Wolves

Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness. These are called ‘unalienable rights’ in the Declaration of Independence, and a quick look in the dictionary tells us that ‘unalienable’ is something that cannot be bought or sold.  Unfortunately, not only is there a wolf at the door wanting to take these rights away from us, there is a wolf in sheep’s clothing inside our own house eager to sell the very same rights out from under our noses. These wolves hope that the majority of Americans are so weary and lethargic that the true meaning of these rights have become fuzzy, that they have somehow become abstract and illusionary, that they have become mere words and nothing more. Let’s pull these unalienable rights out from the shadow of neglect and into the light of reason, understand them for what they are, and then look at what the wolves within and without intend on doing with them.

Life itself is the most fundamental of all rights. We could debate all day on the essential right of a pre-birth child to live, but I’m not just talking about the right to stay alive once infused with life.  We could even muse over the philosophical meaning of what constitutes life, but the drainpipe of our conversation would get hopelessly clogged with all those split hairs. I’m talking about the privilege of self-sustainability, the entitlement (yes, I used that dirty word!) to thrive by one’s own effort, to act according to the dictate of his or her own basic needs. Who truly lives when their decisions are made for them, when they are slaves to government or religion, when they are handed what others decide should be adequate for their survival? Just recently in the news a Mr. Michael Cole from Great Britain stabbed his wife to death and then tried taking his own life because they were both on benefits and could only sit and watch TV all day and night. Life is not freedom from frustration, but freedom from despair. Life is not the right to merely have those things that sustains itself, but the right to earn them. We cannot demand that an unborn child live, but we can try to give that child every chance to fight for his own right to live. The right to life means not being deprived of it for the benefit of others.

Liberty is the freedom from being oppressed, particularly by a government or religion. Remember, our founding fathers were breaking free of coercion by the tyrannical rule of King George the Third. The right to liberty, contrary to popular belief, does not mean the freedom from all laws and governance. Liberty is choice, pure and simple. When an institution is allowed to whittle your choices away, your liberty is at stake. Recently MSNBC anchor Melissa Harris-Perry took Hillary Clinton’s 1996 book idea that “It Takes A Village” to a disturbing new level when she said that we need to stop thinking of the responsibilities of parenting as being a ‘private notion’ because (and I quote her here) “These are OUR children …We have to break through our kind of private idea that kids belong to their parents…and recognize that kids belong to whole communities.” The government is currently working on a program that will collect individual databases on all schoolchildren under the guise of helping maximize the individual’s education, but is in essence an effort to gain more control by the state. Fingerprint all the kids, take samples of their DNA, find out what they think, how they feel, and then manipulate them into government drones. Sounds like “A Brave New World,” doesn’t it? Liberty is the freedom to raise your children the way YOU see fit, the freedom to vote for whatever candidate you want without fear of Big Brother giving you a hard time over it, the freedom to live without the daily threat of coercion. Remember the patriot’s call to “Live free or die!” Are you willing to die for your liberty?

The unalienable right for the pursuit of happiness can only be realized when the individual is free to seek his own her own bliss. The pursuit of happiness is the mantra of free enterprise, of entrepreneurialism, of capitalism and the very backbone of healthy competition. The writer Ayn Rand said in her book “Atlas Shrugged” (if you haven’t read it, stop right now before you take another breath, get the book, read it, and then send me a thousand word essay on how it changed your life) – she said “My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute.” The wolf outside and the wolf in your midst wants nothing more than to deprive you of your pursuit for happiness, because when they accomplish that, they will have taken your purpose and with it your will. Barak Obama said “You didn’t make that yourself!” If he succeeds in convincing you of that it will be no great leap for him and others like him to tell you that the pursuit of happiness means your efforts are for the good of the whole, that you should sacrifice your own goals for the collective, that you have no right to succeed when there are others in need. Don’t buy into it!

The wolf outside the door is radical Islam. Its goal is global domination, and it wants you to surrender your freedoms and submit to their oppressive, subjugating and violent Sharia laws. Radical Islam is growing at an alarming rate; it is not shy about telling you what it wants: complete surrender to the will of their god, or death. Pure and simple.  Do not under any circumstances let the petty politics and dramas of the world take your attention off the very real threat they pose to your unalienable rights. Unless you live in or near a country that is under the thumb of these animals, you probably feel sure you won’t have to worry about someone coming along and slicing your head off. Tell that to Lee Rigby’s widow. The wolf is right outside your door, and the wolf inside wants to let it in under the guise of religious tolerance. This sheep-covered danger around you is Progressivism, the steady eroding influence of a socialistic government wearing away at your individual freedoms. It wants to reduce you to a disposable and replaceable gear inside the machine of the collective, much as radical Islam wants to reduce you to a disposable and replaceable slave to the desires and whims of pure evil. Both wolves hate life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and together they constitute the vise-like jaws that want nothing more than to crush your freedoms.  Be aware and be prepared, my friends!

