I’m constantly tossing interesting websites into what I call my blogpile. Some of them find their way here in the form of regular posts, but more often than not they languish and get buried deeper in the pile. The end result is that I have to go back and do a bit of shoveling. Today’s item is Thomas Barnett draws a new map for peace.
I could never bring myself to forward all the email jokes, cartoons and other Internet comedy that land in my inbox. But then I started posting the ones my dad sends me. Judging from my comments and emails, my dad has become one of my greatest blogging assets. So for your morning blog chuckle I present: From My Dad.
A man walks into a restaurant with a full-grown ostrich behind him. The waitress asks them for their orders.
The man says, “A hamburger, fries and a coke,” and turns to the ostrich, “What’s yours?” “I’ll have the same,” says the ostrich.
A short time later the waitress returns with the order. “That will be $9.40 please,” and the man reaches into his pocket and pulls out the exact change for payment.
The next day, the man and the ostrich come again and the man says, “A hamburger, fries and a coke.” The ostrich says, “I’ll have the same.” Again the man reaches into his pocket and pays with exact change.
This becomes routine until the two enter again. “The usual?” asks the waitress.
“No, this is Friday night, so I will have a steak, baked potato and a salad,” says the man. “Same,” says the ostrich. Shortly the waitress brings the order and says, “That will be $32.62.” Once again the man pulls the exact change out of his pocket and places it on the table.
The waitress cannot hold back her curiosity any longer. “Excuse me, sir. How do you manage to always come up with the exact change in your pocket every time?”
“Well,” says the man, “several years ago I was cleaning the attic and found an old lamp. When I rubbed it, a Genie appeared and offered me two wishes. My first wish was that if I ever had to pay for anything, I would just put my hand in my pocketand the right amount of money would always be there.”
“That’s brilliant!” says the waitress. “Most people would ask for a million dollars or something, but you’ll always be as rich as you want for as long as you live!”
“That’s right. Whether it’s a gallon of milk or a Rolls Royce, the exact money is always there,” says the man.
The waitress asks, “What’s with the ostrich?”
The man sighs, pauses and answers, “My second wish was for a tall chick with a big ass and long legs who agrees with everything I say.”
My name is Jeff Hess and I’m a biblioholic. I own hundreds of books. Not valuable books, mostly Science Fiction paperbacks and text books, tomes rescued by the bag from library book sales. A few years ago, in the interest of not burying myself, I began reading more books from the library and taking notes. My electronic chapbook was born.
This is a passage I copied from We Are The Ones We Have Been Waiting For by Alice Walker.
It has been despairing to see the ease with which women, after over thirty years of Feminism, have chosen to erase their gender in language by calling each other, and themselves, “guys.” This is the kind of thing one can reflect on during a pause. Are we saying we”re content to be something most of us don”t respect? Conjure up an image of a guy. What attributes does it have? Is that really you? Is this a label you gave yourself?
What does being called “guys” do to young women? To little girls?
Isn”t the media responsible for making it cute to be a guy, as if that”s all the Women”s Movement was about, turning us into neutered men, into guys? For guys don”t have cojones, you know. They are men, but neutered, somehow. So if you”ve turned in your breasts and ovaries for guyness, you”ve really lot out. p. 60-1
The role of mayor of Cleveland Heights is mostly ceremonial. We have a city manager form of government and the mayor is essentially a council member with a few perqs. But when that council member speaks as the Mayor of Cleveland Heights it carries weight and that’s why I’m very disappointed in our current mayor: Ed Kelley.
What did he do? He sucked up to Jimmy Dimora and Tim Hagan.
From the Sun Press:
Mayor Edward Kelley is in favor of Cuyahoga County Commissioners move to raise the sales tax in order to bring a Medical Mart to northeast Ohio.
A Medical Mart would be a perfect fit for Cleveland and would bring much-needed economic growth to Cleveland Heights and other suburbs, Kelley said during Monday’s council meeting.
“If we don’t do something we’re just going to continue in the same economic malaise,” he said. “The benefits of the Medical Mart would spill over to our city with more people buying homes in Cleveland Heights and more business for our merchants.”
