time for me?
Time to change whatever I've got left of me.

If you can hear me praying, then I'll ask one more time.

Can you take it away, Lord? Oh, can I be forgiven?
Can you take it away, Lord? Help me change my ways of living.

three cheers for journalistic integrity!

sometimes there are things in this world that just defy logic. but if we focus on the little things, we might be able to right the world before it is too late. one such area i’d like folks to consider is in the daily reporting of the temperature. yesterday, the weatherman reported that it was 100 degrees, with a heat index was 108degrees. if i understand it right, a heat index is “what it feels like” outside. is this to say that the weather is an emotional state of mind? no. can weather be manipulated by, say, oprah? no. so, why not just report the truth? i mean the temperature is not like a forecast – “there’s a 50% chance of thunder showers in the afternoon.” no one really cares about the accuracy rating of a forecast anyway because the odds of the weathermen being right is less than even. so why not be frank about absolutes such as the temperature. either it is or it isn’t 108. if it is, just say, “it’s 108 degrees outside.” if they’re not sure, just get in the ball park. simply say, “it’s freakin’ hot out there. be careful and make sure you hydrate.” we can take it. and maybe, if we can get the weather reported with some honesty, that attitude might spill over into other areas of journalism.

viva texas rangers!

wow! it may be only an ephemeral moment, but i’m going to enjoy it. the texas baseball rangers are in first place! IN MAY for crying out loud! GO BOYS, GO!!!!

i'm a sucker for a good ad and a good beer

"Great men are never sufficiently shown but in struggles." Edmund Burke

The following is a letter from Andrew McCarthy to Attorney General Holder concerning a request to participate in President Obama's Task Force on Detention Policy. Wow. If only we had conservative politicians running with the cojones of Mr. McCarthy.


May 1, 2009


By email (to the Counterterrorism Division) and by regular mail:

The Honorable Eric H. Holder, Jr.
Attorney General of the United States
United States Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, D.C. 20530-0001

Dear Attorney General Holder:

This letter is respectfully submitted to inform you that I must decline the invitation to participate in the May 4 roundtable meeting the President’s Task Force on Detention Policy is convening with current and former prosecutors involved in international terrorism cases. An invitation was extended to me by trial lawyers from the Counterterrorism Section, who are members of the Task Force, which you are leading.

The invitation email (of April 14) indicates that the meeting is part of an ongoing effort to identify lawful policies on the detention and disposition of alien enemy combatants -- or what the Department now calls “individuals captured or apprehended in connection with armed conflicts and counterterrorism operations.” I admire the lawyers of the Counterterrorism Division, and I do not question their good faith. Nevertheless, it is quite clear -- most recently, from your provocative remarks on Wednesday in Germany -- that the Obama administration has already settled on a policy of releasing trained jihadists (including releasing some of them into the United States). Whatever the good intentions of the organizers, the meeting will obviously be used by the administration to claim that its policy was arrived at in consultation with current and former government officials experienced in terrorism cases and national security issues. I deeply disagree with this policy, which I believe is a violation of federal law and a betrayal of the president’s first obligation to protect the American people. Under the circumstances, I think the better course is to register my dissent, rather than be used as a prop.
Moreover, in light of public statements by both you and the President, it is dismayingly clear that, under your leadership, the Justice Department takes the position that a lawyer who in good faith offers legal advice to government policy makers—like the government lawyers who offered good faith advice on interrogation policy—may be subject to investigation and prosecution for the content of that advice, in addition to empty but professionally damaging accusations of ethical misconduct. Given that stance, any prudent lawyer would have to hesitate before offering advice to the government.

Beyond that, as elucidated in my writing (including my proposal for a new national security court, which I understand the Task Force has perused), I believe alien enemy combatants should be detained at Guantanamo Bay (or a facility like it) until the conclusion of hostilities. This national defense measure is deeply rooted in the venerable laws of war and was reaffirmed by the Supreme Court in the 2004 Hamdi case. Yet, as recently as Wednesday, you asserted that, in your considered judgment, such notions violate America’s “commitment to the rule of law.” Indeed, you elaborated, “Nothing symbolizes our [administration’s] new course more than our decision to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay&hellip. President Obama believes, and I strongly agree, that Guantanamo has come to represent a time and an approach that we want to put behind us: a disregard for our centuries-long respect for the rule of law.”

Given your policy of conducting ruinous criminal and ethics investigations of lawyers over the advice they offer the government, and your specific position that the wartime detention I would endorse is tantamount to a violation of law, it makes little sense for me to attend the Task Force meeting. After all, my choice would be to remain silent or risk jeopardizing myself.