What is Seen Cannot Be Unseen

There is a funny little poster going around Facebook that shows a cat with its eyes bugged out in apparent terror as a woman shopper walks behind him. She is in her sixties and hideous to behold, her hair fresh from a wind tunnel, no make-up and a tube top pulled almost down to her waist but still covering her dramatically pendulous breasts. The caption reads: WHAT IS SEEN CANNOT BE UNSEEN. At first glance you can sympathize with the poor feline as you fight the urge to scoop your eyes out with a spoon.

I wish I could unsee the image of that murderer in Great Britain (whose name I will not mention because it is a shame to the human race), his hands bloodied, holding a meat cleaver and butcher knife as he gestured and bloviated in front of the camera. I wish I could unsee the crowd behind him standing around taking pictures, or the woman who walked on by as casually as if she were passing a man talking about the price of tomatoes. I wish I could unsee the sight of Lee Rigby crumpled on the street, ringed in blood and obviously gone from this world. I wish I could unsee the veiled excitement in reporters’ voices and eyes as they pummel the event into the brains of all who care to watch. I wish I could unsee protesters hurling insults at the English Defence League, calling them Nazis and hooligans for gathering and marching against the spread of radical Islam. I wish I could unsee a great many things, to be honest with you.

The world has never been both so small and so large. Small in that the proliferation of news organizations around the world, combined with satellite technology and a record number of people with access to televisions and radios, makes for reporting breaking news anywhere as easy as walking next door and talking to your neighbor. Large in that there is so much information being shoved at us every second of the day that today’s events are swallowed up by tomorrow’s, discarded like used toilet paper. Anyone attempting to keep a subject in the always shifting spotlight is accused of ‘beating a dead horse’ or being behind the times.  You’ve got to be able to go with the flow if you ever hope of keeping up with the happenings around the globe.

Our enemy understands that we easily forget the atrocities of yesterday, and they are more than happy to try and outdo themselves in order to stay on the front page. A famous broadcasting phrase is “If it bleeds, it leads”. The animalistic killers who call themselves good Muslims know this all too well. So many infidels, so few seconds of attention from mainstream media.  Let me try and hammer something into your over-saturated brain: we are at WAR, and our enemy is winning with patience, determination, religious fervor and a complete disregard for human life.  If you are under thirty years old, there is a great chance that the enemy will destroy someone close to you. They are multiplying exponentially, they are using intimidation and threats to prevent the influential from opposing them, and they are taking advantage of the growing spread of apathy and political correctness to both further their agenda (global dominance and subjugation of both believers and non-believers) and to be able to strike with boldness and impunity whenever they want.  Lee Rigby is one in an extremely long list of victims in the war on terror (terror meaning unfettered jihad against us all), and before the dirt settles in his grave the world moves on and forgets.  We are going to forget our way into defeat and death, reader, unless we light a fire of righteousness, freedom and resolve, and use that fire to combat the murderous and barbaric agents of evil.

Of course, I need to eat my earlier words if I believe what I write. I do NOT want to unsee the images burned into my soul, and neither should you. I do NOT want to unsee the daily horror being broadcast constantly around the world. I do NOT want to push aside or forget the atrocities of yesterday. I vow to you, dear reader, that I WILL NOT stop sounding the battle cry. We are at war, and unless we come to grips with this very real threat to our existence, we will lose. Yes, what is seen cannot be unseen. Thank God for that.

Today, Remember

You. Yes, you, with your steady pulse, with your breath, with your mind in neutral, placidly reading these words. This must mean you’re still alive. Nice, isn’t it? Most of us take living for granted, and why not? We get up and tackle the day like we have since we were born. It gets old and weary after awhile, at least sometimes, right? “I’ll be glad when this day is finally done,” and “This is the longest day of my life,” and “another day, another dollar.” Man, some days should never have happened, but they did, so we just have to live through it and move on.

Now, round about this time I could turn this article into a reminder of all the men and women who lost their lives defending our freedom. It is Memorial Day, isn’t it? Time to reflect on those brave few who paid the ultimate sacrifice. It’s the one day a year when everyone is suppose to acknowledge the warriors who confronted the forces of evil head on and died as a result of it.  The President of the United States goes to Arlington Cemetery, lays a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and says a few words in honor of all those deceased soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines. Then the crowd disperses, we turn off our televisions and go outside to barbeque in the warm May sun and celebrate the beginning of summer. Good for another year.  What a sad day, but not too late to turn it around. Here’s a bun, here’s a Frisbee, light up these fireworks, let freedom ring.

