A Question...

  Have any of you seen the movie "Before I Self Destruct"?

  It is a rip-roaring comedy for the whole family about a young man who chooses an unusual career path after the unfortunate death of his mother leaves him with the task of raising his genius younger brother, and the creative ways he finds to deal with the challenges along the way.

  It was written, directed, and starred in by the classically trained thespian Curtis Jackson. ( AKA 50 Cent.)

  Here is an uplifting and inspiring song from the soundtrack.  (Put on your headphones. I don't care where you are...)

  If you have seen this movie, keep in mind that when given complete artistic control over a movie in which he could have portrayed ANYTHING he wanted, THIS is what 50 Cent did.

  While I was surfing around this morning, I ran across this article which showed a photo of Trayvon Martin, taken on the night of the shooting.

  He may as well have been wearing a 50 Cent Halloween Costume.

  Now, you may not have seen the movie I spoke about earlier, but I will guarantee you that Trayvon Martin had.

  Now, to my question.

  Let's say I am riding around looking for a place to eat lunch. On one side of the street I see a restaurant with a well maintained parking lot, beautiful landscaping, and a pretty new sign out front proclaiming that they specialize in my very favorite food. On the other side of the street, I see a dilapidated, run down building, a pothole infested dirt parking lot, and a "Sanitation Grade C" sign posted by the door.

  In which one of these restaurants do you think I am going to eat?

  That's profiling.

  Why can't I do that with people?

  There is a difference between Judgement and Prejudice. I use judgement to prevent myself from getting Ptomaine poisoning when I eat lunch, to prevent myself from buying a worn out lemon car, to make sure I am using the right tool at work. I use it to protect myself from snake bites, to stay out of car accidents, and to know who I can smart off to and still keep my job.

  Why is it somehow racist and wrong when I direct that same judgement toward people?

  If I were to buy a surplus military Humvee, an Army uniform, cut my hair really short and carry an M16, the people who saw me would assume I was in the Army. When I am wearing my work uniform, I don't have to show my badge to get my work discount at Zaxby's.

  Why is it wrong to assume that someone who is wearing the uniform of a street criminal may be up to no good? 

 


 

Just A Suggestion...

Here are a few simple tips to help make sure that what happened to Trayvon Martin does not happen to your child...

1. Don't raise a thug.
2. Teach your children to be polite and respectful to the people they may encounter.
3. Know where your kids are, and what they are up to.
4. If your child is already a thug, has his own burglary tool kit, has been suspended from school, and your neighborhood is experiencing a rash of burglaries, take him around and introduce him to the local Neighborhood Watch members, and give them your phone number.
5. Keep Skittles in your house at all times.

If you are a teenager, and you want to avoid Trayvon Martin's fate yourself, here are some tips for you...

1. Don't be a thug.
2. Be polite and respectful to the people that you may encounter.
3. If you are walking around alone in the dark, and someone is following you, go home.
4. If a person confronts you while you are walking around alone in the dark and asks you where you are going, politely tell them where you are going,and then go there.
5. Under no circumstances should you ever start beating on random people you know nothing about. You could get yourself shot.
6. If you live in a neighborhood that has been plagued with a rash of burglaries, you are suspended from school, have your own burglary tool kit, and you are out of Skittles, try to get by with Raisinettes, or M&Ms, or whatever else you may have in the house untli you can go to the store in the daylight.

By following these simple tips, you can help to avoid a repeat of the Trayvon Martin tragedy, and if this saves even one life, then it will have been worth the time it took me to write it.

Smart Cars?

The place where I work posted an announcement in their newsletter this month.


It read:

"You spoke, we listened...
Team members have asked if a special parking lot can be created specifically for Hybrid and High Fuel Mileage vehicles, and we at ( huge corporation that you have absolutely heard of) think that this is a great idea.
So, this summer, we will open a special new parking lot which will be restricted to Hybrids and vehicles which meet the standards for high fuel mileage set forth by the LEEDS List". (Whatever that is.)

First of all, NOBODY asked for this.

NOBODY.

The people I work with, almost to a man, drive big, huge, monstrous pickup trucks. The only reason they drive the size vehicles they drive is because nobody makes a pickup truck bigger than the ones they currently own, and as soon as Peterbilt comes out with a pickup truck, the parking lot where I work will be covered with them within days.

Second, the place where I work does not really provide the employees with anywhere to park anyway. The closest parking lot to the building in which I work is an eleven minute walk away, and we get ten minute breaks, and a half-hour lunch break. If you leave anything in your vehicle, you have to do without it until the end of the shift. (Which is ten hours.)

But I think it is a great idea.

I think that people who drive Hybrids and such SHOULD be segregated from the rest of the population, and not just in parking lots.

When you do the math, you will learn that you will NEVER drive a Hybrid enough to actually save any money, and more environmental damage is done building a single Hybrid than in building THREE HUMMERS. (Except that they don't build Hummers anymore, but you get the picture.)