Spill over? Have you been watching Ronald Reagan movies again Mr. Mayor? Trickle down economics didn’t work in the ’80s and it’s not going to work now.
What economic growth would a Medical Mart bring to Cleveland Heights Mr. Mayor? Do you actually have anything more than the fantasy figures Hagan and Dimora are trying to pass along from their corporate masters? Can you point to one change you know will occur if you support a regressive tax on your constituents?
I didn’t think so.
What back scratch have you been promised, Mr. Mayor?
…and I didn’t reply, I’m sorry. I let my backlog get way out of hand. Today I’ve spent close to five hours replying to your comments and with the exception of three threads — SILENTMIAOW SPEAKS… IF YOU CAN”T COMMUNICATE, IS IT LANGUAGE…? and DISGUSTING… PERVERSE… IGNORANT… — I’m all caught up.
Those will be dealt with shortly.
Thank you all for stopping in, for reading and, more importantly than I can measure, for taking the time to write a comment. I’ll do better in the futre in holding up my end of the conversation.
I’m constantly tossing interesting websites into what I call my blogpile. Some of them find their way here in the form of regular posts, but more often than not they languish and get buried deeper in the pile. The end result is that I have to go back and do a bit of shoveling. Today’s item is Icon of Hatred.
The English are feeling the pinch in relation to recent terrorist threats and have raised their security level from “Miffed” to “Peeved”. Soon, though, security levels may be raised yet again to “Irritated” or even “A Bit Cross”. Londoners have not been “A Bit Cross” since the blitz began in 1940 and tea supplies all but ran out.
Also, the French government announced yesterday that it has raised its terror alert level from “Run” to “Hide”. The only two higher levels in France are “Collaborate” and “Surrender.” The rise was precipitated by a recent fire that destroyed France’s white flag factory, effectively paralyzing the country’s military capability. Commander Sue
American Soldier: I shot a man once for driving his vehicle towards me in Iraq. He was off the road and at an accelerated pace. He was within 100 meters before I shot him and even then it would have been too late if he had set off his charge. The scenario played out in my head over and over after, and to this day I think about it. I wondered if he was just a pawn…
Part of being a good citizen of the blogosphere is visiting, reading and, most importantly, taking the time to leave a comment on other’s blogs. It’s all about the conversation. In the interest of setting an example I’ve decided to link to those blog posts that have compelled me to leave a comment.
1215 Research on child pornography, molestation unpublished.
This week we got to see a very different response to disaster along the Mississippi from President George Bush. Two years ago it took President Bush five days to put feet on the ground in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina struck killing 1,836 Americans. This week we saw how he responded to a disaster at the other end of the Mississippi.
President Bush waited only three days (First Lady Laura Bush got there in two days) to tour Minneapolis after the bridge collapsed killing five Americans (eight remain missing).
I can’t think of a better illustration of how our president views two different Americas.
(If I were really cynical, I would note that the governor of Minnesota is Republican Tim Pawlenty, the mayor of Minneapolis is Republican R.T. Rybak and that the 2008 Republican convention will be held in Minneapolis.
Whereas the governor of Louisiana is Democrat Kathleen Blanco, the mayor of New Orleans is Democrat Ray Nagin and the last time the Republican’s held a convention in New Orleans was 1988, the convention that nominated George H.W. Bush for president.)
I could never bring myself to forward all the email jokes, cartoons and other Internet comedy that land in my inbox. But then I started posting the ones my dad sends me. Judging from my comments and emails, my dad has become one of my greatest blogging assets. So for your morning blog ah-hah I present: From My Dad.
What In The World Is Going On?
A Global Intelligence Briefing For CEOs
by Herbert Meyer
Four Major Transformations:
Currently, there are four major transformations that are shaping political, economic and world events. These transformations have profound implications for American business owners, our culture and our way of life.