Truth is, my friend, there are more than just American soldiers dying for freedom. Do you know who Lee Rigby was? His widow can tell you. He was brutally murdered in the street just last week in Woolwich, Great Britain. You know, the one whose blood was drying on the killer’s hands as the monster made his little speech in front of a camera. While you’re watching CNN broadcast Obama shuffling forward with a huge wreath, think about Lee, too. I know, he’s not American, but hear me out. There’s a war going on all over the world, with a vicious enemy that openly wants to kill us all. They are in your city, fermenting their hate, biding their time, waiting for just the right moment to strike so as to inflict as much carnage as possible. 

This is a war that of ideology, and it is bigger than all the armies of the world. Those of us who don’t share their twisted belief, their warped interpretation of scripture, their Caliphate mentality, their Sharia law, we are all targets, every last one of us, and that makes us all soldiers whether we like it or not. Did you know that over three hundred people have been killed by al-Qaeda in just the past two weeks in Iraq?  Kabul, Bangaldesh, Paris, Beirut – everywhere, reader! To the families of this widespread violence, Memorial Day is every day.  The surviving husbands, wives, children and parents will tell you their loved one was a true soldier of decency and compassion who wanted little more than to make it through each day.  Today I remember the lives stolen by those who wish only to destroy us.

A newspaper article today said that Memorial Day is evolving. Let me help it with this proposition. Let Memorial Day belong to the world. Let it stand for all of us whose lives were snuffed out by the agents of evil. Remember the words of Ephesians 6:12 – “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” It is time we raise our heads and look around at all the poor souls who died for nothing more than the chance to live. It is time we gave this day of remembrance to every nation, to every citizen of this planet, to every voice that cries out in grief. Let us make Memorial Day a global event. And then, perhaps someday we can take a moment out of every day to pause and honor those who have given the ultimate price for decency and freedom. I guarantee you it will transform your day into one of gratitude; it will strengthen you against the coming battles.

ENOUGH!

I watched in horror as the news channel aired the video clip of two men hacking another man to death in the streets of suburban London. As a crowd began to form one of the men walked up to someone taping them and began giving his justification for committing the atrocity, saying ‘you people will never be safe’ and ‘you and your children are next’. The monster ranted as he held a meat cleaver in one of his bloodied hands. To add to the surreal and nightmarish scene a woman walked casually by the man on her way home from a day of shopping as if nothing was wrong.

The images that splashed across my TV screen made me sick. I’m still sick. But I’m more ANGRY than sick. That scarf-wearing shopper who strolled right by the murderer, that oblivious woman who saw the carnage but didn’t hesitate to amble through, that very act of turning a blind eye and pretending nothing was wrong is indicative of the majority of us, and this outrages me so much that I want to scream and pound my fists into something. This is going on all around us – hatred-fueled murder and mayhem in the name of God – and we watch it as if nothing is wrong!  To follow Howard Beale’s advice in the film Network: I’M MAD AS HELL AND I’M NOT GOING TO TAKE THIS ANYMORE!!!

I’ve got a copy of the Qur’an, and in Surah 5, verse 32 it says “… if anyone slays a human being – unless it be in punishment for murder or for spreading corruption on earth – it shall be as though he had slain all mankind…” There are other references to the subject of murder, but this one is as close as I can get to outright condemnation of homicide. If you are a Muslim and know of any other verse in the Qur’an that unequivocally denounces murder, please bring it to my attention.  As far as I know, however, the holy scripture of Islam does not outright say “Thou shalt not kill.” (Exodus 20:17) There is always some caveat or stipulation which can be warped and twisted. What’s even worse than morphing scripture to justify murder is that the rest of Islam is just like that woman walking by, aware of the horror but unwilling to act against it.  The typical response for Muslims and non-Muslims to do is to say “Islam is a peace loving religion and does not condone such violence.”  Really? Those murderers claim to be Muslims, so they must go to some mosque, they must be getting their brains infected with hatred from some Imam, they must be a brother, a son, a husband, a father – SOMEONE has to be aware of the evil pouring out of these radical killers and what fount of poison they’re drinking from. I’m pointing my finger at Islam and I’m not afraid. Clean up your house!

Jesus said in Matthew 5: 21-22: “Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment:  But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment…”  If you think God is telling you to hate, if you think your spiritual leader is right by shoveling rage and violence into you, if you think you are justified to murder innocent human beings, I’ve got news for you: There will be an accounting.  If you know someone who is like this, if you live with or near someone who talks about murdering infidels in the name of Allah, if you stand by and watch them slaughter another human being, if you walk on by, I’ve got news for you: There will be an accounting.