For what it may be worth, I will say this much. For eight years, we have had a robust debate in the United States about how to handle alien terrorists captured during a defensive war authorized by Congress after nearly 3000 of our fellow Americans were annihilated. Essentially, there have been two camps. One calls for prosecution in the civilian criminal justice system, the strategy used throughout the 1990s. The other calls for a military justice approach of combatant detention and war-crimes prosecutions by military commission. Because each theory has its downsides, many commentators, myself included, have proposed a third way: a hybrid system, designed for the realities of modern international terrorism—a new system that would address the needs to protect our classified defense secrets and to assure Americans, as well as our allies, that we are detaining the right people.
There are differences in these various proposals. But their proponents, and adherents to both the military and civilian justice approaches, have all agreed on at least one thing: Foreign terrorists trained to execute mass-murder attacks cannot simply be released while the war ensues and Americans are still being targeted. We have already released too many jihadists who, as night follows day, have resumed plotting to kill Americans. Indeed, according to recent reports, a released Guantanamo detainee is now leading Taliban combat operations in Afghanistan, where President Obama has just sent additional American forces.
The Obama campaign smeared Guantanamo Bay as a human rights blight. Consistent with that hyperbolic rhetoric, the President began his administration by promising to close the detention camp within a year. The President did this even though he and you (a) agree Gitmo is a top-flight prison facility, (b) acknowledge that our nation is still at war, and (c) concede that many Gitmo detainees are extremely dangerous terrorists who cannot be tried under civilian court rules. Patently, the commitment to close Guantanamo Bay within a year was made without a plan for what to do with these detainees who cannot be tried. Consequently, the Detention Policy Task Force is not an effort to arrive at the best policy. It is an effort to justify a bad policy that has already been adopted: to wit, the Obama administration policy to release trained terrorists outright if that’s what it takes to close Gitmo by January.

Obviously, I am powerless to stop the administration from releasing top al Qaeda operatives who planned mass-murder attacks against American cities—like Binyam Mohammed (the accomplice of “Dirty Bomber” Jose Padilla) whom the administration recently transferred to Britain, where he is now at liberty and living on public assistance. I am similarly powerless to stop the administration from admitting into the United States such alien jihadists as the 17 remaining Uighur detainees. According to National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair, the Uighurs will apparently live freely, on American taxpayer assistance, despite the facts that they are affiliated with a terrorist organization and have received terrorist paramilitary training. Under federal immigration law (the 2005 REAL ID Act), those facts render them excludable from theUnited States. The Uighurs’ impending release is thus a remarkable development given the Obama administration’s propensity to deride its predecessor’s purported insensitivity to the rule of law.

I am, in addition, powerless to stop the President, as he takes these reckless steps, from touting his Detention Policy Task Force as a demonstration of his national security seriousness. But I can decline to participate in the charade.
Finally, let me repeat that I respect and admire the dedication of Justice Department lawyers, whom I have tirelessly defended since I retired in 2003 as a chief assistant U.S. attorney in the Southern District of New York. It was a unique honor to serve for nearly twenty years as a federal prosecutor, under administrations of both parties. It was as proud a day as I have ever had when the trial team I led was awarded the Attorney General’s Exceptional Service Award in 1996, after we secured the convictions of Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman and his underlings for waging a terrorist war against the United States. I particularly appreciated receiving the award from Attorney General Reno—as I recounted in Willful Blindness, my book about the case, without her steadfastness against opposition from short-sighted government officials who wanted to release him, the “blind sheikh” would never have been indicted, much less convicted and so deservedly sentenced to life-imprisonment. In any event, I’ve always believed defending our nation is a duty of citizenship, not ideology. Thus, my conservative political views aside, I’ve made myself available to liberal and conservative groups, to Democrats and Republicans, who’ve thought tapping my experience would be beneficial. It pains me to decline your invitation, but the attendant circumstances leave no other option.
Very truly yours,

/S/
Andrew C. McCarthy
cc: Sylvia T. Kaser and John DePue
National Security Division, Counterterrorism Section

my own dr.s frankenstien: albert marsh and william hoskins

the above is a result of a quiz which rae ann, she of i'm a hoe, not to be mistaken for a rake or a shovel fame, turned me onto. i'll leave it to both of the viewing audience members who know me as to whether or not the results of the quiz are accurate. i must confess, i was stunned upon discovering that i have been labeled a toaster. you too can find your inner inanimate object here .

happy hour indeed!

i though about calling this photo this little light of mine, but it sounded kinda sacrilegious. so, i'll just call it, papa's a pretty cool dude 'cause he took me to sonic.

the wojtowicz's, franklin, and douglass

patrick, melissa, and gabrielle wojtowicz have become my newest heroes. after reading an article about them in the 4/14/09 issue of USA Today (having trouble linking to the article - sorry) and a subsequent article by peggy noonan , I decided to check out the wojtowicz’s blog (i can't figure out why this link says the blog doesn't exist, but when it says that true north doesn't exist, click on true north and it will take you to none other than true north).

these guys figured it out. as patrick says in the USA Today article, “The idea of living a fuller, more satisfying life seems simple to us now. . . . We would basically buy stuff to feel good. . . . When that stuff stopped filling the voids we had, we started analyzing what it was that we were really missing. . . . Money, cash, credit, maybe they don’t matter. Maybe, just maybe, it is those things that impede our ability to be truly happy.”