1. The War in Iraq. There are three major monotheistic religions in the world: Christianity, Judaism and Islam. In the 16th century, Judaism and Christianity reconciled with the modern world. The rabbis, priests and scholars found a way to settle up and pave the way forward. Religion remained at the center of life, church and state became separate. Rule of law, idea of economic liberty, individual rights, human rights, all these are defining points of modern Western civilization. These concepts started with the Greeks but didn’t take off until the 15th and 16th century when Judaism and Christianity found a way to reconcile with the modern world. When that happened, it unleashed the scientific revolution and the greatest outpouring of art, literature and music the world has ever known. Islam, which developed in the 7th century, counts millions of Moslems around the world who are normal people. However, there is a radical streak within Islam. When the radicals are in charge, Islam attacks Western civilization.
My name is Jeff Hess and I’m a biblioholic. I own hundreds of books. Not valuable books, mostly Science Fiction paperbacks and text books, tomes rescued by the bag from library book sales. A few years ago, in the interest of not burying myself, I began reading more books from the library and taking notes. My electronic chapbook was born.
This is a passage I copied from We Are The Ones We Have Been Waiting For by Alice Walker.
It is the woman who says: Stop. We have enough firewood and canoes, don”t cut down any more trees. Stop. We have enough meat; don”t kill any more animals. Stop. This war is stupid and using up too many of our resources. p. 60
I’m constantly tossing interesting websites into what I call my blogpile. Some of them find their way here in the form of regular posts, but more often than not they languish and get buried deeper in the pile. The end result is that I have to go back and do a bit of shoveling. Today’s item is The world’s best paper planes.
Eric Jones: We leave camp early in the morning to set out for our next mission. Everybody seems ready to go. We get some chow and eat on the run — hard to do in a gun truck! As we hit a stretch a road about two hours into our mission, one of the TCNs* has a flat. It would normally take KBR* up to four hours to come and fix it, so the TCN does it himself. We pull…
I could never bring myself to forward all the email jokes, cartoons and other Internet comedy that land in my inbox. But then I started posting the ones my dad sends me. Judging from my comments and emails, my dad has become one of my greatest blogging assets. So for your morning Ah I present: From My Dad.
A Slip Of The Tongue
By Tom Hoobyar
My wife and I were in Santa Cruz, where we go on many Mondays. In case you don’t know where that is, we live in northern California’s Silicon Valley about fifty miles from the coast. Santa Cruz is a great town on the coast.
I write and consult, and Vikki is a psychotherapist with no clients on Monday. And we’re grandparents. So weekends and most weekdays are very busy with clients and family.
On Mondays we try to get out to the coast where we can spend some quiet time together without interruptions. We take our laptops and sit in a coffee shop, and study and write.
It got to be late afternoon on this particular Monday and we hadn’t had lunch, so Vikki and I walked to a nearby restaurant pretty early for dinner.
It was new. No one was at the podium to meet us. I said to Vikki, “Boy, this place is deserted. You sure you want to eat here?”
“It’s new and looks nice; let’s try it.” She said.
We heard noises back in the kitchen, and across the dining room a young girl, about nine, was skipping around the tables. I noticed that she was setting them with silver and napkins as she danced around.
She spotted us and came skipping up to us. “Two?” she said.
“Yep. Are you serving dinner now?” I said.
“Yes, we are, and I’m supposed to seat you.” she said, looking around uncertainly. Then she grabbed two menus and led us to a table near a corner window, looking out on the patio.
“My mom says this is the most romantic table,” she said, “I’ll go get you some water.”
As soon as she had left Vikki and I talked about how charmed we were that this little girl was so responsible for seating us in her family’s new restaurant.
My name is Jeff Hess and I’m a biblioholic. I own hundreds of books. Not valuable books, mostly Science Fiction paperbacks and text books, tomes rescued by the bag from library book sales. A few years ago, in the interest of not burying myself, I began reading more books from the library and taking notes. My electronic chapbook was born.
This is a passage I copied from We Are The Ones We Have Been Waiting For by Alice Walker.
I thought that life
With him
Had killed
The wild-haired girl
I knew.
But no.
There she is
There she goes.
Blushing.
Eldering.
p. 55
I’m constantly tossing interesting websites into what I call my blogpile. Some of them find their way here in the form of regular posts, but more often than not they languish and get buried deeper in the pile. The end result is that I have to go back and do a bit of shoveling. Today’s item is Over Compensating.
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