steve's journal

Phuket

2008-12-31T22:31:00.001-06:00

Jodie ......

It's pronounced poo-kett, not f*&k-it

:)

The things they say

2008-11-22T01:49:00.003-06:00

I worked late last night, and it is my job to get the kids off to school.

At about 7.15am, Natalie crawled into bed with me, shook my arm and said:

"Steve. You have to get up to wake us up!"

I enjoy their innocence :)

This just does it for me :)

2008-11-18T21:51:00.004-06:00

I don't normally do swear words, not so "in yer face", anyway. But I wanted something to sum up how I feel about the election results, and this just does it for me :)

What a difference a day makes.

2008-11-09T08:25:00.003-06:00

On a day-to-say basis, life is pretty much normal. We worry about bills, and the kids just like everyone else does. We get up, work, play, laugh and cry in much the same way as I have always done. Nothing much, in that respect, has changed between my old life and my new one.

I love my wife and take a great deal of pride and pleasure in the kids I have here, and I miss the two that are not here. Life is as normal for me as it was when I lived in England, and it is for everyone else.

It's sometimes hard to see the differences, but they do exist. For a start, I am an Alien in this place. I have no right to be here, I live here by permission and with the consent of the authorities. This consent is conditional, and could be removed. Most people live in their country of birth and never experience the unsettling feelings associated with immigration. Not a daily thing, but it creeps up sometimes.

I try to avoid comparasions as much as possible. It isn't fair to compare America with the UK. America is not the UK and shouldn't, even in my own mind, be subjected to negative comparasions. A bit of me does wish that Americans would do some comparing, however, they might find such an exercise er ... illuminating. But that's not how Americans do things. Well, at least it isn't how the American leaders have done things in the last eight years but I suspect that is about to change.

What's wrong in America?

2008-11-05T08:24:00.000-06:00

I'm not pissing on parades here ...... Oh no!

I am an Englishman living in Oklahoma, and at 10pm CST last night, I danced for joy in my living room, with my American wife at my side, and my three American kids asleep in their beds.

My next act was to grab my phone and call my friends in Maryland. This gay couple were the first people to invite me to these shores, and remain, to this day, the dearest of friends. I wanted to share the moment with them.

They were drinking champagne and crying. Good for them.

One thing, however, sums up the state of the nation. Despite the joy, and amid the celebrations, several onerous Propositions passed up and down the country. Several were defeated too but it was a mark of the work still to be done.

As Barack Obama, the 44th President of the United States of America (Oh I love the sound of that), said ..... this is a beginning.

One simple fact struck me about the next President ....

He only finished paying off his Student Loans in 2006 !!

There, in that sentence, is the whole of it. We can look at healthcare, we can examine the economy, as we must, and we can make policy to mend what is broken, and advance that which is succeeding. We can foster inclusion, and we can and will end discrimination wherever and whenever it rears it's head.

If we want an idea of the depth of the problems though, this one small fact highlights it all.

The man we just elected President paid off his student loans only 2 years before he was elected Leader of the Free World.

It's as sobering as it is joyful.

Why bother to vote

2008-11-03T17:25:00.000-06:00

If you live in a safe Red State, why bother?

You won't change the result, you won't even influence the result. It's eight hours in-line to be pointless, right?

Wrong!

Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong and even more wrong.

There are a number of good reasons to vote tomorrow, even if you do live in Oklahoma, or indeed, Utah. You get the picture.

MoveOn just sent my wife an email, and I can't find a link so I'll quote:

Big margin = big mandate. The popular vote doesn't put anyone in the White House, but it affects what presidents can do when they get there. Want Obama to be able to actually do the stuff he's been talking about? Pass universal health care? End the war? Then we need a landslide.

The other things on the ballot matter! For example: Congress. Without more support in the House and Senate, Obama will have a hard time getting progressive laws passed. Plus, there are other important local races and ballot questions in some places.

If you don't vote, everyone can find out. Voting records are public. (Not who you voted for, just whether you voted.) Pretty soon, finding out whether you voted could be as easy as Googling you.

Help make history. You could cast one of the votes that elect the first African-American president. If we win, we'll tell our grandchildren about this election, and they'll tell their grandchildren. Do you really want to have to explain to your great-great-grandchildren that you were just too busy to vote in the most important election in your lifetime?

People died so you'd have the right to vote. Self-government—voting to choose our own leaders—is the original American dream. We are heir to a centuries-long struggle for freedom: the American revolution, and the battles to extend the franchise to those without property, to women, to people of color, and to young people. This year, many will still be denied their right to vote. For those of us who have that right, it's precious. If we waste it, we dishonor those who fought for it and those who fight still.

There is another reason .....

Tomorrow, history will be made. There will be a paradigm shift in both the politics and attitudes in this country, the like of which hasn't been seen since forever, and certainly since JFK.

This great nation will elect a black President. They will elect Barack Obama not because he is black, but despite the fact that he is black. They will elect the best man for the job, and for the first time, his skin color is a secondary issue for many, and a non-issue for others.

There is no going back. From the ghettos in New Orleans to the Projects in New York, black kids the country over will, for the first time, be able to believe that they CAN be anything they aspire to.

There is NO going back. The genie cannot be squished back into the bottle. The skinny black kid is will be President and, by and large, white people elected him.

It has been a long time coming. Too long, actually, but the moment is almost among us.

Regardless of the progress made in the next 4 years, the actual event will inspire, and free up the hopes of millions.

Racism will not end. It will not end in my lifetime. But tomorrow, with a fair wind and your vote the end comes a giant leap closer.

The reason to vote #6?

I was there! It was an historic moment in our nation's development. It was our Woodstock, our Moon Landing. We elected Barack Obama and I was there. I did my bit, and I can tell my grandchildren that ...

I was there.

Fiscal Conservatism

2008-10-27T10:25:00.001-05:00

Where has this idea come from? The suggestion that the GOP represents a fiscally conservative form of Government, and the flip side being that Democrats will willfully squander the National Wealth?

Or is fiscal conservatism simply a metaphor?

Nary a day passes when I don't hear some reference or other to the idea that the Republican Party is a Party of fiscal conservatism. A Party of small government, and a proponent of the free market.

So how did that work out?

We have a record national debt, budget deficit spiralling out of control, financial markets collapsing around the world predicated on the US economic mess, and long established businesses failing across the country.

Meanwhile, education is lagging behind ALL the other industrialised nations, 2 million people a year are being bankrupted by healthcare costs, and still aren't getting healthcare, our jails are overflowing and we still shoot 30 000 of our fellow citizens every year.

So the Democratic Party has held the reins for the last 8 years, right?

This morning Paulson implemented the first part of the ~~give money to our friends~~ economic rescue package, when he ~~nationalised~~ took an equity stake in nine major banks. But that's not Socialism, oh no!, it's fiscally conservative.

In the last 25 years there has only been one budget surplus, and there has only been one Democratic President. The fiscal conservatives Impeached him. Our side, when they finally won a little influence, refused to Impeach the current incumbent, presumably because they recognised his fiscally conservative instincts, and didn't wish to set America on a path to Socialism; which could even end up with the Government taking over the Banks - heaven forbid.

In the end, I have concluded that fiscal conservatism is a metaphor. What it really means is keeping the wealthy few, very wealthy; and making damned sure that the poor remain so, under-educated, in poor health and with the constant worry about losing their jobs/homes etc.

The American Dream of owning your own home fits nicely here .... we can fiscally conservatively make sure that at least one third of poor peoples income goes straight back to the rich via their mortgage payments. And just to be mean on the side, we will charge them more in interest than we charge rich people.

So can we quit with perpetuating the myth? The GOP represents greed and division. Nothing more, nothing less. Suggesting, either positively or by not challenging the suggestion, that the GOP represents fiscal conservatism, is to play to their greatest talking point. Hammering them on this exposes the biggest lie.

Crossposted with discussion

Rank Incompetence

2008-10-27T10:23:00.001-05:00

How would a McCain Administration run the country?

Let's examine a small part of his campaign .....

It is reasonable to assume that many of the Campaign managers, on the winning side of the aisle, will form the Executive staff in the White House.

These people will, on a day-to-day basis, be charged with running the country. While Congress is tasked with making laws, that is a process which is reactive, and rarely proactive, almost by definition. The Executive has to be responsive, on an immediate basis, and has also to anticipate.

Doing all of this requires that the Executive is staffed with able people. Folk who are knowledgeable and who possess good instincts, and have access to informed advice.

A key component of this is the application of finely tuned political skills and acumen. It isn't enough to be right more often than you are wrong; it is also important to appear to be right, and not be so unskilled that you do the right thing, but make it look bad.

Barack Obama passes this test easily, and we need have no concerns. Despite the most ferocious attacks on character witnessed in US political campaigning, he has appeared to handle it all very comfortably.John Kerry, arguably, came under an equally sustained personal attack from the SwiftBoat group. The differences are in how he responded. Equally arguable is that the attempt to link BO to terrorism was actually rather harder to manage. The ins and out of that are another debate.

Despite the vitriol, BO has, and continues to inspire ordinary Americans in extraordinary numbers. Witness his ground game. Barack Obama has, over the last two years, demonstrated an Executive competence unparalleled in it's efficiency and effectiveness.

Let's cross the aisle.

I only want to look at a single, topical, example of the executive talents of the RNC and the McCain Campaign. It is an example that goes right to the heart of managerial skills, with particular reference to their political skills.

Sarah Palin's frock, or frocks, and shoes, hair and other girl stuff.

How on earth did the campaign allow the cost of outfitting Saracuda to become public knowledge so close to the election? It is almost so bad to make me wonder if they are deliberately trying to sabotage their own chances.

If the Campaign had given me $150 000 (I wish), and asked me to spend it in such a way that it made them look as out of touch, and reckless as possible, I could not have done better than they managed themselves.

Where were the managerial skill? Where was the political acumen? Are these the people we will entrust delicate International negotiations to? This mindset is the same as "You are with us, or you are against us" school of thought, or more of the same.

I don't much care how much her frocks cost, quite frankly. It's a minor expenditure. But they surely realised that this trivial amount (Obama will spend upwards of $600 million), is probably the most politically charged expense of the McCain Campaign. Was it entirely beyond them to hide it? Jeez .... a $150k charge off to a marketing agency for "marketing expenses incurred" would never have been noticed. And if it had, and folk wanted it specifying, then the response "We'll get back to you with the details ..... call us on the 5th Nov. we're kinda busy right now", would have sufficed.

I am not advocating fraud and deception here. I am simply saying that the RNC and the McCain Campaign lacks the skills even to manage clothing it's VP nominee.

How on earth do they expect us to trust them to run the country?

Crossposted with discussion

Wandering around the Internet

2008-10-27T10:22:00.001-05:00

I occasionally cruise (not in a wide-stance way) the Internet, and pop into various Forums to discuss all things liberal.

I am often taken aback at the vehemence, and sheer hatred I encounter. Often I simply back away slowly from my keyboard. Sometimes I don't.

Today I was minded not to, so I let them have it, both barrels, metaphorically speaking :)

They drive me nuts, so I come home, here, for reason and sanity

Ok, granted. I can't accurately say it until the votes are counted. However, this is not a too close to call situation.

So I can call it. If I am wrong, I feel confident that my crap blatherings will be pointed out to me

What some here are going to have to get used to is the idea that their failed ideology is being rejected on an unprecedented scale. They are being rejected and defeated. And you know what .... they don't understand why.

They don't get that America is about to elect that colored boy the next leader of the free world. They don't comprehend that America actually feels good about that. The best bit? This is not an *affirmative action election. Barack Obama will be elected, by many, because they feel he is the best man for the job, DESPITE the fact that he is black. Progress.

This isn't their America. They thought that Guns, religion and waving the flag was their perogative, and that Libruls were the enemies of the State. They have not even a glimmering idea that America has taken back the flag, is renouncing extremist fundamentalism (while embracing faith), and the issue of guns doesn't even rate in the top 10 things voters care about.

So they will thrash around, blind and clueless. At the same time twist associations, words and actions. They will make their strawman argument, and call argument blather, and ideas crap, because it is all they have left.

Their Dads taught them that when they were 18, and nothing since has encouraged them to be curious. To ask what is changing, and why. To begin to understand that there is a world beyond these shores, and that world is rapidly marginalising the US to an ugly sideshow, while the world keeps turning.

More and more the American people are realising they have been dumbed down, lied to and cheated out of the American Dream. And they are taking it back.

Y'all can .... er ..... blather and insult all you want. But come Nov 5th, some of you will need to re-assess. The America you believe in is leaving you behind.

Get on the bus, or get out of the way.

Crossposted with discussion

Can John McCain be remembered as one of the greatest American Patriots?

2008-10-27T10:20:00.001-05:00

Is there now a way for John McCain to understand that the race is all over bar the shouting, and move to a position where he will forever be remembered as one of the greatest American Patriots.

I believe there is, and here is how:

Tonight is the second in the Presidential debates.

Here is one way it might go:

McCain:

Thank you Tom, and good evening Senator Obama.

I am, tonight, going to be true to my Mavricky tendencies. I probably won't answer any of your questions in quite the way you might be hoping or expecting. But I do have a few words to say, and ask that, for the next few minutes, you allow me to address the American People.

My friends, and fellow Americans. Today, and for the last several days, it has become increasingly clear that America is reaching a turning point. I have run my campaign based on Change. Change in Washington and Change on Wall Street.

My opponent, Senator Obama, has run a similar platform, we differ only in the mechanics. Granted those could indeed be large differences, but all my career I have been known as a Maverick, so maybe the differences would be outweighed by the similarities.

This past week, Congress came together, with persuasion, for the first time in nearly eight years and passed Bi-Partisan Legislation that is, while imperfect, a necessary start along the road of recovery.

The key to this is, my friends, bi-partisanship. Reaching across the aisle in time of need in a way I have always tried to do often to the chagrin of my Republican friends.

Tonight I am going to use this time, in front of you, my 50 million American witnesses, to reach across the aisle again.

When Barack Obama entered this race he was not ready to be President. He was untried, untested, and unknown to the people who were being asked to entrust the future of themselves, their children and their Country to. This is no longer the case, and while I may disagree fundamentally with Senator Obama on many issues, he has clearly made his position known, and offered a choice to the voters.

I too have offered a choice. It is a choice of returning to fiscal conservatism, to defending the USA and to reducing the impact of Government on the lives of the Citizens except for where it is necessary. Many of these aspects of Republicanism have been lost in the last eight years, and I would seek to retore them.

But I have put my case, and steadily, but increasingly obviously, the American people, you, are seeking another course. I can continue, as my colleagues would wish, to continue to put my case, and continue to point to aspects of Senator Obama's character and experience that I might feel are worthy of further examination. This, my friends, would appear a little negative, almost by definition.

My race is run. I have made my case and been given a fair hearing. All the indications are that you, the American people, will choose another path.

It is my belief that America needs a 50 State Strategy at this point in our history. We need a President who has the backing of Congress, but, way more importantly, has the backing of the people of all of America, from the mountains to the lakes, and from shore to shining shore. We can not face the current economic crisis, not the demands abroad by dividing along Party lines. It won't get done, my friends, and you, the voters, are demanding that it does get done.

From tonight I am suspending my campaign. My friends this is an action that is going to bring me a great deal of criticism, but it's not about me, it never was.

I am going back home .... and when I cast my vote on November 4th, as I surely will, I will cast it for Senator Obama.

He would never have been my first choice for President. I think I have made that clear. But he is America's choice, that IS clear. I can serve America best by not spending the next four weeks attempting to denigrate and diminish the next and 44th President of the United States.

Thank you, and may God Bless America.

Crossposted with discussion

The beginning of the end?

2008-10-27T10:19:00.001-05:00

The news cycle is, as most are agreed, a 24/7 beast. Today's hero can quite easily become tomorrow's villian.

Over the past many months now we have all witnessed the MSM giving a virtual "free pass" to the McCain Campaign, allowing him corrections, where we just know that Obama would have been taken to task.

Then we had the DNC, and we all felt great. And so we should. We were treated to the rare sight of a man of conviction, ready to lead his country. And he is, and he will.

Then came the RNC, complete with Sarah.

And the news cycle shifted. Sure there were murmurings, but they were buried under an avalanche of lipstick. Then the murmurings grew, and grew, and are still growing.

Not content with riding the crest of the Palin Wave, the McCain Campaign thought they could lie with impunity. They had no reason to believe any other than that their lies would be accepted. Maybe the odd minor "correction" would be needed but hey, who was ever going to see it?

Well now ..... Karl Rove, advisor to the Campaign saw it, and called it right there on Republican Central (aka Fox News). Tucker Bounds got another beating from a girl on Republican Central (aka ... you got it).

When Foc News is calling the Campaign "Liars", then they are so far in the soft and smelly they are in danger of running out of oxygem

The New York Time is calling their shit
The Washington Post is calling them
CBS has been running their "Reality Check" for weeks

These are but a few, and they are definitely Mainstream. No longer is the McCain Campaign being given carte-blanche to lie and cheat. Sarah Palin can make a meal out of refusing to cooperate with an investigation (Has the Alaska Senate taken Impeachment off the table?), and McCain can suggest that Obama is criticizing American Workers because he doesn't agree with him (John McCain)and they can do it for the next 50 days.

But the writing is on the wall. The wheels are falling off and the lies and excuses are just beginning to sound desperate and feeble. As evidence for this I offer the fact that even Fox News is noticing; and I am wondering if the Right are preparing the way for throwing him under a Moose and preparing for 2012.

It's not over. It won't be over until the polls close on the 4th November. But at least THIS news cycle offers a clearer view of the winning post.

Barack, Joe, keep at'em, you can see the whites of their eyes.

Crossposted with discussion

Leave the kids alone

2008-10-27T10:18:00.001-05:00

I have mixed feelings about some of the comments I have read here and elsewhere about Bristol Palin.

Bristol is a news item, not an issue. She really isn't a National news item, she is simply another example of a failed education policy, or she is just another pregnant teen. Either way, she has my sympathy. Both for her plight, and for the feeling I am left with that she has little access to advice that considers only what is in her best interests, given the statements of at least one of her parents.

Bristol's personal misfortune is a National news item not because Dkos put her there, but because her mother did.

Whatever the motives, the most charitable being that Mom broke the news in a controlled manner, before it broke anyway, the fact remains that Mom making this statement was NOT in her (Bristol's) best interests. They would have been better serve by Gov. Palin deflecting such questions with "this is a personal family matter, not relevant to the Campaign". I might have suggested her adding that any media intrusion would be rebuffed regardless of any consequences to the Campaign.

But no, Sarah Palin took the stage and told the World that her daughter was pregnant. Please shoot me if I ever do anything like that to my kids.

But Bristol Palin is only one example. We all coo'd over Malia and Sasha on Monday. They are too cute. But they too were put on National Television by their parents. Chelsea Clinton was Internationally known and recognised at an early age. The Bush twins also.

Don't think for one minute that Barack and Michelle Obama didn't fully understand that portraying the whole of their family was a vote-winner. I have some sympathy with the Obamas in this. There is a large wedge of US opinion that feels that they have a right to know about a politicians family, kids and all, and somehow the Obamas might appear "not American enough" were they to be kept out of the public eye. Those unreasonaable charges are enough to persuade even the most protective of parents that some appearances are necessary.

On the other hand, I am left with the distinct impression that questions about a pregnat 17 yr old Malia would be met with a MYOFB. At least I hope so.

Bristol Palin is not an example of how her Mom's policies or beliefs are a failure. The generic statistics suggest that abstinence only education is ineffective, but her story is a personal one, and should remain so. However, Sarah Palin making an announcement inevitably links the story to her political position. She made her daughter the story, not those who discussed it.

It is wrong that politicians, any of them, feel it necessary to prove to any section of American society that they are good, wholesome, productive parents. Family matters are private, and the children of our Leaders should not have to have the ills of their parents bestowed upon them. It isn't the fault of the politicians, it is that part of America that demands to know about private family matters .... those who feel that a man or woman shielding their kids has something to hide ... those who hold the public man/woman to a standard none of us has to meet in our own lives ... they are to blame.

Ok, I like cutesy pics of kids. I like kids. I have five and I love to show them off. And I do, to family and friends. I will never have to show them off to a Nation, to get a job. I am grateful for that because, in the end, it is their lives, and they would get precious little say in the decision.

Crossposted with discussion

Citius, Fortius, Altius

2008-08-21T12:24:00.001-05:00

Over the past several days I, along with about 2 billion or so others, have been watching the Olympics. It is truly remarkable to view the endeavour, the sheer guts, the joy and despair of athletes who have dedicated their entire lives to this pursuit.

I have been enthralled by gravity defying gymnastics, seen the joy on the face of the man who won by 1/100th of a second, and witnessed the despair of the athlete who lost by the same margin. I ask myself if he/she actually did lose .....

Citius, Altius, Fortius.

Adopted as the Olympic motto in 1894, and literally meaning Faster, Higher, Stronger. This motto, however, was never meant to mean that only the fastest, highest and strongest achieved the Olympic ideal. No, it was an exhortation to excel. A clarion call that encourages athletes to strive for the best they can muster, and in doing so give life to the idea that taking part is more than winning. Winning is a goal, it is not an ideal. Were it to be so then all the medals below Gold become the badge of failure, rather than the badge of honour that they truly represent. More, medal or no medal, you took part. Those who take part, who fight, dig in, give of their best represent all that is best, and all win the respect and adulation they deserve.

So I want to say a few words about Medal Tables.

There is only one Medal Table. It is right there on the Olympic website. It is on the BBC Homepage and in probably a million other places too. It is the same medal table everywhere except, apparently, on NBC (and lately CBS too). I haven’t checked the other US news outlets, but wouldn’t be surprised to find many have caught the same disease.

Somehow, here in the US, and only here, the United States of America tops the Medal Table. Everywhere else on the planet has the US second. Does it matter? (rhetorical). Well only in as much as it makes a few suggestions about how at least the US Media regards the US place in the world, or what the Media feels needs presenting to the US public.

NBC has been showing a Table based on total number of medals awarded. No one else does this. Medal Tables are ranked according to Gold Medals awarded, then tie-breaked by number of Silver, then Bronze. On this basis, America is a distant second behind China. This may indeed change, but for now ....

So what is going on? There is a perception abroad that the US is belligerent and arrogant when it comes to foreign policy matters. Indeed, John McCain has perfectly illustrated this in his recent comment regarding the situation in Georgia. For my own part I think it’s both a shame and not that simple. I have been, and continue to be, made very welcome in this country, my new home. People I meet are invariably and genuinely open, honest and kind. My English family wonder how I can live here, what with the US being despised and feared in many parts of the world. They don’t know the folk I know, and that’s a shame.

So do NBC feel that they should find any metric that will allow them to display the US as number one? Or do they feel that the US psyche is too fragile to take coming second (esp. to China). Is it the case that NBC takes the view that the US deserves to be number one in all things, which would indeed be breathtaking arrogance, or do they just want to display the US that way?

I found myself thinking through a few scenarios. Suppose that the US had won 30 Gold Medals, and no others, and that China had won 31 Bronze Medals only. Given the NBC metric, China would now be heading the Medal Table. Is this the table NBC would show us many times a day, or would they suddenly be struck by "Gold Fever"? Yeah, that’s what I thought too 

NBC, CBS et al.are changing the rules to suit their view of the world and America’s place in it, and in doing so are, I contend, dishonouring the US athletes who are, in fact, bringing great honour to themselves, their sports and their country. The news media arrogantly denying the athletes the true spirit of the Olympics, the idea personified by the Olympic Motto, that taking part is it’s own reward.

NBC should never again be allowed to host the Olympics on it’s shabby network, not until they grow up and get over themselves. The US has a great deal of work to do in repairing the damage caused in the last 7 years. I know in my bones that this great nation is more than capable of restoring it’s reputation, but really does not need NBC perpetuating the lies.

When the final race is won, the US may indeed top the Medal Table. It is of no great consequence whether they do or not. US, China, UK, Russia, Germany, France ..... they are no more important to the ideal of the Olympics than Trinidad and Tobago, Iceland or Iraq. If the US heads the list, good for them, it is a mark of excellence, but it is not the point. NBC has declared it’s position. Only winning matters! And only the USA winning really matters, and win or not we will show the American people how we won. This attitude runs very deep in US society. From Hollywood showing the World how America won the war, to the present day. It is a presentation nightmare and is so unnecessary. The exploits of the US Military are perfectly laudable on their merits, as are the achievements of the athletes. The would be enhanced by the Nation’s willingness to embrace and applaud the efforts of other; ya know ... I did my best but the other guy was just quicker ...

NBC hasn’t got that message.

When we consider a "Change Election", the changes need to run very deep. It’s not enough to implement Universal Healthcare, decent employment protections and excellence in Schools, although those things matter a great deal. The type of Change that is needed is a sea-change in attitudes. We need our representatives to have a vision not just of America’s place on the World Stage, but a vision of the vital place of others too. This starts at home with the US reaching out, rather than digging in. The current Administration has spent seven years in Bunker USA. We are still taking off our shoes at airports while cargo goes un-inspected. The change we need is to get out of the damned strom shelter, go meet people and ask them what they think, then show some signs of er ... listening. No one expects nations to agree on all things, but neither has any nation the Right to be supreme, and the people of that nation are smart enough to know that second in a Medal Table is a sign of where we need to go, not a National Slur.

Crossposted with discussion

Constitutionally Speaking

2008-04-29T11:21:00.000-05:00

I have this curiosity about the Constitution.

Y’all need to understand that I was not force-fed US Government in school, because I went to school in the UK. Due at least in part to my upbringing, I often compare the attitudes in the UK and Europe, with those here in the US. That is not to suggest that one is better than the other, only to acknowledge the differences, and maybe get hints as to where different societies can learn from each other.

This means that I am only slowly beginning to understand the implications of your Constitution, and am generally playing catch-up with those around me. It also means that I am not simply persuaded that the Constitution is the best thing since before sliced bread just because my parents, teachers, preachers, TV tell me so. I do, however, get that the Constitution simply *is*, and that there are few around right now who could be trusted with making any significant changes, even should changes prove to be wise and necessary.

I will say, upfront, that one can only admire and respect the United States, for achieving so much in such a short period of time. It would be easy for a Brit to criticize the political process here, safe in the knowledge that our 1000 year Parliament has had time to perfect it’s operations . On the other hand, there are indeed checks and balances at work in Europe, that clearly do not work here.

Reading today about how the 4th Estate has been busy swallowing whole the propaganda of the Administration, thereby colluding in the deaths of over 4000 Americans, and many tens of thousands (at least) of others, I am wondering about the 1st Amendment.