I’m not going to let some hate-filled monster try to harm my family and friends, or any other human for that matter. If I’m around to witness that level of evil I will use every means at my disposal to insure they meet their maker, even if I have to beat them to death with my laptop or choke the life out of their hateful body with my bare hands.  Radical Islamists, if you come after my family, friends or neighbors, I will be glad to help you get to paradise.  I am not going to take it anymore.

This is the moment when we as decent people need to draw a line in the sand and scream “NO MORE!” If you don’t want to get involved, do the rest of us a favor and stay in your house. Your non-action and your silence condones the spread of hatred. Those of you who are fed up, who are as mad as hell as I am, here’s what you do: Stand up against evil! Step in and do your best to stop hate, whether it manifests in the form of vitriol or violence! Speak out against intolerance, prejudice and hatred regardless of its source. Don’t let yourself fall into the stupor of non-action, like that woman who just walked on by or the others who stood there taking pictures. Be the one who has the courage to confront evil despite the danger!

It is common for people to say “Oh well, that’s fine and good to believe such things, but we never know what we’ll do until we find ourselves in that situation.” If you’re not sure what you’d do, then prepare yourself to act in that moment! Jesus said “Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13) We all have the instinct to try and save our own life when in danger. It’s called self-preservation. Jesus also said “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” (Matthew 22:39) Who is your neighbor? We all are! Don’t be someone in the crowd taking pictures or just walking on by. I promise you that even if ten percent of us act, evil will not prevail. Be ready! Be one of the ten percent! Be mad enough to do something!

My Children

It would be nice to have all my kids together with me while I’m alive, and I don’t mean on my deathbed or anything like that. The chances of it happening are slim to none, though, but a man can hope, can’t he? I’ve got a son that still lives with me (ladies – rich ladies especially – he’s available. The only baggage he carries is his PS3), another son that lives across the street, a son in Pell City, Alabama (for now – that boy moves more than I did at his age. I think he got the wanderlust gene), another son somewhere in or around Atlanta, a son that lives in Kalamazoo, Michigan, a daughter, also in Kalamazoo, who lives upstairs from her brother, and a daughter in Erie, Pennsylvania. 

I do have an adopted daughter in South Bend, Indiana, too, that I need to get caught up on. Her name is Lanette Wilburn. I dated her mom twenty years ago and we took to each other like peanut butter and jam. She had (and still has) the most wonderful constellation of freckles on her face, and whenever someone asked her where she got them she’d smile brightly and say “A yard sale!” I wish I knew what yard sale I got my liver spots from – I’d send them back. Here’s a photo of Lanette (she still goes by ‘babygirl’ to me) when she was a firecracker:

My oldest son, William Joseph Harding, was born January 11, 1978 (great music back then, by the way) when I was married to his mom Kathy. When he was a year old he caught pneumonia and was hospitalized. His mom slept on a cot next to his bed at night. One night I agreed to relieve her but decided to stop by a friend’s house and party a little before going to the hospital. Big mistake. By the time I arrived in Joey’s room I was hammered, and decided I would throw up in the toilet before settling down. Hospital bathrooms have excellent acoustics, by the way. Kathy heard my vomiting and it made her sick to her stomach, so when I emerged from the bathroom and face-planted myself on the cot, she took my place and did her own little upchuck solo. A couple of hours into my drunken sleep I was awakened by a nurse who said she had heard this horrible retching coming from the bathroom and found my wife with her head in the toilet, so they rushed her to the ER. That’s the last time I ever drank heavily before going to the hospital. I think. Joey grew up to be a full-fledged iconic symbol of what a great man should be and is with a strong-willed, gorgeous, loving woman Gracie, living in Pell City. He has blessed the world with eight children, most recently a beautiful little girl Laie born May 1^st, this year. Joey and I see each other often, but not as often as I’d like. He’s my favorite oldest son, by the way. Here’s a picture of Joey when he was a human cannonball:

My next son, John Amos Harding, was born on May 8^th, 1980, also with my first wife Kathy. I could tell right away he was exceptionally smart by the look he gave me from his crib, you know, that look that says ‘I’ve already figured out the mysteries of the universe. Have you?’ Unfortunately, his mom and I split up less than a year after he was born and I moved to Michigan, so I didn’t get to see much of him. His Uncle Jack raised him to be an outstanding man, though, and for that I am forever grateful. John came and stayed by my side when I had my near-fatal heart attack in 2010. His visit rates as one of the top three moments of my life.  He lives around Atlanta with his beautiful wife Amanda and his son Riley. I hope to see them someday. Here’s a picture of John when he was a pre-teen heartthrob:

