drowning our sorrows

Jerry made it to Honolulu. The condo where he will be living for the next month and where I will join him in two weeks is just a couple blocks from Waikiki. I was Facebook IMing him this morning (he was up early, thanks to jet lag), and he was loving being there, his favorite place in the world. We commiserated for a while about how the elections turned out, but he has the beach to console him and even an Aloha Sushi in his building.

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Me, my way of drowning those sorrows, as I blog aimlessly, is to sit here treating myself to a Pepsi and thinking about going to see the movie Jackass 3 tonight. One of my Guilty Pleasures -- the Jackass movies. Well, and Pepsi too of course, but I ration my Pepsi intake as much as I can stand to.

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... and isn't it one of Life's Dirty Tricks that Pepsi isn't a health drink -- That the more of it you drink, the better it is for you? Life really sucks sometimes, when you really stop and think about it.

*****

Interesting factoids coming out of the election: 37 wimpy Democrats in Congress voted against the health-care bill; of these, only 12 were re-elected. The other 25 were voted out.

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In exit polls, 47% of senior citizens voted for Tea Party candidates. It's kind of funny but also pathetic that so many seniors hate government involvement in providing health care but they sure do love their Medicare!

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This from my friend Lee: "Here's a terrible thing. Voters in Iowa ousted the 3 judges that put in same-sex marriage. Time for another Pepsi..."

don't forget to vote today....

..... even though we all know that our political system has become a total embarrassment.... and tonight we'll hear that the political party that destroyed the U.S. economy through 2008 and then over the last two years refused to cooperate to help fix it will be voted back into Congressional majority. Incredibly stupid.

... But life goes on, we hope...

Randy Moss has been let go by the Minnesota Vikings, and most Vikings fans, including myself, are ready to say, Hey let's get rid of the coach instead. It's a weird football year. It might be time to move on to something else.

Jerry left this morning for his month in Hawaii. Might be a perfect time for an escape.

back when everybody watched the World Series

Congratulations to the San Francisco Giants, 2010 World Champions.

packing for a month away in a distant time zone

Hawaii is five time zones away from Minnesota. It's an eight-hour plane ride from here IF you get a non-stop flight.

... and it's Jerry's favorite place in the world.

He leaves Tuesday for a month of R & R there. I follow in a couple weeks to spend the last two weeks with him.

But planning and packing for a month away is no easy chore. Meanwhile, he's cooking an elaborate dinner for our friends Diane and Tony, who are coming over to watch the Vikings-Patriots game that starts in a few minutes, and dealing with work stuff that keeps his phone ringing even on a Sunday afternoon.

"I'm overwhelmed!" he just said.

He needs to be on that plane waiting for take-off.

pitfalls of democracy, part three

I was just reading that the Tea Party woman who is running against Harry Reid for his Nevada U.S. Senate seat is predicting a major Republican victory on Tuesday, that they will re-take the House of Representatives and maybe the Senate, all of which will lead to the repeal of the Obama health care law, she says. I recognize that this might happen.

The health care law is of course mostly hated by the insurance and pharmaceutical corporations, who have the power and the resources to sponsor these office-holders and candidates and television ads, and, by repeating supposedly vicious buzz words like "socialistic" over and over until they become distorted truths, they know how to fool the under-educated American public into voting against their own best interests.

We hear that tens of millions of Americans have had no health insurance, but the plain fact is that most Americans do have health insurance in percentages that probably lead to the large percentages (in polls, at least) that are against "Obamacare". To repeal this law is to go back to the disgraceful health insurance policies that denied coverage to the people that really need it but are a definite voting minority. The Obama law is flawed and needs to be improved, but it is a major step in the right direction.

clearing a path

This morning I drove into the office parking ramp, and there was a guy at the gate with a box of candy and a big smile, saying "Happy Halloween!" That and the little bag of Peanut M & Ms made me smile too and shook me back into a reality of time and place. It set the tone for a good day at work catching up on the stuff that had piled up while I was gone -- unexpectedly -- for most of the week. Normalcy returns, but I think I have a renewed appreciation for extended family. We in our family are lucky to have each other.

PHL to JFK to MSP

Back home to much chillier temps than when we left...

We generally fly non-stop, Philly to Minneapolis, but this time we were using frequent-flyer last-minute tickets and beggars can't be choosers, so these tickets had us changing planes at JFK Airport in New York. It's kind of a weird, non-user friendly airport to make a connection but it all worked out well. Made us want to stay in New York for a few days.

brothers

My brother Davy arrived from Texas yesterday and my brother Ronnie lives here in South Jersey, so all six of us siblings were together last night for the viewing/visitation (In NJ, it seems to be a "viewing"; in Minnesota, it tends to be a "visitation"). It's not very often that we're all in the same place at the same time, and we enjoy it when it happens. We just wish it wasn't a funeral bringing us together.

There were probably 400 people at the viewing, long lines out the door of the funeral home. Today is the funeral and the burial. It is a gloomy rainy day, which seems appropriate as we say goodbye to our beloved brother-in-law John.

sisters

My brother-in-law John was always kidding around, was a tease, loved making people laugh, so it's fitting that as we mourn his death, we also are doing a lot of laughing and enjoying each other as we remember "John stories". These days that we're spending with my sister Mary and with my other sisters, Joan and Nancy, and with Mary's daughter, son, and daughter-in-law will be days that we will always remember as precious. This is what family is for.

For my sister Mary, who is remarkably brave and strong, this is a surreal time, this time between his death Friday morning and the services that are to come. The viewing is tonight and the funeral is tomorrow, and many people are expected from all aspects of John's whole life. It's not easy for her to face all that, I'm sure, while she is still in shock from the loss of her mate.

Rather than just sitting around waiting for the viewing tonight, Mary asked if we could go to the shore today, so we drove down to the boardwalk in Ocean City, where it was gray and breezy and beautiful. And familiar. It was exactly the right thing to do.

video monday again

click on the "x" to get rid of the ad at the bottom of the video...

gathering

First of all -- Happy Birthday, Jerry! and that's all I'll say on that matter since he very rarely looks at my blog anyway.. :-) Sorry to miss his birthday, but I'm here in New Jersey and he's still in Minnesota and will arrive here tomorrow to join the rest of the family for John's funeral on Wednesday.

For me, it's one of those "worst of times, best of times". The family is so far-flung geographically that it's a happy occasion to see everybody coming together, since it doesn't happen often, yet the mourning takes over our emotions now and then, sometimes unexpectedly and out of the blue.

MSP to PHL

Off to New Jersey to spend time with family.

John

My brother-in-law John, after putting up an amazing fight against cancer, passed away this morning.

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He came into our family in the early '70s, and he and my sister Mary were married in December 1973. This photo was taken somewhere around that time, and they stayed as happy during all those years as they look in this picture. It's hard to think of him being gone. I'll miss him a lot. He became a brother.

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The family will gather in New Jersey within the next several days. I'll be leaving tomorrow for this sad trip.

racquetball flashbacks

The U.S. Open Racquetball Championships are being held this week at my gym at Target Center. There are people and booths and bleachers everywhere, and all of the racquetball courts are being used (which never happens on a normal day). They even turned the basketball court into a racquetball court. So after my workout I watched some championship-level racquetball.

Racquetball was a passion of mine back in the first half of the '80s, and even though I could never get above a B level of play, I had matches or leagues three or four times a week. I loved the game, and during that time I was definitely in the best shape I've ever been in in my life. That was also, I think, the heyday of racquetball nationwide. It doesn't seem nearly as popular these days, and the people who were playing back then had their knees give out eventually. I still get into a court and hit the ball around a little now and then, but the days of hard-core playing are well over. Watching is still fun, though.

So if you're thinking of trying racquetball sometime, I say Go Ahead. Your knees one day will give out from something else anyway, probably something a lot less fun.

pitfalls of democracy, part two

Yesterday, I ranted a little about the Obama Administration's apparent decision to appeal 'don't ask, don't tell' being recently overturned by a federal judge.

If the government's logic is that 'the people' should be making decisions, then here is an example of inconsistency: California has a referendum on the November ballot to legalize marijuana in that state. The U.S. Attorney General has already announced that, if the referendum passes, the federal government will fight it.

First of all, marijuana is almost legal in California anyway. Second, legalizing pot would not infringe on people's rights like 'don't ask, don't tell' does; in fact, it would make a lot more people 'non-criminals' while at the same time raising tax revenues.

So 'the people' have to approve a minority's rights but can't vote to undo illogical laws?

pitfalls of democracy, part one

A federal judge has struck down the stupid "don't ask, don't tell" policy in the military, so for a potentially brief moment gays can serve openly in the Armed Forces. Unfortunately, though, the Obama Administration will probably appeal the ruling, the reason being that they would rather that "don't ask, don't tell" be eliminated by Congress and not by a judge: in other words, that the "people" (theoretically represented by Congress) make the decision and not the judicial system. And any gays that "came out" in the interim will be discharged.