It is reasonable to suppose that the Founders considered the Bill of Rights to be the core principles of the Constitution, just as it is sensible that the document be considered as a whole, and not just a sum of individual parts. I know people struggle with that last bit, especially the gun ownership lobbies, who don’t like *whole* discussions, they even attempt to parse individual words and phrases when discussing the 2nd, but I digress …

It’s probably not too much of a stretch that they chose carefully the Amendment that would be read first. After all, they were guys who fled religious persecution, and would, no doubt, be very eager that freedom from such, together with freedom to worship should be right up there, numero uno. They quite reasonably, to my mind, attached a similar degree of importance to the Right of man to speak his mind, although I do wonder sometimes why they chose to vest that Right in the Press. Nonetheless, the principle is established.

So ….. does it work?

Well apparently not. I can see that the Founders were a body of men who believed that a free and unfettered press was as significant a check on the three branches of government, as they were upon each other. I sit back and admire the vision and the concept both. The problem seems to be that free speech appears to carry very little with it, in the way of responsibility. Sure there are some laws restricting what can be said under certain circumstances, but that hasn’t stopped the Pharmaceutical industry using advertising to pressurize doctors into prescribing. In the UK the advertising of Ethical Pharamaceuticals on radio and TV is banned. The public, it is suggested, is not the customer. The public cannot prescribe the products, so the marketing is restricted to those who can. This is not a perfect system, it relies on doctors keeping up to date, and not succumbing to industry incentives, but neither does it lead to a society where masses of people are conned into believing that they do not need to change lifestyles, because WE have the PILL that will cure it.

The Founders, however, charged the Press with the role of Guardian Angel. There are notable examples of them fulfilling this role admirably. Watergate would, I guess be the obvious one. In the current climate, however, the need has never been greater for the Press to defend the Constitution, defend the people and preserve the principles on which the nation was founded.

Yet never has there been a time when they apparently do less of any of this. Fox News, for example, is one of the worst mainstream offenders. Faux News is a good moniker. But need Fox be like this? Fox is owned by News International, a Rupert Murdoch entity. Rupert Murdoch is Australian and, forgive me Rupert if I read you wrong, cares little for the USA, either for or against, and cares principally about simply making money. He does this any way he is permitted, and he is very good at it. RM will, and does allow Fox News to operate any way it chooses, as long as it makes as much money as possible, or paves the ground for his other activities to make, or continue to make money.

Let us hop over the Pond for a moment. News International also owns The Times (London), The Sun (Lon. Daily tabloid) and Sky TV, including Sky News. While Sky News was always considered a little *tabloid* in it’s presentation, it regularly won awards for good, investigative journalism, and was seen as reasonably a well-balanced an outfit as most of the others. It was (dunno about is) regarded as a genuine news organization in a way that Fox simply is not.

So what gives? The UK has no *free speech* Amendment. Speech in the UK is actually able to be very tightly controlled, in a manner that would have Americans howling in anguish, yet the UK isn’t disintegrating, society there is peaceful and well ordered as most. Companies have their ads banned, yet we still produced both Glaxo-Smithkline and British Petroleum.

I am beginning to wonder the issue of the 1st Amendment. While fully supporting the ideas contained therein, I do wonder why the US has allowed it’s provisions to be perverted the way they appear to have been. Almost to the point of allowing ANYTHING, because the 1st Amendment is the Holy Grail, even when the facts in front of your face every day suggest that this is far from the case.

I might return to this ….. I am constantly reminded of the Rights Americans believe they have …. Rights and Freedoms. From where I stand, the reality appears to be that Americans have, actually fewer rights and freedoms than they think they have. Indeed in my 45 years in the UK I rarely had to listen to my countrymen discussing their rights and freedoms. Sure it happened, but not often, yet I actually believe that the absence of a written Constitution enshrines rights rather more effectively that the reverse. A curious irony.

It’s almost as if the Government got rid of the difficult bit (the granting of rights to citizens) in the title, then went about implementing the small print in such a way that means that citizens have very few meaningful rights, even though we sure can point to all the ones they have. Does free speech mean much when you are subject to *at will* firing? Being the quickest example I can think just now.

I suspect that the Founders were decent and idealistic. They were also smart, and quite deliberately charged the Press with a solemn duty towards the American people. Oh how they have been let down.

Racism - A tool that divides

2008-03-19T01:20:00.002-05:00

It is a few years now, that I have lived here in the USA. Much has astonished me, much has delighted me but there is also the side of life and attitudes here that, quite frankly, shock and horrify me.

Foremost among the latter is the casual expression of racism that I frequently encounter. From family, from friends and from TV. Attitudes and expressions that leave me bemused and feeling dirty.

I am not suggesting that the UK specifically, or even that Europe generally is free from racism; it clearly is not. Here though there is an endemic racism expressed both personally and institutionally that is without comparasion on the other side of the pond.

In Oklahoma 25% of black males aged 18 to 24 are in jail, have been or will be. The figure for white males is around 10%, in itself shocking. (figures vary a little)

When will folk start to understand that crime and punishment is not a symptom of being black (or Hispanic). It is a symptom of being poor.

If you are black in the USA the odds are stacked against you from birth. It is likely that your parents are poor. You will go to largely segregated schools because you will go to the school in your neighbourhood, and if you live in a predominantly black area, this will be reflected in your school. Schools in the USA are failing, and schools in poor and black areas are failing most, and failing fastest.

Your chances of receiving more than rudimentary healthcare are low, and college opportunities are vastly more restricted (by dint of schooling and perception) than are those of your white counterparts. Poor whites will get similar opportunities, but without the doors closed to blacks.

Your chance of experiencing prison is very high, on the other hand. Your chance of being a victim of crime is very high, and your chance of being shot is out of all proportion to the actual population numbers.

A small example. Crack cocaine possession and dealing is treated very harshly. Few users and small-time dealers escape jail and the sentences can be lengthy. Powder cocaine is the same class of drug, but is treated very differently to crack. Most users in possession of small amounts will escape jail, and most small dealers will expect fairly short sentences or probation.

Crack is used predominantly by black people and powder cocaine is regarded as white, and middle class. Until this blatant injustice is overturned how can the black community feel any other than anger at the institutional prejudice being demonstrated.

The people I hear making racist remarks are not wealthy people. I don’t actually know many of those. No, they are white, working to middle class, sometimes with college education sometimes not. They are people who don’t have much, and have worked hard for what they have. They are people who sense that this country has problems that make their lives more difficult than it needs to be and have bought into the argument that black people, Hispanics and immigrants, legal or otherwise, are the root of the problem.

These ideas are not fostered or conceived by poor whites, they are rather a tool used by the ruling classes here to divide. The greatest fear of the corporations, and rich old white men is that the poor will call them on it. That one day their will be the realization that the ills they endure are not caused by the black man wasting welfare dollars, and increasing the cost of the drugs they need, but that the cause lies actually with the drug companies and those who allow them to prey on the welfare and health dollars spent here.

If that day ever comes then black, brown, white will not matter. The battle will be between the wealth producers and the wealth consumers. Poor v. Rich, if you prefer. When the day dawns that poor people recognize that they are deliberately kept poor by those who need them to be, and that those very leaders use racism as a tactic to split the poorer, working community, then their might indeed be a revolutionary war here.

Just before I left the UK for the USA I heard a speech by a hitherto little known Senator called Barack Obama. It was the address he gave to the 2004 DNC, and it was a speech that elevated him to the National Consciousness. For my part, it was simply inspirational.

Currently, Barack Obama is the leading Democratic contender in the race for the White House in 2008. I hope he wins.

Over the last week we have been subjected to excerpts from sermons given by the Pastor of the Church Obama attends with his family. Oddly, when Mitt Romney was considered a candidate for the Republican nomination, it was considered inappropriate to even mention his Church (he is Mormon). Now, apparently, because Reverend White made a few inflammatory statements, the chattering classes feel that Obama needs to redeem himself.

Obama didn’t make the statements (which actually were quoted completely out of context in any event) yet he has to answer to them. Mike Huckabee was a Republican candidate until very recently. Huckabee was a Pastor in a Baptist church, and a senior member of that church. Huckabee did not achieve that status without making some very controversial statements on subjects such as Gay marriage, abortion and Right To Life etc. Yet, despite this, we heard not a single word about his sermons. Not once do I recall the candidate being taken to task for anything he said from the pulpit. And he was the candidate, not the candidate’s Pastor.

The double standard is very obvious, and it’s racist. It’s a racist Press and a racist society. It’s another example of how the "uppity nigger" has to be controlled. If they can’t stop his candidacy (and they might yet), they sure as hell can clip his wings.

Today Barack Obama answered the critics. He challenged America to quit the racial squabbling because it was getting in the way of dealing with the problems. The problems are not race, they are poor.

The very people who I hear express racist opinions are the ones suffering just as much as poor black people. They are the white niggers, and if you don’t like hearing that then consider for a moment how much black people like it.

The fear is that the "black niggers" will join the "white niggers".

Today Barack Obama showed them how.

He is the President this country needs. I wonder if we will get him.

Travel Broadens The Mind

2008-02-19T23:49:00.005-06:00

Having lived most of my nearly 49 years in the UK, life here in the USA has offered up many delights, some frustrations, and a generally broader outlook than I had before. I have traveled some, France, Italy, other places but mostly European, and always felt “European”; that is, comfortable with life in England but pleased to be a part of something greater.

Moving, as I did, to Oklahoma by way of Maryland and South Carolina where I spent time with friends in their homes rather than hotels in resorts, I came to understand the meaning of the saying travel broadens the mind.

I always thought this was about simply learning more. You know, new places, different people, stepping out of the box, so to speak. What I learned is that it’s rather more subtle than that. You can learn about lifestyles, scenery, languages etc right at home. No need to leave the sofa, actually. A laptop, internet connection and decent TV and there you have it …. Learning.

Here is what I learned.

I learned that everyone, every culture and society has faced very similar problems. From how to wire homes for electricity, through how to get kids to school. The simple things … heating homes, which side of the road to drive ….. In Malta, for instance, my then wife and I spent at least a week trying to work out the last. We got iteventually, they drive in the shade!

All of these, and many more are issues society works out answers to. Here is the thing though. They all come up with slightly different solutions. And guess what, they all work. Some things are done better in France than in the UK, America could teach the world about many issues, but has a lot to learn about others.

It lead me to realize that no one has a monopoly on the truth. That the solutions I had always relied upon were not necessarily the only ones, and may not even be the best ones. It taught me that when a problem appears to be intractable, just ask around, your neighbour might just have the answer. It demands you roll back your pride, you actually look better when you ask than if you don’t.

Liberating :)

One area that is in stark contrast here, compared to the Europe I know, is the disconnect that people here seem to have between their daily lives, hopes and ambitions, and the role their Government plays in all of that. Sure the Brits gripe about Westminster, the French do Tax avoidance as a National Sport, and the Italians change their leaders more frequently than most of us change our underwear. All though, do feel that the Government is THEIR government. There is a closeness (varies) but there is also a route to change it if it doesn’t behave to their satisfaction.

It seems not to be so in the US. I get that America is big. I have written elsewhere about the lack of understanding of the US that exists in the UK. Often, when asked by friends or family back home what it is like in the US, I am minded to ask “Which US”. The US of the Pacific Northwest, the US of the Bible Belt or the US of the Peoples Republic of New England? It is this lack of understanding that lead to an opinion poll in the UK predicting that the US would vote 80/20 against GW at the last Presidential Election, and astonishment when the results started rolling in.

I can’t help but feel that this “disconnect”, if such really exists outside of the imagination of this Limey, is damaging in a very profound way. If the people feel disconnected from their government, then to what extent might the government feel disconnected from, and not answerable to, the people?

I have the questions, but not the answers, although a few suggestions spring to mind :)

We might consider spreading out the government a little. Is it actually necessary, modern communication being what it is, for everything to reside in DC?

Could we leave the White House there and move a few bits around. Maybe the Supreme Court could go to Seattle, the Senate to Charleston, and the House to San Francisco. I would send FEMA to New Orleans and give each State a government department.

Maybe the last bit is hopelessly impractical. But wouldn’t those “Peoples Representatives” and Officials be rather more likely to have their minds concentrated on what is best for America if they were actually likely to meet Americans, rather than lobbyists and other Washington insiders?

During this election cycle it is pertinent to ask whether or not the US could learn anything from how elections are conducted abroad. Notwithstanding the size and scope of the country, the cost of campaigning here is astronomical to the point of absurdity. Especially preventing, as it does, any but the wealthiest and best connected from making an impact. In a country of 300 million people it is ridiculous to suppose that more than one person from the same family would rise to become the best suited to the role of President, yet this does happen here, frequently. I simply observe that unless the Bushes or Clintons (or Kennedys) have some genetic disposition to be brilliant Presidents, then somehow the system isn’t serving the country well.

As the biggest slice of expenditure, by far, is Media Spend, what say we just ban it? Yep, you did hear that right. A national primary, with the candidates given free airtime to submit their resume in each State in the few weeks leading up ( a few minutes per evening, networked, Primetime) and be done with it. Of course that would vastly reduce the hold that major contributors have over potential nominees …. Ho hum.

I know there are flaws in the argument. Just dare to believe. Dare to believe that something so radical might, somehow, be made to work …..

Back to Walmart Again

2008-02-15T16:06:00.002-06:00

I am loathe to say "kudos Walmart" for reasons discussed elsewhere in this Journal. However, among it's 1.5 million employees, they have some very nice ones, and I met one today.

I had just come through the Express *20 items or less* checkout at a speed that made me wonder if I was in the wrong store. Our store is noted for the inability of it's patrons to count. Indeed, Tulsa Public Schools, which do a mediocre job at best, need really to concentrate on math. The inhabitants of this fine city appear to stop counting at 20, quite regardless of the actual number of items in their shopping cart, and completely oblivious to the inconvenience they are causing to those customers who actually did pass 1st Grade Math .... but I digress.

The total for my 13 (count 'em) items was over $73. This is unusual for me so I stopped to look at the ticket. The DVD I had picked up (on a shelf marked $9.75) had rung up at $20 ... ho hum!

Now the Customer Service desk at Walmart is a place I try to avoid much in the way one tries to avoid contracting anthrax .... it happens, but not because you didn't take precautions. It is a place usually reserved for the surliest, most entitled of the 1.5 million that Walmart can muster. Whatever your point you often end up feeling like a shop-lifter, fraudster or worse.

"Yes Sir, how can I help" I was immediately on my guard, but decided to play along. I explained to the lady that the DVD appeared to not have charged correctly.

"Oh", she said "Guess Who's Coming To Dinner. We watched that in High School. I didn't even know who Sidney Poitier was at the time. Just recently we watched In The Heat Of The Night".

"Did you", she continued, "get it from the Black History shelf?".

I replied that I hadn't; I was a little astonished that a Walmart in Tulsa even HAD a Black History shelf.

She asked me how much I wanted to pay for the movie. I told her that I thought the price was $9.75, and even acknowledged that I realised that movies were sometimes put on the wrong shelves .... probably by the same person who dumped their McDonalds trash in the Lighting Section.

She promptly charged me $9.75, no quaestions asked, and gave me the change. Thank you :)

This kind and entertaining lady will never last.

Moving Soon

2008-02-09T22:25:00.000-06:00

I am preparing to move the blog from here to my own servers.

Mostly it will be unchanged, just a new address.

I'll post the newaddress when it is available, meanwhile we will carry on here.

ps I got the domain www.bracken.name :)

Mitt Romney aka Idiot of our time

2008-02-08T22:09:00.000-06:00

Mitt Romney will not be missed .... by any other than the corporate interests who wished to foist another 8 years of Bushism on this nation.

Yesterday he gave a surrender speech to a bunch of Darwin-hating knuckleheads, where he spoke full flow of his reasons for his abject retirement. He got his ass whipped, is the real truth, but tried to suggest he was withdrawing in the interests of the nation.

He said this, of the upcoming campaign:

If I fight on in my campaign, all the way to the convention, I would forestall the launch of a national campaign and make it more likely that Senator Clinton or Obama would win. And in this time of war, I simply cannot let my campaign be a part of aiding a surrender to terror.

If Mitt Romney actually believes that Democrats are about to surrender to terrorists, then he is simply a very stupid man, and the White House will not miss him. If he doesn't believe it (and actually, he is NOT a stupid man), then he is either a liar or a shameful exploiter of the natural fear of the citizens that the Oath of Office would have him defend. The White House would not miss him.

Later, in same speech, he alleged that America under the Democrats will be like France. I'm not entirely sure what he was alluding to but I'll attempt to guess.

I suspect that he was saying that America, under the Dems, would be a nation of high, and highly paid employment, enjoy one of the world's best healthcare systems free to all citizens, have superb schools and colleges, and generally be a much more forgiving, tolerant and integrated society than it is at present.

Remind me again why we should vote Democrat?

US Primary Elections

2008-02-06T10:34:00.000-06:00

Someone called the BBC radio show I regularly listen to, complaining that there was altogether too much coverage of the US elections on UK broadcast media.

I have to differ with this view.

The US elections affect us all, as evidenced by their disastrous foreign policies over the last many years.

US elections are far too important to be left to Americans. History tells us how they so very often get it wrong. It might be an idea to ban Americans from voting in their elections, and let the rest of us help them.

From "Cheers and Jeers"

2008-01-21T17:09:00.000-06:00

This pearl from DailyKos:

"JEERS to moments we wish we could take back. Ten years ago, on January 21, 1998, allegations of Bill Clinton's affair with Monica Lewinsky first became public via the Washington Post. The president was later impeached by the House when it was discovered that his Oval Office blow jobs resulted in the deaths of nearly 4,000 American soldiers and cost over two trillion dollars. Thank god his successor restored integrity to the White House, huh."

Priceless

Absolute evidence that our child has started school ..

2008-01-20T23:11:00.000-06:00

We, as a family, don't watch much TV. We have a nice TV, and a full service satellite subscription, but there is always something better to do.

This is, I think, a *good thing*.

Sometimes we watch TV together. Last night we decided to have an *American Idol* catch up session. This was met with approval from the Gremlins, and we all sat down to enjoy.

Part way through, Simon Cowell (the other English guy in the lives of our kids) said, of a perfomance, "What the bloody hell was that?"

Michael (6) was amused. "What did Simon just say?"

Natalie (4) responded from her cosy perch between Jodie and I, "He said What the fucking hell was that"

What can you do? She now understands that some words are best not used when Old People are listening, but really, we haven't stopped laughing yet.

Happy Birthday Karl

2008-01-09T15:17:00.000-06:00

Keep pulling the wings off the Angels mate.

Steve

A note to American restaurant staff

2007-12-16T21:46:00.000-06:00

I enjoy eating out, m'kay? There is variety, decent prices and a generally wider choice than I am used to.

Service is pleasant, a nice smile goes a long way in any country.

But here is the thing ..... When you have brought me my meal, and I am eating, more often than not enjoying interesting conversation with my Wife or family, then I am fine. All is well. I am enjoying my meal, the food is great, the service fine. I don't need anything, and if I should want something, I will ask.

I do not need you to interrupt, continuously, with questions about my general well-being, the weather or sundry other subjects they taught you at waiter-school. Indeed, the size of your tip is inversely proportional to the number of times my meal is disturbed.

Less is more, my friend. Once we clearly understand this, I shall be happier, and you will be better rewarded.

Have a nice day!

Understanding Oklahoma

2007-12-02T22:24:00.000-06:00

I am frequently asked, by both Europeans and Americans what living in Oklahoma is like.

Many are bemused by perceptions of life here being dominated by, on the one hand, gun-totin' shoot anything Rednecks, and Bible Thumpers on the other. There is a third group .... they have a gun in one hand and a Bible in the other, but I jest :)

I recently heard this joke, which sheds a great deal of light on the matter:

An Evangelical Missionary was on a grand tour of the 50 States. His aim was to visit major Churches in each State to study the way Christians worshiped in different parts of the Union.

He started his mission in Illinois. On entering a big church he noticed a golden telephone, beneth a message which read Direct line to God. Calls $10 000 per minute.

As he travelled through the rest of the nation, in each church there was the same telephone, golden, with the identical inscription above it.

Eventually the guy wound up in Tulsa, and his first call was the Victory Christian Center. In the foyer he spotted the familiar telephone, gold in colour, with a familiar sign above it. On closer inspection he realised this sign was different. It read Direct Line to God. Calls 35c per minute.

This intrigued the missionary so he sought an explanation from the Pastor. Why, he asked, was the call charge here 35c per minute, yet $10 000 per minute everywhere else?

Well son, came the reply, you're in Oklahoma now. It's a local call!

Update re: Dish Network

2007-12-02T21:58:00.000-06:00

Despite the assertions by Dish Network that I didn't call to cancel the premium packages, because they have no record of the call, they did indeed cancel two of the three free premiom packages.

I am wondering how they will explain the cancellation of two packages, when, according to them, no such request was made.

Idiots!

Meet my 2nd Ex-Wife

2007-12-02T20:18:00.000-06:00

Right as of now, should you be demented sufficiently to type the search words my husband is useless into Google, then the very second result would be this:

http://jodiebsblog.blogspot.com/2007/06/my-husband-is-ginormous.html

That is a link to a post in my Wife's Blog, but I'm not buying her feeble excuse.

/me, retiring hurt :(

Dish Network - See you in Court

2007-12-02T16:14:00.000-06:00

Following my recent experience with the US Justice System, I am keen for more.

At issue is Dish Network.

I have been trying to bring our payments to this company in line with the statements they are sending, regularly paying about $20 more in the hope that over a brief period this will catch us up. The problem has been that it has only been keeping pace, so we appear to be being charged around $20 per month more than we should be.

Back in September, I contacted Dish and told them I wanted to upgrade the package. I wanted America's Top 250, plus HD service, and nothing else. This should come to around $80 per month.

It seems that they remembered to note the increase, but somehow forgot to note that I asked all other services to be stopped (principally, 2 special offer premium packages that were included as a free trial on sign-up).

Fancy.

So, today, I contacted Dish Network again. They were willing to stop the premium packages from today, but unwilling to refund the excess charges back to September (the time I asked for them to be stopped), on the basis that they had supplied the programming and had no record of my having requested it to be removed. I patiently explained that I was not responsible for their record keeping, and as I HAD asked them to stop those packages, and had never watched them, and had no knowledge that they even existed, that I wasn't going to pay for their mistake.

I was informed that they hadn't made a mistake, and that the proof was that they had no record of the request.

At this point I wondered if I was in the Twilight Zone, or when Mulder and Scully would appear .... or even when I would wake up from this bizarre form of logic.

Dish Network appears to hold the view that it never makes a mistake, and cites as proof the fact that they have no record of making one !!!

A quick search on the Internet reveals many thousands of similar customer errors, all people trying to screw Dish Network for having the temerity to help themselves to cash from checking accounts and credit cards because their customers are willfully refusing to pay for services they have been supplied with; whether they asked for them or not.

I suspect the disputed amount is less than about $60. But it is MY $60, not theirs, and they are not getting it.

So here is the next step.

Today, when their website will consent to allow me to sign in, I will pay the amount I think brings us up to date. They will carry the disputed amount forward to our next statement, and continue to add $5 per month late charge. From today, that amount is in dispute.

Tomorrow I shall call Echostar, in Colorado, and inform their Executive Dispute Resolution Centre that I am holding them in breach of our 18 month contract, and ask them how they intend to remedy the breach. If they try to deny the breach I will cease paying, and request that they collect their equipment at their earliest convenience.

They will cancel my service, and bill me for breaking my contract. This is a bill I will not pay. At this point I have no recourse against them, as they don't owe me money. If they try to debit my checking account (which I shall watch daily), I will have the charges instantly disputed and reversed. I will tell the bank we will sue them if they allow those charges to post to our account.

If Dish Network sends the account to Collection, I will inform them they will be sued under the Unfair Credit Reporting Act, and the damages are around $1000.

I am on a mission here. The money is small, but the principle is not, and they are doing this to many thousands of people all over America.

Tune in and I'll follow this up as and when there is new info.

Now .... what is the phone number for Direct TV?

Life in the Fast Lane

2007-12-01T01:13:00.001-06:00

I have a confession to make. I recently managed to collect a speeding ticket. It was my first on this continent, and my first for 25 years on ANY continent. Indeed, my darling wife laughs at me for setting the cruise control at 60mph on the highway, usually accompanied by unnecessary remarks about me being already too old to be able to afford the luxury of driving so slowly.

Now we have clearly demonstrated that I have either been lucky, for 25 years, or that I generally don't drive too fast, we can get to the meat of the story.

I need to tell you all about *School Zones*. I can already hear half of you laughing, and the other half groaning, but my less American family don't know about School Zones, so bear with me.

School Zones are areas of highway close to schools, that have reduced speed limits at certain times of day, and usually have flashing lights to indicate the reduced speed limit times. The speed limit here is reduced from the normal 40 to 45mph, down to 25mph. The penalties for exceeding the limits are severe, tending to be at least double the normal speeding ticket, and require a Court appearance just in case the Judge had a particularly bad bout of indigestion and wanted to jail you for thirty days too.

I am religious about School Zones (if nothing much else), and it would never cross my mind to exceed 25mph while driving through one. And I wouldn't have, had I known I was in such a place. I was driving, ironically from school, to collect some wood from a supplier. I thought the speed limit was 40mph, and I was doing about 35mph because I was aware that the schools had just emptied for the day. I knew this, at least in part, because I had just left one.

When the Policeman, on his motorcycle, pulled out behind me with lights ablaze, I genuinely thought he must be after someone else. He wasn't, and this soon became apparent. Ho hum! ..... I pulled over in a nice safe place and we conversed. Well actually, he spoke and I listened, nodding and agreeing with him at the appropriate moments.

He wanted to see my Driving License and Insurance. Bugger! The License was all present and correct, but the Insurance Verification appeared not to be. Not to worry, said the helpful Policeman, I can just write you two tickets. This level of generosity appeared a little uncalled for, but I already suspected that he was unlikely to be referring to two tickets for the upcoming OU v. Missouri game, and these doubts were soon firmly embedded in reality. While he disappeared to check my Driving License I called Jodie. She helpfully assured me that the Insurance was safely stuck on the side of the fridge. I looked all around the car, but couldn't see the fridge anywhere, so *helpfully* is a word I use advisedly.

She also asked me if the Police Officer was being nice, or an ass .... I told her that, under the circumstances, it was I who was the ass. As part of my efforts to persuade the Policeman that I was indeed a decent guy who had made a genuine mistake, I repeated this conversation to him. He took the view that I was making his boring job a little less tedious, and wrote down my speed at 34mph, not the 36mph he had clocked me at. This was a significant piece of kindness. Less than 10mph over the limit is way less of a deal than more than 10mph over. The latter would cause an entry on my driving record, and increased insurance premiums (and probably a larger fine). Under 10mph wouldn't. Thank you Tulsa, for decent Law enforcement.