I met my second wife, Bera, in 1981, but before I fell in love with her I was head over heels with her son James, who was about a year old then (he was born March 21^st, 1980 – the Spring Equinox). He and his mother lived next door to me in Decatur, Alabama, and I remember the first time I saw him he was up to his eyeballs in Q-tips, having snatched a box of them off the table and dispensed them throughout the apartment. I knew he was my kind of guy. I called him Jamie for years until he grew up and said he wanted to be known as James.  It does sound more grown up. He rode with me one night when I was a cab driver, and we picked up a half dozen drunk women having just come from a bachelorette party. Jamie was maybe twelve, and as cute as two speckled puppies, so the woman naturally fawned over him. Halfway to wherever we were going the song “Jamie’s Crying” came on and they turned the volume up and serenaded him at the top of their lungs. I was so jealous. Jamie lives in Kalamazoo with his fantastic and mystical wife Heather and two rambunctious children. Here’s an early photo of Jamie – er, James:

Bera and I had a daughter, Sandra, on May 7, 1982. She was the first of my children I actually got to see being born. I thought there was something wrong with her when I saw her alien-shaped, birthing-squeezed head (it eventually resembled a human’s within the week.) and the multi-colored umbilical cord. I later found out that was all normal. Wow. That was around the time I started playing Dungeons and Dragons, and for some ungodly reason I thought it would be cool to turn Sandy into an elf by reshaping the tips of her ears while she was still a newborn. By the time her mother found out I had already made one of them pointy, but she refused to let me balance it out. Now Sandra’s a half-elf. She was definitely a Daddy’s girl. I was stationed at Fort Detrick, Maryland in 1985 and had just gone to work one morning when Bera called frantically wanting me back home. I thought Jamie or Sandy had been impaled by a rogue rhinoceros the way their mom was carrying on. When I got there I saw that Sandy with her face covered in blood. She had seen me shave and thought it was a good idea, except she forgot the shaving cream and nicked her face in about a dozen places. She now lives in an apartment just above her brother James. Here’s a photo of Sandra when she was a true half-elf Princess:

On July 30^th, 1986 Bera and I had a son, Thomas. As a little kid he hated loud music, and loud noises for that matter. I took him to an air show once and made sure he was close enough to see the plane-eating, fire-breathing dragon robot, but that turned out to be a bad idea.  He especially didn’t like to listen to Black Sabbath, either. I worried he might end up being a classical music lover, but he fooled me, because he digs hard rock now.  Someday we have to jump into the same mosh pit, just for fun. He lives across the street from me, so we get to see each other on a regular basis. I do wish he’d turn that damned music down, though. Here is a picture of Thomas when he was young:

Time went by as I matured much too slowly, because I eventually married two more times before getting it right. All my wives deserve a medal for heroism and longsuffering. When I met and married my fourth wife, Debi, she had a daughter and son. Tianna (born April 4^th, 1980) was 12 years old when I came into her life, and she let me know quickly that she was a mature, independent, intelligent young lady. She was right. Tia was the first child I ever had the pleasure of being witness to puberty. Robert Frost once wrote that fog comes in on little cat feet. Puberty comes in on steel-toe, spiked Army boots doing the Lord of the Dance. Tia and I had a lot of great times together, though. I taught her to drive, but all her passengers wish I had been more conservative. Hey, she keeps the shiny side up and the greasy side down. What more do you need? Tia has always been really protective of her mom and is currently not happy with me, but we’ll get through it because family is thicker than blood. Tia lives in Erie, PA, is married to a fantastic man Dan and is raising 4 kids quite well. Here is a photograph of Tia when she was a little cutie-pie:

Adam was 8 years old when I married his mom Debi (he was born November 23, 1982). If you look in the dictionary under ‘sparkplug’ you’ll see his picture. Adam has always taken life by the horns and used them as plows. From the time he wakes up he is non-stop until he completely runs out of steam. As a child, he never ran out of steam. He has always been outgoing and boisterous, and of all my kids Adam has adopted the most of my sick and twisted sense of humor. Score one for nurture over nature.  Once Adam and I went to a temp agency and signed up for a single day working on a roof. After we had busted our butts all day in the wind and cold we were starved. We picked up our pay and had just enough to eat at Burger King across the street. We still laugh at that one. Here’s a picture of Adam and his first girlfriend:

If I dwell on the type of man I was back then I would probably end up wanting to hide under the rock I came out of. Fortunately there is always hope for us all through God’s grace, God’s Son Jesus, and the Light of His Holy Spirit, and I am grateful beyond measure to have finally found redemption and forgiveness from my Lord. I shall spend the rest of this life praying for the health and well being of my kids, too. It’s the least I can do, and sometimes the only thing I can do. Yes, it would be nice to have all my kids together with me, and not when I’m on my deathbed or having my first breakfast in heaven. They are, however, all within the confines of my heart, and there is plenty of room there for their kids – my grandkids – as well.  I have a picture on my desk that I look at all the time. So far it’s the closest thing to having all my children in one shot. Here it is:

Kids, I owe you one. That ‘one’ is my life. I love you all, and Babygirl, too.