There are several problems with the Administration's thinking. First, the "people" have not voted up to now to overturn the policy, and it's been in place for 17 years. Second, whether a group of people should have rights is not something to be decided by a majority and therefore subject to its prejudices -- this is why we HAVE a judicial system. Third, President Obama (whom I still support, of course) should stop trying to cater to the conservatives who will never vote for him anyway and consider his political base instead.

video monday

Since nobody complained about the Olivia Newton-John video last Monday, I'm going to stick my neck out and try to put a video on every Monday for a while (until I get tired of doing so): Mostly music videos, from the sublime to the ridiculous, inspiring or silly... Here we go....

stones in the a.m., moss in the p.m.

When I walked into the coffee shop early this morning, "She's A Rainbow" was playing (1967, the Rolling Stones, from their album Their Satanic Majesties' Request).

"Wow," I say to the young woman behind the counter, "I've heard that song like five times in the past week, and before that I hadn't heard it in ages!"

"That's how it is with me and David Bowie," she says. "I go for months without hearing him at all, and then suddenly I hear him everywhere!"

"Maybe it's just a phase of the moon," I reply, and we agree that yep, that must be it.
*****
This afternoon, I don my Randy Moss #84 jersey and head to the Vikings-Cowboys game. This is Moss's first home game since being back on the Vikings team, and the 65,000 fans there will go crazy seeing him again. Probably a quarter of those 65,000 fans will be wearing #84 Moss jerseys, which like me they kept hanging in the back of their closets since he was traded a few years ago. The ones who in the intervening years dropped their Moss jerseys off at Goodwill have regrets.
*****
Hanging like a dark cloud over my normal activities these days are continuous thoughts of my brother-in-law John, in intensive-care in a hospital in New Jersey, his condition grave. I hate feeling helpless. I want him all well again......

you know how i love the park

Some more gushing about the weather. Forgive me.

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A gorgeous October Saturday afternoon. Another beautiful fall weekend that makes Minnesotans nervous: Is this the last one? And then there is the Minnesota guilt that maybe it's too nice: "But we really need some rain!"

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After meeting Joan downtown for coffee, going home didn't seem like a good option, so I took my book with me and went over to one of the park benches at Loring Park, about a block from our condo. The fountains have been turned off until spring and it's a sweatshirt temperature, I guess, but I enjoyed sitting there reading and listening to the bells at the Basilica and watching the people walking and biking past me. Over on the other side of the lake, there was a wedding party taking photos. Definitely a good photo day. I took a few myself.

*****

Just got an email from my son Tom. This afternoon in his bowling league, he got a 211, his highest score ever. Wow!

entertainment for a captive audience

My cousin Beverly (remember her? the ultimate Elvis fanatic? I told you about her August 16th) sent this email:

Just saw on TV where one of the Chilean miners was a die-hard Elvis
fan. He requested Elvis music sent down in the mine and would lead the
miners in Elvis sing-a-longs. Elvis Presley Enterprises has offered him
and a loved one an all expenses paid trip to Graceland. Remarkable how the
love of Elvis gets people through some rough times in their lives. I know
this is true.

Elvisly,
Beverly.

sports coming out our ears

Earlier this week, I had my car radio tuned to KFAN, the local sports-talk radio station, and part of that time as I listened I was wondering about the hosts and the callers-in, Do these people make sports their whole lives? How many times can you, for instance, analyze every detail of the Vikings-Jets game last Monday night?

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But now I realize how full of sports my week is this week. Unusually so -- I might be setting a personal record! First, there I was watching the Vikings-Jets game on Monday Night Football; then I attended the pre-season home opener Tuesday for the Minnesota Timberwolves (basketball); tonight my son Tom and I are going to the Minnesota Wild regular-season home opener (hockey); Saturday I'll be watching the Phillies on TV as they continue in the playoffs to try to get to the World Series again (baseball); and Sunday, Jerry and I are going to the Vikings-Cowboys game at the Metrodome (football again).
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I know it's just a short time when all four major professional sports games are going on at the same time, but as I am complaining that those KFAN listeners should be Getting A Life, I realize that this is a week when I had no life either!

going underground

As I write this, the 33 Chilean mine workers that have been trapped 2,000 feet underground for 70 days are being brought to the surface, one by one (13 so far). The world, misty-eyed, is watching them being reunited with their families and friends. A feel-good story in the news, finally.

What an ordeal it must have been, in large part because at the beginning their rescue appeared doubtful.

But beyond that, wow, can you imagine spending 70 days underground, in a very confined space, with your co-workers?! I asked my co-worker Theresa, who has worked with me for 21 years this month, what that might be like. Let's just say, her response was not positive and pointed out some of the ickier sides of the situation: 70 days almost naked, with no shower, no deodorant, no toilet facilities.

And I wonder how soon you'd run out of things to talk about. Would you get in heated arguments, just to ease the boredom? Would you come up above ground being better friends or hating each other forever? Maybe the Chilean miners will give us some insight.

day in court

I worked in downtown St. Paul for almost twenty years. We moved the office over here to Minneapolis seven years ago, but I find that I still have a certain fondness for downtown St. Paul. I just don't get to stroll the skyways over there much anymore, where once it was part of the daily routine.

Today I had to go over to St. Paul to testify in a client's divorce trial. I was sort of nervous about that -- it's kind of a contentious divorce -- but I stayed remarkably calm and relatively articulate, and, on some perverse level, I ended up enjoying being up there on the stand. Before I went to the courthouse, though, I had some time to kill and walked through the skyways and reminisced. Or maybe I just was missing being seven to twenty-seven years younger.

Stopped for lunch at a cajun fast-food place where I used to go there in the skyway (they have great bourbon-chicken), and the same people are still working there, and the lady was happy to see me.. "Long time no see!"... Then after lunch, I was walking by the security desk at our old office building, and the security person, a wonderful woman named Sabrina, called out to me and seemed excited to see me again.

There are times when it's nice to be anonymous in an urban setting, but it also feels kinda special to be recognized and remembered.

and now for something totally unexpected....

Turn on your sound and enjoy some music from 1980 (bad hair and all)...

(Actually, I'm just trying to figure out how to post a video)....

(click Play only once or you'll get double-exposure, and single-exposure is plenty)...

ten ten ten

10/10/10. or 10.10.10. 10 October 2010 or October 10, 2010. Maybe a perfect 10 of a day? No, I guess the perfect "10" day was 10.10.1010, and I don't think that any of us remember that day, and did they even have calendars back then, and did anybody even have any idea what the date was? It was still the Dark Ages, you know.

As I was heading to the coffee shop this morning and feeling perfect temperatures and seeing fallen leaves everywhere but with a lot of colorful leaves still on the trees and as I enjoyed the autumn moment, I was thinking, Why can't we just freeze time right here and stay like this forever (Although I hesitate to use the word "freeze")?

Instead the moment passed, and now I'm in my office catching up on work (on a Sunday morning) and taking a couple minutes to blog with you fine folks.

Jerry is in San Juan, Puerto Rico for three days, for three reasons: To re-visit Puerto Rico now and then because he lived there for a year a couple decades ago and all of his memories of it aren't bad; to visit his good friend Jose; and mostly because he needed the frequent-flyer miles to keep his Delta Silver Medallion status (And fares to Puerto Rico are apparently cheap).

and uh-oh, I see on an Internet website that Brett Favre is in trouble. I need to get back to work and get the heck out of here.

it was seventy years ago today

It is hard to imagine what John Lennon would have been like at age 70. He was born seventy years ago today and was murdered thirty years ago December 8, and we were all cheated out of watching him grow older.

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And in those forty years that he lived, what a difference he made. It's hard to imagine how our lives would have been different if there had been no Beatles, and, let's face it, John Lennon was the creative spark of the Beatles.

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And it's also hard to imagine how our lives might have been different if he had still been with us the past thirty years, not only for his musical new directions but also as a voice and influence for peace and sanity.

*****

Closer to home and on a more personal level, it was twenty-nine years ago today that my younger son Tom was born. I remember that day so well, and he has been a joy from Day One. We celebrated his birthday last night, had cake and ice cream up on the 21st-floor rooftop on a perfect evening, and in a few minutes I'm taking him out for a birthday breakfast. It's hard to imagine what life would have been without him the past almost-30 years!

i really don't want to get a flu shot

The office building sent emails about free flu shots yesterday, and then after work I walked over to the gym and there were signs at the front desk about free flu shots, and then there are of course signs over there at Walgreens and CVS.

And I guess a lot of people do get flu shots. I know this because I always seem to hear about it when they have a reaction to the shots and are under the weather for a day or so. But I haven't had a flu shot since 1976 (one of those swine-flu years), and I don't think I've had the flu in a couple decades. This makes me highly unmotivated to stand in line for a flu shot. And who knows what they put in those vaccines? Plus, it's 83 degrees outside: who can think about cold-and-flu weather?