Anyway, a few minutes, and two tickets later, I was on my way, complete with Court date and helpful instructions on how to get there.

This would be simply a sorry tale of one man's stupidity, and there is little of any real interest in that. But there is a sting in the tale, and that became apparent yesterday, in Court.

Tulsa Municipal Court is, I soon came to realise, a cash register for the City. As I sat there for an hour listening to case after case, the fines were racking up thousands of dollars income for whichever departments benefited. Now don't get me wrong. I am not complaining about this, just astonished by the revenue flowing in from various traffic and other less savoury crimes committed daily in this city. It goes on, day after day, month after month, and must add up to a tidy amount per annum. I was simply hoping that, when my turn came the penalty would be bearable. We are not wealthy people and can ill-afford for me to squander hundreds of dollars in this manner. In the end it was a bearable $175 including costs, and I count our blessings.

There were a good number of defendants who were out of work. Some of these unfortuanates were racking up fines in the hundreds (actually, thousands, for one guy), and clearly didn't have the means to pay them.

Tulsa has a *Workday* scheme. I am sure they are common, but this was my first encounter. Basically the Judge, when satisfied a defendant couldn't pay, was able to offer a number of days Community Service in lieu of the fines. I did the math .... He was offering a rate of exchange of about $50 a day (tax free, of course).

I did some more startling, more revealing and much less palatable maths too. At my rate of pay as a Substitute Teacher, I would be financially better off taking the Community Service, than I would be by paying the fine and spending the equivalent time teaching classes of High School students.

Pitiful.

Pitiful is the only word I can readily think of to describe a situation where the City values a few hours cleaning graffiti, or sweeping up leaves, or whatever, at a higher rate than they will offer to those who regularly spend days, weeks and months educating our children. Their commitment to Education is underwhelming, and this City, and local School Districts should hang their heads in shame. If the experience of shame was an emotion ever felt by politicians.

Nope ... we need grandiose schemes to develop the River, or a new Exhibition Centre, or tax breaks for business. Meanwhile we will appear on TV wringing our collective hands when school results crop up, when it is demonstrated that half the City schools are on the "need of improvement" lists, or otherwise failing.

Pitiful! There it is ..... Now then, you can start by giving MY $175 to the school my kids go to. Maybe then they won't have to rely so heavily on cash from Quick Trip to fund necessary school activities.

Bemused

2007-11-20T21:57:00.000-06:00

I find myself in a large measure agreement tonight, with the Southern Baptist Convention.

This is a first. Hopefully it will happen again, I am nothing if not for decent people living together in harmony, while respecting each others differences.

At issue is the Oklahoma Legislature House Bill 1804. I have spoken about this racist law before, and now the Southern Baptists have spoken too.

They have written to the Governor of Oklahoma, expressing an intention to break this law by passive resistance. In doing so they join the many Churches and Charities who have expressed similar intentions.

So, tonight, I raise my glass, and tip my hat in their direction.

So, it's not just Oklahomans who are nuts!

2007-11-19T21:59:00.000-06:00

I am a man. Ok, now we established that I'll further state that I generally hold that what happens in a woman's body remains her private business; until such time as a new life emerges and takes it's place as a Citizen.

Apparently, not everyone feels the same way.

A small group of demented and power crazed (my analysis) Coloradans believe that it is THEIR business too. They believe that they have a right to interfere with women, in particular with their wombs, in a manner that is quite unprecedented. If the Government wished to persue such intrusion it would require a warrant. Well it would have required a warrant had the 4th Amendment not been so severely wrecked by the Knuckledraggers.

See: Medical News Today

In this instance a Judge in the Colorado Supreme Court has given these mysoginists permission to raise the required signatures (76000), to place this on the Ballot.

Let us examine the implications and motives for this move. If a fertilized egg is to be regarded as an individual, with full rights, then a pregnant woman will be guilty of child abuse everytime she does something the "State" disapproves of. A drink, a cigarette, too many late nights, not enough vitamins ..... all would become criminal offenses.

More significantly, abortion would be first degree murder, and any action taken by the woman that caused, or contributed to the death of the fetus would become probably second degree murder.

A minor car wreck that caused a spontaneous miscarriage would be vehicular homicide, and every miscarriage would be a matter for the Police and Prosecutors to *mull over*.

The second major implication is for contraception ..... everything other than a barrier method, or possibly the mini-pill, would be murder. Any method that prevents a fertilised egg from implanting would be murder.

I hear Colorado's entry into the World Series was almost abandoned when the Pope advised them to "pull it out at the last minute".

Curiously, the proposal doesn't explain how the State is to deal with the minor matter of there being no "Good Samaritan" law, or Constitutional provision. If the fertilised egg is to be considered a Citizen, there is currently no way the State can force a woman to allow it to use her body, possibly at the expense of her health or well-being, for nine months. There is no way, in US law, that one citizen can be forced to aid another. Mothers cannot be legally be made to care for their children, even after birth. They are legally constrained from neglecting or abusing them, but they are not compelled to raise them. Nor can they be.

It's probably not a well thought out proposal, but it might actually reach the ballot, this being the USA.

I suspect that contraception is behind this move. The Fundies around here cannot control sex. They would like to, but they mostly cannot keep their pants shut, as an endless prossession of sordid revelations continually reminds us. What they can do is continue to control women, and make them as subservient to old white men as much as possible, for as long as possible.

But only if we let them.

Find the bigots and nutcases who hide behind religion. Find them, expose them, ridicule them and humiliate them. That is precisely what they wish to do to you. Especially, it appears, if you happen to possess a womb.

If that girl gets out of bed ..

2007-10-01T22:07:00.001-05:00

... one more time tonight ....

I am going to forget to be nice !!!

When will America ....

2007-10-01T19:56:00.000-05:00

... get up off it's burger filled ass and start complaining?

Let us start with a few facts, not jingoistic opinions.

Fact: Americans have fewer freedoms than Europeans.
Fact: Americans have worse healthcare than Europeans
Fact: American children are less well educated than Europeans.
Fact: American employees have pitiful job security.
Fact: Service levels in the USA are appalling.

I could go on ... and most probably will at some time, but today two things have seriously pissed me off. Not, you understand, because I think Europe is better than the USA; but because, in certain areas it clearly is, yet Americans have swallowed the shit peddled to them by politicians and media to such an extent that they actually believe the lies.

My commitment is to life here ..... but I pay taxes, and have opinions, and while there is breath left in my body I will shout and scream that you need to shake off this ridiculous belief that you are always right, and start complaining that you are not, and that only this way will we make America the country y'all think it is.

First ..... I was teaching today. My School District pays Substitute Teachers $50 per day. You, and your children, get what you pay for, by and large. If you agree that your children and Grandchildren should be taught, sometimes for days on end, by people who could earn more at McDonalds, then we have nothing else to discuss.

If you think the students deserve better, then why are you not bitching about it all day every day? I chatted, during Gym, to a full-time teacher. She was asking me about life in the UK, and the conversation turned to Healthcare. She was a self-confessed Conservative, Republican Christian (nothing wrong with that), who believed that free enterprise should run the health service, and that the USA had the best quality healthcare in the world. I was blunt. No, you don't. France, Germany and the UK all have superior healthcare, and so does Canada. The very wealthy here indeed have wonderful healthcare .... the rest have the highest rate of infant mortality in the Western World, many citizens having little or no access to any but the most basic of services.

"But I have heard about the waiting times in the UK", she said. "Well", I replied, "that is part of the lie they feed you to keep you quiet. In fact, for urgent care the UK system has service standards that rival the best in the world. How long are the waiting lists in the US, if you don'tt have health insurance?" I asked her.

Why do Americans pay up to 25% of their salaries for healthcare, only to be denied treatment by an insurance company, even when doctors recommend it? Why do you not scream, shout and complain? Why do you keep voting for those who put you in this position, then do everything they can to keep you there?

Another point we covered was TV advertising. The UK prohibits Political and Religious ads. She was aghast. What about freedom of speech? Well that is one of the biggest red-herrings of all. Britons do not feel that their right to express a view is particularly impeded, but they are simply not prepared to see the entire democratic process debased and reduce to the guy with the biggest pocketbook.

Case in point. Tulsa will vote next week on a sales tax increase to fund River Development. Now there are many cogent arguments both for and against the proposed development and it's funding. Both sides have strong arguments with merit on each side. For the last month, however, the TV has carried hundreds of *Vote Yes* ads, and not a single *Vote No*.

The vote yes campaign is being funded by individuals and businesses whose identity is obscure. My question is how does this serve democracy? How is this *Free Speech* in the best interests of the community? And if it isn't, then why was the right of people to freely express a view allowed to be used to buy election results?

Fact: Americans have fewer, not more, rights than Europeans.

We even still hang on to Habeas Corpus .... fancy.

When UPS tells you one thing, and does another .... complain. When three doctors say you need treatment, and the Insurers disagree, moan, go camp in their fancy offices, be a pain in the butt. When your kid fails to graduate High School, or misses a scholarship, make the District Superintendents life a total misery. When store personnel tell you something just can't be done, don't accept it, demand to know how it CAN be done.

America ... quit lying down and rolling over when every petty beaurocrat and official refuses to provide a level of service that America should be demanding. Vote for the other guy, watch the other TV channel, and email Producers and tell them what you are doing.

Use your much vaunted Free Speech, loud, long and clear. Maybe then you will find out what Europeans have long known:

Telling you you have Free Speech gets rid of the difficult part in the title ... when you really start to use it, watch them panic, and count the improvements.

News (sic) Reporting

2007-09-15T19:48:00.000-05:00

It is neither fun, nor rewarding to watch News Broadcasts here in the USA. What makes it worse is that it is rarely informative either.

More than anywhere else than I have experienced, it is slanted, biased and the worst of "lowest common denominator" I have witnessed.

The so-called News reports do little other than pander to an uneducated, and largely uncritical audience. That, at least, is the impression they give of the Broacasters respect for the viewers.

A case in point toninght. The local affiliate of ABC broadcast a piece about the falling school roles in Oklahoma. They attribute at least some of this to the latest round of Immigration Legislation passed by the Oklahoma Legislature, and will become law in November.

This particularly odious piece of law is both Un-Constitutional, and discriminatory; but that is another post. Clearly though, local community leaders and business have been reporting falling trade and numbers of Hispanic families coming here, and reports that, so far, up to 20 000 may have already left for more humanitarian States.

Of course the Extremists here see this as a victory .... and have little understanding of the concept of "Phyrric" None of this excuses News Channel 8 for it's story. They were suggesting that the Education and Social Services would benefit to the tune of $200 million anually, in Oklahoma, from reduced costs.

That assertion is both bogus and intellectually dishonest. Bogus because it simply isn't true, dishonest because they know it isn't true, and if they don't, then they are absolutely in the wrong business.

Last year, the IRS published figures that showed they received contributions totalling $56 Billion (yeah, you did read that right) from residents with no Social Security Number. Of these, an estimated 10 million people were adjudged to be illegal immigrants. No one particularly disputes these figures, even the Republicans seem to stipulate to them. Most estimates put the social costs of accommodating the same group of immigrants at around $26 Billion per year. Do the math!

What News Channel 8 seemed to be suggesting is that as Ford Motor Company might save around $7500 for every car they don't make, the company would indeed benefit from selling no cars at all.

Of course the "cost" of any operation is never, and never can be, judged by the investment, but only by the Return on the Investment. It is dishonest, willfully so, and rather stupid to suggest any other.

What is even worse is that others who trumpet the economics of the Madhouse, are elected to high office, and returned to office time and again.

There is a possibility that they are right, and I am wrong. News Channel 8 did little to persuade me of that tonight.

We all should have fountains

2007-09-04T19:52:00.000-05:00

Whatever happened to healthcare in the United States of America?

I have an angle here, an edge, a motive. My starting point is a profound belief that a society is judged not by it’s military might, it’s technological achievements or it’s presence on the World stage; no, it is judged by how it cares for it’s Seniors, it’s children and it’s sick.

On all three of those tests the USA falls woefully short of accepted standards in the developed world. Baby Boomers will feel the full force of the first, the second is being felt by High School students all over this nation, with Many Children Left Far Behind, but here I want to address the care of the sick.

I am angry tonight. Angry that, as a father and husband I have to make choices about whether or not my 5 year old step-daughter gets the drug her Doctor prescribed, and if so, what we have to go without to afford it.

Natalie has a Staph. infection. Nothing serious, but her allergy to penicillin requires an alternative drug. The one prescribed is an antibiotic that isn’t on the Formulary of her Insurance company (Aetna). So it’s going to cost $80, on top of the $20 co-pay to see the Doctor. That is $100 to sort out a boil on her cute butt!!

Natalie is lucky. She will get her meds, and insurance will meet part of the bill. An estimated 47 million people in this country are not so lucky. They rely on charity, or go untreated. It’s that simple. 20% of the population of the USA, in 2007, have little or not access to effective healthcare. I don’t want to hear about the *waiting lists* in countries with Universal Healthcare systems, or the cost to taxpayers of maintaining those systems. Ask people here with no coverage how long the waiting lists are! Ask my wife, who badly needs surgery, how long is the waiting list. Her Insurance company have decided that *medical necessity hasn’t been established*, despite a pain management doctor, a primary healthcare physician and two plastic surgeons saying that it has!

So, despite approximately $650 per month being paid to cover my wife and her three children, they still either can’t get the treatment they need, or have to pay through the nose for it. Jodie earns about thirty four thousand a year. Those premiums add up to $7800. That is around 23% of her gross income. On top of that are all the co-pays, which could be nothing, or could be many hundreds of dollars a year.

Did I tell you about the fountains in St Francis Hospital, Tulsa?

The building is magnificent …. Marble and fountains in every foyer, beautiful plantings and comfortable chairs. The only problem is that up to 25% of the city population can’t actually be treated there …. They can’t afford it.

Jodie has three children, born in ’98, ’01 and ’03. The first cost her about $40, the 2^nd about $1500 and the third about $4000. These were her out-of-pocket expenses, the only difference was that the third was a caesarian section. What happened between ’98 and ’01? And why, with citizens paying those kinds of additional contributions, is infant mortality among the highest in the developed world.

How is this society in a position to criticize a young woman for attempting to flush a baby down a McDonalds toilet, when it might cost her anything up to $4000 to have the baby in a medically accepted manner? Ok, I accept the example is extreme, and the young woman really should have known better; after all, she had had the benefit of twelve or thirteen years schooling!

I am not one of those Europeans who comes over here and simply criticizes. I do not wish to see the USA emulate a British way of life at all. But it is useful to draw the odd comparasion here and there. To not do so is to be blinkered and insular.

In the UK, there is Universal Healthcare, free at the point of delivery. It’s not perfect, and it’s under strain. Some charges have crept in but the principle remains the same. The Brits pay for this in two ways. Employees contribute around10% of gross up to a threshold, and employers pay about the same, with no cap. Put simply, less than 20% of payroll fully funds healthcare, pensions and unemployment benefit. The cover is available free, to all.

As I said, it isn’t perfect, but it’s considerably cheaper than healthcare here in the US, and 100% inclusive.

So why are Americans afraid of *Socialised Healthcare*? I simply fail to understand why y’all are prepared to pay through the nose for inferior products, and then hear folk claim you have the world’s best healthcare. No, you don’t, and you don’t even come close.

Did I tell you about the fountains?

You have insurance companies deciding treatment. Do they have your best interests at heart? You have drug companies literally spending billions in advertising to the public (who can’t actually buy the product), all in an attempt to pressurize a doctor to prescribe the latest wonder-drug. It is unethical, and in many countries is simply unlawful. Do the citizens of Germany, France, Switzerland, UK etc ….. appear to be suffering because Glaxo-SmithKline are unable to sell them prescription drugs over their bowl of Cornflakes?

The USA has one of the unhealthiest populations in the industrial world, but change? No Siree Bob, it’s the American Way.

In this Race For The White House, is there a single politician who has a costed and thought out proposal to deal with this situation. Is any one of them prepared to say NO to drugs? NO to the insurers, and enough already to the hospital administrators?

Is there a politician who has the guts to actually do the right thing, not the expedient thing, or the politically possible thing. Is there a man or woman who is brave enough to dream? Dream of an America where the sick are treated, the Seniors and Veterans adequately cared for, and the children taught?

And not just to dream, to get up of his ass and say so. Say so on TV, say so on the stump, say so from Maine to California. Brave enough to be a Democrat yet say Arnie is trying to do the right thing. Brave enough to be a Republican and say we need to move trillions from defense, and spend it on people? (actually, that last is asking a bit much).

Is any man jack of them actually concerned about the USA, and the welfare of it’s people, or do they all just want to look good on Face The Nation. They will indeed face the Nation soon enough. Let us hope for the sake of the candidates that their lack of clothing is not visible to all.

Or perhaps one of them will step up, and be the Emperor in a full dress suit.

Oh to be in England ...

2007-08-09T18:11:00.000-05:00

The only consolation in Tulsa right now?

It's too bloody hot for the mosquitos!

Just because

2007-07-08T20:33:00.000-05:00

There's a new world somewhere
They call the Promised Land
And I'll be there someday
If you will hold my hand
I still need you there beside me
No matter what I do
For I know I'll never find another you

There is always someone
For each of us they say
And you'll be my someone
Forever and a day
I could search the whole world over
Until my life is through
But I know I'll never find another you

It's a long, long journey
So, stay by my side
When I walk through the storm,
You'll be my guide, be my guide

If they gave me a fortune,
My pleasure would be small
I could lose it all tomorrow
And never mind at all
But if I should lose your love, dear,
I don't know what I'll do
For I know I'll never find another you

But if I should lose your love, dear,
I don't know what I'll do
For I know I'll never find another you

Another you, another you

Camping

2007-06-16T23:52:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow I an taking four *camping virgins* to Keystone Lake.

To be fair, Jodie has camped before, but not since she was about 5 years old.

If we are not back by Wednesday, would someone please call 911

Thanks :)

Humans .... Can't live with them, can't kill them!

2007-06-16T01:03:00.000-05:00

My name is Sheffield. I am the gorgeous girl you see on the right. Aren't I just the cutest? I am almost two years old, and I live in Tulsa with my sister, Wednesday. She's the stoopid one. She was born at the same time as me, and was generally considered to be the runt of the litter, but now she's twice my size and don't I just know it!.

Anyways ... for about two years we have allowed a family of humans to live with us .... the smell is awful, the menu is boring, and sometimes the silly sods lock us out at night :: sigh :: On the other hand ... the food is free, and we have them pretty well trained. Well, all except the short, and often very scruffy, blond one whose hair is even longer than mine. She could almost be a cat, were she not so obviously devoted to the rest of this disfunctional family. Showing devotion, by the way, is something no self-respecting cat would ever do, not unless it wanted to repeat Grade school with the emphasis on *How to be a cat 101*.

Life has been pretty good until recently. We repay our humans by offering regular treats .... mice, lizards and snakes being particular favourites of theirs. See ... we at least try to offer them a varied diet ... but they aren't getting the message. Must be the school system, or something. Wednesday and I have recently been discussing how we might offer a little more, but we don't think the elder female human is quite ready for possum!

Where was I? Oh yes ....

Humans ... You know, we are easily pleased. We want to be fed, and we want you to leave us alone. Leave us alone. If we want you, we'll let you know. If we don't let you know, it's because we don't want you right now. Deal with it.

On the whole, we think it's a decent arrangement. We let you live with us, and you behave yourselves. Not too much to ask is it? There are several dos and don'ts. Right at the top of the *Don't* list, is DONT GET A DOG.

So what did our humans do? Did they get a dog?

No. They got TWO dogs !!!

Two scraggy little furballs that look more like baby bears than dogs. I mean, just how stupid can one human family be? I kid you not, these dogs (spit) are just a mess. They are called Edmund and Baldrick. We simply call them Dumb and Dumber, and the names suit them, believe me!

We were so sure we had these idiots where we wanted them. Even the midgits had stopped hauling us around like we were some kind of Barbie Doll, but no. Just when you think you can look forward to a long. prosperous and peaceful existence, along comes these:

Sometimes, I just throw my paws up in despair.

Is Bush the Worst President Ever?

2007-06-15T21:37:00.000-05:00

He would have some competition for that title, but, again, the question is a little misleading. Yes, I know I asked it, but I did so only because it is a phrase I hear repeated around the place, and thought it maybe bore a little examination.

Let's go back to the beginning.

There are those, I am sure, who would consider George Washington (funny that, all those Georges) to have been a pretty Un-American kinda guy. After all, he was the 1st President to be sworn in under the newly adopted Constitution of the United States of America. This *liberal* nonsense has come under severe attack from the latest, and in their eyes at least, most enlightened of Executive branches of government.

Indeed, it would appear that root and branch reform of this worthless liberal document, this "piece of paper" is in order. Notwithstanding the fact that it has proven to be the very foundation of this country, and the bedrock upon which a broadly democratic society has been built.

Given the outrage heard from some right wing quarters when *freedoms* are called into question, then there does appear to be some support for the notion that the Bill of Rights in particular, needed George Bush's wholesale reform, and never mind what the State's governments might have to say about it. Oh, but leave the 2nd alone, as those same people think it allows them to shoot folk in the streets without any apparent concern that there might be an arrest, trial and life-imprisonment to follow.

So, broadly we have two groups taking positions on the two Georges. One group insists the first George was an enlightened leader of a young nation, and that the latest George is a man of limited intelligence, who is pushed around mercilessly by the smart but evil folk around him, eventually to be found washed up, like flotsam on the shores of history. The other group, and I generalise a little, accepts that history deals kindly with George Washington, and acknowledges that he was indeed a man of honour and vision, during times when democracy must have been a hard line to walk. The two hundred years or so that have elapsed have done much to show that the document those guys signed up to is still relevant, still powerful, and still a moving tribute to their courage.

Yeah we get amendments. There is a process, and it requires the States to sign their agreement. I have no record of which States agreed to the trashing of the 4th Amendment, but feel confident that others will point me to the evidence I am missing. I am conscious that other Amendments have been damaged too, but the 4th is so damned obvious I am stopping there.

So .... is he the worst or not?

I think the answer to this question lies buried in another piece I wrote. I think you have to ask *Which America?*. It is a fatal error that Europeans often make (many Americans make the same mistake), to think that America is one big place, homogenised from shore to shining shore. It isn't, it never was, and it came as quite a shock to me when I first realised it. There are many Americas, all linked federally, but separated in significant ways. Separated socially, geographically, culturally, racially, economically and in many other ...allys.

One significant separation is that between the corporate side of the US, and the people who live here. Each would seem to rely upon the other, and to a great extent they do. But it is not a symbiotic relationship. Corporations here are not run for the benefit of their employees, nor of the community at large. Walmart does not provide health care for very many of it's workers. In fact, in many States, Walmart is a parasite upon the State relief for the poor, relying on this to cover it's sick. And Walmart isn't alone, it is just the biggest.

American corporations do not move American jobs abroad to advance the economic standing of the community. They do it to avoid paying a living wage, to maximise profits for a few, with no sense of shame or patriotism. I don't give a flying fuck how many Stars and Stripes they fly outside their corporate headquarters, they behave like economic terrorists.

So how would this America, this corporate society view the current incumbent? Well, quite frankly, they bought him the desk, and he hasn't let them down. Well maybe a little, having kinda queered the pitch for a potential successor. With that single caveat though, he has been a resounding success, and possibly the best President in history. The biggest American companies have grown bigger, fatter and more difficult to reason with, more in the last six years than at any time in history. Take a look at the increases in defence spending if you don't believe me.

Meanwhile, I still post in internet groups where ordinary Americans ... you know, the comfortable but still need to work, the poorer but still happy, those Americans, most of us ... and this President gets oodles of support.

They support the employer who discriminates then is supported in turn by a bankrupt Supreme Court. They support the man who shoots someone who *looked at him in a threatening manner* (I exaggerated that for comic effect, but you get the drift). They think they have decent healthcare ... are they nuts? ... and heaven forbid we ever had *socialised care* ... you know, the kind that gets you better without bankrupting you ... and they will vote for Republicans again.

I want some of that. Some of the kind of power that allows you to treat people mercilessly, to abuse them, to deny them any worker rights, or even habeas corpus, yet still gets them buying, again and again and again.

Most of all, I want Democrats to have it .... have it and use it wisely, responsibly, and for the benefit of all Americans. Yeah, even the ones who voted Republican ... again, dammit.

There are many different Americas ... I want a government that responds positively to them all.

Awakenings

2007-06-10T04:14:00.000-05:00

It’s three thirty seven am, as I start to type this, My wife is sleeping, noisily, and the kids are away for the weekend, The dogs are asleep, as I should be, and the cats are out looking for lizards, or some such treat to break the never-ending monotony of the Pedigree cat food we supply them with.

Jodie deserves to sleep a long time tonight. She took another major step on the road to realizing that all people are different, yet all are the same; and that difference is a cause for celebration, rather than a reason for fear and enmity.

I run karaoke shows from time to time. Tonight I ran one in an expensive hotel for a wealthy friend. I will call him Jack.

Jack is from India. He arrived in the US in 1971. He went to college and started a business. In the twenty five years that have elapsed since the business opened, both Jack, and his company, have prospered. Tonight we celebrated that 25 years, and Jack’s 50^th birthday. Jack was the first member of his family to move to the US. Now there are around fifty. One is a banker, one runs another established company locally, many are children, or at college, or are elders enjoying a decent retirement.

Jack, and his family, epitomize the American Dream, and the benefits to us all of immigration. When I arrived, a little over two years ago, I met Jack in a local bar. He was friendly, and he was very helpful in providing me with opportunities, including parties to DJ. He continues to be helpful and despite him probably being the richest person I actually know in this country, I charge him rather less than I charge other people.

Tonight’s party was a curious affair. It was attended by around one hundred and fifty people, a mix of friends, family, employees and business contacts. They didn’t want to sing much, although they did enjoy the singing by both another guest and myself. Clearly, success in business turns you deaf, but that’s another post. It was, however, very clear that there was a clash of cultures that was very difficult for some people to comprehend. Much Indian music was played. It was the usual scene …. One of the guys would give me a bunch of CDs, with a neatly tabulated sheet asking me to play certain tracks in a particular order; then, as soon as I start, the girls would come rushing in, resplendent in their saris, demanding that I change the order, and casting withering looks in the direction of their menfolk. All very normal. My difficulty was that I don’t have much in the way of Bollywood Hits, and cueing up the next track is tricky, when you have no idea when the first is likely to end.