The Blame Game Burns Me Up

I have just raised my head from reading a story that drew my attention (I like to read with my head down because I don’t want to appear snooty to the casual observer): http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2013/05/02/shiny-dog-bowl-blamed-in-santa-rosa-fire/

It seems a couple’s metal dog bowl caught their house on fire. At this point I would say that now I’ve seen it all, but I uttered that once and now can’t take it back. Therefore, I must have seen this sort of thing before, but have forgotten it.  I forget a lot. That’s one of the perks of getting older. But that is worthy of a blogpost in itself, so remind me to write something about forgetfulness because I just know it will slip my mind. However, the parabolic pooch’s pan story has gotten its hot little claws in me now and won’t let go until I vent.  Long live venting. And prunes.

So this woman tells reporters that she saw something like a big plume of steam rising (or would that be pluming?) just outside by a glass door, and when she went to investigate saw that the side of their house was smoking. Firefighters were called and put out the fire before it got out of control, and upon investigation concluded that the dog’s metal water bowl had caused a concentrated beam of sunlight to shine on the side of their house.  Now, before you go out and try burning your nosy neighbor’s garage, let me dispel the many fallacies to this tall tale.

First of all, the woman went outside and found her house was smoking. If the house is over 21 years old it has every right in the world to smoke, and she should be grateful it kept its bad habit outdoors. I suspect the house is a minor, though, because as soon as it was caught it pointed to the dog bowl and said “The water dish made me do it!” It must have raised enough suspicion to deflect blame from itself, but come on, man, couldn’t it come up with a better excuse? Not all houses are gifted with intelligence, though.  Our family lived in a really smart home once in Muscle Shoals, Alabama around the time I discovered smoking. The house taught me to take a magnifying glass out with me whenever I puffed, and it saved my hide on more than one occasion. My mom would come trundling around the corner and find me hunched over a lit cigarette lying on the ground with that magnifying glass in my hand trying to catch the sunlight just right, and without blinking an eye I would say something like “Aren’t these things swell? I’m going to destroy every nasty cigarette I see by burning it up!” Hook, line and sinker, dear reader. At least I thought so until my mom told me a decade later she knew all along the house put me up to it.

Just to make sure this story out of San Francisco is fake, I went out and bought a couple hundred metal water bowls, filled them up and set them all around the neighborhood. The fire department has me under house arrest now, but I have a feeling it will be short lived. The Defense Department wants to meet with me in three days about becoming some sort of sub contractor. I’ve got blueprints of a metal water bowl fifty miles in diameter, and we’re planning on putting it on the North Korean border. Watch. Every home in a three hundred mile radius will blame their bad habit on it. I know this because I’ve seen it all. Really.

Trivial Pursuits II

It’s been a long time since I’ve lambasted the scientific community (last week), but this time they’ve really gone too far.  I read the other day that ketchup comes out of the bottle at twenty-five miles an hour.  Really?  Then why does it take four days of constant beating on the bottom of the bottle for it to come out at all?  It must be getting a running start in there. What do these guys think they’re doing?  Oh, I can see a couple of egg heads hanging around in their laboratory with nothing better to do than to let their pet monkey come up with statistics using a stick in the yogurt.  What I can’t see is one of these guys pointing a radar gun at his buddy who’s got a bottle of ketchup in his hands, saying “Alrighty, let ‘er rip!”  Please.  If we encourage this sort of behavior, they’ll be telling us a sneeze exits the body at one hundred miles an hour or that if we fart constantly for six months three days fifteen hours and nine minutes we’ll have expelled enough energy to power a light bulb for one minute. (I tried that one – the light bulb exploded after just a few toots – and it cost me some pretty expensive cosmetic surgery)

Seems we just can’t get enough stupidity in our lives.  Case in point: sitcoms.  I rest my case.  It needed a break.  Listen to some of the most absurd facts ever deposited into the great well of society’s knowledge.