Tempting fate? Falling into one of those "over-60" categories of people who should be getting flu shots but ignoring the warnings? The heck with it, I'll take my chances for another year. And if in a couple months, I'm blogging about being sick as a dog or coughing my brains out, try not to remind me.

favre to moss

It was a big sports-news day yesterday, so let's recap!

Football: The New England Patriots traded wide-receiver Randy Moss back to the Vikings, and this has caused tremendous excitement here in Minnesota (except, of course, for those few contrarians who can't stand Randy Moss). What quarterback Brett Favre has lacked this season is an excellent pass receiver to throw to, and, in my humble opinion at least, Moss is the best. Let's hope that they have perfect chemistry together and can make the rest of this season entertaining at least and maybe even of champion caliber!

Baseball (2 days in a row!): The excitement from the Moss trade helped to offset the Twins' disappointing loss in the first playoff game with the Yankees. Everybody here is thinking, Oh no, here we go again, probably not getting past the first round of the playoffs.

But, for me, a Phillies fan, it was also a good day because the Phillies not only won their first playoff game, but their pitcher Roy Halladay threw for a no-hitter. There has not been a no-hitter in a post-season game since 1956! An amazing accomplishment.

And I won't blog again about sports tomorrow unless some other spectacular thing happens. :-)

damn yankees

Today a lot of people here in downtown Minneapolis wore Minnesota Twins shirts to work. That's because, after work, a few blocks away, the baseball playoffs start. The Twins won their baseball division in impressive style. Reality, though, might hit them hard in the face now since the first (and maybe only) team they're meeting in the playoffs is their nemesis, the New York Yankees. In their last 18 meetings, Minnesota has won two games and the Yankees have won 16. Of course, everybody in the country other than Yankee fans hate the Yankees, so maybe all that hate flowing from around the U.S. will energize the Twins to victory.

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Then, if somehow they get past the Yankees, the Twins will face either Texas or Tampa, and the winner of that match-up will go to the World Series to face the National League champ, which of course I'm hoping will be the Phillies. Philadelphia starts their playoffs tonight against Cincinnati. It's a lot of good teams to get past, but a Phillies-Twins World Series would be great, wouldn't it?

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The Phillies were in the World Series last year, you know, but ended up losing to -- whoops, the Yankees. Damn!

*****

Football note: I'm so glad I kept my Randy Moss Vikings jersey!!

facebook: the movie

A couple nights ago, I was able to drag Jerry away from his laptop and Facebook to go see the new movie about the founding of Facebook, The Social Network (see my blog post on September 16).

This film has opened to critical acclaim and box-office success. It is sort of a fictionalized/non-fiction story of how Mark Zuckerberg founded Facebook in his Harvard dorm a few short years ago and how it has developed into a company worth billions.

I liked it. The film is very face-paced and engaging, and Jesse Eisenberg as Mark is totally convincing. Jerry liked it not quite as much, and I think that my sister Joan didn't like it much at all, finding the story not all that interesting. But for those of us who have made Facebook a part of our everyday lives, I guess that it's just a film to see.

Meanwhile, real-life Facebook dramas continue. People get happy with it for a while, and people sometimes get offended by thoughtless Facebook "friends", even to the point of dropping out of Facebook altogether. And then you miss them when they're gone and you hope they come back.

hymn-singing with garrison keillor

OK, I wasn't quite "singing". I don't do that. But I do listen.

And it was billed as "an old-fashioned hymn-sing", held at our church yesterday afternoon, led by Garrison Keillor, author and host of the radio program A Prairie Home Companion. I guess it was sort of a tip of the hat to "the evangelicals" in this decidely non-evangelical church.

Garrison grew up in a fundamentalist evangelical church, as did I and as did the music director of our church, and we're apparently still all "in recovery" from those days. Yet it felt sort of good to hear some familiar songs (I knew them all by heart), even though they are full of "blood" and "sin" and all the buzz words related to guilt. "If any of you grew up hearing rough preaching," Garrison told the audience, "this may be emotional for you." And maybe it was, a little, even though there is for me a total dis-connect theologically between me and these hymns. I think for most of the people there, though, these 150ish-year-old gospel songs were brand new.

Garrison Keillor seemed a lot older and more feeble than the last time I saw him, four years ago, by the way. I wonder if he would think the same about me!

the heat is on

I hate myself for mentioning the weather again, but here it is.... and it's mostly all positive for the moment, so why not celebrate it? The past week has been one of the most beautiful early-autumn weeks that I have seen. The leaves are changing color, but the temperatures have been in the 70s for the most part. I have a friend Marty who says that his favorite weather is "shorts and sweatshirt" weather, so I know he is relishing these days.

A little blip on the radar now and then reminds us that these days are fleeting. Last night, the temperatures fell into the upper 30s, and, even though the next week will bring us temps back into the 60s and 70s, a killer frost can't be far behind.

Our 23-story condo building has either air conditioning or heat available to be turned on in the individual units, never both at once. This morning, there was a notice in the elevators: The heat has been turned on. Which means that, unless a freak heat-wave turns up anytime soon, we don't have an air-conditioning option until next spring. Ominous.

No reason to turn on heat yet for us, though. Let's open some windows and let the breeze flow through.

my competitive brother

My brother Davy, who generally splits his time between San Antonio, Texas and Shanghai, China, called me on my cell phone yesterday from an Air Force base in Indiana, waiting for an Air Force military hop to Hawaii. He retired from the Air Force about twenty years ago and still has the benefit of getting cheap/free? military flights (as long as he doesn't mind no frills and being on standby indefinitely).

And why Hawaii, you ask? Well, first of all, Hawaii is Hawaii, and everybody should see Hawaii sometime. But also because Hawaii was one of the seven states that Davy had never been in, and I'm realizing that he and I are suddenly in a competition to see who visits all 50 states first. I have three to go, and now he will be down to six, and later this month he is coming to visit us in Minnesota with the intent of taking road trips from here to North Dakota and Iowa, which will bring him down to four.

So do I start booking flights to Oklahoma City and San Antonio and Portland, or let him win? Am I as competitive as he is? :-)

another downside of watching too much television

The political ads! They are mostly hideous, and the barrage will only get worse between now and November 2.

What is most appalling about them is how they have become totally devoid of substance. There is zero intelligent discussion of any issues. It's just negativity and distortion. And I say this about the campaigns even of the candidates that I support and will vote for.

The problem, other than of course that this is no way to operate an effective democracy, is that it turns off so many potential voters by Election Day that they don't go vote. Or is that part of the reason for the disgusting ads, to keep voter turnout down?

little red vw

Work is fine, the office is fine, my clients are fine, but there are just some days that shouldn't be spent there... As I was walking around downtown after lunch today, I had the greatest urge to just get into my little red GTI -- the best, most fun car I've ever had -- and drive lazily and aimlessly and see where I landed. I mean, it was such a perfect day, and I could have opened the sunroof and and turned up the music and headed away from the interstates and down some unknown country roads (making sure to avoid the ones that are closed due to flooding) and just smile, under the optimistic assumption that those back roads must all lead somewhere.

Instead, of course, I went back. After stopping to buy a lottery ticket.

clean water

Tonight Jerry and I are hosting a fundraiser for Clean Water Action, a nationwide non-profit organization advocating responsible environmental policies. We're expecting a turnout of between 75 and 100 people.

Clean Water Action's mission statement:

Clean Water Action is an organization of 1.2 million members working to empower people to take action to protect America's waters, build healthy communities and to make democracy work for all of us. For 36 years Clean Water Action has succeeded in winning some of the nation's most important environmental protections through grassroots organizing, expert policy research and political advocacy focused on holding elected officials accountable to the public.

http://cleanwateraction.org/ Check it out!

red meat night

A long but productive day at work, followed by a hard-hat tour of a 42-unit residence being constructed for homeless youth. Then home to find Jerry firing up the patio grill for bone-in ribeyes and grilled squash. All non-connected events that add up to a good day.

limited prosperity

Another mega-church, another flamboyant gay-hating pastor who ends up in bed with "the enemy"! This time it's "Bishop" Eddie Long, who leads a 25,000-member flock in Atlanta and farther than that through the miracle of television praise-and-condemn evangelistic entertainment.

It's not surprising that a leader who has the imagination and creativity to build an entertainment empire would turn out to be less than "straight" or that a person bad-mouthing other people for their sexual orientation would be less than secure in his own.