The culture clash was this …. Many guests simply couldn’t get their heads around the music. Nothing about it appeared to them to relate to life as they knew it. This lead to a general exodus to the designated smoking areas, and a dance floor filled with Indian teens, young Moms and grannies, all having a whale of a time. I heard a few disparaging remarks about the music, and was filled with a sense of loss. Loss that guests who didn’t understand, and didn’t try to understand, were suffering. From my perch all I could see was a room filled with people having a great time. From the 4 year old who waited up until 11 pm for a chance to sing a country music hit, to the very genuine attempts of middle aged white people joining in and having a blast.

I was witnessing a normal, very commonplace, family party. I was a little surprised that others saw it differently. Jodie didn’t. She saw exactly what I was seeing, and it troubled her deeply (several Jack and Cokes contributed). She was mortified that she grew up in an area where people see difference as fearful, colour as an object to be scorned, and if it ain’t sung by Garth Brooks, it ain’t music. I’ll be honest. I don’t much care for Bollywood type tunes. They are unfamiliar, and strange to my ears. On the other hand, when the girls insisted I play the same track three times in a row, telling me it was just the biggest hit ever, I got it.

Jodie wants to know how we can fight these attitudes. How she can shelter her children, my stepchildren, from their father and grandfather who still call black people “nigger”; a word I don’t even like to type, and how we can help them inderstand that a gay couple can be loving and decent, in the face of sneers from Dad. And she complains, that she may be awakening, but she is just one person, what difference will it make?

All the difference in the world, is the real truth, but she can’t hear it yet. Maybe in the morning.

Shopping for Dummies

2007-06-08T16:20:00.000-05:00

I went to WalMart. I really should stop going to WalMart, given their abject failure to provide a living wage, let alone health care, for most of their employees. Nonetheless, I had a list, so I went shopping.

I also had $75, which was about all we could muster, and we just got two dogs, so I was a little concerned that said $75 would prove insufficient (it did).

Before I left, Jodie gave me the list. Usually, I shop without a list. I do the shopping, and I pretty much have a default shopping list hard coded into my brain ... Milk, creamer, lunch meat, bread ... it's a decent list.

Today however, Jodie had added a few things for which she felt the need to apologise in advance. I didn't actually look at the list before I left, but soon found myself looking at an unfamiliar shelf, and muttering "Kotex, Kotex, Kotex" ... which endeared me to a few of the female shoppers around me, and scared off a few others.

Maxi, Long, Ultra-Thin and No Wings ... said the list. WINGS? My experience of Wings in the US is that you smother them in hot sauce and butter. Never knew they were made by Kotex!

So, I am trying to find the exact ones specified by she who must be obeyed. It really wasn't all that easy. They had *Light*, *Medium*, *Maxi*, *Mississippi Levee*. Short, long, thin, purple, red, winged and wing-free ........

I decided to steer clear of the Mississippi Levee .... they probably leak! ewwwwww!

I bought a pack .... bought the right ones, and earned a few credit points :)

Life, the Universe, and Jodie ...

2007-06-05T23:50:00.000-05:00

Sometimes we have conversations. We have a happy marriage, one that has not yet tired of exploring ideas about the world around us, and how we relate to it. I have a sneaking suspicion that we never will, actually, tire of it, and that is the source of a great deal of pleasure and satisfaction for both of us. In the beginning .... a cute phrase, doncha think? ... Jodie looked to me to help her find answers to things she had long considered, but never conceptualised, let alone put into words. Mostly it was about attitudes she had inherited, from parents, family, school and her general surroundings here in Oklahoma. I think what drove her to ask me was that I was simply the first person she had ever been close to that had been brought up in a different culture, with different ideas and a completely different perspective. It was probably encouraged by the fact that I clearly wanted to listen, and was willing to share.

That is where we came from, we have moved on a good deal. Jodie is now much more of an *equal*, in our conversations. She asserts her views, and listens to mine. She is equal in her own head, she was never anything less in mine.

Of late, the subject of Creationism has been on our minds. Not so much that it is something we obsess about, or even discuss much. Just generally. Little things like the opening of a Museum dedicated to lying to children about Evolution .... minor issues like that and the recent Republican debate where three of the ten rich old white men wanting to be President asserted a belief in Creationism, and a scepticism about Evolution. And they want to be the next Leader of the Free World!! The scary bit is that one of them might .... that they even can be considered credible is bad enough. I digress.

Today we chatted about the Universe, the speed of light, and the origins of religion.

Not bad for a quiet Tuesday afternoon. It was just one of those conversations that meandered a bit. Neither of us were seeking to explain the Big Bang, what came before it or what might happen in the unimaginably distant future when the universe stops expanding. These are answers that are unknowable, and quite likely will remain so well past next week. So it doesn't matter much.

We nattered about Einstein, about the speed of light (whether, if it is a constant, time is constant), because it kinda matters if distance is to have much meaning, and whether or not God is a concept, created by man to satisfy his own need to have answers, or whether there really is God, or a God, or several ....

We ended up talking about what has changed in the 2000 years of Christianity, accepting too that there was religion before Christianity, and that there probably has never been a time when there was actually less religion than the current time; though, living in Oklahoma, it doesn't seem that way.

For what it's worth ...... my view is that, right from the time of the earliest men, there has existed a need to understand the world around us. It was easy enough, when dragging the bear back to the cave, to understand that one was able to directly affect your immediate surroundings. It was impossible to understand what affected, or effected change in the wider environment. For example/ It's not too hard to plant a crop and see the result of the planting. You did it, and the wheat makes the bread. It is not so easy to understand why some years it rains when you need it to, and some years there is drought. That is entirely outwith the control of an individual.

It must have been a very short step from hoping that it would rain to praying that it would.

As our collective knowledge grows, we need to pray a little less (although hope springs eternal). We understand a great deal about why things happen, how and the mechanisms involved. It's also not so hard to make this leap of faith .... and I use the term advisedly ... If it is the case, that developments in our knowledge have lead to a clear understanding of things that were hitherto unknown, then it's not such a leap to expect that much of what is currently unknown, will not remain so for ever.

We also discussed why America appears to be in the grip of such Fundamentalist Religious Nuttery. It's a personal view, but I suspect it has a good deal to do with time .... and development in terms of nationhood. It's easy for the UK, with it's thousand year tradition of Parliament, to be relaxed about religion. It's just as easy for France, Germany, Spain, etc. Remember, the USA has been an independent nation for only a matter of two hundred years or so. How long ago the Spanish Inquisition, the persecution of Catholics in the UK and the dissolution of the Monasteries?

Jodie believes in God. She believes in God in the way all decent Christian folk do ... as a source of strength and inspiration .... not a daily ritual, but a staff when one is needed. I don't, and we live very happily together, with our conversations.

Neither of us believes the new museum (sic) is anything other than lies. Lies that will harm our children. The last gasp of a failed and dying theocracy.

Family don't call family "Fatass"

2007-06-01T22:38:00.000-05:00

Let's clear up one matter, before we start, ok? I love my Mum. No ifs, buts or maybes ... I love my Mum the way we all do. That I also admire and respect her is quite another thing, those are earned, not given as right, because she's my Mum, y'understand.

So imagine my surprise when I get online, and start chatting to my son, Tom, who has just returned from two weeks in France with my Mum and Dad (and his brother, who is still there, and assorted other friends and relatives).

So Tom says to me ...... Nanny wants me to tell you something. Oh shit .... what did I do now? At 47, the words *Nanny wants me to tell you something* are redolent with memories of yesteryear. Not the wonderful memories, the nostalgis of childhood, but the *Steven you better get yourself in here quicksmart before you get into more trouble than you are already in*, kind of memory.

I wouldn't mind, but she is 5000 miles away, so what can she actually do? Well, quite a lot it seems :)

It turns out that Tom is to speak to me about all the weight I have accumulated since I took it upon myself to go live in the Land of the Burger.

It would appear that the various Clan members have been gathered around whatever kitchen table my Mum has, and have been discussing, doubtless among other things, like the length of my toenails; the appearance of a substantial gain in avoirdupois, in the Christmas picture they all received. Indeed, it is even possible the word ginormous made it's unfortunate way into a sentence that also included the word Steve.

So, at this point in the conversation with Tom I am half amused, half cross and half relieved. The Europeans will realise that is three halves .... many Americans won't, given their unwelcome position at the lower end of the world academic acheivement ladder.

Tom also informed me that son number two, Joe, had a few things to say to me, so I got on the phone. Our free calls to Europe are a mixed blessing! Joe tells me I have to avoid eating any more Krispy Kremes. I tell him that sometimes it is only Krispy Kreme that keeps me here. I also tell him that I have actually LOST weight since I arrived in the country of the Big Burger. When I left the UK I tipped the scales at a not inconsiderable 196 lbs (89 kg), and now weigh in at a slender 174 lb (79 kg). Indeed, I can now get into a 32" waist, and haven't weighed so little since I was about 30.

I did speak to Mum ..... she seemed entirely amused by the whole thing. I also spoke to my dear sister, who clearly took the view that the camera wasn't lying. My sister is called Sue. I refrained from reminding her that when she rolled back into England from a year in Australia, we called her Suet. I wouldn't be so unkind.

Jeez I love the lot of them, and I miss them.

Iraq ..... the President's Schoolyard

2007-05-31T13:26:00.000-05:00

The matter of the War in Iraq is consuming Americans. It should as they are paying a very high price for it. A substantial majority of public opinion wants an end to it. A substantial body, but not substantial enough, of political opinion wants an end to it too.

But for the President, it will define his term in office. It will not define it kindly.

I read a piece that puts the issue into decent perspective, and I want to share some of the ideas I found, and add to it.

For the President, this war is about winning. He thinks it can be won, and will not stop until either the clock runs out on his term, or he wins. The main issue here is the belief that the war was ever *winnable*.

As Iraq slides further into civil war and chaos, we are assured that just a few more thousand troops and we will prevail. We will win. It's an illusion. As time rolls on, and the troops deployments increase, the death toll rises and violence breaks out in areas that had been relatively peaceful thus far. I heard it described as playing *whack a mole*. The US gains some measure of control in Baghdad, and as it does, violence erupts in other provinces. Many military experts have insisted all along that to subdue Iraq would require upwards of half a million US troops, not the 160 000 currently deployed. Even then, it would be like clamping a lid on a kettle.

All through the occupation benchmarks, targets, objectives have been set. As the deadlines came and went, so did the imperative to meet them, and new ones were dreamed up. Now we are told that the surge requires until September for a proper assessment. In September, we will be told that there are some very encouraging signs, and January will give a clearer picture.

How do I, a simple man with no experience or knowledge of military affairs, know this? Because we have been there before. Four years and 3500 US deaths ago we were told that the US had won .... major combat operations in Iraq are over .... declared a President, standing beneath a banner proclaiming *Mission Accomplished*, bought and paid for by the White House.

Since then, the actions of the President have resembled those of a child playing a game with another. We will play best of three, or first to five goals, or ten points. When he loses, he shifts the objective .... best of five, first to eight goals ...... then best of eleven .... well, you get the drift.

So we are back to the original point ..... it is about a President who thinks this war is winnable, and will not stop until either he wins, or someone tires of the game and takes their ball home. At which point he will declare victory, or blame the other side for bottling out.

Meanwhile, because we are saddled with a President, and his apologists, who all think we can win; then we all lose!

I might remind the President of another point, were I ever to get the chance. 9/11 and Iraq are not linked, never were and never can be. If you prefer it in simpler terms:

When you go Bowling, you get no credit whatsoever for scoring a Strike in the lane next to the one you are playing in.

Just for Tom and Joe

2007-05-31T12:34:00.000-05:00

Your Monster Profile

Lethal Worm

You Feast On: M&Ms

You Lurk Around In: Las Vegas

You Especially Like to Torment: Cops

What's Your Monster Name?

Who controls whom?

2007-05-31T10:45:00.000-05:00

We have lost it. Finally, as we staggered dimly groping our way into the 21st Century, we lost. Too many Sci-Fi films have made mockery of an age where machines take over. They go from passive, but useful lumps of metal, plastic and silicone, forever tasked with spending their existence serving mankind, to Masters of the Planet.

My WebHost is a case in point.

Some time ago I purchased an additional domain, for a woodworking project. The WebHost (1and1 Internet, the biggest in the world) refused to accept my Debit card details. Specifically, it was having trouble with the address. This is a card they have had on file for two years, and have happily charged a not inconsiderable sum to.

Now my websites are locked .... poof .... they are no more. Try one of the links, and you get the infamous Error 404 page. It's a pretty blue and white logo, with nice hints of red and yellow, but of the info you were looking for, nuttin'. The picture is missing from my profile here because it is hosted on my webspace. So, if you are reading this, and there is a picture, then it's fixed.

I do what all self-respecting customers do when their service is suddenly interrupted .... I call, and politely enquire as to why. I am informed, equally politely, that I am pondlife, with no care or concern about the welfare of this giant corporation, because the bank declined my card, and only vermin who don't deserve food, let alone a website, ever have cards that are declined. And it couldn't possibly be for any reason other than that I am the lowest of the low socially, I probably live in a trailer, almost certainly am a criminal, and if not my kids probably are, and they wouldn't be at all surprised if I was an illegal immigrant as well.

Of course, they didn't put it quite like that.

That was my interpretation of the sneer, when I tried to suggest their system was broken. Broken because it now seemed to have indegestion swallowing a card it had happily snacked on before, not because there were insufficient funds, but because it didn't like the address! Well Pardon Me!!! We can't all live at an address with a personal approval rating from 1and1 Internet.

So, patiently, and with great forebearance, I lead this hapless girl through the timeline. We managed to agree that I wasn't an axe-murderer, that I had indeed attempted to inform the company of the correct billing details; that I had even managed to contact their billing agent direct, and pay the bill (they had less trouble running the card than an Olympic Pole vaulter would have hopping a small creek), and that all was *hunky dory* with my account.

So, I persisted .... Why don't my websites work, and why is my Blog bereft of it's picture?

Well the system, apparently, takes 24 to 48 hours to unlock accounts. Ahh ... so it's the *system*. Ok, how can we ask the system to be closer to 24 hours, than 48 hours? .... We can't, it's the system.

At this point, I inform this young woman (who really was trying to help once we had punctured the sneer), that the company runs the system, and not the other way around. There must be somebody in the company who can tell the system to open this account.

Apparently not ..... the system is the system .... All Hail the System.

So, it's off with the shoes, Margarita in hand I'll kick back on the porch of the trailer, and enjoy the view of the cars on bricks, the loose dogs and litter for 24 more hours, while I wait for my probation officer to make his weekly call, and for 1and1's System to put my picture back.

Toodle Pip!

Do the dishes!

2007-05-28T22:32:00.000-05:00

I did them :)

Jodie's rant here

Memorial Day

2007-05-28T11:34:00.000-05:00

Today is a solemn day in America.

Over recent years, Memorial Day has come to be seen as the unofficial start of summer. It is a day of cook-outs, boating, swimming and family gatherings. But it wasn't the original purpose. Memorial Day is the day America honours it's fallen warriors. There will be, and are as I type this, ceremonies being conducted all over this land to do just that.

On this day, this year and for the last 4 years, it is particularly poignant as young men and women are dying in combat overseas. Specifically, they are dying in countries many Americans can't even find on the map, countries that pose little or no real threat to the borders of the USA. Arguably, Afghanistan has some justification, Iraq has none.

When we take a few seconds out from eating steak and hotdogs, swimming and sport it is worth remembering that a big battle still awaits.

The battle, here at home, to end the senseless conflict, the tragic destroying of another land, the futile and pointless squandering of the lives of so many brave young people who only dimly grasped the notion that they may really die when they joined up.

When you turn on your TV, and see the President using today of all days, to vainly attempt to justify his abuse of the military, his callous disregard for their families, his woeful inaction towards better treatment for the injured, and his criminal use of the nations resources, against Americans and foreign captives, then remember .....

The battle to re-establish morality, to end the violence and restore an Administration that acts in the interests of all the people ..... that battle is just beginning.

What was the most venomous thing in our yard?

2007-05-27T18:10:00.000-05:00

Yesterday we had a party. It was held to celebrate Michael's 6th Birthday, and it was a good party. We had the pool open, a Jupiter Jump, enough hotdogs and chips to make the Oklahoma National Guard feel at home, and the weather was, at least, tolerable.

Actually it rained .... a bit. Not enough to spoil anything, but enough so that I couldn't mow (good), and enough to keep the temperature below 90F (even better)

Michael had an absolute blast, and so did all the many other kids here. In the end, that was the point, so we claim the event a success.

Now let's talk about the adults for a moment.

This party was remarkable mainly for the fact that it is the first time since Michael's father left this house 3 years ago, that both sides of the children's family have occupied the same patch of (over-long) grass at the same time. The 2 weeks leading up to the function were punctuated by periods of Jodie worrying that the knives were all going to be used to cut food, and not find their way between the shoulders of varying family members.

Here is the reason. Jodie's family, and our friends, are decent, tolerant (well maybe not Tracy) and supportive. They are quite the nicest bunch of people I have met in many a decade. Jodie's ex-inlaws are dull, boring and filled with anger, resentment and enmity towards anyone not sharing the shallow end of the gene pool with them. The picture (right) shows two of the nice people, Jim and Ashley, Jodie's Dad and niece.

We have spent many happy hours, over the last three years, with Jodie's family, at many events from Baptisms to Thanksgiving, and rarely, if ever, has there been a cross word spoken. These people actually like each other. They even seem to like the weird Limey Jodie imported a few years back. Well they are at least polite enough not to object :)

Here are the Clampetts. Denny is the kid's Dad. He is the one in the foreground, who made a special effort to dress for his son's party. Now Denny I understand. He is not highly educated, but a hard working man who genuinely feels he does his best for his kids. Unfortunately, he doesn't have much of a grasp of their actual needs, so he gets it wrong, sometimes comically wrong, often tragically wrong. No matter, he works, he supports, and he visits with them.

Then he launches a futile legal action that deprives his kids of a good deal of money that, instead of being used to bring up his children, is used instead to meet the down payments on the Mercedes driven by various attorneys. He is a racist and a homophobe. To his credit, he is slightly less so than his father, and that is, I guess, to his credit. Nonetheless, yesterday he was respectful, and we were happy to have him here.

The rest of the tribe get no such credit. Jodie was concerned that I might be uncomfortable, given that this family has directed, albeit indirectly, a good deal of resentment in my direction. I assured her it was no problem at all. After all, they were coming to my house, to sit under a porch I built, on furniture I made and eat food I had not only had just been out and bought, but had cooked for them. I was perfectly relaxed. Besides, they are all way too busy concentrating on their own petty squabbles to worry too much about me ..... but for the record ...

One refused to meet my eye when introduced. Her problem. She also just fell out with her sister, and spoke to her probably even less than she spoke to me. One shook my hand, then wouldn't utter another word the whole time there. He did manage a good few hotdogs though, and he sat in my chairs, and was entirely unable to find anything to criticize. His wife was a little more forthcoming. At any other time she would have been downright rude, but these are strange times, and by comparasion she was fine.

Any way, they came, they partied and they left. They all went off to a restaurant for dinner, and I was going to say that I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall, but really, I don't care. They won't be coming back anytime soon, and even if they do, so what?

Jodie left that family after the best part of 10 years trying to make a life for herself and her kids. What took her so long? It's really quite curious watching these folk, and wondering about Jodie trying to fit .... she doesn't, she never did and she is a better person because of that. They will never see it. They are someone else's problem now.

There were other people here. Nice people, non-judgmental, or at least able to reserve judgment and enjoy family. They will come time and again, and we will enjoy them coming, time and again. We visited with friends, we partied and we sung karaoke until late. They went home happy and relaxed.

Tracy, by the way, is adorable .... quite one of the best friends a person could wish for.

Tracy's husband, Cory, has eagle eyes, and he found this lurking under the edge of the air conditioner. It is a Black Widow Spider. Technically, it is now an *ex-BWS* .... we squished it, sorry.

This little blighter is nasty. It is highly venemous, although, to be fair, rarely fatal. Being fair to spiders is an amusing concept, but hey, I like insects :)

It is was one of those *moments* when I realise I am a long way from much that is familiar to me. On the other hand, which ever side of the Atlantic you live on, squishing spiders is pretty much the same process.

Let's take a look at the birthday boy:

Jerry Falwell

2007-05-15T13:14:00.000-05:00

Jerry Falwell is dead.

As another human being, I sympathise with the loss to his friends and family. Like the rest of us, Jerry Falwell was a family man, and he will be missed as any of us would be missed.

Jerry Falwell was, however, more than just a private individual; he had a public persona as the Evangelical Minister who founded the Religious Right, and turned it into a political power in this country.

As a public figure, Jerry Falwell left a stain on this land that no amount of Oxyclean will remove. It will take generations for his demonstrably un-Christian views and teachings to be erased.

Jerry Falwell did more than any other single individual I can think of, to set back the cause Freedom, Liberty and Justice For All in the United States.

Whatever might be said in the next few days and weeks let us remember that if you are black, gay, pregnant or simply wishing for your leaders to represent ALL the people, then today one of the obstacles to human decency died.

Mother's Day USA

2007-05-13T21:06:00.000-05:00

Today is Mother's Day here. It is big in the US, way bigger, although no more significant than in the UK.

Julia Ward Howe wrote this, in 1870, when Mother's Day was proposed:

"From the voice of a devastated Earth a voice goes up with
Our own. It says: "Disarm! Disarm!
The sword of murder is not the balance of justice."
Blood does not wipe out dishonor,
Nor violence indicate possession.
As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil at the summons of war,
Let women now leave all that may be left of home
For a great and earnest day of counsel.
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means
Whereby the great human family can live in peace..."

In churches large and small, from shore to shining shore, I expect this sentiment was the central theme of morning services today.

Happy Mother's Day America.

sigh ....

2007-05-11T10:11:00.000-05:00

I don't mind in the slightest, when I open the toilet to find the poop of our 4 year old sitting there.

What is less appealing, however, is the complete lack of visible evidence that any toilet paper was used.

Cute, isn't she?

America? Which America?

2007-05-11T09:54:00.000-05:00

When I lived in England I had a view of America. It’s normal, we all do. America is a big influence there, as in many other parts of the world. My view varied over the years, as I grew up and influences on me changed; but also as I developed an independent perspective on the world around me.

Growing up, America wasn’t a nice place. The ideology my parents subscribed to held the United States responsible for a great deal that is wrong with the world. It was a view I grew up sharing, and, in truth, I can see where that comes from. It’s never quite gone away. It should have, because, as always, it’s never that simple. Let me give you a small example of how this view forms:

In theory, America is a Capitalist nation, where the vested interests of business outweighs the personal interests of the people. Of course it is never put quite like that, but judge me not by what I say, rather judge me by what I do! The old Soviet Union, on the other hand, was exactly the reverse. Again, it’s never quite so simple and Judge me not ……. Well you get the drift.

So let’s jump back a few years to the moment these two great cultures had a defining episode, and one which might, had two people of great wisdom and commitment not put country above personal considerations, have been a disaster for us all. The episode is known as the *Cuban Missile Crisis*.

I am not going to rehearse the argument. That has been, and continues to be done by scholars, and others, much better and more completely than I have time for. Rather, I would like to look at the conventional wisdom in the West. I’d like to briefly look at the two main contenders, and see what they predict for us all, in our differing environments.

America had John F Kennedy. A young President who has been pretty much raised to Sainthood here in the US. It is he who is credited with *bringing us back from the brink*, he who is seen as the strong, determined leader. He who represents the American Way. Kruschev is the enemy, the warmonger who was ultimately defeated by American might and resolve.

This is an unfortunate view. It is unfortunate that the tone of a nation can be set in this manner. I have little doubt that JFK had some very fine qualities. I equally wonder how much more just a society might this be had he been allowed to complete two full terms, then remain and still be influencing policy today. We’ll never know.

But how accurate is this *good guy*, *bad guy* scenario? Was Kruschev the evildoer? I suspect it’s not that simple. Nikita Kruschev was head of the Politburo and General Secretary of the Communist Party. Both positions required that he be elected by his immediate peers and colleagues. In the world of politics, both here and in Russia, such a position is not comparable to the US President. He is elected, indirectly, by the people, and can only be removed by Congress, or by term. Nikita Kruschev had many competing views, not to command, but to balance. JFK had only to follow his instincts. This is not to demean JFK, merely to compare their two positions.

Once those missiles left Russia, it is unlikely that Kruschev could have stopped them any earlier than he did. Had he attempted to do so, he could very easily have been replaced. What is important is simply that his replacement would have, by definition, been a politician with less inclination to turn the ships around than Kruschev; and then where would we have been? The only way those missiles were heading home was when Kruschev could convince the Politburo that the Americans were NOT going to back down, and that feat of diplomacy required JFK to play his part without over-reacting. Both men did what was needed, and a crisis averted.

It really does take two to tango. Kruschev needed JFK to be strong, and he was. The world needed those two men to *step up*, and they did. I am minded, at this point, to pause for a moment and wonder how the current incumbent at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue would have handled it …. OK, enough doom and gloom for one day.

My point, if you are still with me, is that the emotional health of this great nation would benefit immensely from realizing that there are shades of grey. That Nikita Kruschev may indeed have been a bad guy, but on that day he played a full and active part in probably the greatest test of diplomacy the world has ever faced. It might allow some here to realize that military might is not, ultimately, the solution to anything other than the bottom lines of the military suppliers.

It might help Toby Keith refrain from such crass nonsense as this:

Now, this nation that I love has fallen under attack
A mighty sucker punch came flyin in from somewhere in the back
Soon as we could see clearly
Through our big black eye
Man, we lit up your world like the Fourth of July

Hey, Uncle Sam put your name at the top of his list
And the Statue of Liberty started shakin her fist
And the eagle will fly
And there's gonna be hell
When you hear Mother Freedom start ringin her bell
And it'll feel like the whole wide world is rainin down on you
Hey, brought to you courtesy
Of the red, white, and blue.

Oh, justice will be served and the battle will rage
This big dog will fight when you rattle his cage
You'll be sorry that you messed with the U.S. of A.
Cause, we'll put a boot in your ass
It's the American way

I adore many of your songs, Toby, but really … grow up!

Where was I ? Oh yeah …..

So my view of America was formed by events such as this, events that had a profound effect on many yet don’t, I find, come to represent the reality here at all. They do, however, represent the views of a large and extremely noisy section of society here.

I live in Oklahoma. If I can’t live in *Old England*, then I would probably feel more comfortable in *New England* than I do here. There you have it. That is the thing about America that Europeans don’t get. When you talk about America, you have to ask: Which one?