• Some butterflies have fake heads on their butt to confuse predators.  That has certainly kept me from munching on those little critters.  I think they have fake heads on their butts to confuse lepidopterologists (people who study butterflies).  Maybe they think two heads are better than one.  Maybe they’re the original butt-heads.  Anything’s better than saying they’re doing it to confuse predators.  Mr. Lizard’s hanging out on a rock getting some rays when Beatrice the Butterfly floats by.  He starts to jump on her with a slice of bread and a dash of mayo when he sees she has two heads and runs away screaming.  I don’t know about you, but if I see two pork chops stuck together in a pile of pork chops, I’m going after the extra meat.
• It takes three thousand cows to supply the NFL with enough leather for a year’s supply of footballs.  Give me a freaking break.  Have you seen the size of those guys?  It takes three thousand cows to keep up with a team that’s eating from the buffet.  And what do they mean a year’s supply of footballs?  Why can’t we use them over and over?  There’s only fourteen to sixteen games a week.  Let’s make a better football and prevent the extinction of our national past time: eating steaks.
• The longest recorded flight of a chicken is thirteen seconds.  I’m not even going to spend a lot of energy on this ridiculous fact.  Give me a single engine Cessna, a pilot and a chicken and I promise you I can have that bird in the sky longer than thirteen seconds.
• Howdy Doody has exactly forty eight freckles on his face.  O. MY.GOD.  Who in the hell cares?  Did somebody actually get a government grant to find this out?  I feel like going into the world with a Sharpie and a mission to prove that piece of trivia wrong.  Has anyone checked to see if maybe he’s got a freckle hiding behind another freckle?  It happens.  Also, where in the hell did he get his freckles from?  A yard sale?  Maybe from sitting in the back window of a car for one long, hot summer?

It makes me absolutely sick thinking there are scientists out there that are supporting their families from such drivel.  On the other hand, it beats having to suck farts from bus seats.  Still, there is entirely too much spare time in research facilities around the world.  Now, if they could concentrate on really important things, like reporting that Marilyn Monroe had six toes, I might change my mind.  That reminds me, though – I’ve got a sudden interest to see Some Like It Hot so I can count her toes.

Re-Inventing History

I like reading a wide variety of subjects, and keep certain volumes around, like a book of quotable quotes, a rhyming dictionary, and the New York Public Library Desk Reference.  Now, I’m not entirely an academic reader – I’ve been known to carry on a relationship with a good novel from time to time, and I especially like some of the things found on the Wal-Mart bathroom wall, but generally I enjoy sticking my head in books that give me plenty of trivial knowledge so I can bewilder and dazzle anyone unlucky enough to be trapped in an elevator with me.  Well, I was poring over a book that tells when certain things were invented, and who the inventor was, when I came across an entry that read that in 1866 a fellow by the name of Alexander Melville Bell (evidently not the Bell that invented the graham cracker – you know, Alexander Graham Bell) came up with the idea of lip reading.

As soon as I read that, I knew someone was making things up.  Do the writers of that book of inventions mean to say that no one did any lip reading before 1866?  What about the poor slave in ancient Egypt who watched two task masters chatting at the bottom of the pyramid?  I suppose since this is before the invention of lip reading, he looked at the one task master’s lips moving and thought he said “Let’s free the slaves after lunch,” when the fellow actually told his buddy “Let’s beat the slaves for lunch.”  Imagine the letdown.  How can someone invent something like lip reading?  That’s like saying Herman Toot invented the fart.  Before that everyone had to pass gas through their ears.  I’d be willing to bet that Oog the caveman was sitting in his cave, saw Mrs. Oog grunting with their neighbor and was able to tell by watching her lips that she said Eekanbeack instead of Hottontott.  I’m not trying to take anything away from Mr. Bell.  If the scientific community felt the need to give him credit for being able to tell what the people down the street were saying, so be it.  It made me wonder, though, what other silly things have been attributed to a single individual, so I did a little research.

In 1285 a fellow by the name of Alessandro de Spina is credited with inventing eyeglasses.  I suppose before that, people had to prop their reading material on a tree stump and back away until they could see it.  Before eyeglasses people actually had to look through coke bottles.  Before eyeglasses you could flip an old geezer off without him throwing his dentures at you.

Sir John Harington invented the flush toilet in 1589.  If he didn’t get a ticker tape parade for that one, he should have.  Can you imagine what people had to do before that?  “Harriet, could you hand me some toilet paper and a fork?  I’ve got a floater here.”  I would have solved the unemployment problem by starting the world’s first pooper scooper business.  Its motto would have been: “Like it never even happened”.

The medical thermometer was invented in 1616 by Santorio Santorio.  He’s probably the ancestor of Duran Duran.  Before his invention patients had to hold mercury in their mouths and then spit it into a bowl of tea leaves.  I bet he had a few bumps in the road along the way, though.  “Mr. Feliciano, I TOLD you not to bite down!  Now you’ve got to hold the mercury and broken glass in your mouth until I can get some tea leaves.”

Of course, everyone knows the sandwich was invented by the Earl of Sandwich.  I’m just glad his name wasn’t the Earl of Crap.  “Would you children rather have a peanut butter and jelly crap, or a bologna and cheese crap?”