What amazes me instead is that there are so many people taken in by the spiel of a guy like this to begin with! He's one of those preaching a "prosperity gospel", which basically translates to "God wants you to be rich, and, if you're not, then you have a spiritual problem". That theory, of course, is based on the distortion of some remote verse in the Old Testament (and totally opposite the message of the New Testament). But he, the preacher, is dressed in expensive clothes, driving expensive cars, buying expensive houses, enjoying an extravagant lifestyle, so he must be right about this, correct?! Except of course, you and I can see that his riches came from the suckers throwing cash ("planting their seeds") into his offering plates. Somehow though, mindlessness continues, and prosperity theology is thriving.

take comfort in rituals

Yesterday afternoon when I was done at the gym, I stopped at the Starbucks across the street from Target Center, which is where I work out... you know that Starbucks -- the one next to the Hard Rock Cafe. It was one of those great September days, a day that felt perfect for sitting at one of the tables outside Starbucks with a cup of coffee. And it was. That's always a good spot for people-watching too.

While I was sitting there with my coffee, I noticed that there was a new phrase stencilled on the Starbucks door. It says "Take Comfort in Rituals", with the silouette of a steaming coffee cup. I'm thinking as I sip the coffee (which I took comfort in, by the way), "Hey, there might be a blog entry in that phrase somewhere" (my blog having become a 10-minute ritual of my day, although I'm not sure how much comfort I find in it). So I start thinking the predictable responses I could blog about, like rituals that I take comfort in or maybe how people take comfort in their religious rituals, or whatever.

But when I got back to my computer and Googled the phrase "Take comfort in rituals", I found all sorts of recent blogs mentioning the phrase (it must be a new Starbucks thing nationwide) with bloggers posting about rituals they take comfort in or how people take comfort in their religious rituals, or whatever. And I apparently have nothing original to add. But if, a couple hours after I post this, you Google that term and scroll down far enough, you'll find a link to this post also. Who it is at Google that scans these blogs I don't know, but it's a bit intimidating. And impressive.

'i can't sleep anymore, it's too much like death'

That's one of the best lines from my favorite movie, Moonstruck.

I've always heard older people say that they can't sleep late, and they get up at the crack at dawn. Now I've become one of them. No matter how late I stay up (after falling asleep watching TV), I'm awake at 6:30 or 7, and the options are to just lie there and toss and turn or give in and get up for the day.

So I'm up, and I admit that the mornings are a beautiful time to be alive. Time for coffee now. Nap time later: another old-person's trait.

a taste of san juan

Way back when, Jerry lived in Puerto Rico for a year -- a year in which he rented out roller skates and organized a failed rock concert that almost got him killed (I'll let him tell that story sometime) -- but one thing that stayed with him from that year is his Puerto Rican cookbook. Tonight, we're attending a church-group pot-luck dinner to which everyone is supposed to bring an ethnic dish (other than your own ethnicity), so Jerry is making one of his signature dishes, Puerto Rican-style rice and beans. It's always quite good. Even you might like it, Ruthie! My concern, of course, is what will the other ethnic dishes there be? If I taste even a hint of cilantro in anything, I'm outta there!

don't ask, do tell

The U.S. Senate a couple days ago nixed the repeal of "Don't ask, don't tell", 17 years old now and one of the silliest laws of all time. It's still fine to be gay or lesbian in the military as long as you never say those words out loud about yourself ("Freedom of speech" and "bearing false witness", re-defined).

My fantasy that will never happen: One day, all on the same day, every gay man and lesbian in the U.S. Armed Forces vocally "come out of the closet". Think about it. What if 10% of the military is gay or lesbian (which may be a conservative number)? There are 2 million people total in the military, so that would mean that the country would suddenly be dealing with throwing 200,000 people out of the service? Not only would the brass (and Congress) be shocked by the sheer numbers, they'd find that they were facing the prospect of firing many of The Best that they have.

the bristol stomp

Last night I was waiting for Jerry in the condo lobby -- we needed to run over to St. Paul -- so I stopped in the condo office and chatted with Judy. In addition to all the security cameras she was watching, there on one of the screens was Dancing With the Stars, a show that I've never seen (I do have my limits, you know!), and there was Bristol Palin dancing with some partner. I'm not a pro at dance technique, so I don't know if she was any good or maybe a total klutz, but the idea of her current celebrity status still grates on me and it even annoys me that I'm writing about it. In addition to stints like this on TV, she now gets $15,000 - $30,000 per speaking engagement to advocate for "sexual abstinence". It's hard to see how she can have much credibility in those speeches, however. Pre-marital sex turned out to be the best career move she ever could have made. That and being born to a mother who became a big-mouthed governor of Alaska for about ten minutes.
*****
Took the day off today to go to the Twins noon game later. I went over to the coffee shop early and found it to be a totally different atmosphere than the weekend mornings that I'm used to there. Weekends are quiet, with a few old guys like me here and there. Today there were lots of students from the community college across the street -- books open, laptops going, nobody past their twenties. A great energy. Life.

hawaii five-o

Blame it on the HDTV that we bought last spring, but I'm finding we spend more evenings than we used to being Couch Potatoes. We've gone from knowing zero current TV shows to knowing a few of them.

Now the "new" TV season has started, and we actually found ourselves looking forward to a couple shows last night -- the season premiere of Two and a Half Men and the series premiere of the re-make of Hawaii Five-O. It's kind of scary that we even knew what time they came on!

And even though the original Hawaii Five-O was on TV all those years, I didn't realize until yesterday that the "Five-O" part of the name was because Hawaii was the 50th state. Anyway, this remake is well done, although we probably mostly enjoyed seeing familiar Hawaii scenes in High Definition. We're going back to Hawaii for a visit in November, you know, but I'll save that story for another time.

witchy woman

It drives me crazy that the more outrageously incompetent a political candidate is, the more that person makes the news and the blogosphere. The latest is that Tea Party favorite, Christine O'Donnell, who is now the Republican candidate for a U.S. Senate seat in Delaware. This woman, believe me, has zero credentials to be a Senator and is mostly known for her extreme religious-right statements and for being an "anti-masturbation" crusader on MTV in the '90s.

Her headlines in the "news" the last several days have been that her religious backers are shocked -- shocked! -- to learn that Christine "dabbled in witchcraft" a few years back. They are demanding explanations -- in other words, is she a pure-enough "christian" for them? This would all be hilarious to watch if it weren't for the fact that this unqualified whack-job could end up in the United States Senate (Actually, in this case, "whack-job" might be an inappropriate term to describe her!).

visitor from the mosque

I live in a district that elected the first Muslim U.S. Congressman, Keith Ellison. There is a fairly large Muslim population in the Twin Cities. We are used to diversity in our midst. Presumably because of that, there doesn't seem to be the Islamophobia here that there is in much of the country at the moment -- the people being stirred up by by religious pseudo-leaders, Fox News, and desperate politicians who need fear to operate.

This morning in our church -- admittedly, one of the most progressive Protestant congregations you'll find anywhere -- an Imam from a North Minneapolis mosque was an invited guest to speak for a few minutes and read a passage from the Qur'an. It was a very moving service, celebrating inter-faith beliefs in common rather than hatred based on ignorance.

I was proud to be there.

not quite ready for 'freedom'

Jonathan Franzen's new novel, Freedom, is getting lots of attention: Excellent reviews, a cover story in Time magazine, #1 on the bestseller lists, and now the ultimate assurance of selling zillions of copies -- being selected for the Oprah Winfrey Book Club. What makes the Oprah selection particularly noteworthy is that she picked Franzen's book, The Corrections, in 2001, and then Franzen apparently gave the impression that he was conflicted about being an Oprah pick, so she rescinded the offer, all of which produced plenty of media attention and guaranteed the sale of zillions anyway. Apparently now all is forgiven, and good publicity is produced for all involved.

My sister Joan and I were talking about it over coffee at Barnes and Noble a few minutes ago. She is on the waiting list for Freedom at the library, and I'm debating whether to buy a copy. There is something appealing about being part of a group reading, even with Oprah fans, and I liked The Corrections quite a lot, and the Freedom story even takes place here in the Twin Cities. The downside: It's 576 pages, and I've become such a slow book reader, which of course is why I can't borrow it from the library and be expected to read it in three weeks. This might have to wait for cold winter nights. Although they are quickly approaching. Darn! Another weather reference!

the thousand-mile disadvantage

My parents both had lots of brothers and sisters, and almost none of them lived more than a half-hour away from us. When they needed each other, they were nearby for each other.

Now families seem to be scattered all over the country or even all over the world, and people get used to relying on people other than family in times of emergency and crisis and they often grow away from each other emotionally.

My five siblings and I are still close -- except in distance. My brother-in-law John in New Jersey is right now going through all kinds of hell with pain from cancer plus surgeries and treatments, and it's hard to not be more immediately available to him and my sister Mary. It's a helpless feeling being far away at a time when I feel like I should be following my dad's example and being there for family, in person and not just in spirit.

the social/anti-social network

I've been seeing trailers for a new movie that's coming out in a couple weeks. It's called The Social Network and is the story of the founders of that contemporary Internet phenomenon, Facebook.