Oklahoma is the State that allows you to shoot someone who approaches you in your car. Chicago has all but banned handguns. New York’s Mayor believes Gay Marriage should be permitted, and he’s a Republican. Oklahoma Republicans think he is going straight to Hell. Federal Law bans the use of religious symbols in State funded and operated institutions. Oklahomans put the Ten Commandments on the lawn in front of courthouses (actually, that is probably just to remind the judges arriving for work which of them they broke last night). Oklahoma has Toby Keith, Pete Seeger was from New York.

Oklahoma is not alone, and it’s not only Southern States that are different either. Oklahoma no more represents the USA, than does Washington DC, Vermont, Florida etc, etc.

The USA is not easily categorized, it depends where you are from, what background you have, what problems you face. I know that is true of many places, to an extent, but here it is magnified to a point where the entire nation is split along racial, religious, social, economic and political lines in a way that would be quite startling to Europeans (I know this, I came here and am more than a little surprised).

Americans take themselves way too seriously ….. seriously! As a nation, but less so as people, they give the world the view that they are a violent, greedy and dangerous country to have in our midst. Americans do not see this at all, but it isn’t helped by the very bad habit politicians have of giving the dumbest names to legislation. The Patriot Act! Implied in the title is that to oppose it would be unpatriotic. Actually what the Patriot Act does is to overturn 200 years of the Bill of Rights, and is the most deeply unpatriotic legislation this country has, with the possible exception of the Who Needs Habeas Corpus Act (they called that one the Military Commissions Act). Quite frankly, the world needs a Patriot Act to protect itself from the current band of villains running the show here.

In Oklahoma we have the Citizen and Taxpayer Protection Act 2007. Cute huh? Well basically it allows citizens here to abuse immigrants without fear of reprisals. Why didn’t they just call it the Immigration Act 2007? Simple. Immigration has bugger all to do with the State Legislature, it is a Federal matter. Govenor Henry, who signed this worthless piece of paper into law admitted as much, but he did at least have the common decency to stop the religious right’s attack on women this month. That was, by the way, about abortion.

I’m gonna stop here, conscious though I am that this is incomplete. I am well aware that I started this entry to look at some of the reasons and causes of the divisions, and I haven’t moved on to the biggest. I will though, but it will be later today, or in the next few days.

New Blog

2007-03-26T00:09:00.000-05:00

Jodie has a blog:

jodiebsblog

I smell trouble ahead :)

Busted

2007-03-02T12:11:00.000-06:00

Jodie has a lap-tray. Nothing unusual about that, you may think, and you would be right. Jodie’s lap-tray is special for two reasons. It is the second reason that earns it a place here.

Jodie went to college at age eighteen. As a parting gift, her sister Jennifer made her the tray in question. It’s kind of rectangular, with a cut-out so as to fit comfortably in the *lap* position. The tray is covered with pictures, newspaper clippings and magazine snippets that I guess were of interest to an eighteen year old Jodie.

Yesterday, Natalie told Jodie that there were pictures of both Mommy and Steve on her tray. This so patently isn’t true that Jodie asked Natalie to show her the pictures. Natalie pointed first to Jodie’s picture (which is on the tray), and then to a picture of a younger Patrick Swayze, of around Dirty Dancing vintage.

“There is Steve”, opined a clearly very intelligent girl.

“That’s not Steve”, was the rather unnecessary response from my dear wife.

“Steve says it is” ………..

Whether I did or not is kinda unimportant here. Any denials by me would be as believable as …. well …. A very unbelievable thing.

I still haven’t quit laughing though!

$uper Bowl

2007-02-04T22:13:00.000-06:00

Today was SuperBowl …. In fact, it just finished a few moments ago. Fittingly, for a fairly mediocre game, if finished as it started, in pouring rain more reminiscent of Manchester than Miami.

For the record, Indianapolis Colts beat the Chicago Bears by 29 to 17.

Super Bowl this year is memorable for rather more than the game itself. As I already mentioned, the actual football can hardly be described as a classis encounter. On the other hand, as often is the case with sporting finals, the result is rather more important than the game; so tonight the Colts are happy. Incidentally, we all will now be spared the plaintive wails about Peyton Manning never having been to Super Bowl.

Two things stand out, for me, about this year’s event.

The first is that, for the first time ever, a black coach has lead a Super Bowl team. In fact, both head coaches were black this year. This ought to be a cause for celebration. Indeed it is, but the celebration is marred somewhat by asking one simple question: Why the hell did it take so long?

The unappetizing answer is *Racism*. The facts are clear. Seventy percent of NFL players are black. Twenty five percent of NFL coaching staff is black. So, either black players aren’t intelligent or ambitious enough to become coaches, or someone is refusing advancement in favour of lesser-talented, but lighter coloured applicants.

My belief is that racism (or to give it its more palatable name *institutional racism*) is alive and well in the NFL. Let’s not get too carried away by the NFL either. In our kid’s school, seventy percent of the student role is black or Hispanic; substantially greater, in percentage terms, than the headcount of the teaching staff.

Now I don’t pretend for a moment that the Principal of our children’s school is racist, nor that the majority of senior staff at NFL teams is either. However, the procedures for training, recruitment, employment and promotion are all still conspiring to prevent the reasonable opportunities for many.

These issues run very deep here. Only this week, a senior politician (Joe Biden) voiced, in a manner Freud would have recognized, the belief that blacks really aren’t generally in a position to make important choices and decisions. When asked about Senator Barack Obama as a potential Presidential candidate he made remarks about …. At last, a decent, clean, mainstream black candidate. I paraphrase, but the patronizing mis-beliefs were obvious. He seems to have forgotten Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Jesse Jackson, and Rosa Parkes …. Oh yes ….. Colin Powell!!!

Incidents and events like this say much about how far we have come, but rather more about how far we still have to go.

The second, and equally remarkable incident describes just how far America has allowed *Corporate America* to set the standard. Corporate America is not very nice. It is greedy, grasping, swift to retribution and callous. If there is a dollar, or cent to be made, they simply have to have it in their own pockets, and there is no room at all for much in the way of human decency. There are notable exceptions to this. Gap, Body Shop and Dove all spring to mind. The NFL does not!.

The NFL this week threatened a Church with legal action if they went ahead with their planned screening of Super Bowl, in church, on their projector screen. This caused many churches, probably thousands, across America to cancel, or hastily revise the plans they had made for today. Apparently there is an NFL rule that prohibits the public screening of NFL matches on screens larger than 55”. Oh, except if you are a bar, then the sky’s the limit. My cynical mind wonders if this has anything to do with Budweiser being the largest sponsor of the NFL. The excuse offered by the NFL was that it was *common practice* for bars to show sporting events on larger screens. My response isn’t printable, but involves the extension of rather fewer than my full compliment of digits in their direction; but, more reasonably, to suggest to the NFL that Churches, when they display any events, do so on the screen they have and is, thus, *common practice*.

My brother-in-law told me that his church was having to move the projector closer to the screen to reduce the picture size. I suggested they should show what they wanted and say *so sue us*. He replied that that was the suggestion of his sensible fifteen-year-old daughter, but that the church couldn’t expose itself like that.

When will someone here cry *FOUL*? Yellow flags should be raining down on NFL headquarters from Churches and other concerned bodies across the land.

All week, on TV and radio, I have been hearing about the stature of Super Bowl here in The USA. Even Katie Couric said that the event was right at the heart of American culture. As such, it is an event of National significance, and not simply a cash-cow for the NFL. No one, least of all me, would deny the custodians of this spectacle a reasonable profit. This petty restriction was not reasonable, and now not tested in court, unfortunately. The NFL tries to restrict all images of their games to its own peculiar set of rules. Their demands and strictures even suggest that using small, relevant excerpts is a breach of their terms and conditions. As far as I can work out this flies directly in the face of *fair use* laws. While the NFL may indeed put themselves above God, they cannot impose terms that breach Federal laws.

My suggestion is two-fold. American advertisers (for it is all about advertising) should pull the ads. One major company doing so would send shockwaves through Corporate America that would reverberate for years. Ironically, it would also garner millions of dollars of free advertising for the sponsor concerned.

Failing that, America should simply switch off. Just once, one year, go out and do something more useful instead. Turn off the TV, don’t watch it, tell the greedy, the uncharitable and the unconcerned that this time they went too far. One Super Bowl, no audience, job done.

This year, you wouldn’t have missed much.

Rap? Techno?

2007-02-04T20:01:00.000-06:00

As I drive around this State, I become increasingly convinced that the apparent disrepair, or visible damage to cars on the road, is directly proportional to the inane quality and outrageous volume of music rattling the air-bubble laden tinted windows of the vehicle.

We should all have this problem

2007-01-23T18:54:00.000-06:00

So I am watching ET …. That is the trashy TV program *Entertainment Tonight* and not the rather more interesting movie with the same initials. Quite why I am watching this junk momentarily escapes me, but it may have to do with the News having just finished, and my inability to immediately lay my hands on the remote.

Anyway, I am watching the aforementioned crap, when they begin to discuss Christy Brinkley’s divorce. Super-model divorces being something of a staple diet to US TV networks, y’understand.

Apparently there was a custody hearing today for the two minor children. Delightful though they appeared, quite why a responsible parent would want them pictured on national TV is a bit beyond me. My understanding of *good enough* parenting suggests that keeping them as far as possible from such exposure would be rather more appropriate, but I digress.

The Judge made all the usual recommendations of …. Don’t use the kids as messengers, be nice to each other, keep it out of court and never let them vote Republican ….. the sort of thing decent judges always recommend.

At this point, Ms Brinkley makes her only demand of the ex ….. that, should the National Terror Alert be raised to RED, he should only transport them via private jet.

I am dumbfounded!

Custody hearings are about who buys school shoes, which weekends they spend with Dad and which burned turkey they get to eat on Christmas and Thanksgiving. Not once during the messy custody battle we are currently involved in has a Private Jet been mentioned.

I perceive in this situation, a slightly greater understanding of the dichotomies in this country. Not just the inequalities between the *haves* (her), and the *have nots* (us), but an apparently wealthy, educated and thoughtful woman who actually believes the Terror Alert system really means something.

And we still have the *State of the Union* address to come ….

Oklahoma Air National Guard

2006-12-11T20:25:00.000-06:00

George is from New Jersey. I referred to him once before in this journal … the *Karaoke Hell Yeah* post. Nothing remarkable about George, other than him being a thoroughly nice guy who has made settling into life here easier than it may otherwise have been; except to mention that he is a Karaoke KJ.

Of late, George (The Jersey Devil) and I (Steve the Limey) have been running private parties together. Last night we entertained the Oklahoma Air National Guard at their Christmas Party. The party was held in the Mess Hall on the airbase, just north of here.

These guys … and girls, work hard, and party hard. From the Colonel in the afro wig and flares, to Tammy, the sergeant who organized the bash, all had a great time. And well they should. These young people, some barely out of High School have served tours of duty in Iraq recently, and many are soon to return there.

Quite regardless of the rights and wrongs of the situation in the Middle East, the young airmen and women cheerfully pack up and fly 8000 miles to endure who knows what. Most return home intact. Some don’t. None of them knows when they leave what the future holds, and for a few it will be dire. I guess all of them miss their Moms.

Whatever, they go, they do our dirty work, and they come home again and party … at least on the outside.

I found myself looking around at all the very young, smiling faces, and wondered how many wouldn’t be alive to sing at next year’s party. I hope they all will, but hope doesn’t provide body armour. Hope doesn’t stop the shooting. Hope will not bring these people back to their families. But hope is all I have.

Hope that sense returns.
Hope that sanity prevails.
Hope that the bullets miss … on both sides.
Hope that those who send these troops to fight are wise, and caring.
Very little hope on that last point.

As I looked around the hall, and felt close to the soldiers who just do their jobs as best they can, I didn’t feel any less British; but I did feel just a little more American.

Come back safe, and see you guys next year.

Black Friday revisited

2006-11-24T18:47:00.000-06:00

It’s that time of year again ….

Once more, I ventured out into the event known as Black Friday.

Today, I can officially announce the adoption of a new time-zone, WST. This is Walmart Standard Time, and it is precisely two minutes in advance of Central Standard Time.

Happy shopping !

Email to amazon.com

2006-11-23T14:02:00.000-06:00

Dear Sirs,

Your X-Box promotion was little short of appalling.

No one minds not being one of the 1000 lucky customers. We didn't even expect to win one.

What is unforgivable is your technical inability to even serve the appropriate pages. You should have anticipated the demand, and provided the bandwidth to accommodate the requests.

We are not only unimpressed by this outrageous failure to meet a demand you created, but are reluctant to spend any more of our very hard-earned dollars for any items offered by you.

I am dismayed that it has come to this, after years of happy trading, but we will not be treated in this manner.

Yours

Steve Bracken

The Spirit of our Marriage

2006-11-06T19:03:00.000-06:00

The Spirit of our Marriage,
Lies not in the Horse and Carriage,
The top-hat and the veil,
Are not the symbols that prevail,
The vows of faith and eternity,
Are not the things that make it work for me,
Children, home and pets,
Make not the bedrock where it sets.
If I plight my troth to thee,
That's the way I choose to be,
The day we wed I had my say,
It was forever, and a day,
The symbols we rely on,
Even the bed we daily lie on,
Make mischief if we feel,
They represent what's true and real,
When we grow old, and days are short,
The vows we took will count for naught,
What matters most is what's inside,
The private parts we seek to hide,
Therein the Spirit of our Marriage lies,
Within our hearts, where it defies
Attempts, thoughts and actions that misconstrue,
It lies in me, and it lies in you.

Steve, 2006

Boogers and Vomit

2006-09-16T14:23:00.000-05:00

We get to spend quite a bit of time in the car. We go to Okmulgee a lot. Less now that Jodie works in Broken Arrow, but all the family are down there, and we visit.

To get to Okmulgee is about a 50 minute car ride. Now car rides are generally ok, air-conditioning, decent stereo and cruise control takes care of that. The highway requires little in the way of steering input, and it’s an altogether easy enough experience.

The one significant fly in and otherwise unsullied ointment, is that we generally have three small children occupying the rear seat, much in the manner that you might expect three large and untrained tigers to manage.

They are, in descending order, Mackenzie (7), Michael (5) and Natalie (3). Natalie appears to have crammed about 30 years worth of learning how to be cute and disgusting at the same time, into 3 years.

So, parents out there, and children old enough to read will understand that car rides are a cross between episodes of frightening rage and threats of child abuse, and periods of serenity. The former when they are awake, and the latter when they are asleep.

Just every now and again you have a journey that is FUN. We had one yesterday.

We had spent about 30 minutes taming the tigers with the aforementioned threats of torture (or *questioning*, if your are reading this and happen to be the US President), when Mackenzie suddenly made *vomiting* noises, and announced that Natalie was eating boogers (bogies, to the English).

This was an interesting turn of events, thought Steve. Gotta be some comic value here. Well …. Nat eating boogers was funny enough, but Mackenzie being disgusted was even better.

“Are they crusty and small, or green and slimy”, I asked, innocently.
“Ugh! I’m going to vomit”, said Mackenzie, following this with “and she still has them, under her tongue!”.

“How many do you have Nat?”, I inquired. The answer came back with a lifting of the offending tongue to show everybody “TWO”.

“I’m feeling really, really sick now”, complained child number one.

“Yeah Steve, and if she is then YOU are cleaning the car!” was the comment Jodie felt obliged, rather unnecessarily, I thought, to make.

“Ten green boogers, hanging on the wall,
Ten green boogers, hanging on the wall,
And if one green booger, should accidentally be eaten,
There’d be nine green boogers, hanging on the wall”.

“Good song Steve”, yelled Michael, who is a boy, so *booger* songs by adults rate pretty highly with him.

“Mom, make him stop. I’m really gonna vomit!”, squeaked the seven year old.

“Ten cups of vomit, standing on the wall” ……………….

Well you know the rest (

Fifteen minutes of rolling around laughing, while trying to drive and avoid the usual crowd of cell phone using, mascara applying and donut eating drivers so often bent on running you off the road, made the journey FUN !!!

No, she never did vomit …….. phew.

So, you think you have nothing to hide?

2006-08-29T09:32:00.000-05:00

This is going to ramble a bit. It’s also to be published in a few places, and hopefully the ensuing discussion will help me understand the issues raised that strike a chord with folk, and those that don’t.

I just don’t understand many Americans. On the one hand, they claim to be a society of cherished freedoms. Yet, at the same time, appear willing to sacrifice those freedoms at the drop of a hat, anytime someone with even the teensiest amount of positional authority tells them it is necessary.

Some Americans hold the ACLU, for example, in utter disdain yet, in the next breath will describe how they cherish the Constitution and *people fought and died to bring us freedoms, doncha know?*. The irony of this position is lost, and it baffles me.

Currently, the 4th Amendment is under attack. The 4th, for those that don’t know works like this:

The American people effectively have a privacy bill. The Brits don’t, and many want one. It says, paraphrased, that a person shall be free from intrusion into their private affairs, unless a Government agency can show *probable cause*, and that any other searches are *unreasonable* and, therefore, unconstitutional.

Now to most Americans the Constitution is absolute (this can vary a bit depending on Supreme Court decisions), and it the very bedrock upon which this nation is built. Part of my problem is simply that it is a unique document, and I have only 2 year’s experience of it. But absolute it is and, with respect to the 4th, you can’t argue that the Founding Fathers didn’t know what they were doing when they included it, without accepting that if that is the case, they may not have known what they were doing when they wrote the rest of it.

So the 4th can only be interpreted by the Supreme Court, it is, after all, their reason for being.

Why then, are so many prepared to accept so many commonplace *unlawful searches*, that many aren’t even a cause for comment. A particularly good example of this would be Field Sobriety Tests. They are, by any estimation intrusive, and entirely subjective. The only purpose of a FST is to provide a Police Officer with evidence to convict you, and, as such, also breaches the 5th Amendment. You know, the one that gives you an absolute right not to provide evidence that will incriminate you. If the Police wish to determine your blood alcohol levels, then there are entirely OBJECTIVE ways to do this, none of which involves the performing of humiliating circus stunts at the side of the road ….. yet, everyday, thousands of Americans think they have to comply with this ridiculous request, for no better reason, it appears, than they were told they had to! Beside which I never could rub my tummy and pat my head at the same time as walking in a straight line all the while balancing a small child on my nose …. I don’t think that last bit is part of the test but hey! Why not?
I hear the justification for this acceptance of authoritarianism time and again …..

If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to worry about !!!!

This argument is about as fatally flawed as you can get, on oh so many levels.

The authors of the Constitution knew a thing or two. They knew, for example, that although a system of government is *pure*, the people who run it are not. They knew that they had to provide a guaranteed set of checks on government so one thing they did was to include the 1st Amendment. This enshrines the freedom of the press; surely a group who could be relied upon to expose duplicity and guard the freedoms of the nation ….. Hmmmm …. Well I suspect the intention was good, but in any event, the point remains.

Systems are honest, systems have no ulterior motives, no hidden agendas. The people running them, however, have both, and often are shown to be dishonest too. There is a great deal of power in information … any information no matter how trivial or *non-incriminating* you might think it is. For example. Suppose your grocery bills were generally available for scrutiny. Let’s futher suppose that you went to Walmart and bought nicotine patches, and speculate that Walmart sold that information to the Insurance companies. It’s gonna be tough to prove you weren’t smoking (in contravention to the clauses in your life insurance policy), when you are dead, and they are trying to reduce or deny the payout to your widow.

Another ….. Suppose you suddenly found youself asked to resign from the PTA, or the School Board, and didn’t understand why. Maybe you made some lifestyle choice that, while perfectly legal and unrelated to education, someone used information held by a government agency to force you out. The point here is simple ….. the government shouldn’t have that information unless it specifically addresses an issue that gives *probable cause* in a crime. They one absolutely guaranteed implication of widespread data gathering is that there will be calls for the said data to be shared. The arguments will be couched in terms of *law enforcement*, *war on terrorism* …. Fill in the blanks, there are hundreds. The point of all that is that however *sensible* it appears, indeed if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear, it’s a direct breach of two, count ‘em, amendments to the Constitution.

What if the only thing you have to hide is the fact that, despite years of misery and struggle, your wife or husband is unable to quit smoking. Then your employer fires you, because her/his health records came to light unlawfully or otherwise, and he wished to reduce his company’s health care bill by firing all employees who smoked, or whose family members smoked. It’s quite possible you and your spouse had shared that information with dozens of agencies, some governmental, some not in an attempt to be honest, and get support. Just bit you in the ass, didn’t it?

We are entitled to privacy not because we have anything to hide, but because the Constitution says so, and because the information is ours, not owned by others whose motives and ambitions may be dishonest, manipulative, or simply different to our own.

Why has it suddenly because somehow suspicious, to exercise Constitutional rights? You may think you have nothing to hide, but there is an underlying statement when you make the point to others. Effectively, you are arguing that the illegal intrusions you are prepared to accept because *you have nothing to hide*, somehow comments adversely on those who are rather less willing to share. Often it is even couched the other way around: *Well …. If you have nothing to hide ….*

It’s insidious …. And it should be resisted.

I dunno, maybe I just see it wrong!

Never a Dull Moment

2006-04-25T10:21:00.000-05:00

Mackenzie (to Natalie): *Stop making me do that"

Steve (from bedroom): Mackenzie, I don't think Nat made you do anything"

Mackenzie: "She did! She made me bleed!"

Steve: "Natalie. Quit making your sister bleed"

Natalie: "Ok"

Maximal Stress Test

2006-04-10T19:04:00.000-05:00

What a great sounding term!

Unfortunately, the implications are dire, and involve subjecting yourself to wheezing, gasping, aches and muscles that you didn't even know you had shrieking "Enough is enough! Dammit!"

A *Maximal Stress Test* is merely a way to determine the fastest rate your heart can beat. Getting it there is the tricky bit. It's an easy enough process to describe ...... slowly wind your treadmill up to around 5 mph, over about 10 mins, then increase the gradient by 2% every three minutes. At some point (often quite quickly) there will be a pounding in your ears as individual red blood cells remind you that they have given all they can, and are now off on a long vacation .... so quit already.

Hopefully, when this happens, your Heart Rate Monitor will have recorded a figure that computes with those living, and in reasonable shape.

There are a bunch of ways to estimate what your heart should be able to manage. In my case, a 46 year old male, it is in the range 174 to 178, decreasing by about 1 bpm per year. This can be out by up to 15% and as the training zones are 10 to 20% wide, can make quite a difference to the value of the exercise. Running is time-consuming, so ya might as well get the most from each mile.

Long story short ......... 189!

Yup, the Limey has heart :)

Jodie was *officiating* during the test. It was apparant, even to me who was dying out there, that she seemed to be rather more amused than she should have been every time she hit the gradient button.

Course, she still has to do hers, and I have control .....

ps. We went to Dallas to collect the treadmill we bought. This involved crossing the Red River, and that leads me nicely onto a cute little anecdote from my childhood .... coming next.

Battle Creek

2006-03-14T10:32:00.000-06:00

There is a small shop a few miles from here called *Things UK*.

Jodie and I had been planning a visit for a little while now, and Saturday was the day.

There isn’t much to say about the shop its self. It’s a smallish place filled with a variety of imported stuff from Golden Syrup to Black Pudding. Jodie has now seen black pudding, and is even less inclined to try it than when she simply had a description to work with (and she was not very keen even then).

The treacle supply is welcome, and at $5 a tin, less expensive than Pettys (a supermarket in Tulsa).

No. What was interesting was the journey to the shop …..

Leave our neighbourhood, drive a mile and a half east then turn south onto the quaintly named South 145th East Avenue. You have to drive through *Battle Creek*, and various Ridges, etc, before arriving, a few minutes later in Broken Arrow. I half expected to see Commanches riding down the road in front of us. Here, however, it would be more likely to see members of the Creek Nation :)

Wild West indeed !!

Karl

2006-01-10T15:43:00.000-06:00

The 9th of January, and the 19th of July are two days those in my family may go a little quiet.

They are the days, respectively, that Karl, brother, son and father of two was born and, 34 short years later, died.

We miss you bro ... and my heart goes out to all those who loved you.

Rest well.

Steve

So you wanna be a SAHM*

2006-01-10T13:44:00.000-06:00

*Stay At Home Mom

So Natalie, who has been watching *Stuart Little*, comes into the living room with her pants and knickers around her ankles ...... she kinda hobbles in ....

She is holding toilet paper, and I figure she wants help wiping.

Oh boy does she want help! It is with a sickening realisation that I notice the poop smeared down her leg .... Heaven help me, what has the poor little Tyke done?

What she has done, is poop in her knickers, and then gone into the bathroom to try to clean it up ...... that was sweet, but a mis-judgement, the magnitude of which only a 2-year-old, or a Baptist Minister, is capable.

I follow her into the bathroom. The poop is still mainly contained in her panties, but a significant amount has managed to smear itself on the floor, the wall, and the toilet.

In a flash, we whip off her clothes and stand her under a warm shower, delicately placing the *ruined beyond all hope of salvation* panties, out of her reach.

"Is that your special soap Steve", asks an adorable, cleaner and much nicer smelling Natalie. "Yes dear ... and it got you all clean".

So, she's in a nappy because it's nearly day-sleep time. Panties are in the trash, jeans and top in the wash, and the bathroom cleaned.

All is well.

Wedded Bliss

2005-12-13T10:51:00.000-06:00

To date, my journal has steered well clear of most controversial aspects of religion and politics here in the USA. However, there should be nothing controversial about this:

In Atlanta, Georgia, a 37 year old woman is charged with a variety of sexual offenses against a 15 year old boy by whom she is pregnant.

Nothing remarkable about that you might think, just a sorry tale, and indeed you would be right. Whatever the circumstances, it's hard to accept that this woman shouldn't have known better.

This is where the story takes a turn for the bizzare. The couple are planning to marry, and the law will allow it. Georgia allows the marriage of children, of any age and without parental consent, if the girl/woman is pregnant.

Let's try to count the number of ways this is wrong ...... I lost count!

This is a charter for child abuse. No if's but or maybes. It is wrong, wrong, wrong. It is state sponsored pedophilia. Quite frankly, I am struggling to understand why George Bush doesn't have tanks surrounding Atlanta/Hartsfield International Airport, securing access for *Cotton Storm*, the operation to liberate this Third World abusive regime.

This law was enacted in the sixties, in an attempt to prevent or reduce the numbers of children born out of wedlock. What the hell were they thinking?