And if you believe that they will pump one drop less oil from the ground because you bought a Hybrid, then I don't want to have to deal with you in traffic.

So, when I read that, I did what any logical, thinking, rational person would have done.

I went out and bought a pickup truck twice the size of the one I was currently driving. (A big, blue, 4-wheel drive GMC.) 

And I plan to watch the Hybrid Lot when it opens, and to pay attention to who gets out of the Idiot-mobiles that park there, so that when I see them in the plant, I will know what to expect from them, and I will know not to trust them with anything too important.

Crack kills

There is a plague which is wreaking havoc across our nation.

A horrible trend which ruins the lives of everyone who is exposed to it, and it must be stopped.

I see it everywhere I go, from work to church to Wal*Mart, and everywhere in between.

That plague is the plague of Crack.

Not the drug "Crack"...

Butt Crack.

Now, before you start, I don't go around looking at people's butts. I am not a pervert, or a peeper. I am just a normal, regular guy, trying to live in the world, and am cursed with a measure of situational awareness.

I understand the need to be fashionable, and to wear your "Skinny Jeans", "Low Riders", or 'Hip Huggers", or whatever you want to call them, and I know that the trend of saggy, posterior exposing pants and midriff exposing tops is probably here to stay, but I don't have to like it, and I don't have to keep quiet about it.

Nobody wants to see that.

Even if you have the prettiest one in the whole wide world, it's still your butt. Cover it up.

When the preacher gave the invitation this morning, I saw FOUR of them, shining out toward the congregation, right there LITERALLY in front of God and everybody. (Maybe that's why the preacher wanted every head bowed and every eye closed...)

And I cannot believe that these people are unaware that they are displaying four inches of plumber's butt to the world. I know where the waistline of MY pants is, and I know about where the Good Lord split me. If I cannot make the two areas overlap, I tuck in my shirt. (You're welcome.)

I know what to do about it though, and I want you all to join me.

Around my house here, there are about twenty little syringes. They come packaged with children's medicines.

I'm going to start keeping one on my person, filled with Baby Oil.

And when I see exposed Crack, I'm going to squirt Baby Oil right down it.

Maybe by doing that, I can make the crack flashers as aware of their crack as the rest of us are.

Maybe I can get them interested in keeping me from seeing it.

Maybe I can run fast enough while laughing hysterically to keep from getting beaten to death by someone with a slippery exposed crack...

Hmnn... Maybe this plan needs a little more work...

The Liberals Won?

“It doesn’t matter who’s president because the Liberals won. In the 1960s, all the protest was on the Left because America was conservative. We have conservative politicians, we give conservative speeches, but on every major issue the liberals have won. We are a liberal country. You can go into the most conservative neighborhood in America and, you go into their home, talk to their kids, and their kids listen to the same music, talk the same way, dress the same way. Culturally we’re liberal.” - Jerry Springer on yesterday's Howard Stern Show.

Uhmn... Not quite, Jerry.

The Liberals have won on almost every major issue, that much is true. But these issues were not decided through a fair exchange of ideas, or a majority vote of the people, they were decided through the courts.

The Liberals did not win by winning the hearts and minds of the people, they won by forcing their ideas on the country against our will.

Liberalism has won by circumventing your ability to make up your own mind about how you want to live your life, run your business, raise your children, or with whom you will associate. The Liberals have won by usurping your Freedom.

That is why the energy for protest right now is on the Right.

That is why Liberal Talk Radio is unsuccessful.

That is why it is too early to declare winners and losers.

The game is not over, they just happen to have the ball right now.

Friends

I have 33 friends.

At least that's what my Facebook page says. (As of now, anyway.)

I joined Facebook Saturday morning, and so far it has been a lot of fun. Some of my friends don't talk enough, and some of them talk... uhmn... a lot. There are a lot of people with whom I had lost touch, and I am very glad to have this resource with which to preserve those relationships. There are some people with whom I have absolutely no interest in re-establishing contact, but I still think about them from time to time, and I have been able to discreetly peek in on them without bothering them, or stirring up any confusion of any kind.

And there are some that I don't care enough about to even look for, and those, I have left alone.

All of these people are, or have been my friends, and my interactions with them over the course of my life have made me who I am, and will continue to shape me until I die, whether we stay connected or not.

This experience has caused me to think about what, exactly, friends are. I have known thousands of people, been close to a hand full, but really close to only a couple.

 Lifelong, really close, fully trusting, unconditional, no agenda friends... I have one.

 One friend.

 God gave him to me when I was 3 months old, and we played together in the playpen together before either of us could walk or talk. God almost took him back again when he was 6 weeks old, when his mother was involved in a horrendous car wreck ( In those days, we didn't haaave all those fancy-schmancy child safety seats...) and he was very nearly killed. (I'm convinced he sustained severe brain damage, cause, the boy ain't right.)