If you use Facebook, and you probably do, then you know that it can bring chuckles and tears and pleasure and irritation. It can bring reunion with people you've lost contact with over the years or it can cause family fights or it can bring viruses to your computer. You name it.

Lately, I've seen some nasty family fight stuff going on, which mostly has to do with people finding out more about each other than they're comfortable knowing. Or political opposites within the same family. Or how about this: a fairly distant cousin (who I probably haven't seen in 40 years) who this week dropped all of her Facebook friends that hadn't publicly (meaning, on Facebook) consoled her on the recent death of her dog. Being dumped as a Facebook friend is the ultimate put-down these days, you know.

Then there are the Facebook friends that you maybe used to have some loose connection with and now have become a good cyber friend. The high-school classmates, for instance, that you maybe never once in high school had a conversation with and now you find yourself caring about their daily lives. And they care about yours.

It's all very strange. It's all quite new, yet it already feels so familiar.

the ides of september

The pace of my work life seems pre-determined by calendar dates, and the 15th day of certain months -- especially March, April, September, and October -- causes anguish and too many hours in the office, blah blah blah.... the worst part of that being that time goes too fast, and, look at us, the beautiful month of September is half gone.

But I finished work late last night and went with Jerry over to Eli's Bar and Grill, a couple blocks from our place, and had some tasty late-night dinner and some fun talk and, in my case, a couple of Tanqueray-and-tonics, and life was good again.... And I went home and crashed, while Jerry tried to plan the next vacation. 'Got to get it on the calendar somewhere in between deadlines!

the bush tax cuts

The next two months will be filled with nasty politics before the mid-term election in November.

And one of the issues that will be twisted into perversion rather than contemplated in rational discussion will be the expiration of the "bush tax cuts" at the end of 2010. Unless a new tax law is enacted before the end of the year, the tax rates will go back up to what they were in 2000. President Obama has suggested, Hey let's keep the tax rates as they are except for the wealthiest taxpayers. After all, we have huge budget deficits to get under control and continuing economic problems, and the wealthy have had good rates for ten years.

But the Republicans, the Party of No, says there will be no compromise. They have wealthy friends to protect, and they want all the bush cuts to stay in effect. They apparently would rather have everybody's taxes go up in 2011 and then blame that on the Democrats.

Money is very much involved, so this will be the dirtiest politics we've seen in a while. I sometimes am amazed at people who say they are Republicans because they are "fiscally conservative", when it's obvious that they are more and more fiscally irresponsible and destructive, with the focus only on power and the next election and the short-term. Pity the generation that is just now coming of age. They will inherit a disaster.

drawing

a blank today.

My brain is crammed with work stuff that if I tried to articulate any of it, I'd drive you away forever.

Something else tomorrow.

toccata and football in d minor

In some churches, "Rally Sunday" is the Sunday after Labor Day when the church year starts after a somewhat sleepier summer schedule. The church where I'm a member but where I'm sort of hit-and-miss about attending has been around for 157 years, and one of the many long-time traditions there is that the organ prelude on Rally Sunday is always Toccata and Fugue in D Minor by Bach, so this wasn't a Sunday that would be a "miss" for me. The Toccata is the classic piece for pipe organ, and the organist at this church is the best I know, so I relished every minute of hearing it. I've played this piece (rather ineptly) on pipe organ, and I know how challenging it is to play but also how much fun and how motivating it can be!

Then back home for another September tradition -- Sunday afternoon football. My son Tom is here and had a game on TV when I got home, and we ordered a pizza and here we sit vegetating and enjoying the moment....

09.11.01

A little earlier, I was having coffee downtown with my sister Joan, and we talked, among other thigns, about 9/11 and how that date still haunts us all. It is certainly a day every year when our country remembers the people who died in the attacks that day and the policemen and firemen and rescue workers that were the heroes that day, and it's right that we do that. But, as we were chatting and I was thinking, it was also a day when a lot of people were heroes: the people who just went to work that day, as stockbrokers, secretaries, clerks, restaurant workers, maintenance people, and were just normally doing their jobs that day.

We never heard much coverage that day about how New Yorkers found ways to get home to their families even though mass transit was paralyzed and communication was disrupted and nobody knew for sure what was going on. Or how about all those people in airplanes in flight across the country that had to be landed at the nearest airports and were potentially stranded for days? The country could have descended into chaos that day, and it didn't. I think there were a lot of heroes, ordinary people, who were never recognized or acknowledged and that there were many stories that were never heard.

09.10.44

My mom and dad were married 66 years ago today. It's strange, but even though they've been gone for 23 and 21 years respectively, certain dates -- their birthdays, anniversaries, the dates of their deaths -- still pop up in my mental calendar every year. Happy Anniversary, Mom and Dad. I hope that if you're out there somewhere, that somehow you're together.

acceptable levels of violence

You know I'm a non-violent person -- very anti-war and against all forms of physical abuse -- so my love of football sometimes must seem like an obvious exception to my principles. But we all have exceptions to our principles, do we not?

That NFC Championship Game last January between the Minnesota Vikings and the New Orleans Saints almost made me re-think football. The obvious game plan of the Saints was to injure the Vikings quarterback, Brett Favre, to the point of having him carted off the field, perhaps permanently. It was brutal to watch but at the same time, realistically, maybe just an extreme version of what football is. Football has been compared to war -- men fighting for territory -- and it has left many football players in pain and with disabilities for the rest of their lives.

Yet the season officially starts tonight -- a rematch of the Vikings and the Saints -- and I'm anxious for it and I hope the Vikings smash the heck out of those rotten Saints. So maybe football is just another of those Guilty Pleasures of mine. Are you keeping track of these?

another religious war would make for good headlines

I was going to write something innocuous about what a beautiful day it is and how near-perfect, weather-wise, it should be for the Twins game tonight we're going to, but now I'm too annoyed by the news media to think about all that mundane stuff. What has me fired-up is all the attention that a nobody idiot preacher in Florida is getting this week because he and his sub-moronic congregants (a measly 50 members) plan to burn copies of the Koran (Quran? Qu'ran?) this Saturday, September 11, in an apparent attempt to piss off the entire Muslim world.

Now, think about it: News reporters could have ignored the fool, figuring he's just another lunatic-fringe nut case, which of course he is, but no! They had to make this into a "news story" which has now caused international outrage. International outrage, of course, will not keep the dweeb from getting his 15 minutes of fame and becoming a hero to ignorant fear-addicts and becoming a talking-head on Fox News. His weird little church will be bursting at the seams, he'll get all kinds of offers for speaking engagements, and maybe he'll run for office as a Tea Party candidate. The sky's the limit.

I heard somebody the other day say that all wars have been caused by religion, directly or indirectly. I'm not sure I agree with that, but I do have the feeling that the next one will be a doozy. If only just the religious extremists could fight each other and knock each other off and leave the rest of us out of it! Or isn't that a big enough story?

the day after summer vacation

There is something about the day after Labor Day that brings on some sense of the blues or impending doom. It could be just the realization that we have to go through another long winter before we ever see summer again. For me and for some other people, I don't think that's it. Going back in time in my case several decades, it was always the day that school started up again, and that feeling of dread still pops up annually in my psyche, just out of habit. School wasn't exactly the Prime Time of my life, although, now that I think about it, I'd be hard-pressed to name the period that was Prime Time. Geez, maybe it's now... although I'd rather think it was a time when my eyes, my knees, and my prostate were a bit more dependable!

last day for white shoes

Labor Day. There should be more holidays like this. Ones where there are no particular places to be or things to do or presents to buy or any obligations at all.

We thought maybe we'd get up early and go to the last day of the State Fair, but the idea sounded less appealing when we woke up this morning (although we might still end up at the Fair later). Instead, we went to the Spyhouse Coffee Shop over there on Hennepin Avenue in Uptown (probably the "hippest" part of Minneapolis) and sat outside while I drank coffee and read my Nick Hornby book (Juliet, Naked) and Jerry drank herbal tea and read the newspaper. The weather today is cool and kind of cloudy, and as we sat there we thought, Hey, this feels just like Amsterdam! ... and how could life ever feel more perfect than this?

Amsterdam, our favorite city in the world (so far!) is where we went several years in a row this time of year -- late August, early September -- and the memories are good: a week on a houseboat in the middle of the city or sitting at outdoor cafes drinking coffee or smoking a joint (Ha! No, I didn't really say that). One day we'll get back there, but for this morning at least, Minneapolis felt awfully good.
*****
For those of you who would ever wear white shoes, remember that it's been decreed by the Fashion Police that you can't wear white shoes after Labor Day, so enjoy your white shoes today. Fortunately, I've never had a white shoe on in my life anyway, unless you count sneakers, for which I hope no fashion rules ever apply!

a junket

We got back home to Minneapolis yesterday, where suddenly people are wearing sweatshirts and jackets. (Fall couldn't wait until after Labor Day? [tomorrow?])