And where were the church leaders while all this was going on? They are, apparently, able to dictate which books are available in schools, prevent our children participating in normal *teen* activities and reach right into the Oval Office. What they seemingly cannot do is stop legislation that sanctifies child abuse. I wonder why?

Is it, do you think, because they were too busy opposing effective sex education, and the use of contraception in a manner that might have reduced the unwanted pregnancies in the first place?

All this, and I haven't even mentioned Roe v. Wade !!!

House Rules

2005-12-11T10:07:00.000-06:00

We try to extend a *liberal* outlook into aspects of family life. Both Jodie and I believe in helping the kids understand why they should or shouldn’t do stuff, rather than simply telling them how to behave. *Telling them* never seems to work anyhow :(

As a consequence, there are very few *rules* in this house. Generally there are only two:

No writing on the walls
Obey all the rules!

Recently however, there has arisen the need for a third rule:

Whatever you want to say, if it starts with the name of a brother or sister, we don't want to hear it.

Those blessed with just the one child might not readily see the imperative for this rule. I feel confident though, that parents of two or more children would agree that this rule ought actually to be hard-coded into the genetic make-up of all children. Quite frankly, the fact that it isn’t is ample evidence to disprove the theory of Intelligent Design.

“Michael hit me, Mom”, “Natalie bit me”, “Mackenzie said I am dumb” …. By the time breakfast is over, replying with “Not hard enough, apparently”, “Bite her back” and “Well are you? Ok then, ignore her”, is all wearing a bit thin.

It seems to me that Rule #3 is eminently sensible. I don’t, however, hold out too much hope for real success with it, judging by the amount of writing on the walls!

Later ….

Coughing Re-visited

2005-12-07T09:14:00.000-06:00

So I apparently need to explain *Cough Syncope* some more. I’ll try to do it slowly, using little words! To help a little, I offer this from MedicineNet.com:

Definition of Syncope

Syncope: Partial or complete loss of consciousness with interruption of awareness of oneself and ones surroundings. When the loss of consciousness is temporary and there is spontaneous recovery, it is referred to as syncope or, in nonmedical quarters, fainting. Syncope accounts for one in every 30 visits to an emergency room. It is pronounced sin-ko-pea.
Syncope is due to a temporary reduction in blood flow and therefore a shortage of oxygen to the brain. This leads to lightheadedness or a "black out" episode, a loss of consciousness. Temporary impairment of the blood supply to the brain can be caused by heart conditions and by conditions that do not directly involve the heart:
Non-cardiac causes: Syncope is most commonly caused by conditions that do not directly involve the heart. These conditions include:

Postural (orthostatic) hypotension: Drop in blood pressure due to changing body position to a more vertical position after lying or sitting;
Dehydration causing a decrease in blood volume.
Blood pressure medications leading to low blood pressure.
Diseases of the nerves to the legs in older people (especially with diabetes or Parkinson's disease) when poor tone of the nerves of the legs draws blood into the legs from the brain.
High altitude.
Brain stroke or "near-stroke" (transient ischemic attack).
A migraine attack.
Fainting after certain situations (situational syncope) such as:
Blood drawing,
Urinating (micturition syncope),
Defecating (defecation syncope),
Swallowing (swallowing syncope), or
Coughing (cough syncope)

that trigger a reflex of the involuntary nervous system (the vasovagal reaction) that slows the heart and dilates blood vessels in the legs and cause one to feel nausea, sweating, or weakness just before losing fainting.

Now it appears from reading this, that nowhere is it suggested that a single low dose of Sudafed, a minor painkiller and a couple of beers are responsible. For what it’s worth, the ER doctor was totally unconcerned. His view was that only the alcohol was likely to have contributed (it lowers blood pressure), but even then, only marginally.

I go to the trouble of offering this explanation not because I am defensive about it, but simply to let y’all know that feeling smug by thinking you are safe because *yer not that stoopid*, actually offers you no protection at all … you heard it here first!

Actually, having just re-read that passage above, there are a few cause of Syncope that may, or indeed may not, bear further examination ….

Can you imagine suffering *Defecating Syncope*? Jeez! Don’t squeeze so hard, take your time sister. This being a family journal, we have probably explored that scenario quite far enough. Still, as a guy I imagine I would prefer *defecating syncope* to *urinating syncope* …. Less far to fall!

What comes from all this? Only one thing really. If you feel a major coughing fit coming on, or you are experiencing one, sit down. Do not stand and try to walk, you might not make it. Simple.

By the way. The cuts on my head are healing nicely, and it finally feels like I am getting over this cough.

Steve and Natalie sporting matching *owies*

Proud Parent Syndrome

2005-12-04T20:19:00.000-06:00

I am proud of both of my boys, but on this day, I am particularly proud of Thomas.

After many years of dedication and commitment, Thomas graded today for, and achieved, 1st Dan (Black Belt) in Shenen Jitsu (Karate).

He isn’t yet 13 years old.

Many congratulations Tom …. You earned it.

Also, a warm mention to Tom’s Mum, and other family for the continued support they offer. It is appreciated.

Cough Syncope (It makes you fall over)

2005-12-04T19:43:00.000-06:00

Thomas …. When you read this remember … I am ok.

All is well and there is nothing to worry about (I’ve had the flu! Nah, not the *bird* variety, just your common or garden upper respiratory viral infection. Generally I am rarely sick. When I am, I simply find the whole thing a bit of a bore. Quite frankly, sneezing, aching joints and coughing gets old pretty quickly. But ya just keep on *keeping on*, and try to be pitiful, for sympathy, while still doing what you need to do.

That is pretty much how this dose of flu was, until last night.

It started on Thanksgiving, and proceeded along a well-trodden yet desperately annoying track for a week or so. By Friday I was thinking about whether or not we would make the bar that night. It’s a karaoke bar, and I love to sing ….. without the singing, and feeling sick would be a bit like denying yourself a chocolate, then sitting watching everyone else eat them!

In the end we went, and it was ok. I coughed a bit, but sang four songs and didn’t massacre any of them more than normal. My throat was feeling pretty ropey when we got home tho, so Saturday was doubtful.

In the event, we went to the bar after returning from the Okmulgee Christmas Parade, and dinner with the family. During dinner a friend had called and asked if we were coming out ….. he said George was complaining the list of singers was too short, and where was the Limey Bastard!!!

We got there at 10.15pm, via home for me to swallow a swift Sudafed and a couple of painkillers. Yes, I am aware of the consequences of alcohol and medication but … it was the first meds all day, and there wasn’t going to be much alcohol and I wanted to sing a new song dammit!

As we walked in, George appeared and said I was next on, unless I wanted to wait until we had drinks. Nope, gimme the mic and stick on The Dance … it’s easy, and my throat needs *easy*. All was well, and apart from the occasional mild cough, I felt good. The bar was pretty empty, and even the air smelled a little better than normal (I’ll vote, by the way, for a smoking ban in OK bars).

After that I stumbled through Alan Jackson’s *Remember When*, but nailed *Wonderful Tonight* pretty well. Jodie loves that song, and I like to sing it for her. All through, I was coughing a little and was close to thinking maybe we should go home soon. What happened next came right out of the blue.

I had just finished that last song. I was sat at the table next to Jodie, and chatting to Chris, another friend. I felt my chest tighten, and began to cough hard. I needed air. Go outside, it’s cold …. refreshing. I push my chair back, stand, turn. I am coughing so damned hard and my lungs seem to be fighting my diaphram. The door is there, just there, two or three steps ……..

*Wake up Steve!* It’s Jodie ….. mmmmmm, I’m cosy and warm, why is she yelling at me. And what the hell are these people doing in our bedroom? Weird. *Steve! Steve! Are you ok?* ….. Damn …. It dawns … I’m still in the bar, and something just went terribly wrong. Must get up, Jodie wants me, and George …. I can see Rick and Chris. What the hell happened?

So I sit up. I suddenly take in great globs of info all at once. I must have fallen down, the music is playing but Rick stopped singing. He is here with the microphone and Britney has dialled 911 and is talking to the emergency services.

*I’m ok*. I am feeling great, I can breathe, I’m not coughing and I appear to be the only person in the bar not worried about me. My face hurts though and I’m scared. This is just not normal and I want to go home. *Take me home Jodie, please*.

*I’m taking you to the hospital*, she says. Hell no! That’s gonna cost a fortune, and I’m fine, I just need to go home. I ask George to get Rick to come to our house when he finishes the song (still not apparently thinking straight). I needed to be out of there, to calm down, to let our friends see all was well, and sleep, I wanna go to sleep. My face hurts, and I can feel a lump on my forehead. The worst problem though is that my glasses are all bent out of shape, and I’m having real trouble keeping them in a position where I can see well.

We get outside. *Are you driving?*, I ask Jodie, and receive the kind of withering look such an inappropriate attempt at humour deserved. *Get in. We are going to the hospital*. I persuade her that we should go home first, then, reassess when I’ve cleaned up a little, and had a glass of water.

I tried, a guess a little half-heartedly, to suggest all I needed was a good nights sleep. After all, I just feinted, right? Surely if Jodie keeps an eye on me we will be ok. She isn’t buying it for a New York second. Honestly, I looked at her and she was scared stiff. Only a doctor was going to reassure her, and I wasn’t dumb enough to try to suggest otherwise, anymore.

I’m going to cut a long story mercifully short here. I have, in the past, made remarks about the US Healthcare system. Those comments have been a mixture of positive and otherwise, and they still stand. Having now experienced the ER in a large city hospital, I have a little more to say, but in the next post or so.

Suffice it to say that I am fine. Maybe just a little more in touch with my own mortality than I was yesterday, but fine nonetheless :)

Howard Stern

2005-12-04T19:20:00.000-06:00

I like Howard Stern.

I have been thinking ahead to the point where we will be able to justify a subscription to satellite radio, and decided that Sirius will be the service we choose. Howard's program was part of that process.

I had been wondering why he was prepared to swap his massive *Earth bound* audience for the relatively untried new service, and one with only 2 million subscribers.

Then I discovered he had signed a 5 year contract worth ... wait for it ...

500 million dollars !!!

So, that nicely explains THAT!

Road Rage

2005-12-01T04:04:00.000-06:00

LONDON (Reuters) - Deaths from car crashes in developed countries are nearly 400 times greater than those resulting from international terrorism, according to a study published on Thursday.

As many people die every 26 days on U.S. roads as were killed in the September 11, 2001, attacks, and politicians should bear this in mind when allocating resources to combat two "avoidable" causes of death, researchers said.

I have been driving for what seems like *forever*. Actually, it is 30 years, or thereabouts, since I first donned a bright yellow crash helmet and wobbled precariously down Bybrook Road on a second hand moped.

In the years that followed, I estimate that I have driven between three and six hundred thousand miles, on both sides of the road, in about ten countries and on two continents. I have taken, and passed, driving tests in cars, vans, mini-buses, motorcycles, forklift trucks and on a tractor.

At the same time I have been involved in five minor accidents. Only one of these was my fault (the most recent one) all were minor, and only one involved an injury (to me). I have ten years no claim discount with my most recent insurance company.

I consider myself to have an average driving record, and I think I am an average driver. I am actually aware that I am not quite as good as I was ten years ago, and have responded by generally driving a little slower, and more carefully. Ironically this probably makes me a safer driver than before, and doubly ironic is the fact that the only accident I have ever had that was my fault, was the most recent. This was a minor *rear-end* on a wet Interstate 40. The cars in front were stopped, I *very nearly* stopped too, but the Teflon Tyres on the pickup didn’t want to cooperate …. Such is life.

So, with my experience of a variety of driving conditions, vehicles, roads and countries, I have reached a few conclusions.

The first is that the worst driving I have ever encountered is here, in the United States. Not everywhere, y’understand. I had no issue at all in Maryland and Washington DC, but *here* here …. Oklahoma. Yes, by the way, I have driven in both France and Italy!

I need to be mindful that *I* am the newcomer, the one unused to local customs and traditions. Like the one that says that *weaving in and out of fast moving traffic in a bright red Chevvy pick-up with *spinners* on the wheels* is not only appropriate, but positively life-enhancing. Let us neither forget the charming habit of joining a highway, from a minor sideroad, by pulling straight out into the off-side lane and proceeding to drive along at 30mph, just a few yards in front of cars bearing down on you at anything up to 90mph. Don’t worry, they’ll swerve round you. Seriously though, the practise of *under-taking*, that is, passing on the inside of slower vehicles is the norm. It takes some getting used to. Try it in the UK and you’d expect a blast from the guy you passed at best, and a prosecution for dangerous driving if you were seen doing it.

I am not suggesting that *under-taking* is inherently dangerous, but it is when you aren’t expecting it; and Limeys just don’t expect it ( From what I see daily, many Americans don’t expect it either.

As I drive the streets and highways around here, it’s surprising there aren’t more accidents. People on phones (every other car it seems). Folk reading the paper, putting on make-up (British women, and some of the men, do this too), chastising the kids, not strapping kids down, dogs jumping around ……. The worst feature though is simply a general lack of awareness of what is going on around, coupled with a few complete lunatics who, quite frankly, shouldn’t be allowed to drive. Not in a million years.

I have long held the suspicion that every new safety and comfort development the car makers comes up with, further isolates the driver from the road, and other road users to the point that some of them don’t seem to realise that others actually exist. When I started to drive (first motorcycles, then cars), drivers were constantly made aware of the limitations of their vehicles, and had a much greater *contact* with the road and other road users. There was also a good deal less traffic to contend with, and speeds were lower.

These days, all that is reversed. Crumple zones, side impact bars, anti-lock brakes, seatbelts, airbags ….. you actually have to work quite hard to hurt yerself in a modern car, although try and remember that other road users don’t benefit in the same way. At the same time, better heating, audio systems, sound-proofing and, especially here, suspension set so damned soft you wonder if there is a road at all; all serve to encourage a belief of *quiet invincibility*.

Why else would a guy, with his wife and kids in the car, tailgate an 18-wheeler at about 80mph on Highway 75? I mean, he can’t see past, he couldn’t possible stop in a hurry. If the truck brakes hard, this nice family is dead. The guy doesn’t want to kill his wife and kids so I can only assume he simply has no concept of the danger he just put them all in. I know a degree of tailgating by aggressive drivers has always happened, but this is different. It’s routine! Commonplace and frightening.

Washington DC (like the UK) has already outlawed the use of a handheld phone while driving. If it’s a good idea in DC, where the important people (sic) live, then surely those in the *flyover* states deserve the same level of protection? I know there are those who will wish to defend their (probably Constitutional) right to call their Mom while driving, but the UK banned the practise and hey! the world as we know it did not end. It’s just a small example.

One thing that I do like here is the idea that a State issued drivers license is a privileged, not a right and, in some States, it can be suspended for not being a *good citizen*. There are, however, serious issues of double jeopardy in the way this idea is implemented.

It does seem to me that one of the ways we can reduce the accident rate is to help drivers regain their awareness of their surroundings, in a much more meaningful way. If we can drastically reduce the vast number of minor accidents caused by inattention, etc, then the way is clear to identify the real abusers, and get them off the road.

To the brain dead moronic tailgaters there is an easy answer. The problem appears to be one of their neanderthalic belief in their own invincibility. This is a cause for concern because it’s always some poor innocent they kill, someone who had no choice but to stand in the bus queue they ploughed into …. You get my drift …..

After the first offense I suggest they are made to drive *adapted* cars. It can be a model of their choice, but here is the rub. All the safety devices are removed. No anti-lock brakes, no airbags or seat belts. Remove the side impact bars. Then, bolt a 10 inch steel spike to the centre of the steering wheel.

That should slow the buggers down.

Sooners v. Cowboys

2005-11-27T23:27:00.000-06:00

OU 42 OSU 14

Good job!

Black Friday

2005-11-26T18:27:00.000-06:00

I am completely cured of the burning desire to experience, first-hand, the *spectacle* that is the opening of the post-Thanksgiving Sales, in the USA.

The day after Thanksgiving (4th Thursday in November), is called *Black Friday*, by the retailers and advertisers. The reason is simple; this is the day the retail stores get their annual sales figures back into the black, following disappointing summer sales. Quite why they are disappointing you would need to ask them, as it happens every year and you would think by now that the disappointment was more, er, expected!

Anyway … Thanksgiving is a wonderful occasion. It is, more-so even than Christmas, a day when families come together to give thanks. I wrote about this last year, and this year was every bit as delightful … as was the sweet potato casserole. This outpouring of goodwill appears to affect some Americans so much that they feel the need to atone the following day. Thus Black Friday is also the day when the feral American descends on the stores, to mix with decent folk whose only crime is to be so well organised they had the stores, and relevant target purchases, written on *easy to use in the crush* index cards. Next year, she needs to get them laminated, and maybe she (Jennifer) won’t miss the biggest bargain she was after. I shall make a special Banoffee Pie to commiserate … but I digress.

The TV and papers have been full of ads for about 2 weeks now, so I decided to go along to see what all the fuss was about. The mailbox has been full of ads too ….. I do hope the USPS charges very highly for stuffing our mailbox full of un-solicited, hardcopy spam, but I doubt it. Anything to make a buck, and who cares about the trees?

The teensiest fly in this ointment, is the minor detail of the sale starting at 5 am. There doesn’t seem to be much point arriving later than this, so 5 it is … ugh! The other small issue is one of having no money …. Hehe …. Oh well! So 4.45 am sees me driving along Admiral, towards Thomas’s favourite store, the Walmart at Admiral and Memorial. I am mindful that the bars haven’t been closed long, so I drive carefully and am rewarded when the car behind me, which passes just after the Mingo traffic circle, is a Police Cruiser. My smug feeling of satisfaction changes abrubtly to a modicum of *piqued interest*, as the cruiser turns into the Walmart parking lot in front of me. As I turn in, I realise something deeply troubling is afoot ….. the danged parking lot is full. FULL I tell ya, at 5 in the bloody morning!!!

So, I park somewhere in the next County, and begin the hike towards the store. I cast the odd fearful glance around as I go. This is not the crime free neighbourhood we would like it to be, and elderly men on their own, in the dark, are a tad vulnerable. As it happens, I see a teen *Hoodie* by the front entrance ….. but it turns out he is just waiting for his Mum … awwwwww.

Did I tell you the parking lot was full?

I enter, and pick up a cart. Here I need to apologise to my friends and family back home. I find myself increasingly using American terms like *cart* … A cart is a shopping trolley, ok? At least I said *Mum* and not *Mom*. So I take my cart and head off left up past the toothpaste and feminine products whose purpose I would rather not have described to me, thank you very much. As I walk up the aisle I can see a crowd gathered. At first the noise is subdued, kind of like a gentle background murmur, but it wasn’t to last. As I approach, the volume increases through swarm of angry bees an on to Boeing 747 at full throttle, with a hole in the exhaust (muffler). A crowd of about a hundred women, and two guys like me conducting a social experiment, are milling around a stack of Care Bears, shrouded in plastic wrap and being guarded by a Walmart employee wielding a craft knife. I suspect the craft knife is to be used to remove the plastic wrap, but I caught her eye and decided not to put this theory to the test. It was 4.55 am, and the crowed was baying for a countdown. The craft knife girl was determined to hang on until 5, but, knife or no knife, she was risking life and limb for a bunch of $5 soft toys. She did the math and cut the wrap.

Now I can tell you, that I have a watch that knows what time it is, to one second in ten million years. It was 4.58 am, so the sale started early!

Oh boy did it start. The shoppers (loose description .. imagine a herd of wildebeest that just caught wind of a lion, and you’ll be close), quite literally *devoured* the Care Bears. Boxes of product went flying as those assembled displayed a level of assertiveness that was out of all proportion. I got three …. Dunno where the girl with the craft knife went, I guess she was just trampled. So. I actually did want one of these bears for Natalie, for Christmas. Then I figured Jordan would love one too. The third was me being mean ….. I took three so that those fighting over soft toys would have one less to take, then, later, I could replace one on the stack to give a other shoppers a chance. I am a bit mean at times, and I giggled all the way around the store at the thought. Yeah, I know …. Bite me!

Onwards, ever onwards. The delight that was the scrum for the Care Bears was behind me, and I went off searching for that other *must have*. This was a radio-controlled 1.10th scale Hummer for Michael. These were being advertised for $20, and he would just adore one. Clearly the Care Bears were being bought, in the main, by women, who, for some reason had turned from normally mild-mannered and pleasant, to Linda Blair for the morning. The men were buying the radio-controlled cars, consequently the neat stack was unruffled, and I could chose at my leisure. I chose a big yellow one, and I can’t wait to see his face.

Between the Care Bears and the main toy department I could glance over to the Electronics section. OMIDOG !!! It was like New Orleans after the storm …. Not the flood, we are in desperate need of rain, but the sight of about 300 people, mainly young men, carrying TVs out of the store. I hope they paid for them, they really don’t want to run into the girl with the craft knife or that little old lady who sits by the door saying *goodbye* …. She scares the crap outa me for some reason.

As I write this, I can smell smoke, and Jodie just appeared to tell me she is NOT burning dinner, but that some fat I spilled is burning off the hob …. My fault again, but I am relaxed about it because we are having Chocolate Malts shortly. The parking lot was full, did I mention that?

I am going nowhere near the Electronics section. In any event, Jennifer has the Harry Potter movie we need on one of her cards, so that must be a given. I do have to kinda skirt the general area though, to get to the milk and creamer required to make my life *liveable* when I get home. The crush down this aisle is horrendous. It’s about 25 yards to the other side, but is moving very slowly. As I make my way down, I am being *assaulted* from behind by a cart. It’s not quite *Trolley Rage*, but annoying anyhow. I turn to find the driver of the said cart, banging in to me while looking left, right, anywhere but where she is going. “Excuse me Madam”, I politely inquire, “But do you think you are likely to get out of here more quickly by repeatedly ramming your cart into my Achilles tendons?”. She was pissed (angry) I could tell, but she muttered sorry and suddenly decided there was somewhere off to the left she needed to be, and disappeared.

I was home by 5.30 am. Jodie had told me “I will be asleep when you get home. Please don’t be funny and make me laugh, it wakes me up”. But I had to tell her the parking lot was full (Have I mentioned that?) … She promises to forgive me by New Year.

A little later that day, Jodie and I popped into Walmart in Okmulgee. The parking lot was civilised, and orderly with lots of space. The store was moderately busy, but no one banged into my ankles. On the other hand, there was not a single Care Bear to be seen!

George Best 1946 - 2005

2005-11-26T08:31:00.000-06:00

I was priviledged to watch him play. Along with the whole football world, I was saddened to see such talent brought so low, and ultimately die too young.

George, thanks for all you gave me and so many millions.

For those who din't know him; he was our Babe Ruth!

Chocolate Malt

2005-11-18T13:07:00.000-06:00

One of the wonderful things about travelling, is the discovery of things completely outwith your experience and expectations. This is all the more true when the things you are discovering are commonplace in the area you travelled to. The sense of wonder you experience is often quite unknowingly, added to by the wry amusement of those around you, who never looked at *it* that way.

A case in point was my recent post about High School Football. One of Jodie's friends reacted to that post by commenting on how strange it felt to see something that was simply an accepted part of her life being viewed by someone from outside.

Foremost among the new experiences has to be local food.

I could, and one day probably will, go on at length about the food I have tried in the USA. But I just want here to mention one thing ...... Chocolate Malt.

You could see this ...... thing ..... as a milkshake. Oh no! Revisit that. A well made chocolate malt is an *experience*, not simply a drink.

Many of the fast food outlets here have this on the menu. Many have it, very few appear to know how to make it well. One outlet that does is Braums. Braums also knows how to make decent burgers and fries, what they lack is any sense of urgency!

So, having explored the genre, here is my idea of a Chocolate Malt:

4 Scoops good vanilla ice-cream
3 Tbsp Malt Powder
4 Tbsp Chocolate Sauce (I use Hersheys)
1 tsp Vanilla Extract
1 Cup Milk

Mix the whole lot in a blender. Whizz until smooth and a decent amount of froth is on top. Serve in a well-chilled glass.

Of prime importance here is that you consume this drink well away from any children in the house. In this house that especially means *any under the age of three*. If you don't, you will have to waste a good deal by giving them some of it. Nothing short of scandalous!

Homebrew

2005-11-08T13:08:00.000-06:00

While we are on the subject of alcohol, and anomolies, here is one:

Homebrewing beer in Oklahoma is illegal. OK is one of the few remaining states yet to incorporate Federal law into State legislation. This means that, according to the relevant law, the brewing of wine or mead is permitted, but not the brewing of beer. In fact the statute expressly forbids the production of any alcoholic beverage not expressly allowed for in the law. The Federal position (now adopted by most states) permits the brewing of up to 100 gallons of beer per adult in the household. This is for home consumption by friends and family, and, I think, you can give it as a gift. The department that regulates these matters has stated it has no intention of attempting ever to enforce this law.

So if anyone asks, we make Beer Wine, ok?

For those who don't know, the US history of alcohol generally, is a pretty chequered one. The effects of Prohibition are still evident all over the place, and nowhere moreso than here.

At risk of serious trouble, I shall mention, very quietly, religion. Some of the Baptists in this state (the Buckle on the Bible Belt), believe that the Communion Wine of the Christian world, which represents the blood of Christ was, in fact, unfermented grape juice! What is interesting about this story, which appears, at first sight to be apropos of absolutely nothing at all, is that this interpretation is new. It is not mentioned in the bible, and was never mentioned by the Southern Baptist Churches until around the time of Prohibition.

Prohibition was bad law. There is no doubt about this, and it was rightly repealed. I do find it a little curious tho, that, at the same time as referring to the laws of God, as determined in the Old Testament, we are also told that the Church's response to being denied their Communion Wine is, in some way an indication now that ALL alcohol should be avoided. The *turning of water into wine* parable must be a little ... ahem ... inconvenient!

Anyway .... homebrew.

We do it, allthough if anyone asks, Jodie does it!

We were due to *do it* last Saturday. We had the ingredients and, for the first time *Stateside*, I was going to attempt an All-Grain brew. We specifically chose a brew designed to be the all-grain version of the partial mash recipe we tried last time. The end result of the last batch was great, and this one ought to turn out a little more complex, but essentially the same. If it doesn't, either the technique isn't working well, or the recipe is formulated wrongly. We shall see.

The last couple of weeks have been spent trying to convert a 5 gallon Rubbermaid drinks cooler into a mash tun. You knew we were close to achieving this when the last couple of trips to Home Depot cost under about $3 a time. I have been trying to get a cooler for weeks, and was determined to find one for $10. Just when I had resigned myself to spending $20 at Target, I found one, brand spanking new, at the local flea-market ... it seemed somehow, providential. So, various plumbing fittings later, I had replaced the tap with a ball-valve and fitted a mesh-screen on the inside. In the end, the screen failed .... more later!