But God didn't take him, I believe, partly because He knew that I would need him.

We weren't really close growing up. We lived about five hours apart, so we would see each other once a year, maybe, and I think that he and I slightly annoyed each other. We both were, and still are, show-offs and  clowns, and we both crave the undivided attention of whatever room in which we happen to find ourselves, so there was a sort of natural competition between us.

But after he graduated from college and I moved into my little trailer on the outskirts of our home town, we discovered that we had some complimentary skill sets, and that the two of us working together could command twice ( at least ) as much attention as either could alone, and a partnership was formed.

He and I have laughed at each other, worked together, played together, written songs together, chased women together, retrieved broken down cars together, loaned each other money, and seen each other through all manner of physical and emotional trauma. When I wrecked the Turkey Truck, he was the second person to arrive at the hospital behind my wife, and he made it all the way into the X-ray room to laugh at me before Hospital Security threw him out. (He had wrecked HIS Turkey Truck two weeks earlier...)

Since I got married, we have drifted out of contact again, and I had seen him maybe twice in the past three or four years.

But on Saturday, completely independent of each other, with no idea that it was happening, he, in North Carolina, and I, in South Carolina, sat down at our computers, and started our Facebook pages AT ALMOST EXACTLY THE SAME MOMENT.

And I believe that if I were to contact him tonight, and ask him to help me dispose of a dead body, the only questions I would get from him would relate to locating heavy equipment to make the process more efficient, and he would carry the secret with him to his grave.

Everyone needs a friend like that. I would never have made it without mine.

Let's Get Caught up, Shall We?

Okay, let's see if I remember how to do this...

Okay... Drudge Report.

SUICIDE BOMBER ATTACKS MOSCOW AIRPORT?! 35 DEAD?!?
... Oh, wait... That's Russia. Never mind.

Wait, what's this?
  
GM's China sales pass US for first time in history?

Aren't there like a Trillion people in China? It's about time. 
Besides, China buying cars from Government Motors is basically Communists and Socialists trading hats. Maybe the Chinese will buy enough American products to offset some of this debt some time in the next 200 years or so...


'Global warming' litigation may lead to 'hundreds of billions of dollars' in damages...

At last! Now maybe someone will be forced to prove the existence of Man-made global Warming beyond a shadow of doubt in a court of Law. (Wishful thinking?)



'Bug Mac' and lovely 'grub': food of the future...


I ain't eating bugs and worms... Not on purpose. Sorry.

OBAMA MAKEOVER: PRAISE REAGAN...

Ronald Reagan would kick your scrawny butt, Mr O.
You see, Democrats have never understood Ronald Reagan, or his popularity. They mistakenly believe that his electoral success and continued popularity was a result of Marketing and Packaging, and that the "great unwashed" bought into the advertising campaign. The thought that this many people agreed with Reagan's Ideology over theirs is so unbelievable to them that they can't wrap their heads around it.
When you see Obama saying he admires Ronald Reagan, understand that what he admires is what he believes to be Reagan's ability to fool you.


...outgoing CEO Schmidt gets $100 million

Good for him. There is not one among us who wouldn't cut the same deal for ourselves if we could. 

Lieberman: 'Partisan Mud Fights' Hurt Self-Confidence...

Awwwww... Heat, kitchen, big-girl panties, yada yada yada...

Abortion Doctor Ran 'House of Horrors', Body Parts Lying Around In Garbage Bags...

ALL abortion Doctors run Houses of Horrors, body parts or not.

Well, that was fun. Seems not much has changed since last year... The world is still crazy.

 

 

 

 

 

Here We Go Again?

Nobody told me that children will not allow you to think anymore.

I have no doubt that but for children, Cancer would have been cured by now, we would have time Travel, Cold Fusion, and cars that run entirely on stupidity, but the people who would have thought of these wonders had children, and were prevented from thinking them up. 

I mean, I guess I knew it, but I hadn't really thought about it until I actually had some children, and tried to write a Blog with them in the house. (They are asleep right now.)

They are beautiful, and wonderful, and delightful, and I love nothing more than playing with them and watching them grow and learn... But they absolutely won't let me string two thoughts together into a coherent idea, much less type that idea into a readable Blog post.

But an unusual thing has occurred.

In an attempt to avoid losing contact with friends from work, and from Florida, and from North Carolina who, for one reason or another, have drifted in and out of my life over the past few years, yesterday I set up a Facebook page.

And almost immediately, several of my old Blogger Buddies came out of the woodwork, and I realized that I have missed Blogging, and the interaction that I enjoyed with friends and sparring partners within this forum.

So, here we go again.

I have no idea how frequently I will be allowed to compose and publish new posts, or how closely I will be able to monitor the comment threads, but I am at least going to try.

We'll see how it goes for a while.

For now, here are some pictures of the children. 

(So you can see what I've been doing with my time for the past year.)