While I was at the coffeeshop this morning, I was thinking about this trip down South. We took advantage of that free gambling-junket offer mainly to travel through four states, but what about the gambling part of the trip? Well, believe me, we are only occasional and low-end casino gamblers, but I had a vague awareness that there were such things as gambling junkets and yet didn't know what to expect.

Most of the people on the casino charter plane from Minnesota (about 120 people) had done these trips before, so for them it was Old Home Week seeing each other again. All very nice ordinary people and none of them obviously wild-eyed ravenous gamblers, so I'm not sure exactly what drives these invitations. The casinos obviously know what they're doing, though, and are good at the red-carpet treatment. Since we don't get out of control in the casinos themselves, I'd do one of these trips again if we get the offer, which we probably will. I'm hoping for an offer to Biloxi, down there on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. We could have some good driving trips out of there!

Until then -- no more casino thoughts for a while. Or road trips.

46 in the 47th

We're on our way home after a definitely worthwhile and fun trip. Plus, I'm able to add four states to my States I've Visited List, am up to 47 -- three to go after this (Oregon, Oklahoma, Texas). The 47th was Alabama yesterday, where we spend exactly 46 minutes -- long enough to pee and have some coffee and apple pie. That gives Alabama the distinction of being the state, of the ones I've seen, that I've spent the least amount of time in, replacing West Virginia. More exciting Howard trivia to come.
*****
For Instance:
THE STATES THAT I'VE SPENT THE MOST TIME IN:
1) Minnesota (How did this happen?).
2) New Jersey (Which is maybe where my heart has sort of always been).
3) South Carolina (Don't ask).
4) North Carolina (2 months of Army basic training at Fort Bragg, plus several other trips to the state).
5) Louisiana (2 months of Army jungle training at Fort Polk, with no return trips ever!).

on the road again

Where we're staying, in Tunica, Mississippi, is just south of Memphis, Tennessee, and just east of Arkansas, so yesterday we drove through the countryside of this part of Mississippi and into northeast Arkansas and from there into Memphis.

What we noticed: That this part of Mississippi and Arkansas, except for the casinos here in Tunica, are unbelievably poor, especially in the little towns. In fact, Tunica County was the poorest county in the U.S. until the casinos were brought here. I guess that's the reason that casinos were plopped down in an area that otherwise has nothing else -- that and its promixity to the Memphis metro area.

Also noticed: That if I lived in the South, I'd be fat as a pig. I have such a weakness for Southern-style comfort food and I'm eating such good food on this trip that it's a good thing we're going home tomorrow.

Today, we head east to Alabama so that I can cross that state off my States to be Visited List. We won't stay there long, will then head up north through Alabama and cross through southern Tennessee to Memphis where we will have a BBQ dinner in one of the great restaurants there.

the magnolia state

Ah, Mississippi.... Of the 50 states, it's the one that is usually last in education, in income levels, and a lot of the other good stuff... But today we explore it a tiny bit at least, then will wander over into Arkansas a little and then up to Memphis for dinner....

john grisham's neck o' the woods

The early John Grisham novels seemed to always take place in steamy Mississippi and/or across the Tennessee border in Memphis. Grisham novels might have mostly been a '90s thing -- his newer books are kind of lazy and I might be done reading Grisham forever -- but it used to be that readers eagerly anticipated those once-a-year legal-intrigue books.

Anyway, we are on our way to Mississippi for three nights, not because of John Grisham but in spite of him (he never made it sound very appealing), and we wouldn't be going at all except that it's a free airfare, free hotel trip paid by a Mirage-related casino that has been deluded into thinking that we'll gamble enough to make it worth their while. Since we were just in Las Vegas last week, gambling is (mostly) out of our system for a while, so instead we're renting a car while we're down there to drive into the backwoods of Mississippi, Arkansas, Tennessee and maybe Alabama, at the same time hoping not to get killed by rednecks. Wish us luck!
*****
My favorite John Grisham books: The Firm, The Chamber, and A Time To Kill.

dumb and dumber

I've been carrying around this Blackberry since last November, and I still mostly just use it for a cell phone and for some email. I know it's capable, in theory anyway, of a lot more functions but I'm a real klutz when it comes to this stuff, so when I was at Barnes and Noble (another guilty pleasure) the other day and saw the book Blackberry Storm for Dummies, I bought it. There on the shelf next to it was The iPod for Dummies and that book even came with an hour-and-a-half DVD, so I bought that too since I know my knowledge of my iPod is basic and on that day I must have been in a super electronic mood.

But, as I struggle through the Blackberry book, I'm realizing that a bunch of it is still way over my head, so I'm not sure what level of dummies these books in particular are made for, and that makes me nervous. Or I think I might just have a mental block toward cell phones in general. Yeah. Let's say that's the answer.

Sometimes I wonder if there will be ever be a backlash against being plugged in all the time and there will be a movement to disconnect from these gadgets and go "back to nature". Probably not in my lifetime.

leading us through the wasteland

My niece Ruthie needed someone to watch the Emmys with last night. The Emmys are the awards for TV shows, you know, and I hadn't watched those awards in a number of years. "You realize, Ruthie, that the only current TV show we know is 'Two and a Half Men'?" She assured me, though, that the reason to watch awards shows with someone else is to have somebody to make sarcastic comments to, so we of course were up for that.

But it turned out to be fun watching with her. She knew most of the nominated shows and the celebrities, so she was our interpreter for 2010 television. She also is a huge Jimmy Fallon fan, and he was the host for the program, so she was filled with Glee about that. Without her telling us who everybody was we would have been Mad Men. Or Lost.

leave the driving to them

As I was walking to the gym this morning, a guy stopped me and asked where the Greyhound Terminal was. I pointed to it, it was right down on the corner, and as I walked on I started realizing that as many times as I go down that street, I've forgotten that some people still take the bus for long trips. That's only surprising because I worked for Greyhound for a couple years while in college, in Mankato, Minnesota. It was a low-end, minimum-wage job, mostly selling tickets and schlepping luggage, but I learned a lot there: Geography -- mostly Upper Midwest, or at least those cities that have bus service; The quirks of how people travel; and the colorful Street People that like to (or least used to) hang out at bus depots.

I'd like to think that we all have learned something valuable from every job we've ever had.

After leaving the gym, I decided on my way home to stop at the bus station (I don't think I'd ever been in the Minneapolis terminal) to have a cup of coffee and mingle with passengers waiting for the bus to Chicago or wherever. No dice, it doesn't work that way anymore. Signs: "Passengers only beyond this point." Darn. I guess they don't want the wandering Street People there anymore, and today I was One of Them.

the books i've read this summer

1) BEAT THE REAPER, by Josh Bazell (Fiction, 2009). This might be the only novel I've read so far this year (I used to read mostly only novels). My bookgroup (that I basically attend just now and then) picked this one, and I must say I loved it -- a perfect summer beach book, without the beach in my case. It's about a former Mafia hit man who goes into the FBI's witness protection program and becomes a doctor. It's written in a very conversational style and has all kinds of surprise twists and revelations.

2) LAST CALL, by Daniel Okrent (Non-fiction, 2010). A very well-written and informative history of the Prohibition Era -- how the heck it ever happened and how useless it was. I learned a lot from this book.

3) MAYFLOWER, by Nathaniel Philbrick (Non-fiction, 2006). All about the Pilgrims and what came after the mythical first Thanksgiving.

4) THE POLITICIAN, by Andrew Young (Non-fiction, 2010). This is about the political rise and fall of John Edwards, written by his assistant. Our condo has a library, and I saw this book there -- wouldn't have read it otherwise -- and I found it fascinating. I couldn't put it down and read it in about two days.

5) THIS TIME TOGETHER, by Carol Burnett (Non-fiction, 2010). A total time-waster, but -- hey -- I've wasted time on worse things that Carol Burnett. And after all, this was summer reading.

spaghetti-and-meatballs on a stick

The Minnesota State Fair, a/k/a "The Great Minnesota Get-Together", started yesterday. It is the largest state fair in the U.S. in terms of average daily attendance, and conversations between Minnesotans this time of year, without fail, start with "So, are you going to the Fair this year?"

And I do go every two or three years, and it's usually a spontaneous kind of thing if the day happens to have State Fair feel to it. Today is one of those days, the weather is cool and perfect and I can see us strolling around the fair discovering what new foods are deep-fried and on a stick this year (If you ever want to gain weight, all you have to do is walk through the gates of the Minnesota State Fair). But I'm stuck in the office today, so the Fair urge might not last.