patrick is right. and the path the wojtowicz family are on embodies ben franklin’s ideas of self-reliance, specifically virtues #4, #5, and #6: resolution, frugality, and industry. i hope and pray, that the wojtowiczs are indicative of a whole movement back to an agrarian life style. if they are, and if there is a shift in american culture back to an agrarian mind set, maybe an unintended consequence of BIG GOVERNMENT’s meddling in the american way of life could be a positive.

in his Self-Made Man lecture of 1859, frederick douglass said, “Self-made men are the men . . . who they are, without the aid of any of the favoring conditions by which other men usually rise in the world and achieve great results. . . . They are the men who, in a world of schools, academics, colleges, and other institutions of learning, are often compelled by unfriendly circumstances to acquire their education elsewhere and, amidst unfavorable conditions, to hew out for themselves a way to success, and thus to become the architects of their own good fortunes. . . . If they have traveled far, they have made the road on which they have traveled. If they have ascended high, they have built their own ladder. . . . I am certain that there is nothing good, great or desirable which man can possess in this world, that does not come by some kind of labor, either physical or mental, moral or spiritual. A man may, at times, get something for nothing, but it will, in his hands, amount to nothing. What is true in the world of matter is equally true in the world of the mind. Without culture there can be no growth; without exertion, no acquisition; without friction, no polish; without labor, no knowledge; without action, no progress and without conflict, no victory. The man who lies down a fool at night, hoping that he will waken wise in the morning, will rise up in the morning as he laid down in the evening.”

i think franklin and douglass would've been proud of the wojtowic family.

hard-working hands gain control, but lazy hands do slave labor. Proverbs 12:24

go get 'em america!

god bless the new crop of sons and daughters of liberty who are participating tomorrow in the tea parties around the country! may your voices be heard!

a stack of money with eyes, a gecko, and a karaoke singer walk into a bar . . .

this video is for my daughter who really likes all things geico. hopefully, she will not grow up with some sort of unhealthy paranoia.

tell me tommy boy; what is it good for?

as an amateur ornithologist, my ears perked up when i heard about the newest cyber space rage - tweeting. or is it twitting? or twittering? anyway - as a technological neanderthal, i’m doing well to figure out how to post a blog every now and then, much less tweet every two seconds. how does one keep up with tweeting and why? i mean, when i don’t blog for weeks at a time, it occurs to me to go to confession. which is strange. but if stephen king can crank out books a year, shouldn’t i be able to crank out blogs a month? so along comes the twitter. which i still have not gotten a straight answer about from my students. which alerts me to the fact that tweeting or twittering or whatever is either a) so new they don’t even know what it’s good for, or b) it’s not really good for anything. anyone besides the cartoon network got any insight for those of us being left behind?

Bob Dylan once said, “A hero is someone who understands the responsibility that comes with his freedom.” It seems South Carolina’s governor, Mark Sanford almost gets Zimbo’s drift; he sorta understands James Madison's observation that "I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents." So, should Mr. Sanford get half of an “‘atta boy!” for rejecting "some" of the stimulus bill? for almost saying,"No" to the stimulus package? Sanford rightly avers that “The name of the game is staying true to the principles that got you into politics in the first place _ and letting the chips fall where they may." So why not apply this to a total rejection of the stimulus bill? would that there were governors out there who had the strength and courage to follow all the way through with their principles.

ezra, the seer

ezra taft benson was the secretary of agriculture in the eisenhower administration. i’m not sure how popular he was then, but i wish there were more wise politicians with some cajones like ezra’s around today. i understand he actually was a prophet in the lds organization. i think that's what the bookend weirdness of the second clip is all about. after listening to a few of his words, it seems maybe he did have a touch of the sight. certainly, he was on the mark politically.

can you hear me now?

america - how much more can you take? when are you going to listen and realize what's going down? wake up out there. the wool is being pulled over your eyes as the following quote and clip illustrate.

from the press conference last night, obama says: "I know that there are a lot of folks out there who've been saying, 'Oh, this is pork, and this is money that's going to be wasted,' and et cetera, et cetera. Understand, this bill does not have a single earmark in it, which is unprecedented for a bill of this size. ... There aren't individual pork projects that members of Congress are putting into this bill."

the bold italics are mine for emphasis in light of the following clip.

the postman was right about the wretched stone

of course one of the benefits of watching the super bowl is the commercials. however, one commercial in particular was quite haunting.



initially, this commercial made me think of mike judge’s idiocracy (which is a great satire on what happens to a culture that abandons literacy). in the imaginary future of idiocracy, the number one show on television in the year 2506 is owww, my balls. the fictional sit-com revolves around a single theme: how the protagonist’s testicles are assaulted and abused as he carries out his daily routines. after thinking of judge’s vision, i recalled reading neil postman’s great book, amusing ourselves to death: public discourse in the age of show business. in the book, postman reminds us that television’s entertainment value is a type of huxleyian “soma” which lulls folks into a blissful ignorance which translates into a voluntary relinquishment of their rights to the government. if television is a gateway drug and the internet is crack, what sort of drug is hulu? the future is now. and we need to detoxify ourselves. we’ve medicated ourselves into a state of consciousness from which we might never awake. before it's too late, turn off the visual media and read chris van alsberg's the wretched stone to your kids.