Our friend Rick was keen to see how it all came together, so brewing was fixed for 12 noon last Saturday.

We ran a little late. Rick arrived at about 12.30, just in time to consume a large, and very welcome, fried breakfast, but the fateful hour couldn't be put off.

My brewing equipment is an odd collection of stuff put together with no money, but lots of imagination. I have two 100 cup West Bend coffee percolators each capable of heating 4 gallons of water to 180F. They came from Jodie's sister's house. They had been left in the garage by the previous owner along with a bunch of stuff that made the place look like a *meth lab*. Anyway, the relevant authorities declared it safe and I inherited these two machines, both brand new and unused. At my best I can't drink that much coffee, so we will use them as HLTs (Hot Liquor Tanks). Also from the same source is a borrowed turkey fryer. The last batch required only a three gallon boil. We can do this in the kitchen, but this time I wanted to boil six gallons, and the 54k btu burner is ideal.

Add this lot to the previous equipment for making *partial mash* brews, and we have what is needed to brew *all-grain*.

All went well until the sparge (rinsing the sugar from the grain). The strike water temp hadn't quite been sufficient for 154F, but future batches will be easier. Two quarts of boiling water added gave a mash for 45 mins at 152F, and I could live with that. Incidentally, at the end of the mash, the temp had held at 152F .... well done Rubbermaid!

The first few quarts were returned to the tun, and then the worst happened .... it stuck and no amount of *jiggling* was gonna make that wort flow again. After a few minutes swearing and poking around, I dumped the entire mash into the handily placed bottling bucket, and removed the completely collapsed mesh screen. I poked around the kitchen for something to use, and found one of those loose-mesh pan plastic scrubbers. Jamming this around the outlet, we dumped the mash back into the tun and proceeded to sparge. I was not hopeful, but it worked.

The rest of the process went to plan, but I was worried about the extraction we had achieved with our, less than textbook, method! Still, the colour in the boil kettle was good, and it smelled great.

At this point (just before the boil) I wondered was the specific gravity was going to be, so I measured it. This was a pretty stupid thing to do or, if not stupid, then at least pointless at this point however .... 1022 .... you are kidding me right? Jeez! ... even BudMillCoors starts out better than that! It was probably one of the lowest moments of my brewing career.

Jodie was serene, Rick was still eating breakfast .... so ... I engaged my brain.

Hang on .... there is over six gallons in the kettle, and it's very hot. Quick check with brewing software suggested that cooled, and reduce to five gallons, we might be ok (it suggested 1048, but I didn't put too much store by this).

I need a wort chiller. Four bags of ice in the bathtub cooled the kettle to 75F in 30 mins. That's pretty good, but ice isn't cheap, and it's not convenient either. The rest went to plan, and at around five o'clock just shy of five gallons of wort was in the fermentor, pitched with Wyeast 1968 at 75F, and at an original gravity of 1052. The target OG in the recipe is 1051.

Bingo!

As I type this, it has just been moved into a glass secondary and is in my brewing fridge at 65F. The specific gravity is 1012.

And hey Jodie .... As you will read this before you get home tonight. It tastes great!

BudMillCoors

2005-11-08T11:28:00.000-06:00

The alcohol laws here are, to say the least, confusing; and lead to strange anomolies.

In Oklahoma, outwith liquor stores, beer can only be a maximum of 3.2% ABV (alcohol by volume). Liquor stores may sell beer of any strength they want, but if the ABV exceeds 3.2%, they have to sell it at *room temperature*. Nowhere, however, am I able to find a definition of *room temperature*. References in the laws to *not chilled* exist, but everywhere here is chilled most of the year, air conditioning sees to that. So, either that *chilling* is unlawful, or the law is so badly framed it's virtually un-enforceable.

Notwithstanding any concerns about refridgeration, the big three brewers here (Budweiser, Miller and Coors), all brew a special batch for distribution in Oklahoma and, I think, one other State. Their normal brew, tasteless thought it might be, still has a decent amount of alcohol (around 5%), but here it is 3.2%. Due to crazy distribution arrangements, the full strength product is not even available in liquor stores ..... you can get any number of micro-brews, or imported beers, but if you want BMC you have to go to Arkansas, or Texas ......

I'll pause for a moment to explain *tasteless*.

This is not meant to be a cheap shot at BMC beers, although I believe they deserve it, but a simple question about how the big brewers view their target customer base. Quite simply, they ALL TASTE THE SAME !!! Yes they do! Quit arguing. And the silly people who say they prefer one over the other (and thus pretend to know something about beer) simply demonstrate the fact that they know very little about beer!

I wouldn't mind, but the big companies have a vast depth of experience in brewing, employ some of the most skilled brewers and have access to equipment most breweries can only dream of. So why do they do it? Simple. I'll tell you .....

They do it because the marketeers and accountants run the brewery, and not the brewers. They do not set out to brew beer that will please most of their customers, they brew so as to offend the fewest! They all do it, and the result is that they are all brewing beer designed to be served so damned cold, and so lack definable character, that even if there were any differences between them (and there aren't), then you wouldn't be able to tell.

Did the Americans learn nothing from the UK in the seventies?

Our breweries tried that approach. It didn't work. CAMRA was born, and so began one of the most successful consumer pressure groups in UK history. They managed to persuade the major brewers that they would broaden their appeal, and please their customers by continuing to give them beer that was the envy of the world. They have largely remained true to this principle ever since. Sure the major brewers produce pretty cheap and cheerful *session* beers, but they also offer a range of high quality products that the US major brewers don't even come close to.

To be fair, when we are at our local Karaoke Bar, we drink Michelob Amberbok. This is a dark lager brewed by Budweiser, and it's not bad. It's not that good either, and Jodie has recently been heard to mutter something about supplying our homebrew to the bar ....

It's possible that the BMC group of brewers have it right. There are plenty of folk around here who actually LIKE their BudMillCoor beers.

Education of our friends continues. It may take some time.

Sear's Promotions Department

2005-09-16T09:31:00.000-05:00

I am sitting at home, it's 9.30 am. We were due to go to Okmulgee today, but Natalie has been a little off-colour this week, and she is asleep on the sofa. I am doing laundry. I am doing it because a) If I don't, Jodie will come home from work and try to do it herself and ... b) I am an *all-round jolly good husband!*

The phone rings. This is not unusual, but normally, if anything but a name I recognise pops up in the caller display, then I just send it to voice-mail. However, starved as I am of adult conversation, I answered it, not knowing that after the call I would still be very hungry indeed:

Lady: May I speak to Mr M***** please?

Me: Who's calling?

Lady: My name is Juanita. I am calling from Sears.

Me: Are you trying to sell me something?

Lady: No Sir, I am not with the Sales Department or the Credit Card Department. I am with the Promotions Department.

Me: Are you promoting goods or services supplied by Sears?

Lady: Yes

Me: Could you explain to me how *Promoting* differs from *Selling*?

Lady: Well the Sales department does the selling, we do the promoting.

Me: *Insert dumbfounded noise here*

Me: I'd like not to be promoted to today, thank you.

Lady: Very good Sir, have a nice day.

I am at a total loss ... oh well, the sun came out so maybe the day will be slightly less surreal from here on ....

High School Football

2005-09-10T15:26:00.000-05:00

Last week, the High School football matches started for the season. They will be done by Thanksgiving, when the best teams will go forward to the State Play-Offs.

Nothing in my previous life prepared me for the *big deal* that is High School football. Sure I know that schools have football teams, so do UK schools, and they at least play with the right shaped ball. So I was a little bemused by two incidents.

The first was my Mother-in-law asking if we wanted *season tickets* for Okmulgee High .... oh, and a parking lot pass .... yeah sure Judy, why not? We can go along with the other half dozen parents and stand, freezing, on the touchline, while little Johnny, Bubba or whoever run up and down needlessly for an hour. Anyways, it's a family tradition and, more than that, two happened ....

This was Sister-in-law Jennifer, for it is she, calling to ask if we would be at the game because Ashley (niece ... probably niece-in-law, not sure) was er *Flag Twirling*!!! I mean, it's not like there aren't enough flags around this country ... do they really need to *Twirl* them at a football game?

This attitude simply draws pitying looks from assorted in-laws, and they don't even tell me about the *Marching Band* :)

So, the big day dawns and Steve finds the occasional hint that he might need to rethink his position on school sporting events. I turned on the TV news first thing, to hear the sports section giving a run-down on the local High School games that coming night .... My ears perked up, and I begin to get the teensiest feeling that I might be missing something here. The BBC never do this for our High Schools. They mention Arsenal, Chelsea, Manchester United, etcetera ... I have yet to hear them dicuss the prospects of even the most celebrated of our High Schools. *Tonights eagerly awaited showdown between the Snarling Tigers of Eton College, and the Destroying Dynamos of Rugby* is not the staple of BBC sports journalists! Tom's school, Homewood, has never, to my knowledge, crossed the radar of ANY sports correspondent.

So, hearing that the big game is a clash between Broken Arrow (Jodie's school district) and Union, has me wondering what is in store in downtown Okmulgee.

Okmulgee are playing McAlester. We get there, and I am not kidding, there must be about 2000 in the crowd. There are marching bands (1 per side), twirly girls (1 set per side, and Ashley is comfortably the best looking out there) and Cheerleaders yes, you guessed it, one set per side. There are more people involved in producing this game than yer average soccer international ... and the teams haven't come out yet!!!

Just as I am begining to get used to this and, actually enjoy it immensely, the helicopter arrives. I kid you not ... News Channel 8 in Tulsa has sent it's helicopter .... In 30 years of watching professional sports fixtures in the UK I only ever saw a helicopter arrive once; and that was to cart a badly injured football player off to the local hospital (They would probably do that here too, the difference being that the footballer would be asked for his credit card, and the hospital would be decided by the insurance company, but I digress).

Long story short time ..... it was great! Okmulgee were well on top by halftime (and won in the end) Ashley twirled, the band marched and the cheerleaders do what cheerleaders do (and they did it pretty well).

One notable incident during the 2nd quarter. An announcement on the PA system wanting to know who owned a cute, blonde 2 yr old in a Bulldogs t-shirt .... Bugger, where is Natalie???

Apparently she is in the Press Box .... they have a press box too? We retrieved her ... and the day ended well.

Just for the record, yesterday's game between Union and Jenks High Schools was played in the Skelly Stadium, Tulsa, in front of a paying crowd of 15000 .... mind blowing!

Healthcare

2005-08-10T20:05:00.000-05:00

This isn't intended to be a negative comparasion, just a simple tale
of three young boys.

This morning I had an email from my Dad. My son, Joe, was in hospital
in a small French town close to my parents home. Joe is 10, and lives
in England with his Mum. I am in Oklahoma.

Joe woke up this morning at 9am, with severe stomach pains. He was
taken to the local doctors by my Mum at 10am. By 10.30am he was in
hospital and had been seen and checked by 3 doctors. By 11am had had
his appendix removed and was in recovery. Joe is awake, all is well
and he will be home in a few days.

The French hospital needed to see a simple form from the UK before
discounting the entire bill by 80% for the little English boy. When my
parents get home, they can submit the invoices (mainly for meds) and
get most of the rest back too.

Two weeks ago (about) two young American boys were struck by
lightening here in Tulsa. They are in hospital making a slow recovery.
Last night on TV was a feature about their local Church raising funds
to help with the mounting medical bills that were causing the
children's families a great deal of distress. It seems likely that the
boys will recover, but that the parents will be paying the bills for
many years to come.

I thought of Joe and I thought of those boys. My heart goes out to
their parents.

ps ... Since writing this I have heard that one of the boys has died. My sympathies to his family, and to those who knew him - Steve 12th October 2005

pps ... I just now learned this from my Mum:

Just a postnote re Joes health care in France. We have just recieved the bill for joes medical care. To pay. 62euros. The charge is for meals and the 2nd bed provided for me while i stayed in hospita with Joe. Thought you might like to have that bit of info. (Steve 22nd Nov. 2005)

DVD Player

2005-06-22T00:01:00.000-05:00

Ours is knackered ... and it's new. So off we go to Circuit City to change it.

"It's past it's 30 day exchange period" .... said the spotty youth who didn't graduate High Schhool "But I'll exchange it anyway", said same boy when he saw the look on my face ...

So we walk out with a $43 gift voucher, as they don't have in stock the model I wanted, that was prominently featured on their website. Neither can he find it on his computer .... at this point, I am worried we may be here a while :)

Onwards, ever onwards to Best Buy. They don't have the said Philips DVP642 either .... but they do have the 622 at a silly *open box* price of $45. As I was planning on opening the box anyway, when I got it home, this seems reasonable, we snap it up.

At this point, it's worth noting that I have a decent collection of UK PAL DVDs, all coded Region 2.

http://www.thebrackenfamily.info/html/dvd_catalogue2.htm

So, a multi-standard, Region Free DVD player is very much the order of the day. I checked, the 642 is a simple handset hack, and ... ahem ... assumed the 622 would be the same.

LMFAO

So, it's off to the store to buy the special One For All clicker that can generate the required signal to unlock the beast. Bought it, tried it, didn't work! Yeah, I know, we've all been there (or somewhere similar)

So, to recap, we now have a $43 Circuit City voucher, A brand new but not what we want Philips DVD Player, and a Universal Remote Control with no apparent use. A good days work then :)

Today we went to Arkansas. The purpose of this trip (marriage license) is a tale for another time. Suffice it to say, that into the trunk of the car went a DVD Player and a Clicker! Well! Who knows which stores we may pass on the way! So, a few hours later we are on the way back from Arkansas, complete with shiny Marriage License and, yes, the same DVD and Clicker we left with .... what is it with Arkansas? Do they not have Best Buy? Harumppfff.

So ..... we call in at Circuit City (a different one) in Tulsa ... no joy. On to Best Buy where the nice lady gives me back all our money for the 622, pretty much *no questions asked*, but they don't have a 642 either. Grrrrr! This is getting very old. Thence to Walmart.

Now I need to mention a couple of things about our local Walmart. It's improved!!!! I guess they corporation is still giving generously to the wrong side, a matter for another post, but at least this store is now useable.

We return the clicker. The lady asked if there was a problem with it, and the simple explanation that it hadn't done what we thought it would was enough. But here is an odd thing .......

All the fancy-smancy electronics stores we visited, and guess who has the Philips DVP642 in stock? ...... hehe .... except they didn't!!!!

Just a space under the display model where all the stock should be. We even asked a knowledgeable sales assistant if we could buy the display model (yes, Walmart has a knowledgeable sales assistant. She works at the Supercentre at Admiral and Memorial, Tulsa, OK) Unfortunately, they really ARE display models, and have been mutilated beyond repair.

To make a hopelessly long story just a teensy bit shorter, another local store had 6 in stock .... thank you Sam :)

We now have a working DVD player which basically seems to enjoy the flavour of pretty much any disk I throw at it, including DVDs full of .mp3 files and jpg pictures .... kewl.

By the way, the DVD players in the local Walmart are pretty close to the cake section ..... multi-tasking being a speciality ......

Abject and Grovelling Apology

2005-06-09T22:06:00.000-05:00

In the last short while, it has been brought to my attention that I have criticised the United States of America, her people and proceedures, and all she represents, a tad more than strictly necessary. *Necessary* hasn't been defined, but I feel confident the good souls who take issue with me are decent, righteous, God-fearing types, whose wise counsel I would do well to heed. Indeed, it could be argued that ANY criticism of the USA is too much. Most especially if such verbal diarrhea comes spewing unchecked from an alien, a foriegner .... a sour-graped Limey. It could be, and it often is. Why, even your truly great and beyond criticism President reminded all other countries that if you weren't with the US, you were with the terrorists. We all stood corrected ... esp. the French.

So, I take this opportunity, even at this late stage, to offer up, for public dissemination and scrutiny, an unreserved apology to the entire Nation. I am convinced my detractors are a fair and reasonable cross-section of American society, thought and opinion, therefore I do indeed, stand corrected.

But before I finish ...... let's examine what I am apologising for ....

I apologise for spelling the word *apologise* without the required z.
I apologise for admiring the selflessness of the kind folk I met in South Carolina.
I apologise for inflicting myself on Jodie, for the rest of my life .... and I apologise to all the hearts that sank when the news broke (that last one might be a little tongue-in-cheek).
I apologise for praising publicly the Maryland doctor who treated me for almost no money in November, and I apologise to the Oklahoma doctor who promised to do the same if I needed it.
I am deeply ashamed for writing about Thanksgiving, a message in which I applauded the sentiment, and thanked the wonderful people who shared their homes with me.
I apologise that my birthday is July 4th.
I apologise for standing and looking in awe at the original Star Spangled Banner, with a tear in my eye when I felt the enormity of the symbol laid out on a table in front of me. This simple piece of cloth representing the hopes dreams and ambitions of the last, and greatest superpower, and her people.
I am deeply ashamed that, in that moment, I felt moved, and I felt at home.
I am aghast that Tulsan's have had to endure my Karaoke singing, and even more saddened by the friends I have made here.
It was outrageous of me to spend the last three years helping where I could to support American, and other, smokers to quit.
This is probably not the best time to mention that I am looking forward to spending the rest of my life exploring, contributing to, and and offering the little I have, to make this great country a little greater; but also a little fairer and more just, so I apologise in advance.

I have commited my future and my life to the United States. Not the country, per se, but the people, and more especially, one person who can't leave, nor would I ask her to. Because of my commitment, the future of this nation is important to me, so I also apologise for saying now that you ain't seen nuttin' yet. If I am paying the piper, I'm damned well gonna call the toon .... and my tax dollars are as valuable as anyone else's, even though they buy me far fewer rights than most of you .... and I apologise for pointing that out. To show I don't mind, it's my intention to ensure I pay a large amount of tax, knowing as I do that both State and Federal Governments will spend it wisely.
I apologise for smiling at the lyrics of Tom Paxton .... had he been an alien, no doubt the moral, the self-righteous, and the pontificators woulda come down hard on him. I especially feel the lyric "Our leaders are the finest men, and we elect 'em again and again" was ill-advised (full lyric available on request – I promise not to sing it, but apologise should I forget).

This journey has, thus far, been a wonderful one. The people I have met, even the ones I only nearly met. The sights I've seen and the places I've visited. I'll give you just one example of the inequalities I've personally witnessed, and I make NO apology for doing so.

I have been to Washington DC. I have seen wealth and priviledge, seats of power and all the trappings such a place considers the norm. But there is another United States. In Tulsa, on a street called Admiral Place is a large permenant Flea-market. Basically it's about 40 000 square feet of crap. However, it's harmless crap, and that's not the point. On the other side of the street is what can only be described as a ghetto. That, by the way, is a generous description. People are living, in the US in the year of our Lord 2005, in squalor and in abject poverty. Put simply, the place is awful, and this country should be (and many of it's people are) ashamed it exists. This wouldn't be so bad were it a one-off, but it isn't. In towns and cities from Seattle to Miami, San Diego to somewhere in the far north east, Admiral Places exist. So sure I'll criticise ..... I'll shout and I'll post and I'll damned well join the campaign to rid our society of such squalor, and I'll apologise to no man for so doing.

America is great, but it's also a work in progress. As an outsider, and alien, a Limey, a concerned human ..... whatever .... I'll do what I can to leave the place just a little better than I found it. If we all do the same, maybe progress can be made.

The United States of America was made what it is today by immigrants. Why do people so object to this proud tradition being honoured. Or maybe they are just dinosaurs.

steveb

American English, and U-Boats!

2004-12-17T17:09:00.000-06:00

I have been developing a theory about the curious dislike of vowels, displayed in the way America uses our language. I accept, by the way, that it is *their* language too, and that 280 million people (many of who speak Spanish as a first language) are entitled to make changes as they see fit :)

Nonetheless, waging a wicked and merciless campaign against a vowel (or two) is simply an unreasonable use of the nuclear deterrent. I put this quite highly, as none of the other nuclear powers have seen fit to abuse our (their) language in such a manner. Indeed the French have a Government dept. tasked with the job of actually preserving French and keeping out English/American expressions. They are losing the battle, I think for two main reasons. One is that French, like all languages, is a living language …. which will develop and change to reflect the experience of native French speakers. The French really cannot want their language to die, and become the *Latin* of Europe. I do take the point that certain steps should be taken to prevent the other main reason their language is being corrupted ….. McDonalds.

In another place, and at another time, I had cause to be thankful to McDonalds for their influence in separate matter, but this is a family journal, so if you want to know what I mean, you are gonna have to ask :)

I do not, nor do the French, thank McDonalds for *le Big Mac*, *les fries*, etc.

But I digress …..

It seems that over the last hundred years or so, the letter *u* has been sent to Alaska. Not literally, you understand (there is no *u* in Alaska either), but I was trying to think of where America would send things they don’t much approve of, and I came up with Alaska ….. or maybe Salt Lake City … I’ll have to ask an American :)

So, for my American friends and readers, here are some *original* spellings. Colour, labour, favour, flavour, favourite … and here is an odd one *aluminium* …. Note the second *i*. When I pronounced the word *al-u-min-ee-um* in conversation, my friend Lori just giggled … Harumphfff!!!

Which all begs the question: “Why?” Why is it that America chose to outlaw the *u*? Was there an ink shortage? A pressing need to write or read faster?

Or is it, as I believe, a conspiracy by Piano Manufacturers? Yes dear, you did read that correctly, and there is no *u* in Piano either …. Not even in *Pianoforte*, to give the instrument much abused in bars it’s proper name :)

You may know (or soon will) that the very best pianos are made by Germans. Such famous names as Bluthner, Bosendorfher, Bechstein are among them. The most famous of all being the name of Steinway. Yup, I know Steinway are American, but here is the thing …. They are too a German family. Rather like our Royal Family, as it happens. And I would be perfectly content to accept that we were to blame for the American persecution of the *u*, were it not for the fact that the only Royal we tried to export to the United States (HRH The Duchess of York or *Freeloading Fergie* to her friends) was promptly sent home with a *Return to Sender* sticker on her forehead.

So, if the Germans are responsible for stealing the letter U, then what possible motive could there be? And now we have the crux of it. Have you noticed how the Germans name their submarines? Yes, they are called *U-Boats*, and they all have an identifying number beginning with a *U*. What is more, they needed quite a few. A recent Hollywood movie about how America won the war was called U-571. That equates to five hundred and seventy one words that need to loose a vowel, just to provide the names for the German Navy. It all makes sense.

Steinway immigrate into the United States, begin to make pianos (good ones too) …. In the meantime they are quietly amassing a stockpile of *U*s, German Navy for the use of. This allows Germany to attempt to wrest control of the world from Britain …. An attempt which ultimately fails, but in return for help in defeating the new owners of the stolen *U*s, we gratefully give control of the world to our latest, if a little tardy, ally the United States of America.

So guys, you swapped the letter *U* for world domination …. Not bad, not bad at all :)

ps. G W Bush apologised recently, for the USA being a little late entering the last two world wars. He promised to make up for it by being *extremely prompt* for the next one!

Nature of support

2004-12-14T11:59:00.000-06:00

I spend a small part of my time attempting (with varying degrees of successs) to support people trying to quit smoking. The quit smoking group I am a part of is currently *adjusting* as people leave, and others arrive.

My journal has, thus far, been about my travels, and that will continue. But sitting at Baltimore airport, then Chicago O'hare waiting for planes I wrote the following, and I thought I would include it here:

For some time now, I have been giving some thought to the nature of *support*. What it is. Who can give it and how, and why is it so much harder to receive, than to give? This last being especially pertinent now, at a time of *giving and receiving*.

Before I continue however, there are a few remarks I wish to make.

The views expressed in this post are mine. I have taken them from nowhere, and they are qualified by no one. I am neither a psychologist, nor a psychotherapist, although I have worked closely with both for many years. I do have much experience in the successful delivery of support to children who very badly needed it, and I also have significant training, and some qualifications in that field.

Like any other post though, I claim no expertise, I simply offer a view, for what it is worth. Please, take what you need, and leave the rest :)

Despite some recent evidence to the contrary, this is a support group, and a damned fine one! There are some who have expressed the view that this support should really be delivered with rather less *Off Topic* content. This is a valid view, but in my opinion, a mistaken one. Mistaken because this view misses essential nature of the way support is provided within AS3.

AS3 could easily be a *bulletin board* or a message board. Those long enough in the tooth to remember 1200 baud modems (and slower) will remember *bulletin boards* with varying degrees of nostalgia. Such vehicles were effective in their primary task of delivering information, but pretty useless as a medium for any discussion.

AS3, on the other hand, operates much more as a community. Few communities are comprised solely of a single dimension …. Indeed they would be pretty sterile environments were that the case. Think *Stepford Wives* in text. It is the process of quitting that brings us together, provides a common goal, a raison d’etre, so to speak; but it is my contention that the real support is delivered as much through the Off Topic content, as it is through the milestone congratulations, and the very pertinent discussions regarding quit methods and other (equally non-controversial lol) subjects.

I would argue quite strongly, that the fun, laughter and the downright enjoyment that can come from the participation in AS3, are in fact the glue that binds the newsgroup, and allows the delivery of effective support to people often feeling quite emotional and vulnerable. The spin off is that people here make very real *real-life* friendships, which come as a bonus none of us expects when we arrive.

Like any community, we have our friendships and rivalries, our fallings out and our love affairs. It is rich, diverse and has thus far, and will continue to, offer massive and sustained support to many thousands of quitters.

So what is support? Is it definable? Could we bottle it?

For me, it boils down to two aspects. The giving of support, and the receiving of the same. I will argue later that there are some cogent reasons why the receiving of support is rather harder. But in the end, those able to receive are best placed to, and in fact do, deliver the most effective help to others.

Giving support can and does take many different forms. If I post my meter, the number of replies can be as meaningful as the actual content of the individual responses. That is not to say the content is unimportant, quite the opposite ….. but the very fact that a milestone is recognised, and responded to, can leave the individual feeling accepted and valued. At it’s most basic level, AS3 offers this to most of it’s participants. No skill is required, neither is any real *empathy* called for, although the individual responses are more meaningful if the replies contain either, or both.

Still in the area of giving support, but rather more individual, are those posts that ask for help either by suggesting the poster is in some form of crisis, or facing a particularly difficult trigger. AS3 is generally, in my view, excellent at responding to these *cries for help*. There are issues regarding the people who I have heard described as *serial quitters*, but generally we respond quickly and in a meaningful way to such pleas. This level of response does require that folk give some regard to the nature of the plea, and therefore the tone of the reply.