The downside of the Fair: It ends on Labor Day, which means this is the goodbye to summer --a definite reason to dread the opening day of the State Fair. It's no wonder that everybody drowns themselves in empty calories while it lasts.

jesse

On the flight back from Las Vegas to MSP yesterday, we were bumped up to First Class, where I found myself sitting in front of Jesse Ventura -- former high-profile professional wrestler ("The Body"), former Governor of Minnesota, current outspoken celebrity. He is a character and an interesting, even sort of likeable, guy to share a flight with. He loves to talk, as the people sitting around him can tell you, and we heard him sharing some of his Jesse words of wisdom. Some examples:

-- That 9/11 was an inside job;
-- That massive sales of bottled water will end up draining the Great Lakes;
-- That Sarah Palin is an idiot and that, if she should ever become President, we should all leave the country;
-- That he no longer is an advocate for third political parties (He was elected Governor as a third-party candidate) because a third party would become as corrupt as the Republicans and Democrats are (He thinks that candidates should be listed on the ballot without party affiliation so that voters would have to become more educated about the candidates and their positions).

He can go on and on about government conspiracies, and that is sort of fascinating to listen to, but keep in mind that he currently has a best-selling book on the topic -- American Conspiracies: Lies, Lies, and More Dirty Lies That the Government Tells Us, which I now have a morbid interest in reading just for the entertainment value.

Ain't life grand? 24 hours ago, I never would have guessed that I'd be devoting an entire blog entry to Jesse Ventura!

that's enough

OK.. Three days in Las Vegas is the limit. It's time to get out of here and head home. No more days of slot machines and gin-and-tonics for a while now, thank goodness. Well, that is, not until next week in Mississippi. Damn!

wading ever deeper into shallowness

It should be obvious by now that anything I write from Las Vegas will never win a Nobel Prize for Literature. A person's perspective changes, the brain metabolizes, gets a bit loose and mushy. For instance, I caught Jerry and Tim, professional men in their fifties and sixties respectively, talking yesterday about how much they would like to go to a Lady Gaga concert. Can you picture that, us at a Lady Gaga concert? But Jerry is convinced that Lady Gaga and her boyfriend (with a mile-high Mohawk) were checking out next to us when we were here at the Mirage in April. Now I admit that I wouldn't know Lady Gaga if I tripped over her, but Jerry would (thanks to the National Enquirer), and the woman checking out certainly dressed and looked like a celebrity of some sort, and the hotel workers were falling all over themselves kissing her butt, so who knows?

*

And on this particular visit I've noticed one -- well, maybe two -- things that I hadn't particularly paid attention to lately: cleavage is certainly very in right now, isn't it! Or maybe it's always been in and it's just more, well, out in the open these days. I'm so slow to catch on to some things.

*

And if I were being my usual grammatical self, I would have titled this blog entry correctly -- "wading ever more deeply into shallowness" rather than "wading ever deeper into shallowness." Or is "deeper" acceptable? I don't know. It's the Vegas effect.

*****

Last night, we went to the big show here at the Mirage -- the Cirque du Soleil show Love. What an enjoyable show, certainly my new favorite of the Cirque shows that I've seen. I had sort of low expectations for this one, expecting it to be kind of light and silly. Instead it's spectacular and beautiful, and with all Beatles music how can you go wrong?

*

I Should Have Known Better!

a mirage in the desert

I admit that it's one of my guilty pleasures. The Mirage Hotel is twenty years old now, but it was the trendsetter for what came later to the Strip in Las Vegas. When I come here, it's still where I stay, even though it's aging a little and there are glitzier and more over-the-top hotel/casinos now. I know I'm kinda boring, but I like the familiar feel, one of those home-away-from-home places. Fortunately, it's also (like Vegas in general) a place where three days is more than enough.

**

But the best part of vacations for me is always the early mornings. I never waste a vacation sleeping in late. I still have time-zone confusion, but I was up early and headed downstairs to Starbucks (another guilty pleasure) for some coffee and to read the paper. It's a beautiful morning. We'll see what the day brings. So far, we've been lucky.

catchin' the 2:15 to sin city

It's early on one of those Sunday mornings that I love...

My son Tom stayed over, as he usually does on Saturday nights. He and Jerry actually let me win at cards last night, and I'm hoping I didn't use up all my luck on that one game. I need more.

In a few minutes, we need to take Tom home in St. Paul, where we'll stop first for some breakfast on the outdoor patio at the Day by Day Cafe. Then back home to pack up the remaining necessities of life (the laptops, the cameras, the iPods, the cords and the chargers), meet Tim and Judie downtown at the light-rail station, and take the train out to the airport. Then we're leavin' on a jet plane, don't know when I'll be back again (actually, Wednesday evening), and we'll be off to wallow for three days in the hideous excesses of capitalism.

Viva Las Vegas, baby! I'll hook up with you there!

but it's a DRY heat

Saturday morning...

Walking over to the coffeeshop and from there to the gym, I could feel the humidity starting to push in. It's been an unusually hot and humid (and stormy) summer in the Twin Cities -- lots of days when it feels like we're walking through hot soup -- and it sounds like it will be pretty muggy here while we are out of town over the next several days.

When we made the reservations for Vegas, my fear would be that we would be facing temperatures of 115 - 120 in the Nevada desert in August. Looking online at the forecast, I'm seeing predicted highs of 102 - 106 degrees. Piece of cake!

As defenders of summers in places like Las Vegas or Phoenix always say, "But it's a dry heat!"

And as Jerry always responds: "So is a microwave!"
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Editorial comment: I try so hard to avoid writing about the weather. I mean, it's so predictable (the topic, not the weather). But if you had a blog and lived in Minnesota, you'd write about the weather too. Trust me on this.

the hard-core gambler

We were in Las Vegas in late April, first time there in several years, and had a great time. Vegas is such another world! Soon after we got back, we met our friends Tim and Judie for Happy Hour and talked about the trip, which somehow, thanks probably to the Happy Hour drinks, led to Jerry and Tim deciding that, Hey, we should all go to Vegas! Tim had only been to Vegas on business and Judie had never been to Vegas, so ,before that evening was over, we had reservations for a trip in August. We leave this Sunday for three nights.

(Meanwhile I was thinking, do we really want to go to Las Vegas twice in one year? and who goes there in August?)

Soon after that, I started getting email offers for free stays and other free stuff at certain Vegas casino hotels -- the Aria (the newest), New York New York, etc. I had done some playing in April -- and I'm talking quarter slot machines -- and had only done as much as I had because I kept winning enough to just keep playing, but it apparently had all added up to enough to make me look like a serious gambler to these places. I'm not.

Recently, though, I got an offer that was even more tempting. Free air fare for two persons and three nights at a MGM-related casino in Tunica, Mississippi (Did you even know that Mississippi had casinos?). September 1 to 4.

I say to Jerry: "We can't go on gambling trips two weeks in a row!" Jerry, on the other hand, would go on any trip anytime anywhere.

The clincher, after much soul-searching, was that Missisippi is one of the seven states that I haven't been in yet, and it's very close to three other states that I haven't been in yet (Tennessee, Arkansas, Alabama). So we might rent a car there, go on the road (hoping to not get lynched somewhere in backwoods Mississippi), potentially knock off four states on my list, and avoid casino-burnout at the same time.

But I'm also thinking -- If somehow these people are considering me some sort of high-roller, then the gambling industry is in deep trouble indeed!

lunching at a new old place

One of the benefits of working (and living) downtown is the great and always evolving choice of restaurants. Of course, I'm always on a half-assed diet of sorts, so the temptations can be a curse too. And there are so many that I'll never be able to do them all.

Today, I lunched with a couple of co-workers, Carolee and Jeff, at a newly opened restaurant named The Forum. The space has been various incarnations of restaurants since the 1930s, and the remarkable thing about the place is the Art-Deco interior, which has been beautifully preserved and/or restored. The food, featuring a very Minnesota menu, ain't bad either!
http://forumrestaurantmn.ringorestaurants.com/

the best country in the world

I still read Newsweek and Time magazines. Or maybe I should say, I still skim Newsweek and Time. Those formerly upstanding magazines are now mostly fluff, dumbing-down the news for the masses in efforts to compete with the Internet. For instance, in this week's Newsweek, you'd be surprised how many times that Jet Blue flight attendant who freaked out gets a mention.

Both magazines these days love lists -- for instance, The 100 Most Influential People in the World. Who comes up with these lists I don't know. This week's Newsweek cover story is the Best 100 Countries in the World, listed from "best" to "least best", I guess, based on factors of health, education, economy, and politics. And the Best Country in the World, or so they say, is Finland! 2nd - Switzerland; 3rd - Sweden; 4th - Australia; 5th - Luxembourg. The U.S. is generously listed at #11, somehow just ahead of Germany and the U.K. (Our education and health systems would obviously keep us out of the Top 10). Of the countries I've been to, I'd rank the Netherlands as the Most Civilized (it shows up as #8 on the Newsweek list), but I do admit that I'd love to visit Finland sometime. It has become perhaps the most literate country on the planet. Kippis!! ("cheers!" in Finnish, I think).