A man by the name of Edward Beard Budding (someone should have invented a better name for him) brought the first lawn mower into the world.  Goats around the world began dying of starvation.  Yeah, well they should have been grateful they didn’t have to drink all that gasoline anymore.

I could probably go all day like this, but I’ll save you the incredulity.  I do need to mention one of the greatest inventions of the modern world: in 1860 a Mr. John Newnham came up with the idea of the snap button.  Think about how much time and effort he saved!  I’ve got another book that chronicles famous last words, and one of my favorite is the suicide note of a man who obviously lived before Mr. Newnham’s invention.  It simply said: “All this buttoning and unbuttoning.”  I feel you, sir.  Where was the snap button when you needed it?

It’s My Way or the High Way

In honor of National Cannabis Appreciation Day – called 4:20 among those who can’t say cannabis – I’d like to devote my thoughts to the subject, if I can keep my attention focused that long.  4:20 means April 20^th, which means some stoner thought that up while staring at the calendar one day.  Marijuana has been called a ‘lefthand’ cigarette, among other things, and if you put your left forefinger and thumb together like you’re holding a joint, your digits will actually look like 3:15 on a clock, so imagine you’re high and your hand is relaxed – voila!  4:20.  Actually, I used to get so relaxed I could only celebrate on June 30^th.  In the end, though, some genius ganga smoker thought marijuana users should have a day all their own, so here we go.

I first heard about it while living in Michigan.  The University of Michigan has an annual event on April 20 of each year called the Hash Bash.  That’s when students all get together on the commons area and fire up their weed so cops will have something to do that day.  I kinda thought it should have been done in private, but hey, I’m not the one having to bail a few thousand people and myself out of jail.  The organizers actually meet at a designated time and everyone sits around in the open and gets wasted.  They call it the Hour of Power.  The only ones with the power are the po po (that’s slang for police, in case you were born before color TV), but they really don’t go in guns a blazin’.  They dress up like students – you know, smelly holey jeans and tee shirts that once belonged to someone born before color TV – and hang out in the crowd waiting for someone to pass them a doobie.  Evidently smoking your own shit is a mere civil infraction, but sharing it with your neighbor is a criminal offense.  No matter how many times the organizers tell people about this, there’s always some doper that gets a little too buzzed and wants to spread the happiness.  That’s like trying to tell a cabbie to drive safely.

There is an actual establishment that has been formed to try and get marijuana legalized, called NORML.  I can’t make this stuff up.  It’s full name is the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, which would technically make it NOFTROML, but then, only the partiers would understand it.  I actually thought of starting a splinter group called America Believes the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, but I was shouted down.  NORML is really well organized, though.  Willie Nelson is their official front man, but Snoop Dog really runs the show.  I would love to be a bong at their shareholders meetings.  That reminds me of the student Joseph Frederick who in 2002 held a sign that read BONG HITS 4 JESUS across the street from a school in Juneau, Alaska while the Olympic torch was passing through.  The school principal expelled him, but the kid’s lawyers took it all the way to the Supreme Court, who ultimately ruled that his constitutional right of free speech had been violated.  The school’s attorneys knew the Supreme Court might side with the student when five of the Justices came out of the deliberation chambers in dreadlocks and ordered pizza for everyone.  Clarence Thomas rolls the tightest joints I’ve ever seen.  Now there’s a Christian Reggae group out of Philadelphia called Bong Hits for Jesus.  The scary thing about this, folks, is that their music is infectiously good.

Now, marijuana is a plant, which means God invented it.  This is the number one reason pot heads say it’s ok to smoke it.  Camel dung is natural, too, but you don’t see people making spliffs out of it.  Well, there was that one guy from Istanbul . . . Just because something is found in nature doesn’t make it fair game for ingestion.  Ok, there’s buffalo wings, but do you know how difficult it is to track one of those creatures down, especially if they’ve got a good tail wind?  Another reason tokers claim that it’s cool to light up is because you never hear about some guy stoned out of his gourd crashing into school buses or running over bicyclists.  That’s because he’s driving two miles an hour.  You also never hear of a stoner coming home and beating up his wife and kids.  That’s because half the time he never makes it out of the car after driving two miles an hour all the way home.  The other half of the time he goes straight to the pantry and refrigerator and inhales everything that’s not nailed down, then crawls into the den, turns on Robot Chicken and laughs until he vomits then passes out.  Man, I miss those days.

So, if you’re one of the millions blazin’ one for the cause today, it’s ok to drop by and let me have a hit.  I’m not an undercover cop, promise.  I’ll leave you with the pot smoker’s national anthem, set to the tune “Row Row Row Your Boat”

Roll, Roll, roll your joint,

Twist it at the ends.

Light it up, take a puff

Then pass it to a friend.

Now if I can only remember where I hid that stash back in ’77 . . .