At this point I would simply state my personal distaste for the phrase *serial quitter*. For me it has connotations of a lack of sincerity, or willingness to quit which I entirely reject. No one willingly puts themselves thro Hell Week time after time after time, if they can see any alternative whatsoever. Of course your mileage may vary, and that is your right. Personally, I have the highest regard for those unfortunate enough to slip back, repeatedly, but who also have the courage and determination to keep on trying. It may interest you to know that when I *failed* it took me ten years to pluck up sufficient courage to try again …. The *serial quitters* (sic) are braver than me!

A step beyond this are those people with problems that require more considered, or more expert help. I use the word *expert* advisedly, as this group contains the distilled wisdom of a generation of quitters and is, in it’s own way, quite *expert*.

We stray then, into the area of receiving support. I stated earlier that it is rather easier to give, than to receive.

I feel there is a very simple reason for this. Giving support requires that a person is willing to give, has the time to give, and has the capacity to provide something helpful. This actually can be as simple as providing a link to an amusing Flash game, which could be just the distraction needed by others, at that time. Others start threads of discussion to do with *What do you want for Xmas*, or *Seat Up or Down*. Each of these, I would suggest, is as valuable as any other thread in contributing to the building and maintaining of our community. Some may feel I put *community* too highly; arguing that in fact we are just a buncha misfits, or at best, loosely bound individuals. Well those people may be right, I just prefer my view is all :)

In any event, the receiving of support requires something way beyond that required to give. In my experience, in order to receive support one has to be prepared to hand over, to the keeping of others, a part of ourselves which is both delicate and private. We have to be prepared to confront and share our insecurities and vulnerabilities. This is, by any estimation, no mean feat and we can’t all do it. Issues of trust and identity are bound up in our egos, and it is a brave or desperate person who can ask for help. Of course, well rounded individuals with a specific need are also able to ask – I don’t profess to be one of those :)

So two things immediately spring to mind, if my suggestions are accurate. The first is that the time people need the help the most ie, on the point of a slip, is likely to be the time they find it hardest of all to ask; and that those believers in *Tough Love* (which I will come on to in a moment) had better make sure they are very careful how they handle some real vulnerability. The risk is of causing real and lasting damage if you get it wrong. I do hope this helps people understand why it is so damned hard to ask for help, and go some way to helping those supporters who get angry at not being asked, gain some insight into why it happens.

I plead with people to remember that *Tough Love* includes the word LOVE! It is a relationship based way of helping a person confront their own issues. It is damned well NOT a permission slip to beat up a quitter having a hard time. It is Tough, only because the process of learning about ourselves can reveal characteristics and traits we are less than proud of. Such insight is indeed hard to bear at times. It needs a relationship based approach, if anyone is to gain, and is most definitely a *loving* approach.

To those who believe *spare the rod, and spoil the child* is the way to go, then I recommend you leave. Other places will doubtless welcome your contributions.

I made the point early on, that I believe those folk who are able to receive support, are often best placed to give it. I think that the history of AS3 bears this out. I am clearly contending that a preparedness to face ones own demons, and an ability to trust that others will take care of the delicate parts of our psyches, combine to create individuals who are able to empathise, and support in a way that simply has to be valued and admired. AS3 has these people, and we need to look after them :)

In the course of the last fifteen hundred words I have made some very bold statements and assertions. There will be those who agree with it all, those who agree in part, and those who disagree because *I* am saying it :) I don’t think I will lose much sleep over the latter group …..

I simply remind you all that it is *One man’s view*. I claim nothing else, but I do congratulate and thank all those who made it this far!

steveb
December 2004

Karaoke - Hell Yeah!

2004-12-05T00:49:00.000-06:00

It’s *Karaoke Night* in a bar called *No Place*. Top of the bill (well, hidden halfway down actually) that little known, but clearly talented English baritone of exceptional clarity and tone, the one, the only and here for one night only, direct from London, England ……… Mr Steeeeeeeeve Bracken.

HELL YEAH!

This all began months ago in a conversation with either Jodie or her partner in crime, Annie. Not sure which, but both are as bad as each other, so they can share the blame .. tee hee. *She* asked what I could sing …… “for my supper”, was the reply, but I didn’t get away with it, and the name of a song was demanded. At this point I tried really hard to put her off, racking my brain for the name of a song so unlikely as to be simply *laughed off*. All at the same time as not wanting to delay my reply so long as to appear evasive.

In the end I blurted out *Rhinestone Cowboy* … thinking huh, that should stall her for a bit. But no, alas, all that happened was laughter and a promise to ask George if he had that song available. Ok then, there is still some hope ….

A day or two later I get the bad news from Annie: "George doesn’t have *Rhinestone Cowboy*". Inside I am silently screaming for joy, and heartfelt thanks to the Gods of Karaoke … when she delivers the fatal blow: "But he will get it in time for your visit!!!!"

Utter consternation. Not only will he have the blessed song, but it will have been bought specifically for me. The chance of sliding out of this one are diminishing even faster than the prospect of actually finding Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq. I am inconsolable. “Oh, very good” I say, “I’ll look forward to it”. Annie isn’t stupid though, and she saw through this pathetic ploy from the start …. Busted!

HELL YEAH!

The week leading up was awful … I was sick. I picked up a cold from Lori, who prolly got it from those *Townies* in New York. I am finding that blaming New York for everything from Global Warming to ingrown toenails works very well everywhere except, probably, New York. Anyway, I was thinking that singing might not be possible. When I mentioned it to Annie her response was typically concerned and supportive … “Nothing short of death will stop you singing at my birthday party” … bugger!

I am surrounded, outgunned and outnumbered. This is not The Alamo, I give in!

HELL YEAH!

So the fateful Saturday arrives. Kids safely delivered to their Dad, card and present bought and afternoon nap enjoyed. A word, before we go any further, about the birthday card. We got it in a sex shop in Tulsa (yes, of course they have them) Anyhow, I tried hard, while in the shop, just to look at the cards. But I couldn’t help the odd glance around the shop. What ARE all those things? And what on earth can they be for? (answers by email, in plain brown cover please).

My throat isn’t feeling too bad … damn! Oh well, if I am going to do this, I may as well do it as best I can, and a few beers first will go a long way to dulling the hearing of me, and most of the audience. If I see anyone with a video camera though, there will be blood.

Then all of a sudden, through a haze of cigarette smoke and flashing lights I see Annie walk towards me. The lights are down, it is 11pm or so. She holds out her hand to give me something … in my befuddled state I stupidly take it. I look down, and I see I am holding a microphone, and the Intro is playing.

“I’ve been walking these streets so long,
Singing the same old song,
I know every crack in these dirty sidewalks of Broadway”

HELL YEAH!

And it’s over. I did it. Badly, but I did it. And they all lied … even George said it was good …. I know you guys lied, at least a bit, but thanks anyway, and I’ll be back. Hell Yeah!

Thanksgiving in Okmulgee

2004-12-04T08:55:00.000-06:00

You either have to be American (or Canadian) or to have been there, to understand what Thanksgiving means to families. I was there this year, for the second time in a row, to share a family occasion that is without peer, anywhere else on Earth.

Thanksgiving is when families come together, free from the commercialisation that is Christmas, to be together, as a family, and give thanks. Quite what they are thankful for one can only guess, it will be a bit different in every home. The usual health, wealth and happiness, I imagine, but also community, country and the wider world.

Last year, my friend’s Mom had prepared a few words as was her habit. These were delivered with real sincerity, as was the Grace spoken this year, in the home of Jodie’s sister. What was clear to me last year as well as this, was the privilege I felt at being invited to this, most personal of events. I thank my hosts.

I was half expecting the people I met this year to be somehow *different* to me. Let’s face it, they are a church-going family from a small town in the mid-west of America. I am, at best agnostic, from a busy metropolitan area 5000 miles away. I wondered what we might have in common. But as I am finding out, such things start to matter a great deal less when you look below the surface.

At the start of the proceedings, Jodie’s niece had persuaded me to part with $1, for a bar of chocolate she was selling to provide funds for her school. So, business as usual. That is certainly something Tom and Joe would recognise. Pst! Don’t no one tell her, but I woulda paid more :) A little later, I was in the kitchen, busily trying to remember my *Rules For Not Upsetting Peoples Relatives* (we’ll come to them), when I picked up the lid of a casserole dish. On it was Jodie’s sisters name and address. It turns out that the church members regularly take along prepared food, so they mark the dishes in a way that makes it easy to get them back to their owners. I made a comment about rummaging through other folk’s kitchens to see what they had *forgotten* to return, and there were giggles, and some knowing looks …. hehe

The point of all this, tho, is something else. In that moment I had a glimpse into a community. A community where people are contributing simply as part of their every day lives. A place where getting the kids first to school, then college, while bringing home the bacon, is a simple fact of life. I saw the community I come from, and it felt good.

So, what are these rules?

1) Eat everything on your plate.

2) Compliment the cook(s)

3) Agree with the womenfolk

4) The older the woman, the more you agree

5) Never discuss Religion or Politics

There are others, but these are the basics. And they have stood me in pretty good stead these many a long year, with the possible exception of the mother of a girlfriend I had way back in the early 80s. After a reasonably harmonious afternoon during which I refrained from telling her to *shut-up* at least 6 times, she remarked to her daughter “That young man is so self-assured I don’t know why he needs a girlfriend*. To this day I am not sure what she meant :)

So yet again, Thanksgiving was a wonderful experience. Meeting Jodie’s family was everything I hoped it would be, in my turn, I hope I didn’t disappoint :) The last word on the day has to go to Jodie’s elder sister tho. If she had any intention whatsoever of discouraging me, then I’m afraid she completely blew it with the baked sweet potato. Quite honestly, they are worth making a return visit for on their own!

Choices - the return

2004-12-01T17:02:00.000-06:00

Following the deep, unremitting tear-jerker that was the “Choices” post, I damned well better let you all know how I got on.

Quite frankly, I was a bit scared to go. Not of Jodie, she visited me while in England, and I knew we would be fine. No, the problems were two-fold.

Firstly, how would I like, or dislike Tulsa and secondly, the extended network of friends and family. The first is easy, and I will talk a little about what we did, in my next entry. The second has implications way beyond just Jodie and I, and is, therefore, much more difficult to get right.

Tom and Joe have met Jodie, albeit briefly, but they are not the only children in this equation. Jodie has three kids who have already experienced some recent changes, and I think we were both keen that they should be disturbed as little as possible. Well! To leap unerringly straight to a conclusion, it was great.

Jodie has, in the past, affectionately referred to the kids as Bitchy, Whiney and Messy (Before anyone makes the kinda point I had to listen to before, just remember, I know that Jodie would lay down her life to save a single hair on those kids heads from coming to harm)

Anyway, a week later I feel I can safely conclude that “Bitchy” isn’t … well not much, and she is also the oldest, and a good deal of fun, and more ticklish that she admits to. “Whiney” can indeed whine for America. He is also a most loving and giving child (must remember to check on which day he was born) and Messy simply should be renamed: “I don’t know who the Limey is, but I’m staying over here and watching until I am sure he has been safely defused”!

In the end, it is my view that the children will be the ones who guide what we do, when, and how. Sure they will need help and support. Of course it is the role of adults to make “adult” decisions, and we will. But we will do so according to our best assessment of where the kids are at, and what will help the most.

This is what we will do …. So who’s gonna help us?

Minister of State at the Department of “Get a life”

2004-12-01T00:54:00.000-06:00

Ok, so I thought this was an “English” disease. And it is true, we do have a bad case, but it seems the symptoms have spread way beyond our tiny borders. Borders which have repelled everyone since William the Conqueror, I might add, and He was invited. So maybe we are a tad more scrupulous about keeping things out, rather than keeping them in.

This is probably a “good thing”, as we can encourage the Spice Girls, and Arsenal, and the Welsh to leave, then pretend we are all out when they come back …. Talking here about precisely whom we may wish to keep out would need a little more space than I have available.

Oh yes, what is the disease? Well it is moaning, whingeing, whining and complaining, and assorted other acts likely to turn a perfectly good day into a trial. Worst of all are the people who simply refuse to accept that the world is a different and, by and large better place, than it used to be.

We English are used to this … the phrase “Little Englander” being commonly heard applied to those who refuse to accept the notion that “Johnny Foreigner” could possibly have a point of view. Oh, and if the point of view at issue happens to be Gay, Black or, in some cases, female, then Little Englander, from Sutton-Under-Wold, Home Countyshire, will be seen venting his ire to the point of apoplexy, In the local bar or golf club of a Sunday lunchtime.

So I have been in Oklahoma. A later entry will give my view of the Oklahomans I met, the welcome I had and the fact that I could easily spend the rest of my life there … but for now I wanna talk about the “seedier” side of life … the Redneck (attitude, not work ethic), the “Little American”.

Here is a revelation for me ….. you have them too …. Lolol And apart from anything else, they do provide an endless series of opportunities for mischief-making at their expense (best to avoid the ones actually carrying pump-action shotguns)

So here is where the Government Department for Get A Life comes in. I know the US Republican Party is a party of “small government”, and the idea of yet another Dept. of State might not appeal … but bear with me. My journal has actually separated Church from State already, a concept all y’all seem to be struggling with, at the moment. So I figure a teensy bitty new dept would be ok. Besides, the Democrats aren’t immune from gazing at their own navels either.

This department will seek to fairly govern ALL the population, free from prejudice and malice …. We ARE breaking new ground tonight … and strike fear into the hearts of the whingers, and more especially their attorneys, wherever they chase an ambulance or attempt to start yet another futile “Class Action” that benefits no one but the lawyers, and generally makes the place less open and relaxed that it could be.

It was an accident, ok? No one was to blame, no one should get 50 000 dollars because they broke a fingernail, schools should be able to organise outings, and fieldtrips with a element of fun and danger, without needing prohibitively expensive insurance because little Lori, or Randy scratched his/her arm on a nasty, wasty bramble ramble. GET A LIFE !!! Want your kids to grow up as wusses? Well then, protect them from every danger known to Man (or thought up by attorneys)

Attorneys, by the way (except for mine) should actually be told, en-masse, to get a life :)

So … next time I am in South Carolina, and I read in the newspaper about moves to have the Flag of the Confederacy flying alongside the Stars and Stripes …. The Minister will have the full authority to say “Dangnabit it ain’t gonna happen, no siree! You lost, deal with it, GET A LIFE”

I’m a Limey, and I love to hear Johnny Horton’s “Battle of New Orleans”. But here is the thing …. We lost, and we actually don’t mind. Apart from the aforementioned “Little Englander”, we are generally pleased at how our cousins from Left Pond conduct most of their business … we got over it! (plus it means that Europe, esp. the Germans, generally don’t hold us responsible for your Foreign Policy (sic))

So there we have it. An end to the whingeing and a return to the real values of the past people hanker after … freedom to roam, live peacefully, raise a family, without the attendant poverty and ill health that afflicted us all in the “Golden Years”

Just ….. “get over it”, and grin.

*editors note

The author of this journal accepts no responsibility whatsoever for the increased consumption of Krispy Kreme for breakfast, by Floridians.

Choices

2004-11-23T07:16:00.000-06:00

So I got to thinking about choices.

This happened while I was negotiating the website that is www.amazon.co.uk It’s Joe‘s birthday on the 28th, he will be ten. Yay! Double figures at last. Anyway, I needed to buy a present that I could have delivered. I already posted a card, but postal rates being what they are, it is cheaper to pay the Amazon delivery charge. I’m not going to tell you what I bought, because there is a chance Joe will read this before Sunday, and the element of surprise will be lost. It is worth a small diversion here to remind everyone that an element of surprise is important to Joe; it reminds him that the adults in his life can still, with careful thought, outwit him.

So where was I? Oh yes, Amazon, and choices …

Well Amazon served to remind me that around a half a million or more items to choose from for a birthday present is way too many …. Maybe I should have just search for “under $5” …. Ha! Only kidding Joe … $5 is far too generous, unless we are talking Canadian Dollars, but that is a whole other journal entry

That is one kind of choice. If ever you want an example of the danger of too much choice, think no further than mobile phone ringtones …. I need say no more!

The other kind of choices, are the life choices that have lead me to be here, and away from Joe (and Tom) on his birthday, in the first place. At this point in my journal, I stand bare-arsed under the cold shower of reality. I miss them. And missing them is set to get a whole lot tougher, just at a time when other aspects of my journey take on an exciting new phase. Sometimes I wonder how people remain intact, sane, functioning, under the pressure of such competing emotions. Then I remember that they often don’t, and am minded to count my blessings. A friend of mine uses a “Tag-line” something like this: If my barn burns down, it simply gives me a view of the stars. She stole it, I am sure …. But all the same, it’s great.

Tonight I am flying to Tulsa by way of Dallas. I am writing this while I wait for my flight at Baltimore Washington International airport. I am flying to meet Jodie and, for the first time, her children, friends and family. I am flying to be “on show”. People want to make judgements, and they have the right. I am flying to sing at Annie’s birthday, to eat turkey and visit a High School. I am flying to my future and, miss my boys tho I do, I am happy tonight.

Happy Birthday Joe, I love you.

Sweet South Carolina

2004-11-15T23:26:00.000-06:00

Hey little guys :)

It’s Monday morning and I am on a train. I am going from Florence, South Carolina, to Washington DC, and as I go towards the capital of this nation, I pause, and think a little of the place I am leaving.

The Carolinas are not the rich bit of America. Sure there is money here, but there is also unemployment and grinding poverty. Look at the houses as you drive through, or ride by on the train. Trailers, park homes, tumbledown houses with old cars outside …. You see them in the old movies on tv ….. here they are where people live. Alongside are often new properties. Out in the country there are no apparent ghettos, just places where people put their homes. Professional next to labourer, rich alongside poor. It looks a bit odd, but it seems to work :)

There is something else here too. There is a spirit, and a cheerfulness. A welcoming of the newcomer, the foreigner, the Limey. From the girl in the Dollar store to the guy in the gas station … everyone has a smile and a few welcoming words. The girl in the store moans a little. She is 23 and *I was born in Kershaw, and I’ll likely die in Kershaw. Be nice to see someplace else first tho* All this delivered in the kinda accent that mangles what is left of English even after you average American has had his tongue round it for a while .. lmao

Then there was Junior. Junior is in his sixties, lives in a small house in rural South Carolina with his wife Edith. Junior has been a manual worker all his working life. Doesn’t have much, doesn’t ask for much; he seems happy. Junior breathes oxygen from a machine. When you are in the house, you can hear the constant hum of the machine running 24/7. It is a reminder that, without this noise, Junior will die as his lungs were ripped apart by tobacco. Kinda ironic as tobacco is one of the crops that give most employment to guys just like Junior, not too far from here.

Anyway, it would be reasonable of Junior to have a few moans and complaints. Not a bit of it. I spent about two hours talking to him and his wife, and he was a man full of tales, full of curiosity, full of life. Kind of makes you thankful for what you have. And don’t you all get to feeling sorry for Junior …. He wouldn’t hear of it :)

So my friend Ripley drove me to the station this morning. About 60 miles. After a few miles I could have sworn it had been snowing (damned sure it was cold enough). Nope, I had seen my first ever cotton fields. Kids you’d have loved it. Ripley stopped the car and let your daft old Dad pick up some cotton from the roadside. I guess I felt the same way we do when we first see the vineyards in France. Wow! It really is soft, just the way you would imagine it to be from the pictures we see on television.

Now I leave behind Ripley, and her friend Michael, and about 178 dogs (not really) and I thank them very much for their hospitality, their kindness, and for showing me a little of a world I never dreamed existed.

Washington calls ….

Wally World

2004-11-11T20:28:00.000-06:00

Walmart has come to England in the shape of a takeover of Asda. There the similarity ends. There really isn’t anywhere in the UK remotely similar to Wally World, and I am not sure yet whether or not this is a good thing.

France has Auchan and Continent, etc. These come pretty close to the idea that is Walmart, but French hypermarches have one fatal flaw:

They do not sell Krispy Kreme!

To call Krispy Kreme a doughnut, would be to call the Mona Lisa a painting! Krispy Kreme may be to spelling what Donald Rumsfeld is to relaxed tolerance, but they are what taste-buds were invented for.

Krispy Kreme is, quite frankly, worth emigrating for. It is a doughnut well worth the trouble it would take to invade and conquer this mighty nation. I am now not surprised that US Immigration kept me waiting two hours at Charlotte airport to ask me the following questions … “Why are you here?” and “How long are you staying?”, before saying “Welcome to America, have a nice trip” …. They were, it appears, simply trying to keep me from discovering eternal happiness in a deep fried dough product.

Well now, America, your secret is out :p

You can keep your World Series … no one is bothered about Superbowl, and the Everglades sound like an air-freshener. But now we know about Krispy Kreme, your borders are that little bit less secure … deal with it.

I haven’t even got started on pecan pie yet ….

Getting there

2004-11-09T07:25:00.000-06:00

Hey boys :)

The big adventure started ... it was hard to go, in so very many ways. I guess you two felt it too. I went to Aunty Sue's last night, and while I was there Nanny called. It was nice to hear them, and I hope I can chat to them soon.

So, I was at the airport with Uncle Keir in time to watch him mangae TWO Egg and Bacon McMuffins for his breakfast!!! Two, I tell ya ... lmao

So I was kind of hoping I would get a couple of seats to myself on the flight over. Meanwhile, I was at the gate, looking around at all the fat people, and simply praying to whatever God was most likely to help, that they would be sat miles away from me. Those seats are small enough, without the next guy spilling over into mine :)

I thought I was in luck, when the plane was nearly ready to leave and the seat next to me was empty .... then a young woman (fortunately very slim) came and sat next to me. Things were indeed *looking up* :)

As I type this, we are about halfway. I think the pilot is still sober as the plane seems to be making a fairly steady way across.

I brought a picture of Osama Bin Laden with me (I won't carry it thro immigration) On it I wrote *This is your enemy* .... I have checked carefully, but he isn't on the plane*

More later ...

*thanks Spike

My Clothes :(

2004-11-04T03:57:00.000-06:00

Ok, so you know I'm packing (you do, because I said so earlier, and you've been keeping up ... right?) Well today I need to sort out my clothes.

I've been putting this job off for a while, and as a result, there is a good deal of laundry needing doing. I've also been putting it off, because the task will highlight my desperate need for clothing that looks either a) less like it's been slept in by cats for the last three years and/or b) less like my Nanan bought it for one of my uncles in the post-war depression years.

Also is the question of quite what to take. I have ONE suitcase, a backpack and a laptop case as the available space. Now OBVIOUSLY the laptop and it's attendant needs have to come first. Plus all the cables needed to connect it to a variety of TVs, natch! Then there is a big fat cookery book (Delia, again *natch* ... no Martha Stewarts here) and by the time I have included various bits and pieces essential to life in George Bushes new *Post Bush* USA, then I begin to wonder where the clothes will fit in. It really is a blessing that I have so few :)

I really should go get on with it ... jeans, leather jacket, a few t-shirts sox and pants, and that's about it I guess. All the rest of my stuff not immediately suitable can be packed for later (expensive) shipping. When it arrives, I will be able to sort thro everything and THEN decide to throw it all away :)

later ....

What voting means to me

2004-11-02T13:55:00.000-06:00

In response to a request on a newsgroup, I posted this:

When we vote, we honour those whose struggles made possible the freedoms we cherish. We remember Emily Pankhurst. We remember Birmingham, Alabama. From the Mississippi Delta, to the Townships in South Africa, and in every country in the democratic world, we owe our rights, and have a duty towards, those brave people who struggled and died to create a fairer world.

So when I vote, I vote with conviction and with pride. My parents, among many, were in the forefront of the struggle for the rights of the less fortunate in our country, so when I vote, I honour their commitment too. I vote also to show my children that Dad feels this is both a right to be exercised, and an obligation to be proud of.

We are *quaint* over on Right Pond .... we still put a pencil cross on a piece of paper, which is then counted by hand by lot's of volunteers. Whether a pencil or a thumbprint, postal ballot or button to press on some fancy smancy gadget, it matters not.

What does matter is that you vote. Voting isn't *optional*, it's an obligation you inherited with the bald eagle on the front of the little blue passport. Not voting isn't *abstaining*, it's copping out! If you want to abstain, get to the voting station, and spoil your vote. If you choose not to vote, then you give up the right to make any comment about the performance of those persons elected to represent you and your country. You dishonour the real heros. It's your choice.

Black, White, Christian, Jew, Gay, Redhead, Native American, Democrat, Republican ..... whoever you are and whoever you want to vote for, all that matters tomorrow is that you do it.

Then you can walk or drive home thinking:

"I did what I could, with my hand on my heart, to make this world a better place when I leave it, than it was when I arrived"

my non-partisan 2p

steveb

steve's journal

Phuket

The things they say

This just does it for me :)

What a difference a day makes.

What's wrong in America?

Why bother to vote

Fiscal Conservatism

Rank Incompetence

Wandering around the Internet

Can John McCain be remembered as one of the greatest American Patriots?

The beginning of the end?

Leave the kids alone

Citius, Fortius, Altius

Constitutionally Speaking

Racism - A tool that divides

Travel Broadens The Mind

Back to Walmart Again

Moving Soon

Mitt Romney aka Idiot of our time

US Primary Elections

From "Cheers and Jeers"

Absolute evidence that our child has started school ..

Happy Birthday Karl

A note to American restaurant staff

Understanding Oklahoma

Update re: Dish Network

Meet my 2nd Ex-Wife

Dish Network - See you in Court

Life in the Fast Lane

Bemused

So, it's not just Oklahomans who are nuts!

If that girl gets out of bed ..

When will America ....

News (sic) Reporting

We all should have fountains

Oh to be in England ...

Just because

Camping

Humans .... Can't live with them, can't kill them!

Is Bush the *Worst President Ever?*

Awakenings

Shopping for Dummies

Life, the Universe, and Jodie ...

Family don't call family "Fatass"

Iraq ..... the President's Schoolyard

Just for Tom and Joe

Who controls whom?

Do the dishes!

Memorial Day

What was the most venomous thing in our yard?

Jerry Falwell

Mother's Day USA

sigh ....

America? Which America?

New Blog

Busted

$uper Bowl

Rap? Techno?

We should all have this problem

Oklahoma Air National Guard

Black Friday revisited

Email to amazon.com

The Spirit of our Marriage

Boogers and Vomit

So, you think you have nothing to hide?

Never a Dull Moment

Maximal Stress Test

Battle Creek

Karl

So you wanna be a SAHM*

Wedded Bliss

House Rules

Coughing Re-visited

Proud Parent Syndrome

Cough Syncope (It makes you fall over)

Howard Stern

Road Rage

Sooners v. Cowboys

Black Friday

Is Bush the Worst President Ever?

Sear's Promotions Department

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