Here's the Newsweek list (not sure how long the link will be on line): http://www.newsweek.com/2010/08/15/interactive-infographic-of-the-worlds-best-countries.html.
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I sort of wish that Jet Blue flew in and out of the Twin Cities. What an entertaining airline!

whatever happened to joe cocker?

I was just sitting here and suddenly a vision of Joe Cocker popped in my head (maybe because I saw part of the movie Woodstock on TV recently), and I began to wonder what the heck he's doing these days. These days, of course, you don't have to wonder about such things -- you just go to Google and find out.

Joe Cocker was one of those wild-looking-and-acting rock stars that in 1969 we never would have predicted would still be alive in 2010 (Of course, we wouldn't have predicted that we'd be alive in 2010 either). Good news, though: He is alive and well and performing often. His next tour is in Russia and Eastern Europe (Joe Cocker has fans in Russia??). He ever has a website -- http://cocker.com/. Funny thing -- he looks nothing like he did at Woodstock. 41 years does that to a person.

Here's a link to one of my favorite Joe Cocker songs, that old Lovin' Spoonful song "Darling Be Home Soon". Enjoy! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqeOlQEW5SU

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This afternoon's news flash: Brett Favre's plane has landed, he's back in town.

summer sports update (mostly)

Even though it's hard to think about football yet, mid-August in Minnesota this year, like last year, means wondering, "Hey, Is Brett Favre going to play for the Vikings this year or is he retired?" I think that most Vikings fans would care a lot less than they do, and in some ways it would be good to be done with these annual guessing games, except that the other Vikings quarterbacks suck. Most everybody is feeling over-Favred by the news media, here and across the world, and I'm thinking that this season won't be as much as fun as last season was, Favre or no Favre, but ya never know. I sorta hope he plays, even if he is a total media hog.

Meanwhile, on the other side of downtown, baseball continues, and the Twins are back in first place. They're three games ahead of the Chicago White Sox, and the White Sox arrive in town tomorrow for three games. The new Twins stadium is an enormous hit, and most games are near-sellouts. The stadium crowds are generating tremendously good energy for the city, at least as long as we have a winning team.

Out there on the East Coast, my other home team, the Philadelphia Phillies, have been doing better, are creeping up in the standings against Atlanta, and might yet make it to the baseball playoffs. Go, Phils!

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33 years ago today, Elvis died. I got a reminder email about that this morning from my cousin Beverly, who has been the ultimate Elvis fan since the very beginning. She's still in mourning.

(Brett and Elvis. Two good guys that came out of Mississippi, of all places.)

minneapolis sunday mornings

Summer Sunday mornings are the times when I wish I could be in a few different places at once. Sleeping-in doesn't seem to be an option anymore (another weird thing about getting older, I wake up early regardless of how late I stayed up the night before), but there are so many things I want to do to make the most of those too-infrequent Sunday mornings and I can't make up my mind which thing to do and often end up doing none of them.

This morning was beautifully cool after days of heat and the downtown streets were quiet and I walked over to the coffee shop -- drank coffee, read my book -- and decided to go to church. I came back home, where Jerry had turned off the air conditioning and opened all the balcony doors. The breeze was blowing through the condo and, across the park, the Sunday morning bells at the Basilica were sounding, and it would have been cool to just sit there on the patio and enjoy. I stayed on task, though, and made it to church (hadn't been there in 2 or 3 weeks), came home and Sunday morning was gone again. I'm kinda glad I've become a person who doesn't sleep through them anymore.

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P.S. FYI -- When I go to church, it's Plymouth Congregational, a few blocks away. http://plymouth.org/.

stelllllaaa!!

We're lucky to have such great theater choices in the Twin Cities metro. The Big Kahuna in the local theater scene is the Guthrie Theater, and, even though I tend to prefer the smaller theater companies, we see most of the sometimes-overblown Guthrie productions. Some of their choices are debatable, but at the moment there are a couple of remarkable plays being performed there, and, if you're anywhere nearby, you should try to see them.

The first is that Tennessee Williams classic, A Streetcar Named Desire, a near-perfect drama in some ways but maybe difficult to attempt because so many theater-goers, because of the 1951 film version, can only picture Marlon Brando as Stanley, Vivien Leigh as Blanche, and Kim Hunter as Stella. For a mortal stage actor, that's a lot to live up to without seeming to imitate. And while nobody will ever be able to put the same raw emotion into screaming "Stelllllaaa! Stelllllaaa!" that Brando did, these Guthrie actors are thoroughly believable in their roles. The Guthrie staging is world-class, as always.

Down the hall from Streetcar, a new musical, The Scottsboro Boys, is on a pre-Broadway run. It's the last collaboration of Kanter & Ebb, the team that brought us Chicago and Cabaret (Fred Ebb died in 2004). The show is based on a downer of a subject -- a true story about nine black men wrongly accused and ultimately ruined for life in the 1930s in Alabama -- but all presented in a kind of minstrel style. Much of the show is very light, with amazing choreography and good music (although with no show-stopping songs that I noticed), all leading to a depressing yet hopeful conclusion. Not sure how it will do on Broadway. I don't think it's a show that a person would go back to see over and over. Worth seeing once? Definitely.

friday the 13th part 2010

The dog days of August, day after day of hot humid weather... and Minnesotans hesitate to complain, knowing that in January or February they'd kill for days like this....

I've had bad luck on various Friday the 13ths -- car accidents, traffic tickets, etc. -- but I've had plenty of bad luck on days other than Friday the 13ths too, so I'm not going to let this one bother me. Hoping for a drama-free weekend.

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Reality check: Is it a slow-news year? I wouldn't think so! But somehow the Palins and their baby-daddy Levi Johnston keep filling up the news. Now Levi is running for mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, with the hopes of getting his own reality-TV show. Does he have fans, or are people just attracted to a bizarre story? Has mainstream news become the National Enquirer? Little did the dweeb know that screwing Bristol Palin a couple years ago would lead to fame and potential riches.

blessed are the peacemakers

It's odd that fundamentalist Christians never quote from the Gospels when they try to use the Bible to justify their own bigotry. Instead, they find isolated, out-of-context verses in Old Testament or Epistle books of questionable origin (which is not to imply that the Gospels are not of questionable origin), twist them into whacky interpretations, and convince the willingly-deceived believers in the pews that they are "preaching the Bible".

When I was in the my late teens, circa 1966, temporarily waylaid in the Deep South, I heard a sermon that used scattered Old Testament verses to come to the conclusion that racial segregation is Biblical. How convenient for a racist congregation! That was the moment I realized that a person can make the Bible, a very big book, say anything you want it to say. The Gospels and the perceived ministry of Christ are an inconvenience to such people.

That was my theological thought for the day. You won't get too many of those.

today's sentences

I came back to blogging with the intent of writing something on it every day, even if it's just a one-sentence nothing. My niece Ruthie reminded me today that I hadn't done added anything the past couple of days, so I'm off to a bad start. She says it's okay that it just be a quote or a song lyric -- just something.

Quotes and song lyrics for the past several days would have been a bit negative, though... about betrayal, about hypocrisy, about sadness. Better to skip days like that or acknowledge them? We shall see.

a not-so-easy target

A couple weeks ago, word leaked out that Target Corporation (headquartered two blocks from where I live in downtown Minneapolis) had donated $150,000 to a candidate for governor of Minnesota, using the reasoning that this candidate was "pro-business". The problem for Target, a company that generally has had a reputation for giving back to communities and for being very tolerant and supportive of its diverse employees, is that this candidate is also a right-wing nut case. He, for instance, has had ties to a "Christian" organization that has advocated for the extermination of gays.

This endorsement from Target created howls of protest from its employees and customers. A boycott of Target was organized and started, both in Minnesota and across the country. Finally, Target apologized for the contribution, although some issues related to the company's intent still remain.

Several things came to my mind during the Target mess, especially the question of, If you boycott Target, where do you shop? WalMart is obviously an unacceptable choice. K-Mart/Sears, are they any better? The sad eventual realization is how little shopping choices we have outside the "big-box" stores, all owned directly or indirectly by mega-corporations. There are hardly any local stores anymore -- the "mom-and-pop" stores -- that used to be plentiful all across the U.S., and the ones that are left are struggling to compete because the big stores can charge less for similar items, and the American consumer will go for the deal that costs three cents less.

If we wanted to do all our shopping at independently-owned stores, is that even possible? Even in a large city like ours?

And when Target and Best Buy and the other guilty corporations try to impose governors on us that are "pro-business", how pathetic it is that they want elected officials who are "pro-" businesses like theirs and not for the small-business owner and entrepreneur. Competition used to be a good thing. Eventually there will be one store to choose from, since all mergers and consolidations get approved these days, and fears of monopolies are never voiced. The Soviets would have loved it.